Who’s Controlling the Health Narrative? How Media Trends Are Rewriting Public Health

In the not-so-distant past, most of our health information came from textbooks, physicians, and peer-reviewed journals. Today, it comes largely from viral social media posts, including TikTok videos and Instagram reels, many of which have more flair than facts. The line between education and entertainment has blurred, giving rise to what some now call “health … Continued

Social Issues

The Big Business of Infant Formula: A Case Study of Industry-Funded Research

This article is an edited instructor post from our Plant-Based Nutrition Certificate Program, in reference to the critical analysis assignment. In this assignment, students critically review published health claims and receive feedback from the instructor team. You can learn more about the program here. Our goal is not only to increase nutrition literacy but also … Continued

Nutrition Science

How to Reduce Your Water Footprint through Smarter Food Choices

Water is often described as the most essential element for life on Earth, yet it is a resource we frequently take for granted, especially when it comes to the food we eat. While we may be mindful of turning off the faucet while brushing our teeth or fixing leaky taps, the vast majority of our … Continued

Food Sustainability

Carbohydrates: Simple, Complex, Misunderstood

Lost in this noise, almost as if by design, is a basic understanding of carbohydrates, the functions they serve, and the many factors determining their health effects.

Nutrition Science

Does Industry Funding Affect Research Findings?

Assessing and discussing health claims can be difficult. Imagine a friend who tells you it’s important that you eat several servings of fish each week. Your plant-based lifestyle, they suggest, is putting you at risk of not getting all the nutrients you need to thrive. How would you respond? In an ideal scenario, you would … Continued

Nutrition Science

How Our Food Choices Could Help Reforest the Planet

The global food system lies at the center of some of today’s most urgent environmental challenges, including climate change, biodiversity loss, and deforestation. Yet it also offers one of our greatest opportunities: the chance to reforest vast areas of the planet by rethinking what we eat. Nearly half of the world’s habitable land is currently … Continued

Food Sustainability

How to Plant a Fruit Tree Guild for a Resilient Backyard

If you are looking for a beautiful, resilient way to rewild some or all of your backyard, look no further than tree guilds. Also known as a permaculture garden, a tree guild is centered around a fruit or nut tree and incorporates a diverse group of plants that work together in harmony. What Is a … Continued

Food Sustainability

Everything in Moderation: Wishful Thinking or Wisdom in Action?

Moderate consumption of unhealthy food and beverages is frequently encouraged as a step in the direction toward better health outcomes. Is that true?

Wellness

Supporting Pollinators in Your Backyard

The next time you are biting into a fresh apple or crafting a delicious salad, be sure to thank pollinators. Pollinators are responsible for one out of every three bites of food we take every day.[1] Three-fourths of the flowering plants worldwide and 35 percent of the global food crop depend on pollinators to reproduce.[2] … Continued

Food Sustainability

The Hidden Cost of Glyphosate: Milkweed and Monarchs

Monarch butterflies have long captured the hearts of millions. Their delicate orange-and-black wings, extraordinary migration spanning thousands of miles from Canada to Mexico, and symbolic connection to transformation make them one of nature’s most beloved creatures. Monarchs are more than just insects: they’re a miracle of evolution and a source of wonder. But beneath their … Continued

Food Sustainability

Toxic Trade-Offs: How Banned Pesticides Still Enter the US Food Supply

Despite growing scientific consensus around the dangers of certain pesticides, many of these chemicals continue to be produced, used, and consumed around the world—even in countries where they’ve officially been banned. This global dissonance is particularly stark when comparing pesticide regulations in the European Union (EU) and the United States. Relying heavily on the precautionary … Continued

Food Sustainability

Pesticides—Adapting Chemicals of War

The story of pesticides is not merely one of agricultural innovation; it is also a story of militarism, industrial expansion, ecological upheaval, and a conflicted relationship with the natural world.

Food Sustainability

School Nutrition Programs: Who Do They Serve?

In a study published in 2020, researchers scored the diets of more than thirty thousand US children in the two- to nineteen-year-old range.[1] The nationally representative data, which came from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) from 1999 to 2016, were scored using the goals of the American Heart Association (AHA), which include … Continued

Family & Kids

Can Organic Farming Feed the World?

In the ongoing debate between conventional and organic farming, it’s commonly believed that conventional agriculture is necessary to meet the growing global demand for food. However, decades of research from the Rodale Institute show that organic farming can not only match but often outperform conventional methods in terms of yield, sustainability, and profitability.

Food Sustainability

Is Your Child a Picky Eater? Avoid This Common Misstep

It’s a common refrain: My kids won’t eat anything! Many parents report feeling concerned, stressed, or guilty because of the struggle to feed their kids healthy foods, especially vegetables.[1] These are unsurprising, innate responses. The drive to ensure our children get enough to eat and eat a wide enough variety to meet their nutritional needs … Continued

Family & Kids

Beef Tallow for Health: A Political-Commercial Farce

Is beef tallow healthy? Setting the record straight on all the press and speculation.

Nutrition Science

When Unhealthy Is Normal: The Social Spread of Disease (Video)

In the following video, Thomas Campbell, MD, discusses how numerous unhealthy behaviors and outcomes can spread through personal networks, even as far as three degrees of separation. As you watch the video, consider the flip side. If social connections are conducive to unhealthy outcomes, why not also health? What might this signal about the potential … Continued

Disease

The Psychological Toll of Living with Preventable Disease

Although we all know on some level that the state of health in the US is not in a good place, it can be difficult to quantify exactly what that looks like. There are multiple layers of failure, and some are more immediately apparent than others. The physical challenges of living with disease are the … Continued

Social Issues

How Annice Transformed Her Life and Health with a Plant-Based Diet

I am not perfect, but I would like to be. It seems that every story about whole food, plant-based (WFPB) nutrition I read in magazines or books or hear on podcasts celebrates someone who discovered the diet and suddenly changed their lifestyle, losing an astounding amount of weight. I envy their resolve and don’t understand … Continued

Success Stories

Fish Farming and Aquatic Life

Aquatic ecosystems worldwide are facing severe challenges according to nearly every available metric. Recent reports indicate that shark and stingray populations have been halved since 1970, trends which echo earlier studies showing a 49% decline in fish populations between 1970 and 2012.[1][2] Today, nearly 90% of global marine fish stocks are fully exploited, overexploited, or … Continued

Food Sustainability

What Makes Animal Protein High Quality?

How have different proteins been measured historically, and are these measures useful when assessing the healthfulness of foods today? And, is animal protein high-quality?

Nutrition Science

Can You Boost Your Brainpower with Plant-Based Nutrition?

I was reminded recently of the 2011 science fiction thriller Limitless, which tells the story of a struggling author, played by Bradley Cooper, who takes a drug that unleashes his full mental capacity for the first time. You might remember the premise—that we typically only use a small percentage of our brainpower—which I suspect could … Continued

Nutrition Science

Community Is an Essential Health Need

Psychologists and sociologists have long known how important a sense of belonging is for overall welfare. “[It] is a powerful, fundamental, and extremely pervasive motivation,” write the authors of an article published in Psychological Bulletin.[1] Abraham Maslow, the psychologist famous for conceptualizing the hierarchy of needs, which he published in his 1943 paper “A Theory … Continued

Social Issues

What You Order Might Be Influencing Strangers

We might expect our food choices to affect the choices of those around us and vice versa. But do we appreciate how significant this effect can be? Are some people’s dietary choices more susceptible to social influences than others? Is there a limit to that influence? These are just a few of the questions researchers … Continued

Social Issues