Hello and welcome to Zoey Shorts, the Bite Size podcast where we discuss one topic around

science and nutrition. I'm Jonathan Wolf and as always I'm joined by Dr Sarah Berry

and today's subject is eggs. Eggs are one of the most nutrient dense foods they're relatively

cheap to buy, they have a long shelf life and they're widely available but they're nowhere

nearest popular as they used to be. So Sarah what has led to the decline of the egg?

Various factors could be at play here Jonathan and I think I can explain why eggs have fallen

out of favour and why we could be seeing a research and sympathy. How exciting let's get to it.

So we did some research and in the 1950s before there was any big advertising for eggs in the US

here in the UK people were instructed to go to work on an egg as part of a popular marketing campaign.

The idea was that if you ate an egg for breakfast this was the best way to start the working day.

Yeah Jonathan so whole eggs are nutritionally rich they supply almost every nutrient the human body

needs except fiber. They're even sources for some harder to source nutrients like vitamin D and

vitamin B12. What about the health benefits? There's been a lot of debate on the health benefits

or indeed the risks of eggs. The majority of recent research suggests that eggs pose no risk to

our health and much more likely to actually provide health benefits. In fact eating eggs alongside

other food can help our bodies absorb more vitamins they can make us feel full for longer

and one study found that adding an egg to salad can increase hampte vitamin E we get from the salad.

Amazing so we also found out that at the end of world war two eggs were more popular than ever

and on average an American consumed seven eggs a week in the USA and we know this because in 1909

the US Department of Agriculture began to track egg consumption. Eggs are still popular but there

has been a decline in popularity since the end of World War Two and the most recent data from the US

suggests that the average American consumes now about five eggs a week. Now eggs are really

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