Letters: Keep meat in school lunches

I am appalled at the idea of removing meat from our school lunches, as suggested in the Sept. 7 letter, “Get meat out of school lunches.”

I was involved in a N.C. program called “Healthy Carolinians 2000,” aimed at the obese school child. Many of these children weighed in at 200-300 pounds at age 12 and had never walked a mile, jumped a rope or exercised in any way.

We didn’t cut meat out of their diets. We cut fat and added exercise, and these children lost weight and built muscle.

Obesity comes from fried foods, which are quick to prepare, candy, sodas and other concentrated carbohydrate intake and no exercise. The problem with meat is the way it is prepared. We need to bake, boil and broil food — not fry it. Yes, fruits and vegetables need to be increased, and children need more whole grains and less sodium, fat and concentrated carbohydrates. It even makes sense to eliminate breakfast meat, because it is usually fatty and full of sodium

Our children need meat protein for its nutrients and iron. Milk and eggs are the only foods that contain all essential amino acids required by the body to metabolize food; our kids need them. Sometimes the only meat that poor children eat is what they are fed at school.

This story was originally published November 3, 2015 at 2:11 PM with the headline "Letters: Keep meat in school lunches."