What would I do if I wanted to be rich? I’d start a class action suit against food companies for their role in creating ‘the perfect storm’, the three major epidemics in this country. After all, a judge has recently created the ‘perfect guidelines’ for a win/win situation. He ruled that smokers can be rewarded for ill health or death. Of course, it’s not their fault they ignored health warnings for 50 years about smoking! But since obesity causes more deaths than smoking, why shouldn’t food companies also reward us for our ill health?

Faced with a class action suit, food companies wouldn’t have a leg to stand on in court. Consider the junk they’ve been selling unsuspecting customers for years. So now you’re suffering from obesity, Type 2 diabetes and recovering from a heart attack. In fact, your cardiologist claims that without bypass surgery you’ll be dead in a couple of years. And all this trouble because of too many calories! Someone has to be held responsible. But don’t point your finger at me!

In court you can tell the judge these problems are just the tip of the iceberg. Diabetes has resulted in the need for cataract surgery.

Moreover, your ophthalmologist is worried that due to diabetic complications you may eventually lose your sight. To add more insult to injury, diabetes has caused such hardening of arteries (atherosclerosis) that renal failure is a distinct possibility. You can plead with the judge the suffering may entail renal dialysis or a kidney transplant.

You may say to yourself, “How did all this happen?” But you know damn well how. Your doctor repeatedly told you long before you hit the scale at 200 pounds that this excess weight would most likely cause Type 2 since other family members also suffer from this disease. But in spite of his warning about the need to exercise and diet, you ignored his advice.

However, the fact that you were warned about health problems isn’t the point. Life has become a living hell because food companies continue to add excessive amounts of calories to packaged foods. Or they have made prepared food so appealing that will power can’t resist it.

For instance why are supermarkets foolishly selling 14 ounce steaks when smaller ones would satisfy. Do they expect all of their customers to have degrees in nutrition? And why do they tempt you to purchase desserts loaded with hundreds of calories. It is dishonest, deceptive marketing, the ultimate culprit that has ruined your health. Someone has to pay for it.

In fact, if getting rich is the motive, why stop at food corporations? After all, because of excessive drinking your wife and children left you. Think of the alimony you’re paying every month! But this problem was not self-inflicted. It was the damn liquor companies that should have realized you were becoming an alcoholic.

One could go on and on blaming various aspects of society for our own self-inflicted problems. So this $15 billion verdict against several tobacco companies is the wrong health message. In 2015 North Americans would have to be living on Mars and have half a brain not to know that tobacco kills. I’m no friend of these companies, but they should not have to reward people for lack of discipline. Nor make them rich for irrational reasons.

If anyone should be sued, it should be the government which for years allowed tobacco to be sold legally while it reaps the reward. If tobacco were introduced to the world today, it would be immediately banned as a hazardous substance. It contains 4,000 chemicals of which 40 are known to cause cancer in humans!

This is another example of an illogical ruling by a court. But it is sad that society has reached a stage where individual responsibility is forsaken. Those who abuse their bodies with tobacco, drugs and alcohol cost us billions of dollars a year. This is bad enough, but to reward them for their folly is utter madness.

What do you think?

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