How Foods Can Prevent Disease

Eating tomatoes to help prevent cancer, garlic to prevent AIDS, or drinking fruit juices to ward off Alzheimer’s? In spite of a various research, the effect of food on killer disease has still remained to be proved.

A balance and quality diet is the key to our good health. This has been agreed by most Scientists and in fact, most governments for the past several years had urged their citizens to adopt a daily diet. At least five parts of our daily diet must be fruits and vegetables, the three are dairy products and starch and only little portion is allotted for back fats, sugar, and alcohol.

Watching what you eat experts say, does help prevent illnesses such as diabetes, hypercholesterolemia – which leads to cardiovascular disease --- or osteoporosis.

However, researchers are not united with their opinion regarding diseases not directly related to nutrition, such as cancer, AIDS, or neurodegenerative diseases ---even though they still recommend eating a balance diet.

One European study has concluded that eating vegetables and fruit high in fiber would limit if not eliminate the risk of colon / rectal cancer. This is only one among thousands of studies in time.

Most of our expert recommended fruit to be the possible protection against lung cancer. Investigation showed that consumption of five cups of catechin-rich green tea a day can prevent prostate cancer because catechins are polyphenolic antioxidant plant metabolites.

Industrial and/or processed fats with many additives had already been known to be harmful to our body particularly to the cardiovascular system. I could also double the risk of breast cancer while soybeans on the other hand reduced the risk threefold.

Soybeans help cells survive because they are rich in antioxidants, but it is said that it could also increase the risk of infertility.

No good or bad boods

Lycopene, the bright red antioxidant pigment found in tomatoes and other red fruits, also found by some researchers to reduce the risk of cancer, but the US Food and Drug Administration says there is no solid proof for the claim.

Alzheimer’s on the other hand, could be kept at bay by pomegranate juice, as well as the polyphenols in a glass of red wine.

Fishes are hailed to be rich in omega 3 unsaturated fatty acids. However fishes are also rich in mercury and toxic polycholorinated biphenyls.

“There are no good or bad foods”, said France’s Afssa food-security agency.

Eating large portion of fruits and vegetable and less of animal fats in our daily diet will maintain a healthy life.

Experts at France’s national food and cancer-research center said a varied diet of mainly fruits and vegetables with not too much alcohol would help prevent cancers of the mouth, pharynx, esophagus, lung, stomach, pancreas, colon-rectum and bladder.

After leafing through 7,000 studies from across the globe, the World Cancer Research Fund recommends avoiding food and drinks high in sugar, salt, or fats and low in fiber and instead eating fruits, vegetables, whole grain cereals and pulses.