Heroes for Health

(an excerpt from the Healthy School Lunch Action Guide)

Popeye knew what he was doing, Bugs Bunny was on to something, and your parents are pretty smart when they say. "Eat your vegetables—they’re good for you."

The Heroes for Health are fresh fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts and seeds—all plant foods. Foods like bean burritos, bananas, green vegetables, rice, potatoes, squash, oranges, raisins and hundreds more, because they can all help prevent disease and keep you healthier. Plus, the more plant foods (and the less animal foods) you eat, the more you’ll be helping the environment. Eating an Earth-friendly diet will help both you and the planet be healthier.

For the past two decades scientists have consistently found that people who eat greater amounts of vegetables and fruits have lower rates of heart attacks, cancers and other diseases. In fact, the benefits of increasing our intake of plant foods are becoming clearer and clearer almost daily. And no wonder—these foods contain a wide variety of beneficial compounds such as fiber, antioxidants, phytochemicals and essential fatty acids.

Fiber

Fiber is the material that makes up the leaves, stems, fruits, and other parts of plants; sometimes it’s called ‘roughage’. Although your body can’t digest fiber, you can’t be healthy without it! Fiber performs many beneficial functions, like cleaning your intestines, while decreasing the growth of bad bacteria and increasing the growth of good bacteria. Because of the fiber in whole plant foods, it is possible to eat less calories and yet feel fuller and more satisfied. Fiber also acts like a sponge, soaking up many harmful substances (like cholesterol, which can cause damage in the arteries), and carrying them through your digestive system, where they are removed as waste. But guess what? Only plant foods have fiber. Animal foods, like meat, fish, milk, and eggs, have no fiber.

Antioxidants

Antioxidants like vitamins A, C and E are abundantly found in plant foods—fruits, vegetables, grains, nuts and seeds. To understand why antioxidants are important, you need to know a little about some very active and destructive particles called free radicals.

Free radicals are highly reactive molecules that are missing an electron. In order to restore their electrical balance, they will rip an electron off any passing molecule—whether it’s your brain tissues, the cell membranes lining your arteries, even molecules in your dna. This leads to damage and aging in tissues throughout the body. In fact, free radical damage to arteries is suspected to be a key factor in heart attacks and strokes, while free radical damage to your cells sets the stage for the growth of cancers. A diet top-heavy with too much meat, poultry, dairy products, processed and preserved foods, fried foods, sugary "junk" foods, and "fast foods," will increase the amount of free radicals in the body².

Fortunately, molecules that "quench" free radicals are abundantly found in fruits and vegetables. Antioxidants—like vitamin C, beta-carotenes, vitamin E, selenium, glutathione, and many others—give up one of their electrons, stabilizing the destructive chain reaction caused by free radicals.^3,4 This powerful ability of fruits and vegetables to protect against free radical damage once again makes fresh, whole, plant foods Heroes for Health.

Phytochemicals

Phytochemicals (phyto = plant) help protect against many diseases.⁵ They increase our immune system’s capabilities and help our body fight infections, and they prevent early cancer growth.⁶ They have even been shown to slow or stop cancer from spreading. As you can tell by the name, phytochemicals are made only by plants. So, the more whole plant foods you eat, the more healthy phytochemicals you’ll be putting into your body. Beneficial phytochemicals are another reason why fruits and vegetables are Heroes for Health.⁷

Essential Fatty Acids

Essential Fatty Acids (efas) help to make healthy cells and are important in proper development of eye and brain tissue.⁸ efas are also involved in energy production and cholesterol metabolism. efas help regulate body functions such as blood clotting, blood pressure,⁹ conduction of nerve impulses, immune responses, and reaction to shock and injury.¹⁰

Efa’s are found in nuts (especially walnuts), seeds (especially pumpkin), and green vegetables like broccoli, collard greens, peas and, legumes (beans), as well as in grains like corn, rice, wheat, and, of course, in humans breast milk. efa’s are also available in refined oils like flax, canola, soybean, walnut, safflower, sunflower, and corn oil. (Use refined oils in small amounts—no more than 2 to 3 teaspoons each day of liquid oils). efa’s are Heroes for Health because they help your cells stay strong and flexible.

A Healthy Diet

For an optimally healthy diet follow these simple guidelines:

Base as many meals and snacks as possible on a variety of fresh—preferably organically grown—fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, seeds, and whole, unprocessed grains.

Reduce your consumption of meat, poultry, fish and dairy products. These foods contain harmful saturated fats, cholesterol and excessive amounts of animal protein.

Reduce your consumption of processed foods, fried foods, sugars, and chemically sprayed and processed f oods.

Read all food labels carefully, and avoid preservatives, food colorings and artificial sweeteners.

Hydrogenated fats and oils can damage our cells. READ LABELS and beware of foods containing "partially hydrogenated" anything.¹¹

Eat locally grown organic food whenever possible, preferably from your own garden.

