Integrative Health and the Emerging Whole-Systems Approach to Dietary Guidelines.

Abstract

Let your food be your medicine and medicine your food. The Hippocratic adage captures a principal doorway through which thousands of health seekers and their practitioner allies enter into a whole-systems orientation to health and medicine. In the United States during the past year, a profound debate has erupted over an issue that suggests that this adage, expanded, is becoming a powerful portal to a whole-systems approach to the health of the planet: Let food sustainability be our guidance and let policy in related areas be guided by food sustainability. This direction could serve as a global rallying cry for those who are part of, or aligned with, the growing integrative health and medicine community. Such a commitment would have double impact strategically. The campaign for food sustainability's yet minor health professional voice would gain power. At the same time, such action is opportunistic for integrative health professionals wishing to shed their unfortunate profile as servants of well-to-do heal...