Postscript: An Overview of Nutrition—Much Progress but Challenges Ahead

Abstract

Nutrition in the twentieth century was mainly concerned with the individual substances found in food. At the same time it became firmly established that the disease pattern seen across the Western world is a direct result of lifestyle, and that diet plays a major role in this. This information has been of tremendous value in showing how health may be enhanced and diet-related diseases prevented. There is clearly a great opportunity to achieve a major improvement in the well-being of the population. Moreover, as the cost of achieving this is relatively modest, the benefits for public health would be highly cost-effective. We now present a summary of the key lessons from this book and the top priorities for action.