Fight the fat

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❚ lettersts@scotsman.com Last week President Fattah elsisi of Egypt berated his people for being too fat after a study of 17 million showed that 63 per cent are overweight or obese.

He “outed” the problem, but he didn’t offer many practical solutions, other than threatening to ban fat people from TV. He was accused of “fat shaming” and ignoring arguments that it is caused by poverty.

There were also reports that the UK Government has plans to limit calories in fast foods and restaurants, a practical “nudge” solution.

In Scotland we never hear from Nicola Sturgeon about our own obesity crisis or what her plan is to start tackling it. Brexit, global warming, lack of LGBTI training in schools – all the usual cross-party virtue signalling rallying points at Holyrood (not forgetting the Christmas card launch) – will not kill thousands of Scots in the coming years, but obesity and the illnesses it causes will. In the process it is ruining lives, blighting our economy and strangling the NHS.

So take a bow, MSP Annie Wells, for publicising a shocking ten amputations a week, largely caused by obesity and type2 diabetes, the first MSP to do so (The Scotsman, Saturday, 29 December). But even she offered no ideas on how to halt this epidemic.

Surely it’s time for someone (Ms Wells?) to demand a Holyrood debate and a public enquiry that produces actionable recommendations.

I suspect Scottish politicians and parties’ reluctance to engage is because they’re

too afraid to offend voters, or to be “first movers” (or too tubby themselves?), but as a devolved government with a chamber and constitution supposedly designed for compromise, surely Holyrood’s time has come? ALLAN SUTHERLAND Willow Row, Stonehaven