Ben OsborneWhile we worry about the possibilities of a flue pandemic sweeping the world, or concern ourselves with the AIDS epidemic in Africa, it is the world-wide spread of heart disease that should be the big worry. Cardiovascular disease kills more people than everything else combined, and it is easily preventable.
With the spread of the American diet around the world, more and more people are dying from heart related diseases that are caused by poor diet. With obesity and diabetes on the rise, there is every chance that children in the US now will on average die at a younger age than their parents will, thus halting what has been a progressive improvement in life span.
The Asian diet is much healthier than then current US diet, but as more and more people around the world begin to feast on burgers and fries obesity and heath disease are spreading.
Today’s TED A Day is by Dr. Dean Ornish, who explains that we can prevent this global spread of ill health but changing our diets and making healthy foods more appealing.
As the world becomes smaller and smaller and diets and cultures begin to homogenise, we can only hope that the one restaurant in the global village doesn’t have golden arches on the sign outside.
