Report: The surprising benefits of food rationing | Letters

The Guardian — Opinion has reported on “Report: The surprising benefits of food rationing | Letters,” presenting it as the central development in the source material available for this brief.

Among the hardships of the second world war, a restricted diet with little sugar did little harm, write Roger Wilkinson and Helen Keats ; plus a letter from Jane Robbins An interesting juxtaposition: ( While British children go hungry, we waste 1.1bn meals a year. The report also notes that Bring on the redistribution revolution, 6 October ); and ( The generation raised on sugar rations – and what their health details 70 years later, 7 October ). Shocking that the average family throws away 156 meals a year, but this knowledge allows us war babies, who still scrape our bowls clean and only throw away items where the mould is too developed to scrape off, to be very smug. And next we’re told that we is expected to probably live longer as a result of our parsimonious cheeseparing. My cup of smugness overflows. Roger Wilkinson (born 1944) Leasgill, Cumbria • My 98-year-old aunt, who along with my mother and family lived in Rotterdam during the German occupation and “hunger winter”, is remarkably healthy. She lives independently, does her own shopping and cooking, and cycled to the local care home to “support out” until she was 80.

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