In 2019 an estimated 1.6 million people were diagnosed with some form of cancer. How do we shrink that number? For me, I want to do all I can from every angle. From prevention with food to help fundraising for cures. I believe our generation has the knowledge and potential to drastically alter the current health statistics that are nothing short of outrageous.
I often talk about my personal goal to eliminate preventable disease through food. It's how I summarize my life's goal in a sentence. If you share that with a Doctor or a member of the FDA and perhaps a CEO in the Pharmaceutical industry, they may put a target on my forehead. Perhaps if I were to expand on what I mean they may lower their bounty.
Before we complicated the hell out of growing our food and manipulating in labs, we grew ingredients that were much more comprehensible for our systems to digest. Our health issues were less epidemic than they are currently. Supply and demand and the constant pursuit of profits has severely changed our intentions of growing food and raising animals. We are now in a society that cares more about likability on Instagram than we are with the likability internal organs.
Our agricultural industry is concerned with making sure they produce enough food to feed our nation and rightly so, to feed their own families as well. In a sense, they feed their families by feeding ours. For many reasons both financial and ecological, it has been hard to make a profit without modern machinery, technology and science. Many jobs depend on agriculture too. Scientist create chemicals, companies develop GMO seeds to resist disease. Mechanics build machines to plant, harvest and fertilize fields. Trucking companies deliver produce and manufacturers turn it into something shelf stable with some kind of gimmicky wrapper that leads us to believe it's something we should feed ourselves. Grocery stores stock their shelves with it and we bust our asses at work on a daily basis to afford to put it in our grocery cart and on our dinner table. Now with Amazon Prime you can even have it delivered right to your front door.
Farm to Table is supposed to cut out that middleman. However, it still doesn't mean that those ingredients are easy on our body. Especially if one's immune system is already fighting off a disease. I prefer to choose ingredients with a slightly larger philosophy and take it a bit further, mostly because that's what I do... I call it "Farm to Toilet". sounds a bit weird, but I'm referring to what happens inside our body. Are these ingredients causing or preventing inflammation? Can these ingredients repair muscle tissue or destroy it? Is this proper fuel or form before function?
One way to know to what is wrong with our health and what we need to consume to improve it is with no doubt...with a Doctor. They can look inside and see what's happening. From their they can advise you on medical treatment. Food however, is something that you can do for yourself while a doctor is also caring for you too.
I was grateful to be nominated to run for the Man of Year for the 2020 Leukemia and Lymphoma Society fundraiser to help fund blood cancer research. www.mwoy.org is an annual campaign both locally and nationally to help those affected by blood cancer. For children diagnosed with cancer, it is most common that they have Leukemia. Your support by making donations can help reduce the 1.6 million diagnosis a year and put an end to this dreadful disease.