The new mayor of New York City has caused a mix of amusement and serious consternation by comparing cheese to heroin.
“Food is like a drug,” Eric Adams said. “And in fact, the studies show the same level of brain that encourages you to use drugs also addicts you to food.
“Food is addictive. You take someone on heroin, put them in one room, and someone hooked on cheese, put ’em in another room, and you take it away, I challenge you to tell me the person who’s hooked on heroin and who’s hooked on cheese.”
The mayor identifies as a vegan, though on Monday he officially admitted sometimes eating fish. He was speaking as part of an effort to convince New Yorkers to switch to a more plant-based diet.
“The more you eat plants [and] fruits, the more you have a healthy lifestyle away from over-processed food, the healthier you are going to be,” he said. “I know how I feel every day, and I want you to feel the same way every day.”
Adams did not say which studies he was referring to.
In 2015, researchers at the University of Michigan found that cheese was among foods people found hard to give up.
But the study did not merit some of the headlines it generated, among them “This Explains a Lot: Study Finds That Cheese Is Just as Addictive as Drugs” and “Headed to Roquefort Rehab: Cheese Is as Addictive as Crack Cocaine”.
Predictably, the internet did not take kindly to Adams’s words.
Writer Tom Ricks said: “I’m into the hard stuff – aged parmesan and old gouda. Is there anywhere I can get help?”
Among more serious responses, Dr Kim Sue, medical director for the National Harm Reduction Coalition and an addiction physician-anthropologist at Yale School of Medicine, said: “Weighing in from addiction medicine to ask [Adams] to please not make these claims about either heroin or cheese.
“The stigma and moralising is rife and not useful.”
Some New Yorkers would agree. On Monday, the Daily News cited “a source close to the mayor” when it said Adams “has been spotted chowing down on beef and chicken in addition to fish”.
“Representatives for Adams did not return requests for comment on the beef and chicken details,” it added.
Speaking to reporters about what New Yorkers should eat, Adams said his constituents should “ignore the noise” and not “worry about what’s on Mayor Adams’s plate”.
