Carob Fever

Carob Fever is the common folk version of Chocoholicism. The Commonfolk can not get chocolate due to the cost of the importation of cocoa beans from Nigeria. This is because of the two Chocolate Wars, which allowed the UK to still get chocolate but for only the wealthy. At the end of the first war the British imported Carob from Portugal, which allowed to get a chocolate substitute. As with all substances that can be consumed can be abused or enjoyed when times get tough for the person such as loss of job or family member or friend or when times are economically unhealthy.

Causes

As Carob is a chocolate substitute it cannot come in bars as it would require an ingredient that would raise the price of the product out of the price range for the commonfolk. Therefore the Carob Powder is an additive to make things chocolate flavoured and can be added to hot milk to make hot chocolate. When something happens as to requires numbing the emotional weight of the bad thing, carob products are consumed more regularly. For some, it does not matter which products the person consumes and in others it does. This is because of the personal experience of the person, for example, they remember a happy memory of them being with a parent when they experienced their first taste of Carob. Or it would be something else such as the sugar in fudge and the taste of Carob could be enough to bring on the additional factor of Carob Fever. With the sufferer wishing to return the feeling of the high, they had from the consumption of carob products. This then of course makes the length of suffering from Carob fever longer as well as suffering from the addiction hard to recover from.

Symptoms

Symptoms include weight gain and increased withdrawals if still suffering emotionally. The sufferer from carob fever will suffer from withdrawals if intaking carob products. The strength of these withdrawals depends on how long the sufferer has been addicted to carob products.

Treatment

Treatment for Carob fever are to; help budget with the sufferer and taking the person to the Spiritual Gardens in Zone 1 or care for a person by spending time with them. Another treatment is based on giving progressively fewer carob products to the sufferer as to ween them of the products.

Prognosis

Scientifically, food addictions occur because of the Food trifecta, in which that if you have the proportions of sweet, fatty and salty correct the hunter-gatherer side of our psyche will find the foodstuff to be addictive. Back in the days before humanity settled down and discovered agriculture anything that gave a boost of calories meant a greater chance of survival. We today still have this so when we eat sugar we can feel that it is good for us when it is not.

Affected Groups

As with Chocoholicism, it affects more women ^[1] than men but men can suffer from Carob fever. As Carob products are available for the common folk and therefore a wealth based product as the wealthy would not purchase carob but rather chocolate items. As this is the case Carob is mainly purchased by those in the middle classes or below, it is those people who will be more affected.

Prevention

Public knowledge and awareness are key as well as checking into people who have been seen to be purchasing a large number of carob products.

Epidemiology

Since it is a food addiction the conduction is not passed through viral or bacterial strains. What will make the condition spread are shared bad times among the citizenry such as economic recession or in times when a business is not doing well its employees may need to emotionally numb the fact that the business might fail and they lose their jobs. Another way this condition can spread can be through the word of mouth. On how wonderful the products are to consume.

History

Carob fever originally came from the importation of carob after The Chocolate Wars, as the common folk could afford carob products. Scientists found that people were succumbing to carob fever. Recognising that the upper classes succumbed to chocoholics they managed to connect the two and looked back into history and found that people of The Old World were succumbing to chocoholicism when times were hard.

Cultural Reception

While carob fever doesn’t affect the same way as alcoholism does as it mainly affects the sufferer than everyone else. While most don’t care because they aren’t suffering from it, only those who have it or have family or friends who suffer from it seem to care about the condition.

Type
Food Addiction
Cycle
Aquired
Rarity
Common