Journal of Food Processing & Technology

Preventing macular degeneration, vision loss, and other chronic disease through packaged food composition choices

3^rd International Conference on Food & Beverage Packaging

July 16-18, 2018 | Rome, Italy

Chris A Knobbe

University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: J Food Process Technol

Abstract:

In 1939 and 1945, Nutrition Researcher, Scientist, and Dentist, Weston A Price published epic and extensive research findings as traditional peoples transitioned from native, traditional diets, to Westernized diets, which he discovered was reliably followed by dental decay and subsequently, chronic, degenerative diseases that included but were not limited to, arthritis, cancers, and loss of immunity to infectious disease. Price called these Westernized foods the displacing foods of modern commerce, which he equated to refined white flour, added sugars, sweets, confectionary, and vegetable oils. Thousands of studies have since firmly correlated increasingly nutrient-deficient, Westernized diets, to diseases of Western civilization, including heart disease, cancers, type 2 diabetes, hypertension, metabolic syndrome, Alzheimer�??s disease, dementia, osteoarthritis, and even autoimmune diseases, such as multiple sclerosis and rheumatoid arthritis. We hypothesized that the displacing foods of modern commerce may also be the primary and proximate cause of Age-related Macular Degeneration (AMD), which is the leading cause of irreversible vision loss and blindness, in developed nations, in people over the age of 65. Through correlative data in 25 nations, we discovered that increasing consumption of proxy-markers of processed foods, i.e., sugar and polyunsaturated vegetable oils, is invariably associated with the development of epidemic proportions of AMD, within approximately 30 to 50 years. Food manufacturers may help to limit and even eliminate AMD and associated chronic, degenerative disease conditions, through limiting or eliminating use of refined white wheat flour, added sugars, polyunsaturated vegetable oils, and artificially created trans fats.