In fact, nutrition is one of the most powerful tools we have to prevent and manage chronic health conditions like heart disease, diabetes, and hypertension. The evidence is strong enough that the American Heart Association identifies eating better as one of Life’s Essential 8, the eight key factors for improving heart health.
Part of the problem is knowing what to eat as part of a healthy diet. Nutrition can feel complicated, especially when health claims can be conflicting or confusing. How much protein does one really need? What are good fats and bad fats?
Knowing what to eat and being able to eat that way are, however, not the same thing.
Even foods that seem healthy can contain unhealthy ingredients. A salad may seem like an obviously healthy choice, yet it can contain a surprising amount of sodium and saturated fat if it has processed meat, cheese, and dressing. Since much of the sodium is already baked into our food, it is not surprising that nearly seven in 10 adults exceed the recommended intake of sodium of 2,300 milligrams per day.
What if you could get low-sodium meals delivered to manage your blood pressure just as easily as you can pick up a prescription refill for your blood pressure-lowering medication?
Yet evidence gaps remain: which approaches work, for whom, and at what cost? We must answer these questions with the same rigor we expect for drugs. This is exactly what the American Heart Association’s Health Care by Food initiative, launched with support from the Rockefeller Foundation, is aiming to do. This initiative is funding the research needed to determine how to make healthy food programs in health care systems accessible, affordable, and scalable.
We also need to do better at teaching nutrition in medical schools. In 2026, HHS and the Department of Education announced a new initiative for medical schools to deliver at least 40 hours of nutrition education in U.S. medical schools. Because healthy nutrition is important for every patient, every doctor needs to learn and know this information.
While this may seem like a daunting task, one of the best examples of success in improving population health comes from Finland. More than 50 years ago, North Karelia, a rural region in eastern Finland, faced a cardiovascular crisis. Heart disease mortality was among the highest in the world. The problem was so severe that local representatives petitioned the government to take action.
We can also learn from U.S. public-health success stories. Take the example of motor vehicle accidents. For much of the 20th century, car crashes were an enormous public-health problem. Simply urging people to drive carefully was not enough: beginning in the 1960s, the U.S. adopted a broader approach that combined safer vehicle and road design—including seatbelts and later air bags—with safety laws and enforcement. Despite a tenfold increase in miles driven, the motor-vehicle death rate fell by 90% per mile traveled between 1925 and 1997, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
We can continue to tell people to eat healthier. And we should. But our current approach is like telling people to drive more safely while watching deadly crashes happen in cars without seat belts. Better advice alone will not be enough. To transform the health of the American population, healthy food should be something we can recommend, be able to prescribe, and deliver as part of health care.
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