Focus on Nutrition

The topic that I found to be really interesting was the lecture on nutrition.  Learning how the food we eat needs to taste good and be nutritious was actually really surprising for me.  I was really a picky eater as a child and always associated healthy food to taste really bad.  I never would eat salad or many vegetables at all because I had a negative connotation  towards them.  Not until college did I learn that foods could be healthy, and also taste very good at the same time.  I studied abroad this past May in Italy and before I went I had never eaten pasta before besides regular spaghetti.  During the trip I was able to try so many different kinds of food that were all really amazing.  I found out the foods we were eating were also very nutritious and good for the body.  Not until I got home from the study abroad did I truly appreciate how healthy they were when people at home told me I had lost weight while over there.  I surely ate until my stomach was content the entire time (it was Italy after all) but because the foods were healthy and part of the Mediterranean diet, I was able to shed a few pounds.
This topic impacts my life because one of the first steps in being healthy is eating right.  I enjoy leading a healthy lifestyle and there is only so much exercise can do for a person.  When you eat right, you also feel better and are in a better mental state.  Eating right is part of a lifestyle that leads to a long healthy life.  This topic is extremely important to public health because in order for the population as a whole to be healthy, everyone needs to start eating better, more healthy foods.  When there is a McDonalds at every street corner eating healthy can be a challenge and so we need to propagandize to the public to take the harder path and eat healthy.   Parents must teach their children at a young age to eat healthy and make wise decisions regarding foods.  Kids learn from their parents, so if parents are setting good, nutritious standards for their kids, the future looks bright.
I am still curious about limiting the amount of meat and protein we eat.  My family has always eaten a lot of meat and potatoes and I am curious of the long term problems associated with this.