under the microscope
Apprentice and Countdown star Nick Hewer, 70, answers our health quiz
CAN YOU RUN UP THE STAIRS?
I ALWAYS used to, but haven’t for the past five years or so. I started smoking at 17, at my worst smoking 20 a day; I gave up 15 years ago. I walk my dog Jasmin, but she’s old and even more out of breath than me, but I do walk for 30 to 60 minutes a day.
GET YOUR FIVE A DAY?
WHEN I was running my PR company I ran on cigarettes, coffee and adrenaline. Now I’m fed healthily by my other half Catherine, who is an accomplished cook, so my diet involves fruit and vegetables.
ANY VICES?
SMOKING. I come from a time when at 17, with your parents’ permission, you could buy cigarettes from the school tuck shop. When I decided to give up, I went to a hypnotist. It didn’t work, so then I tried pills called Zyban — they affected the brain to soothe withdrawal symptoms. I stopped smoking for good.
WOULD YOU HAVE PLASTIC SURGERY?
WHEN I turned 70, my friend Alan Sugar said: ‘For your birthday I’m going to pay to have your eye bags done!’ I thanked him and said I’d think about it. He has mentioned it once or twice since. We were having dinner the other day and he said: ‘My goodness, your eyes look a mess. If you had them done it would knock ten years off you!’
ANY FAMILY AILMENTS?
YES, appendicitis — my appendix was removed at 21, and my father had a rush operation when on holiday in France in his early 50s. In the late Thirties his brother died of acute peritonitis — where an infected appendix bursts — on the day he was due to be married. The good news is my father lived until he was 96, my mother into her 80s and my great granny to 99.
COPE WELL WITH PAIN?
NO. I have a tractor at my home in Northamptonshire to tow the mower. I lifted the mower to hook it up and twisted my back. I took painkillers and have been moaning about it since. I also cannot stand the sight of blood.
ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE?
I SUFFERED terribly from migraine for 20 years when I was running my company — probably because of cigarettes, coffee, tension and not eating or drinking enough water. I saw an acupuncturist, but it did nothing. The migraines stopped when I retired from the business. A while ago I found I was getting a rash on my elbows and, on the advice of a dermatologist, tried Vitamin D spray and it worked.
EVER BEEN DEPRESSED?
I’M CONSTANTLY anxious. I tend to look out for the bad stuff that might occur. What makes me happy? A decent glass of red wine at dinner.
BIGGEST PHOBIA?
WE have three cats and a dog and if they make a mess I pretend it hasn’t happened until someone cleans it up.
LIKE TO LIVE FOR EVER?
NOT the way the world is going. My generation was the luckiest generation one. We had health, no unemployment really; and then we had the Sixties, which were terrific — great music, the Pill, no wars. We were blessed.
NICK Hewer is patron of the charity Street Child in Sierra Leone, streetchild.co.uk, and Hope and Homes for Children, hopeandhomes.co.uk