Each week I vow to ignore consumer surveys peddled by PR people who would gladly swim through shark-infested sewage to get a ten-second radio plug. And each week I fail. I’m inexorably drawn, like a moth to a dingy flame.

The survey that currently entices concerns flatulence. Or rather flatulence and halitosis, twin flies in the butter of human allure. “Two thirds of adults avoid seeking medical help for… excessive wind and bad breath,” says research by WindSetlers Gel Caps. One in seven “would not even tell their partner”.

Eh? If you break wind like a yak or have the breath of a camel with quinsy, then you can probably assume that your partner already knows. Informing those who sleep beside you that you stink is not necessary. A more pertinent problem is how others break it to you. As anyone who’s ever tried telling someone they have toxic breath knows, they’d hate you less if you were sleeping with their wife.

Not to suggest the sufferer would be male. Because, as we know from the adverts, the only people who experience wind, halitosis, bloating, etc, are female.

I look at the WindSetlers box and what do I see? A naked woman clutching a gas-inflated stomach. The UK Breath Clinic website features a woman inexplicably standing in a gale. Constipation and indigestion ads feature females grimacing in tight skirts.

Which is annoying. Because when it comes to flatulence, the maestros are, of course, men. So why lay the stigma on us?

I know why. Because when a woman suffers from wind, she sees a problem; a man merely sees a comedic opportunity. And I think three million “Happy Farter’s Day” cards will bear me out on that.

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