Leading British health journal the Daily Mail recently carried the story of David Harding, an accountant addicted to sausages.

The story pictured a cheerful and rather healthy looking Mr Harding tucking into a large pile of McWhinney’s Irish pork sausages. It went on to reveal that he had eaten at least one sausage a day since the age of five and had spent nearly £2000 on hypnosis and other treatments in an effort to break a 13-a-day habit.



Comments posted by helpful readers suggest possible contributory factors to Mr Harding’s condition, including “something in that brand of sausages that the pleasure centres and endochrine glands have become physically addicted to” or that sausages are being used as a coping mechanism for stress.



Another reader suggests “food intolerance” caused by the presence of wheat, soya or gluten, but since Mr Harding admits to grilling and frying his way through £700 a year, food intolerance is an unconvincing theory.

A lesser man might seek to avoid responsibility, perhaps by citing new research claiming to show sausages to be an illness. Not Mr Harding. “Apparently I just like sausages,” he says.



John from Santa Monica, California is unimpressed. “I feel sorry for his kids…his priority is all screwed up,” he writes.



It’s a good point. Addiction to McWhinney’s sausages is virtually unheard of in the US where people are far more likely to turn to booze and weed than a life-threatening plate of bangers.



One study claims that 52% of US adolescents have consumed alcohol and more than 40% have smoked tobacco or marijuana before the age of 12. Long-term effects include paranoia, disorientation and a tendency to extreme self-righteousness and poor grammar in later life.



Compulsive ice chewing is common in the US. One study found a sharp increase in sales of ice dispensers after a new softer and more chewable variety of ice became available.



A US TV series called Strange Addictions found a woman who liked to snack on toilet paper – organic and chlorine free is healthiest, apparently – and another who ate couch cushions.

Although the US does all the major addictions at impressive scale, the British continue to produce some of the most interesting examples.



The British Journal of Addiction cites three cases of people who have given up smoking only to become hooked on carrots. It’s the kids we need to feel sorry for.



Then there was the multi-addicted Englishman named Johnson, who was equally passionate about burglary, alcohol and cutlery. Mr Johnson underwent 30 operations to remove metal objects from his stomach and liked to celebrate his release from frequent spells in prison by treating himself to meals at expensive restaurants. After refusing to pay the bill he would sit and eat cutlery until the police arrived.



There is a certain heroic defiance about this scene. It is hard to imagine Johnson worrying about how the account of his arrest would go down in Southern California or sheltering behind some flimsy medical defence. You can see him squaring up to the arresting officer and saying with a shrug “Apparently I just like cutlery”, before being led away.

