Overview of Food and Health

Eating a wide range of nutrients is required to keep you well and help reduce the risk of physical health problems like diabetes and heart disease. It also helps increase energy levels, sound sleep, and general health.

Sometimes, your mood affects how much you eat and the types of food you choose. While some foods can boost your energy levels, concentration and mood, others can have reverse effects.

Take, for instance, eating abundant vegetables, fresh fruits, whole grains, and nuts can reduce your risk of some mental health conditions like depression. On the other hand, eating foods that contain a high amount of saturated fat and sugar may trigger the risk of depression.

Eating a healthy balanced diet is essential in your well-being and overall health. Your GP can refer you to an Accredited Practising Dietitian (APD) who can offer one-on-one support. Meeting people with health challenges can give you ideas on how to overcome your health challenges. It can also help enhance your eating habits.

What is Food?

Different schools of thought have different definitions for food, ranging from solid to liquid substances taken by living things. However, in simple terms, food is any substance consumed by the body to provide nutritional support.

How Foods Impact Health

Foods give human bodies the necessary information to function well. Not getting ample information makes our health decline. Also, eating too much or eating foods with the wrong information can cause undernourished and overweight. The body can also be at risk of severe health conditions like arthritis, heart disease, and diabetes.

In brief, the state of our health is determined by what we eat. Foods work as medicine to maintain the body and to also prevent and treat diseases in the body.

The Effect of Foods on Our Bodies

Food nutrients enable the cells in the body to perform their essential functions – growth and body maintenance. When consumed nutrients do not meet the body’s nutrients needed by the cells to function well, the metabolic process deteriorates and may even stop working. Simply put, nutrients pass instructions to our bodies on how to work. Hence, food can be recognized as the basis of information for the body.

From this perspective, foods give us a nutritional view that goes beyond grams and calories, good or bad foods. Instead, it leads us to concentrate on foods we should include in our consumption rather than foods to ignore. Also, while looking at foods as enemies, look at foods as a substance to create good health and reduce disease by boosting the body’s functions.

But today, we eat what is convenient for us, not foods with health benefits. Fast foods have eliminated us from preparing and savoring wonderful meals.