Food Is Medicine: A Movement at a Tipping Point

The Food Is Medicine (FIM) movement is rapidly transforming how we think about nutrition as a central pillar of health care. At the third annual Food Is Medicine National Summit, hosted by the Food Is Medicine Institute at the Gerald J. and Dorothy R. Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, nutrition experts, policymakers, clinicians, and community leaders gathered to chart the future of this growing national effort.

“About 90% of Americans agree eating more healthy foods is important to prevent the onset of many health conditions, and 86% agree that eating healthy foods should be a priority for treating major health conditions,” Dariush Mozaffarian, cardiologist and director of the Food Is Medicine Institute, said during the first keynote address, when he cited a national poll published earlier this year. “Americans really get this, but at the same time, they’re confused about how to eat healthy, because it’s complicated.”

Those thoughts were echoed by cardiologist Victor Dzau, president of the National Academy of Medicine, during the summit’s second keynote address.

“Almost every individual American wants to know what they should eat, what’s healthy, what’s not. But the amount of contradictory, inconsistent information and misinformation on the internet is very high, and it’s hard to know what to believe,” Dzau said. “We as experts and clinicians should be part of a solution to provide reliable information to the public that improves public health, because we know that poor individual health choices can undermine nutrition.”