A lot of people die because of cigarette smoking all around the world. As a matter of fact, in the US alone, Centers for the Disease Control and Prevention estimates that around 480,000 deaths are linked to cigarette smoking. But did you know that more people die because of food rather than these butts? A new expert study, posted in the Lancet medical journal backs this up.
According to the research, which is a part of the Global Burden of Disease study conducted by the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) in Seattle, there are about 11 million deaths reported in connection to food around the world every year.
Experts say the problem doesn't lie on the food itself, but through the unhealthy diet, people often choose for their everyday lifestyle. Several factors tend to be the cause why most people don't desire to dig into a healthy diet. These factors include the cost of these healthier alternatives, the difference in the taste, the difficulty of accessing these kinds of foods, the availability of these goods, the culture of the household, and the limited time most people have to prepare their food.
Given this problem, health experts, alongside with the researchers of this study, are encouraging more people to cut junk food and other unhealthy foods such as instant noodles, fast foods, chips, and soft drinks. Furthermore, they are also inspiring them to embrace foods that are freshly available in the market such as fruits, vegetables, legumes, and nuts.
The study revealed that among all the diet-related diseases that can cause death to humans, strokes and heart attacks are those that top the list of the highest death rate. The second listed are type 2 diabetes and cancers.
Also, through the study, the researchers found out that proper eating and drinking could create a huge difference as it can save one out of five deaths worldwide. Experts blame the high death rate to less consumption of healthy foods such as fruits and vegetables, and overconsumption of sodium or salt, as reported by The Guardian.
"Our findings show that suboptimal diet is responsible for more deaths than any other risks globally, including tobacco smoking..." the researchers wrote. These experts also believe that for people to decrease the consumption of bad things, they should also increase their consumption of good things. This is why choosing good food over those artificial, overly preserved and unhealthy instant foods are now highlighted and been given more emphasis.
