Over the past century, humans have experienced four life-changing revolutions: the Industrial, Agricultural, Economic, and Digital. Around the globe, these revolutions have lifted millions of humans from poverty and starvation. However, slowly and stealthily, these revolutions have moved the humans away from nature and its powerful bioenergy source sun. The natural bioenergy remains intimately linked to both the nutritious food and a balanced healthy lifestyle. The global epidemics of overweight- obesity and associated diseases such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, metabolic
syndrome, hypothyroidism, cancer, and many more are the direct results of unhealthy foods, unbalanced lifestyle, and physical inactivity.

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Avicenna, a Persian Physician ( 980-1037) made an enduring statement “To Prevent, Reverse,
Control, and Cure any Disease; One Must First Know Its Cause.”

        It is this wisdom that brought forth the medical miracle of conquering the epidemics of contagious, life-threatening diseases such as cholera, smallpox, plague, and polio. That miracle put Allopathic medicine at the forefront, ahead of all other ancient disciplines of medicine—Ayurveda, Homeopathy, Naturopathy. The cause of the contagious diseases was identified to be viruses and bacteria. The prevention and cure consisted of the antibiotics, vaccination, sanitation, and mass campaigns of Public Health education. The result we know well; these epidemics got eliminated from the surface of this planet.

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        Unfortunately, when it comes to the current burgeoning epidemics of the food and lifestyle diseases outlined above, allopathic medicine has failed to do its part to focus on the cause to find prevention, reversal, and cure. The treatments offered address mostly the symptoms and not the cause of disease, which is “Unhealthy food, Unbalanced lifestyles, and physical inactivity.” Good examples of symptomatic treatments are:

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Since the treatment focus is mostly on the symptoms and not on the cause, the disease process continues to get worse with time. The afflicted individuals get burdened with the escalating medical bills for the remainder of their living lives. Since the costs of sick care in India are handled mostly by individuals and their families, the lifelong burden of the treatment costs ends up financially devastating many families. Even the wealthiest nations of the world are unable to cope with the high cost of sick
care of the ever-growing epidemics of Type2 diabetes and Heart disease.

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A Sensible, Cost-Effective Solution to Prevent, and Reverse Food & Lifestyle Diseases

        The World Health Organization (WHO) In 2011, called a high-level meeting to engage global leaders, policymakers, public health professionals, and medical researchers on the issue of expanding epidemic of Obesity and its associated diseases. The global experts outlined two preventive strategies:

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• Reduce the exposure to risk factors—unhealthy foods, physical inactivity, tobacco use, and alcohol use.

• Provide periodic screening for early detection of diseases to enable intervention and reversal
  at an early stage.

 

        The above two preventive strategies were considered “Best Buy” interventions because the cost of implementing these for a lower-middle-income country like India was calculated to be as low as $1.50 (INR 100-150) per capita per year. The important message was:

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The prevention of disease comes at a fraction of the cost of sick care. The Governments and Societies who will invest small funds on prevention strategies consisting of Food Care and Public Health Education; are set to make huge savings on the high cost of the sick care of food and lifestyle diseases.

A proper question is: Who should take charge of the preventive wellness programs. Should it be the governments at the central or the state level, or the citizens at the grassroots level?

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        The answer is simple; the grassroots wellness movement makes more sense because food and lifestyle are personal choices, under the individual’s control. In the case of a growing child, these choices are under the power of the parents. The individuals and not the governments are empowered to make a change in their food and lifestyles.

         The first vital step which will make a wellness program succeed at the grassroots level is to create a
public education platform.

Public Health Education Is The Engine Which Drives the Grassroots Wellness Program

         When a patient goes to the doctor, he /she wishes to know the cause of the disease, the available methodology of treatments, prevention/ control, and an explanation of the outcomes. Failure in meeting these basic expectations brings dissatisfaction and doubt, making patients embark on an endless doctor shopping spree. But meeting these expectations gets challenging when the patient-doctor ratio is high, and there is no reliable platform to access credible and understandable medical information. The fake news from many unqualified sources floods social media daily. The need of the hour is; create a trustworthy and interactive platform of health information between the public and the health care professionals (kind of a Wikipedia type platform for food and lifestyle diseases).

For a wellness program to succeed, the health education must focus on the basics:

 

• What are Food and Lifestyle diseases, and why do these occur?

• Emphasis on prevention because it comes at a fraction of the cost of sick care.

• What is meant by Holistic Food and Balanced Lifestyle, how does it help to prevent, reverse, and control food and lifestyle diseases?

• How periodic medical screening helps to eliminate the food and lifestyle diseases like Type2diabetes and heart disease at an early stage?

 

The “Food Lifestyle Balance Website” aims to create an Interactive Health Education platform between the public and healthcare professionals.

 

         The primary goal is to share knowledge on the cause of disease to bring about a cultural shift in adopting healthy foods, and lifestyle behaviors concerning eating, sleeping, physical activity, and exercise. The grassroots movement of education on “Food Life Balance” focuses on empowering individuals to prevent, reverse, and control the current prevailing burden of severe food and lifestyle diseases such as Obesity, Type2 Diabetes, High Blood pressure, Heart disease, Metabolic Syndrome,
PCOS, Stroke, Cancer, and more. The website aims at creating an interactive platform between the public and the interested health care professionals. The key message of the” Food Life Balance” movement is: The knowledge and effort on Food and
lifestyle care will save a fortune on Sick care.

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Radha Sukhani, MD
Wellness Educator