Nutrition and health

Today many diseases are known to be linked to lifestyle behaviors such as smoking, lack of adequate physical activity and poor natural habits. The World Health Organisation (WHO) reports that nearly one-third of early death and disability stems from nutritional or dietary causes, including too little food in the poorest countries and too much food in the richest.

Nutrition is, in part, a preventive science. Given sufficient resources, how and what one eats is a lifestyle choice. Health is defined as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not just the absence of disease or infirmity.

Good nutrition is essential for good health and important for physical growth and development, good body composition, and mental development. People’s nutritional state can protect them from predispose them toward chronic disease. Medical treatment for many diseases includes diet therapy. Nutrition is thus both a preventive and therapeutic science.

Nutritional needs vary individually, depending on a variety of factors including age, sex, level of physical activity, metabolic rate and state of health.

To maintain health and function efficiently, our bodies need 13 vitamins and 16 minerals as well as fats, carbohydrates and protein, although it is not a nutrient, our bodies also need plenty of water. By eating a variety of foods in sensible proportion from all the food groups we can obtain optimum levels of every nutrient needed to maintain good health.

Three main rules should govern what we eat:

• Food should nourish
• It should help to safeguard health-and when necessary should play a role in fighting ailments or disease.
• It should also look and taste good.
  

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How much salt, sugar? New diet rules coming

How much salt, sugar, chilli, turmeric, ginger-garlic paste or garam masala is good for an average Indian if India is to be a healthy nation?

The center has taken up a massive exercise to revise dietary guidelines for Indians after a 10 year gap. People can decide what type and what quantity of food and desirable. Suggestions and comments have been invited, based on which a panel of health and nutrition experts will finalise the new guidelines.

The Hyderabad-based National Institute of Nutrition has taken up the task of revision of the national dietary guidelines, framed back in 1998.

Fresh guidelines are needed in view of lifestyle changes, leading to a spurt in lifestyle related non-infectious diseases.

“Nutrition plays a very important role in the development of human resource, which is one of the strengths of any nation. A healthy population can lead better on all frontiers: education, economics, agriculture, defence, medicine and other sciences.. These dietary guidelines will enable the population to lead a healthy life,” Dr D Raghunatha Rao, convener of the dietary guidelines revision committee, told this. This existing guidelines stipulate that an average Indian should taken ten grams of salt every day. This might go up or down depending on the suggestions people send to the committee.

There will however, be no increase in the recommended calorie intake, said the new guidelines.

The new guidelines will be circulated to policy makers, United Nations agencies, academics, medical professionals and nutrition experts.

Dr Kamala Krishnaswamy, a former National Institute of Nutrition director, heads the dietary panel.

A recent survey, NFHS-3, showed there was no significant improvement in the nutritional status of the population, compared to the findings of NFHS-2.

Surveys carried out by the National Nutrition Monitoring Bureau provided more insight on issues relating to double burden of malnutrition: under-nutrition on one hand and over-nutrition, leading to obesity and other degenerative diseases on the other,.

Some important issues covered by nutrition guidelines include exclusive breastfeeding for up to six months, continuing up to two hours, introduction of food supplements for infants after six months, use of green leafy vegetables and restricted use of cooking oils and animal foods.

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