Nutraceuticals, feeding health
If, as Feuerbach stated, we are what we eat, food plays a decisive role in our well-being. Often however we do not know what we eat, and our quality of life feels the effects, with serious consequences for the body. Information on the relationship between food and health is increasingly inaccurate or rhetorical; the result of anecdotal evidence or the interests of manufacturers. It’s here that the word Nutraceuticals comes into the language; a word rapidly becoming part of the everyday lexicon.
What are Nutraceuticals?
The term Nutraceutical is made up of the words nutrition and pharmaceuticals, and refers to the discipline which encompasses all elements or active substances of food with positive effects for health, and prevention and treatment of diseases. Instead of eating and taking care of yourself, here we have taking care of yourself through eating. Nutraceuticals have a complex and fundamental role: clearing the route of approximation and instead approaching the subject scientifically and with the rigour that it deserves.
This means collecting and examining tests and experimental investigations conducted throughout the world, identifying which elements of food are responsible for any beneficial effects discovered and providing continual updates on the most recent research. The role of the Nutraceuticals concept has therefore become key for whoever wishes to know in detail what truly works, which substances are active and with what actual consequences to our health. Nutraceuticals means recognising, via a renewed relationship between biology, chemistry and medicine, the strict connection there is between our daily food habits and our health.
What are nutraceuticals?
The majority of them are of vegetable origin and are found in fruit and vegetables, such as fibre, soya protein, phytosterols and polyphenols. Many nutraceuticals can also be found in the pharmacy as food supplements.
What effects do they have? The range of the possibilities offered by consuming nutraceuticals is endless: they go from maintaining health to prevention of cardiovascular and degenerative diseases, they can reinforce the immune system and regulate the digestive function, or be of help to sports or cosmetics.
Nutraceuticals are today a medical-scientific reality in continual expansion, both as regards number and accuracy of scientific studies and the proliferation of specific products (in the USA sales run to more than 250 billion dollars).