5 tips for a healthy diet

Eat a variety of foods
Our bodies are incredibly complex and (except for mother’s milk for babies), no food has all the nutrients we need for our bodies to work properly. Therefore, our diet should contain a wide variety of fresh and nutritious foods to keep us strong.

Reduce salt consumption
Too much salt can raise blood pressure, which is a key risk factor for heart diseases and strokes. The majority of people in the world eat too much salt: on average, we consume double the limit recommended by the WHO, which is 5 grams (equivalent to one teaspoon) a day.

Even if we don’t add extra salt to our food, we need to be aware that salt is often added to processed food or drinks.

Fats in our day to day diets
We all need fat in our diets, but eating too much, especially of the wrong types of fat, increases the risk of obesity, heart diseases and strokes. Industrially produced trans fats are the most dangerous to our health. It’s been found that a diet that’s high in this type of fat increases the risk of heart diseases by almost 30%.

Limit the consumption of sugar
Too much sugar isn’t only bad for our teeth but increases the risk of unhealthy weight gain and obesity, which can lead to serious, chronic health problems.

Just like salt, it’s important to consider that there can be a lot of ‘hidden’ sugar in processed foods and drinks. For example, just one can of fizzy drinks can contain up to 10 teaspoons of added sugar.

Avoid dangerous, harmful consumption of alcohol.
Alcohol isn’t part of a healthy diet. Despite that, in lots of cultures, New Year’s celebrations are associated with excessive consumption of alcohol. On an immediate level, drinking too much or too frequently increases immediate risk of injury. On top of that, it can have longer-term effects like damage to the liver, cancer, heart diseases and mental illnesses.

The WHO states that there’s no such thing as safe consumption of alcohol. For a lot of people, even the lowest levels of alcohol consumption can have significant health risks. Remember that consuming less alcohol is always better for your health, and it’s absolutely fine not to drink at all.