Sir, – In the midst of a cost-of-living crisis and buckling health services, there is a renewed interest in structured programmes of nutrition to bolster prevention and delay the onset of chronic disease.
Is it time to prioritise cost-effective prevention programmes to improve the nation’s health?
It takes a leap of faith to imagine a future where the dominance of junk food and takeaways on every street corner has vanished, replaced by public restaurants owned by communities serving hot, healthy food that doesn’t break the bank. Impossible? It’s been done before.
During the second World War, the UK government opened more than 2,000 British restaurants, serving 600,000 affordable meals a day, designed to meet a third of the people’s energy needs.
RM Block
As well as food provision, diners could be co-designed to fulfil the social functions of food including dignity, cultural meaning and enjoyment. And they could reduce the burden of domestic food work including the planning, shopping, cooking and washing-up that remains strongly gendered.
Public diners would require public investment. But because they serve a lot of food a day, costs could be kept at a minimum while maintaining quality. Imagine public infrastructure in Ireland that dispensed with fast-food takeaways and facilitated public eateries where people of all backgrounds could access nutritious food at affordable prices in their own communities.
It’s a brilliant model that would transform health and community wellbeing. – Yours, etc,
Dr CATHERINE CONLON,
Former director human health and nutrition, Safefood
Ballintemple,
Cork.
Public – not bank – holidays
Sir, – Your editorial stated: “We use the terms bank holiday and public holiday interchangeably, but our laws refer only to public holidays” (“The Irish Times view on the August bank holiday: a weekend to rest easy”, Editorial, August 2nd).
Bank holidays go back to an earlier time when banks could only close on days specified by law, and the public generally got these days off as well. Banks have long been able to close on whatever days they want, so there are no bank holidays as such any more. The public holidays are now set out in the Public Holidays Act. Yet we continue to refer generally to bank holidays rather than using the correct term, which is public holidays. This has annoyed me for a long time.
Now that you have drawn attention to this anomaly, could you lead the way by banning references to bank holidays in your columns and refer only to public holidays? – Yours, etc,
MICHAEL G TUTTY,
Naas,
Co Kildare.
More reasons to love Dublin
Sir, – Your article on Dublin and reasons to love it was excellent (“Gay Spar, the George’s Street Arcade, traffic junctions: 52 reasons to love Dublin right now”, Magazine, August 2nd).
I read it the morning after I witnessed the most beautiful outpouring of love for our capital city during Imelda May’s exquisite performance of Peter Sheridan’s play, Mother of all the Behans.
The audience warmly joined May (as Kathleen Behan) as she sang beautiful versions of Dublin Can be Heaven and Cockles and Mussels. Regarding the latter, I overheard one woman on the way out say she was so moved, she couldn’t sing a few of the lines. Well done to all involved. – Yours, etc,
LOUISE CROWE,
Raheny,
Dublin 5.
Catastrophic food shortages
Sir, – We know from the latest Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report, UN agencies and surviving Palestinian journalists that more than 70,000 children under five and 17,000 pregnant women face acute malnutrition in Gaza, while most of the population of more than two million experience catastrophic levels of food shortages. We also know a number of other deeply troubling facts.
We know from decades of responding to famines, that when thousands of children are identified as suffering acute malnutrition it is just the tip of the iceberg – of hunger, disease, social breakdown and death.
We know the weakest and most vulnerable families rarely make it to hospitals or food drops and don’t have the money to buy what little over-priced food might be available in markets if any are still functioning.
We know they weaken and die, usually from diseases, as the body fails before starvation gets them.
We also know that once malnutrition takes hold in a population, the weakest and most severe cases need special foods and specialist medical care to prevent death and begin a slow recovery. In this situation the emaciated bodies of children or adults cannot cope with foods such as pasta or lentils. Personnel trained in dealing with malnutrition must be able to move freely and safely to identify those in dire need and provide assistance without forcing them to travel long distances or struggle to get food in the midst of violence.
The effects of famine have profound multigenerational impacts, including on physical and mental health, on social and economic life and community cohesion. These outcomes are worse where most homes are destroyed and where there is almost no clean water, health, education or social services.
In the case of Gaza we know something else; something that is profoundly disturbing. The malnutrition and hunger now stalking Gaza is the outcome of a deliberate policy by Israel, implemented – at least until recent days – with the knowledge and acquiescence of its allies. The creation of the dehumanising and deadly Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the airdrops, and the paltry number of trucks allowed entry every day, are smokescreens to provide an alibi for Israel as a defence against charges of genocide.
Even this manufactured starvation, a few kilometres from vast quantities of humanitarian assistance, isn’t enough to force Israel’s allies to take any action other than in some cases offering conditional recognition to a state of Palestine. Statements won’t deter Israel, however.
Finally, we also know that as far back as March 28th, 2024, noting that famine was setting in, the International Court of Justice, in a legally binding order, instructed Israel to take all necessary and effective measures to ensure the people of Gaza did not suffer hunger or a humanitarian crisis. The court made this order as it believed, based on evidence before it, that it was plausible the people of Gaza faced a genocide. As the IPC has said, the worst-case scenario of famine is currently playing out in Gaza. Some are guilty of designing this horror, others are complicit in it. – Yours, etc,
ÉAMONN MEEHAN,
Chair, Sadaka – the Ireland Palestine Alliance,
Ballymote,
Sligo.
Facilitating global greed
Sir, – Abie Philbin Bowman makes interesting points about how the past shapes our present in sometimes unexpected but profound ways (“There’s more to Irish history than eight centuries of British oppression and failed uprisings”, Opinion, August 3rd). What is also strange, however, is how it does not do this. As a postcolonial country, for example, you would think we would have huge empathy for other countries emerging from colonialism, particularly the African nations. But because we have allowed ourselves to become one of the world’s largest tax haven, funnelling hundreds of billions through the country, we deny many poorer countries a part of their tax base to fund housing, education and health.
