Last week we spoke about the “spectrum” approach of Dr Dean Ornish to the subject of dietary choices, and how that we each need to choose where we want to be on the range between the least healthful, junk food on the one hand and the most nutritious mostly whole food plant-based diet on the other end.  This is a journey and as our needs and motivations change we may well move up that spectrum in order to achieve a higher level of vitality.

I hasten to add that a healthy life is not just about dietary choices, but also includes adequate physical activity, restorative sleep and emotional/spiritual rest, stress control, social connectedness, living with purpose and avoidance of harmful substances and behaviours.

ALSO READ : Turning the Tide – The role of diet in preventing and even reversing non-communicable diseases (2)

Michael Pollan, American author and Professor of Science and Environmental journalism at UC Berkeley, summarised the aims of a healthy dietary approach with these 7 simple words:  “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants”.  Of course he was referring to real food – food that will spoil if it is kept for more than a few days; food that has very few items in its list of ingredients; food that your grandmother knew and used; food that comes from a farm rather than a food-processing factory.  By too much he referred to the tendency to eat enormous amounts of food, gorging ourselves in a feeding frenzy, rather than savouring our food.  By mostly plants, he emphasised the need to have a diet rich in phyto-nutrients, anti-oxidants, minerals, vitamins, essential fats, proteins, probiotics and pre-biotics and fibre that are the hall-mark of plant foods.

Here is an excellent article by Ocean Robbins about a healthy perspective on diet based on the consensus of around 450 nutritionists, researchers, scientists and experts in the field of nutrition.

Dr David Katz, former president of the American College of Lifestyle Medicine was instrumental in convening the True Health Initiative, an attempt to break through all the media hype and clatter to find consensus on what is best for us. It turns out that 90% of what we should eat every day is well-recognised universally and boils down to a diet rich in plants, low on animal fats and proteins, and relatively unprocessed.

There are literally hundreds of fad diets out there.  Most promise quick-fixes to health issues like weight loss, through elimination of certain foods or food groups. 

Often they are promoted by charismatic individuals with little training in the field of nutrition and based on very flimsy science if at all.  They often are endorsed by celebrities.  Most are not sustainable because they lack important nutrients.  They are often accompanied by flashy presentations and great promises of amazing results.  Keeping to the recommendations would seriously dent your budget, and seriously damage the environment if adopted by the vast majority of the population.

So what are the hallmarks of a healthy diet?

• Based on all the main categories of whole foods – fruits, vegetables, whole grains and legumes, seeds and nuts, mostly locally grown
• Minimal animal products
• Minimal factory processed foods
• Foods grown in a sustainable way, with due regard to the environment
• Avoidance of foods from factory farming which are cruel and unhygienic and potential breeding grounds for epidemic viral infections and antibiotic resistant bacteria.

Here are a couple of articles/videos that are intriguing and a bit scary — about the power of big business to manipulate our palates and impact our health negatively for the sake of profits:

There are a lot of similarities in media coverage about diet as in the controversies between health pundits and big tobacco companies in the late 60’s and early 70’s.  Powerful business interests covered up the science and confused the public with mixed messages.  Some of you may remember how cigarette vending machines were prominent in the hallways of even hospitals, and medical staff tearooms were filled with tobacco smoke.  I remember a newspaper headline “Prof Christiaan Barnard advises his daughter to smoke to control weight gain!”  That is anathema for someone who spent his career doing heart surgery to repair damage so often caused by smoking.

We would do well to keep these insights about the healthiest diets, and the marketing strategies of big business on our choices when we go shopping, and particularly when we are buying snacks for our children for their school lunchboxes and parties.  What we feed our children has lifelong consequences.

Next week we will look at how to determine the best diet.  Almost every week we will see a headline in the media which seems to undermine conventional wisdom.  How do we make sense of what is best for us?

Until then, stay safe.

Dave Glass

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