Is Breakfast Healthy?

You've probably experienced a strange feeling about a missed breakfast  - not a grumbling stomach, but rather a sense of guilt for an unfulfilled duty. And this is not a spasm of a brain overflowing with worries, but an acquired reflex from childhood. We were growing up, and our parents were fussing around, convincing us of the need for a nutritious breakfast before school and hot soup after. And while we blinked half-asleep, stuffing our backpacks with textbooks, we were additionally brainwashed by advertising propaganda, promising that cereal with milk would improve our health for the rest of our lives and help us avoid overeating.

Today it is no secret that many, if not most, studies that confirm that those who eat breakfast do better than those who are used to ignoring the morning meal are sponsored by cereal and cereal manufacturers. Since the conspiracy was revealed, the distrust of nutritionists only grows, and they regularly arrange alternative studies to finally find out the clear and uncorrupted truth: is breakfast healthy or not?

Breakfast will not help you lose weight

From the latest publications in the press, the following picture emerges: breakfast not only does not help to stabilize weight to the desired indicators, but can also contribute to the appearance of extra pounds.

At the beginning of the year, "The BMJ , British Medical Journal", a global provider of medical information and expert knowledge, published a detailed review of 13 recent studies, from which it appears that "there is no evidence to support that a regular breakfast helps to reduce body weight or that refusing to eat in the morning leads to weight gain".

Moreover, the largest study conducted in 2014 found that respondents who regularly ate breakfast consumed an average of 260 more calories per day and gained approximately 0.5 kg over a 4-month follow-up, as opposed to those who remained without breakfast . In other words, arguments in favor of the fact that it is necessary to refuel properly in the morning, carelessly allowing yourself carbohydrate mischief, crumble into dust against the background of the received facts.

"There are strong grounds to suggest that skipping breakfast can be a good strategy for weight loss," concludes the lead author of the BMJ report , British epidemiology professor Tim Spector.

It's not when, but what you eat that matters

It should be noted that studies of the past years did not pay enough attention to the menu of people who eat breakfast regularly. Agree, the objectivity of the findings looks questionable if the scientists summarized under the concept of breakfast glazed flakes filled with fatty milk with ascetic oatmeal on water or waffles in syrup with a steamed protein omelet.

Why, let's return to reasonable relativity: for some , breakfast is important, and for someone it is completely unnecessary, since there is no strong evidence for its benefits. The first category includes growing children and athletes who need regular intake of calories, others have freedom of choice.

"Any diet promotes health if it provides vitamins, nutrients and balances the calories needed to support vital functions - proteins, vegetables, fruits, nuts, fiber-rich cereals," explains Professor Spector. - In the case of breakfast , this is the touchstone of the problem, considering that for many mornings it starts with muffins, pancakes, sweet yogurt or cookies, i.e., an unnecessary dessert of fast and useless carbohydrates for the body.

The BMJ article also confirms that there is no difference in the metabolic rate of those who eat breakfast and those who start the day on an empty stomach.

Nevertheless, the obtained fact does not mean that breakfast is absolutely useless or dangerous entertainment, but only confirms that the regimen should correspond to the individual characteristics of the body. Perhaps the importance of breakfast is really exaggerated, but skipping any meal or having a late dinner can affect the body's ability to regulate glucose levels. And be that as it may, consuming morning calories at the end of the day is not a better alternative to breakfast .