Prevention is better than cure
Protecting our health is a fundamental human right explicitly enshrined in Article 23 of the Belgian Constitution. WHO defines health as ‘Health a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.’ We all know that nutrition is a determinant of health and that it is ‘the first medicine’. However, nutrition has yet no place in our health system, which is mainly focused on healing.
We wait until we are sick and only then are we supported by social security. But it is also very important to prevent diseases, not cure them. Food plays a central role in this. Trying to prevent diseases thanks to food would better protect the population from diseases related to unhealthy food. Besides, we can also fully exploit all the benefits of a systematic approach to nutrition.
Unhealthy nutrition is defined as both nutritional and/or caloric deficiency (undernutrition) and nutritional and/or caloric surplus (overnutrition/hyperalimentation). The strongest link between nutrition and health in Belgium relates to overnutrition. Half of the population is overweight, 16% are obese.1 This contributes significantly to chronic diseases such as hypertension and stroke, heart attacks, type 2 diabetes and certain cancers. In Belgium, between 11% (2021, Covid) and 14% (2020) of deaths are directly related to nutrition, or rather to unhealthy eating. That’s 12,000 to 15,000 people a year.2
The picture is even worse for the most vulnerable populations. In Belgium, someone without a high school diploma is 50% more likely to be overweight than someone with a higher diploma. Nutrition-related health problems affect everyone but follow a social gradient: each additional year of education a person has not had translates into a higher risk of serious disease. (For the record, too much focus on education as a solution should not reinforce the idea that poor dietary choices are purely an individual choice and not a systemic issue. That, of course, is not the case).
Every year, around 12,000 to 15,000 Belgians die from diseases related to unhealthy food.
Apart from the psychological and social effects, the economic effects of unhealthy eating are staggering. Sciensano estimates in a tentative study that between 2013 and 2017, National Institute for Health and Disability Insurance (INAMI-RIZIV) spending due to overweight and obesity was €3.3 billion a year. To this must be added 1.2 billion of costs related to absenteeism.
Moreover, the harm caused by the current food system is not limited to the impact of food on the health of the population alone. Poor working conditions in the food industry, exposure to pollutants in water, air and soil, and the sale of contaminated or dangerous food are additional sources of nuisance with costs attached.3 The FAO worldwide conducted a study based on a broader definition of nutrition (extended to the entire food system) and health. This study estimates that the hidden cost of the food system for the health in Belgium is 27 billion euros a year. 27 billion euros a year. You read it right. That’s roughly what Belgians spend directly on food every year. So after eating badly, we actually have to pay the price of our food again through our health care. The profits of the food industry go to the private sector, while the associated health costs are for the state (read: everyone of us). Not to mention the additional costs related to subsidies or environmental and climate restoration.
Facilitating access to healthy food should be a priority for the government. This is currently not the case. Current plans on ‘food – health’ have focused on regulating the food market (informing consumers, banning advertising of unhealthy products, capitalising on taxes and subsidies to promote healthy food, etc.). These plans are not compelling enough and do not produce the desired results. The food supply remains too ‘obesogenic’, calorie-rich. For example, Sciensano has shown that the shelves of supermarkets in Flanders contain three times as many unhealthy products as healthy ones. A look at the food pyramid shows clear differences between recommended consumption and the actual observed consumption.
Let us not wait until we are sick before taking care of ourselves. Healthy nutrition is an important part of that.