Kids Are Powerful

Kids are powerful. You can greatly influence what food manufacturers produce. Because kids spend a lot of money on food. Manufacturers know this, so they spend billions of dollars to hire advertisers to convince young people to eat their food products. What’s so sad is that most of the food advertisements on tv, radio, in magazines, at theaters and sports events, are for "foods" that are unhealthy. When you eat food that you know is unhealthy, you’re sending a message to the manufacturer to make more. If you don’t buy unhealthy food, manufacturers will stop making it. Every time you eat and spend money, you’re casting a vote.

When you buy and eat food that is good for you, you vote yes for your health. And remember, healthy foods are healthy for the environment too. So vote with your dollars and make food choices that will help create healthy people and a healthy planet. Remember, your vote counts. You can start right in your own school cafeteria.

How Phytochemicals Help You

Phytochemical
Food Source What It Can Do

Sulforaphane
Broccoli, squash,cauliflower, turnips, kale Promote detoxification; lower risk of breast and colon cancer.

Beta-carotene
Carrots, apricots, peaches, cantaloupe Increase resistance to infection; reduce risk of heart disease, and lung and breast cancer.

Allylic sulfide
Onion, garlic, leeks, chives Neutralize carcinogens; reduce high cholesterol.

Genistein
Soybeans, tofu, soy beverage drinks, cabbage Prevent and inhibit tumor growth in many ways.

Flavonoids
Virtually all fruits and vegetables Enhance T-cell activity; help control allergies; potent antioxidants.

Indole-3-carbinol
Cabbage, cauliflower, brussel sprouts Protect against some estrogen -sensitive cancers; help detoxify toxins.

Capsaicin
Chili peppers, cayenne, jalapenos Prevent cancer cell formation; decrease pain.

Lutein
Spinach, collards, kale, red peppers Help slow down and prevent age-related blindness.

Lycopene
Tomatoes, red grapefruit,
watermelon
Protect your genes from free radical damage; 100 times more potent antioxidant than vitamin E.

Alpha-carotene
Pumpkins, carrots, yellow corn, cantaloupe Ten times more anti-carcinogenic than beta-carotene (skin, lungs); help damaged cells become healthy again.

Catechins
Green tea, black tea, berries Reduce risk of skin and stomach cancer; reduces atherosclerosis; antiviral and antioxidants.

1 The Impact of a Low Food Additive and Sucrose Diet on Academic Performance in 803 New York City Public Schools, Stephen J. Schoenthaler, Ph.D.1,4, The International Journal of Biosocial Research, WA., U.S.A.

2 - Maxwell, T Antioxidants: Nutrition’s Newest Super heroes. Drug Topics Medical Economics Publishing, Montvale, NJ, March 11, 1991

3 - Forman, H.J., et al. Superoxide radical and hydrogen peroxide in mitochondria. In Pryor WA (ed), Free Radicals in Biology, Vol.5, 65-89. New York: Academic Press, 1982, #3, p. 7.

4 - Gey, K.F., et al. Am J Clin Nutr. 1991; 53:326S-334S. - Stampfer, M.J., et al. N Engl J Med. 1993; 328(20):1444-1449. - Rimm, E.B., et al. N Engl J Med. 1993; 328(20):1450-1456.

5 - Di Mascio, P., et al. Lycopene as the most efficient biological carotenoid singlet oxygen quencher. Archives of Biochemistry and Biophysics, v. 274, n. 2, pp. 532-38, Nov. 1, 1989. Havsteen, B. - Ref. 4. - Middleton, E. - Ref. 5 - Cody, V., et al. Plant flavonoids in biology and medicine - biochemical, pharmacological, and structure-activity relationships. Alan R. Liss, New York, NY, 1986. - Kuhnau, J. The flavonoids: A class of semi-essential food components: Their role in human nutrition. Wld Rev Nutr Diet 24:117-91, 1976.

6 - Pizzorno, J.E., Murray, M.T., A Textbook of Natural Medicine. Bastyr University Publications, Seattle, WA, 1992.

7 - Laux, M.F. Naturally Immune for Life. Phillips Publishing, Inc., Potomac, MD, 1994.

8 - Simopoulos AP., Omega-3 fatty acids in health and disease and in growth and development, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition,, 1991;54:438-63.

9 - Schaefer EJ, Rees DG, Siguel EN, Nutrition, Lipoproteins, and Atherosclerosis, Clinical Nutrition, 5:99-111, 1986.

10 - Miettinen TA, et al. Fatty-acid composition of serum lipids predicts myocardial infraction, British Medical Journal, 1982, 285:993-6. - Siscovick DS, Raghunathan TE, King I et al. Dietary Intake and cell membrane Levels of Long-Chain n-3 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids and the Risk of Primary Cardiac Arrest, Journal of American Medical Association, 1996;274:1363-1367.

11 - Zeitschrift fur Gastroenterologie, 1993 Dec, 31:727.

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