Yesterday I reported how the government had spent billions on trying to get kids to do some sport with the incredible result of making absolutely no difference what so ever. Today, it has come to light that another one of the government's attempt to stop our kids turning in to a nation of Bernard Mannings have also failed in spectacular fashion. The Department of Health's initiative to get kids eating more fruit has cost £42m to set up and they have blindly invested a further £77m in the scheme since the launch. Every child aged four to six receives a piece of fruit or vegetable every day at school. It has been described as "the largest scale intervention in English children's diet since the introduction of free school milk in 1946". Well, when will governments learn that intervention is not their forte? Exhibit one: Today's study of 3,703 children in the north of England aged four to six, who were given free fruit between February and December 2004, found that by the end of the period their diet was unchanged.
The Professor behind the scheme rather amusingly has said "It is extraordinary that many millions of pounds of government money can be spent on schemes without getting a shred of evidence." BING! Someone has seen the light out of all this at least! And his conclusion to the whole exercise? Well it's like the old saying says "You can make fruit and vegetables available to children, but you cannot make them eat it". At least the DoH have learnt their lesson and are scrapping the scheme. Yet these monkey brain fools at the DoH are ploughing on with the scheme regardless.
And to think I've just done a whole post on the DoH and not mentioned the NHS once. D'oh!