There are lots of myths out there, and useless guidance on things you should and shouldn’t do.
You will have heard the classics, such as “you shouldn’t go swimming after eating” and “getting wet will give you a cold”, but it’s became apparent over the years that these are nothing more than – you guessed it – myths. One similar piece of health advice is taken much more seriously than the previous statements though, that “you should never skip breakfast” and “breakfast is the most important meal of the day”. But how much weight is really behind these claims? Here’s what the NHS has to say.
“A new study in 38 lean people found that six weeks of regularly eating breakfast had no significant effect on metabolism or eating patterns for the rest of the day compared to total fasting before midday.
It also found no difference between the groups at the end of the study in body mass, fat mass, or indicators of cardiovascular health (such as cholesterol or inflammatory markers).
There are various important limitations to this trial though such as the short follow-up time. For example, people who fasted had much more variable blood sugar levels in the afternoon and evening, and we do not know what the longer-term effects of this could be.
Overall, based on this study alone, we would not recommend completely starving your body of all nutrition before 12pm each day, not least because not eating something in the morning may not make you feel very happy or energetic, if nothing else.
Overall, this study does not settle the debate on whether breakfast is the most important meal of the day, because it was quite narrow in its scope. Dr Betts, a senior lecturer in nutrition, metabolism and statistics, told the Mail Online that “It is certainly true that people who regularly eat breakfast tend to be slimmer and healthier, but these individuals also typically follow most other recommendations for a healthy lifestyle, so have more balanced diets and take more physical exercise.”
In normal life situations, breakfast does therefore seem to be linked to health in some way, though direct cause and effect is difficult to apply, due to the influence of other health and lifestyle factors in relationship. However, this study does not provide many more answers of whether we should eat breakfast, or what type of breakfast we should eat.
However, based on this study alone we would not recommend missing breakfast, not least because it may have a negative impact on your mood; you could spend all morning feeling “hangry”.”