The laudable generosity of the Irish people and strangely, even the Government, in funding international aid is massively undermined by facilitating global greed. Are we, as a people, happy with this, or is it just that we are unaware? – Yours, etc,
PAUL CONNOLLY,
Cavan.
Double road tax?
Sir, – I pay motor tax or “road tax” as Rita O’Brien (Letters, August 1st) states, however I use my bike far more frequently than my car. Why should I have to pay twice, especially for something that’s good for my health and doesn’t damage the environment like my car does? – Yours, etc,
BARBARA MONAHAN,
Clontarf,
Dublin 3.
Men reading books
Sir, – What a timely and a thoughtful article by Maureen Dowd (“Attention, men: Books are sexy, but staring into a phone is not”, World News, August 4th).
For the past 12 years or so our men’s book club here in Miltown Malbay has been meeting once a month and sharing thoughts on books of every genre. Some recent ones are Poor by Katriona O’Sullivan, Prophet Song by Paul Lynch and Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. It has become one of my favourite nights of the month and I couldn’t recommend it highly enough. – Yours, etc,
TIM DENNEHY,
Miltown Malbay,
Clare.
Sir, – I enjoyed Maureen Dowd’s article on the value and attractiveness of book-reading, set against the dreary ubiquity of phone scrolling. But the article could have been enhanced if she had noted, along with Ralph Fiennes’s childhood of being read Shakespeare by his mother, a memorable episode some years ago involving the same great actor at the Gate Theatre in Dublin.
As Fiennes played Brian Friel’s mesmerising and mysterious hero, Frank Hardy in Faith Healer (Friel’s greatest play by a country mile), a mobile phone rang out in the darkened theatre one evening. Fiennes asked the owner to turn her phone off. When the phone owner, bizarrely, refused, Fiennes halted his performance. – Yours, etc,
CONOR McCARTHY,
Monkstown,
Co Dublin.
An urban sanctuary
Sir, – I would like to express my sincere gratitude to the caretakers of St Patrick’s Cathedral Park in Dublin 8. As a resident of the inner city, I pass through this park each morning on my way to work and it never fails to lift me.
Though I know little about gardening, I deeply admire the artistry and care that goes into maintaining the ever-changing flower beds. This month the mezzanine section is particularly stunning, with grasses bursting like champagne over neat hedges and vivid blue and yellow blooms.
To those who make this magic happen: thank you, from me and the many grateful tourists, dog walkers and locals who enjoy this urban sanctuary. – Yours, etc,
NIAMH GRIFFIN,
Dublin 8.
Protecting the fox
Sir, – There has been a big change in attitudes to foxes in Ireland over the past decade, partly due to our love affair with nature during Covid. The wily red dog of the countryside has gone from being the demonised loathsome predator beloved of the hunting set to a charming animal that comes into our towns and cities in search of food, and maybe even friendship.
People now routinely leave out a few scraps for them. They don’t cause any bother, just eat their fill and move on until the next visit – if the householder is agreeable.
The greater the level of positive human contact with foxes the more unthinkable becomes the prospect of packs of hounds being used to hunt them. Though the hunting season begins in November, the first attacks start this month when young hounds are set upon fox cubs. Away from public view, hunters encircle areas known to contain litters of fox cubs.
The hound is not a natural enemy of the fox. Both are dogs. Hence, the need to train novice hounds to hunt foxes from an early age.
Anyone who claims that foxhunting is just “nature at play” either doesn’t understand the practice or wishes to sanitise the “unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable”, as Oscar Wilde called it.
Throughout August, even as people continue to host foxes outside their front or back doors or in their gardens, hundreds of innocent young hounds will be blooded.
I hope the Bill to ban foxhunting published by Ruth Coppinger TD will receive the support it deserves when it returns for its next reading in the Dáil. In the meantime, let’s make friends with foxes and say no to this barbarism. – Yours, etc,
JOHN FITZGERALD,
Callan,
Co Kilkenny.
Works of graffiti
Sir, – There are many highly visible examples of graffiti around Dublin that instantly communicate a sense of neglect and dereliction. It appears that the most inaccessible sites seem to have the most attraction for the people who deface our city in such a way.
Examples around Dublin 4 include graffiti at rooftop level on Upper Baggot Street and when travelling in the opposite direction on a gable wall on Lower Baggot Street, which has been severely defaced by vandals with a spray can and a complete lack of respect for architectural history.
Against this background I was surprised to see The Irish Times Magazine using a photograph of graffiti scrawled in huge letters on a concrete wall to form its main headline. The impression this conveys is that the individual who committed that act of vandalism has now had their defacement condoned and made worthy by making the cover of The Irish Times. – Yours, etc,
DERMOTT BARRETT,
Ballsbridge,
Dublin 4.
The wills of private citizens
Sir, – Why does The Irish Times see fit to devote a considerable amount of space to an article written by two journalists about how much money a private citizen left in his will (“Former Mater Private chief Fergus Clancy leaves €15.8 million estate”, News, August 4th)?
Vulgar curiosity is my guess.
There is no reason such information needs to be published in a national newspaper – Yours, etc,
HUGH PIERCE,
Celbridge,
Co Kildare.
A quiet pint
Sir, – Brendan Gleeson laments the fact that he can no longer step into a pub without it turning into “selfie country” (“Brendan Gleeson: ‘I can’t go into a pub any more. I really miss it’”, Arts, August 2nd). He might try Finnegan’s in Dalkey, where nobody bats an eyelid and a quiet pint can still be enjoyed. – Yours, etc,
MAEVE O’HARE,
Dalkey,
Co Dublin.
