“Globesity”, that caloric bomb that threatens the world

In December 2018 I was at the end of the first year of my doctorate, the one in which the thesis is chosen. I had already made a great effort to pass the admissions competition and win one of the scholarships up for grabs. It wasn’t a given, given the high number of competitors. Human nutrition and food culture, this is the title of the doctoral course, brought together two very distinct disciplinary areas. Human nutrition and food culture, in fact, which draw from two different worlds: on the one hand the medical sciences, on the other the human ones. A new path that had attracted many candidates.

The commission had established an equal number of seats for both areas. The intent, probably, was that the class of students, so distant in terms of education, would become contaminated by mixing knowledge. I graduated in Cultural Anthropology at the University of Naples. With my thesis I had explored the religious origins of vegetarianism – already distinguishing it from vegetarianism and vegetarianism had not been easy. With my historical-literary background, delving into the nutritional aspects of diets was even more difficult. But the theme seemed important to me: combining different aspects of eating – an act that we perform every day without thinking much about it or, on the contrary, thinking about it too much – concerned all of humanity, including the animal and plant kingdom. In short, I was convinced that I had made the right choice, but I couldn’t decide what to dedicate the thesis to.

The moment had arrived quickly instead. The tutor I had chosen, the prof. Antonio Spano, a great expert in food consumption, politely reminded me of the deadlines, the works to be published and the entire evaluation system that in a couple of years would lead me to the coveted title of PhD. Then, it’s true, there was a void in front of me: no prospect of using my qualification, except in a difficult university career. The title of professor is a dream, perhaps impossible hearing the stories of the many who preceded me. In the meantime, however, I had to get to the end, I certainly couldn’t give up. I would have worried about the future in due time.

Among the seminars I attended in the first year, one in particular remained engraved in my mind. A teacher from Cornell University, a famous American university, had told us about a global time bomb: obesity. He had defined it globesity, bringing impressive data. Showing us a graph colored red, she said that in 2030, according to projections from an international organization, overweight and obese people would make up almost half of the world’s population. And I was convinced that the world’s problem was hunger and malnutrition, especially in poor countries. Instead, I understood, following the lesson with ever greater interest, that in the world those who eat too much are more than double those who eat too little.

«Excess malnutrition especially affects young people and the poorest sections of the population», specified the prof. Gerald B. Green, right with the B dotted in the middle. «Eating too much and badly causes many diseases, which must be treated at considerable cost, naturally for those who can» the professor commented hissingly. “Is obesity therefore a genetic, environmental, social and cultural issue?” yes and the American luminary asked us. In the ensuing, very lively discussion, the issue came up that, despite the many causes, obesity could not and should not be addressed as a personal stigma. “People who live with this disease are often the subject of prejudice and discrimination,” said a student who was right behind me. “In reality, obesity is neither good nor bad – replied the professor – It is a sign that we need to take better care of ourselves and adopt a correct lifestyle.”

The image of the happy Buddha came to mind, with that prominent belly symbolizing health and well-being: I wanted to say that once upon a time it wasn’t like today when we all have to be thin… I didn’t have time to mentally translate the sentence to intervene in the discussion that the prof. Green was back on point. «The stigmatization of obesity as the fault of the individual is the worst way to address a very complex issue. – he reiterated decisively – But the effects of an unbalanced nutrition on human health cannot be hidden”, and he concluded by reeling off the very high global costs of diseases associated with nutrition. “Here’s a great topic for my thesis – I thought with conviction – of great international relevance, to be approached on an interdisciplinary level, bringing together the history and future of humanity”.

A sort of excitement came over me, the effect of which was that I no longer listened to the rest of the lesson but immediately thought about the route to take. I remembered the pioneering studies of the American physiologist in the 1950s Ancel Keys on the Mediterranean diet: he was the first to correlate the consumption of certain foods and healthy longevity. In the footsteps of Ancel Keys, I already titled my thesis and was thinking about a subsequent book that would bring me fame. The first stop was Cyprus, one of the seven countries that, together with Italy, had obtained UNESCO recognition for the Mediterranean diet. The professor. Spano put me in touch with a colleague of his, a researcher at the University of Cyprus, who would certainly direct me to the right people, he told me. In hindsight, this reference to the ‘right people’ still makes me think. But it is right here, from Nicosia, that my story begins.

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The book

Globesity. The hunger for power”

by Andrea Segrè

Minerva editions, 2024

(149 pages, €16.90)

Andrea Segrè, professor of circular economy and scientific communicator, is the founder of the “zero waste” movement in Italy and Europe. The book premieres at Bologna, Wednesday 6 March (Coop Ambasciatori at 6pm), in dialogue with journalists Valerio Varesi and Beppe Boni; to Gorizia, Saturday 16 March in the Ugo Casiraghi Media Library, in dialogue with the journalist Patrizia artigianato; to Trieste, for the Scienza e Virgola Festival, Saturday 18 May (4pm, Ubik Bookshop).