Eating For Health: Healthy Eating A Guide To The New Nutrition

Content provided by the Faculty of the Harvard Medical School

Eating for health

Not long ago, a healthy diet could be summed up by two simple concepts. One: Maintain a "balanced diet" of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. Two: Get the recommended amounts of vitamins and minerals. Cover these bases, and you'd have enough energy to power your body's cells and enough nutrients to prevent deficiency diseases such as scurvy (caused by inadequate vitamin C) and rickets (from a lack of vitamin D).

But lately the concept of a healthy diet has changed. It's not just about balancing your food choices and avoiding deficiencies. It's about choosing the types of foods that improve health and avoiding those that raise your risk for such illnesses as heart disease, cancer, and diabetes. True, everyone needs a mix of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats, but we now know that some of the choices within these categories are better than others. There are good fats, which promote health, and bad fats, which increase your risk of illness. The same is true for carbohydrates and possibly for proteins.

Deficiency disease is no longer the only concern of nutritionists. The latest thinking goes beyond deficiency diseases such as scurvy. It now includes a knowledge of how diet affects many of the biggest killers of our time. Heart disease, hypertension, and some cancers are more common in people whose diets lack particular nutrients and other components of foods.

Last updated:	January 23, 2007