February 24, 2017
By Shilpa Ravella
Food choices are the most important cause of poor health in the United States. Seven out of ten deaths are caused by chronic diseases like cancer, type 2 diabetes and heart disease, which can be prevented or treated with diet and account for 86% of the $2 trillion spent on U.S. health care every year. But food-as-medicine is still fringe medicine, a practice more likely to be found at a few specialized clinics rather than in the halls of academic medical institutions.
Only 14% of doctors feel qualified to talk to patients about food. The American Heart Association recently issued a scientific statement calling for improved nutrition training for doctors. But education is only a part of the problem — financial incentives also keep food out of medicine.
In academic research, whole foods get less money and attention than drugs even though studies show that food can dramatically affect health. Because there is no intellectual property involved in prescribing food, companies are not interested in funding scientists to study it. And in contrast to drug research, nutrition research is harder to conduct and interpret, making it more confusing and easy to ignore.