Misconception 1: Medicinal and food are the same, so all foods can treat chronic diseases.
The fundamental difference between food, health supplements, and drugs lies in their different "efficacy".
Foods have a balanced nature and contain fewer medicinal components, which makes them suitable for daily consumption. If a certain food causes significant changes in blood lipids and blood pressure after a few days, can it be consumed regularly? Can it be consumed excessively? In fact, the more obvious the "effect" of a food, the more careful we need to be with it. We should not consume it excessively or consume it inappropriately for our constitution. Rice, noodles, vegetables, and apples can be consumed by everyone precisely because of their balanced nature and lack of strong "physiological regulation" effects. The so-called dietary health improvement usually takes a long time to show significant results, and rarely has an immediate effect within a few days.
Health supplements are often concentrated products of various nutrients and medicinal ingredients in food. They have a stronger ability to alter the body's functions and are not subject to the constraints of other food components. If used correctly, they can be beneficial to health. However, if used incorrectly, they can have side effects.
For example, tofu contains soy isoflavones, but it is suitable for people of all ages. Soy isoflavone capsules, on the other hand, should not be consumed casually by children and men, and not everyone is suitable, even for middle-aged and elderly women.
Drugs have a stronger efficacy and a greater ability to alter the body's metabolism. Their significance lies in their short-term effectiveness. If a drug is taken for a week or two with no effect, it loses its value. Therefore, taking the wrong medication or the wrong dosage is a terrible thing.
Many people often ask me: I can't cure my illness with Chinese medicine or Western medicine, so what food can I eat to cure it? This expectation itself is wrong. Because ordinary food does not have such strong efficacy, unless it is consumed for a long time. I am not denying that dietary adjustments can improve many diseases, but I want to say that dietary health improvement requires long-term efforts. However, modern people are impatient and probably cannot wait for one or two months, let alone a lifetime of health preservation.
Misconception 2: As long as it is a dietary therapy, it is safe and non-toxic.
Many people are enthusiastic about "dietary therapy" because they consider it safe and acceptable psychologically. However, the so-called "medicinal and food dual-use" food has therapeutic effects precisely because it contains a significant amount of medicinal components. Whether it is food or medicine, as long as the amount of medicinal components reaches a certain level, it becomes toxic. This is the basic principle of toxicology: dosage determines toxicity.
Foods are safe when consumed in normal quantities, but when consumed excessively, the medicinal components in them reach a certain level and they become drugs. For example, drinking two liang (about 100g) of green bean soup every day is considered normal food consumption. However, drinking three jin (about 1500g) of water boiled with green beans becomes a drug because it is 15 times more concentrated.
Another example is niacin and nicotinamide, which are originally B vitamins. They are normally consumed in doses of a dozen milligrams per day. However, as a treatment for controlling blood lipids, they are consumed in grams, which is tens of times higher than the normal dietary amount. At this point, they have noticeable side effects.
Even water can cause death if consumed excessively, not to mention the toxin solanine in raw eggplants or the toxin produced when potatoes sprout. When consuming large amounts of raw eggplants, it is as dangerous as eating sprouted potatoes.
Therefore, the claim that "dietary therapy is always safe and non-toxic" is not valid.
Misconception 3: The same dietary therapy can be used for everyone.
Many self-proclaimed experts like to pretend to be traditional Chinese medicine practitioners and talk about traditional health preservation and dietary therapy. In fact, real traditional Chinese medicine practitioners prescribe medicine after identifying the individual's constitution, and they also carefully adjust the compatibility of different medicines to balance the hot and cold properties. They would never prescribe the same formula to everyone, as the "masters" do. Just this point alone is enough to determine that they are not qualified Chinese medicine practitioners.
From a nutritional perspective, it is necessary to identify individuals' physiological and nutritional conditions and arrange a diet plan based on their specific circumstances. Some people should consume less red meat, while others are suitable for consuming more. Some people are suitable for consuming more oats, while others are not. If a nutritionist recommends the same diet plan to everyone, it can only be said that they are not qualified nutritionists.
Misconception 4: Nutrition is the study of dietary therapy.
Due to the limited understanding of nutrition by the general public, many people think that nutrition is the study of dietary therapy. Some time ago, when I went to Shenzhen to give a lecture with the theme of "Scientific Diet", I found that the organizers changed the title to "Talk about Dietary Therapy" without my consent. I said, nutrition is not dietary therapy, let alone a study of folk remedies for treating diseases.
Dietary therapy is one of the traditional Chinese medical treatments, which takes the form of diet, but it does not reject the addition of various medicinal ingredients. From the books on dietary therapy, many of them involve the addition of traditional Chinese medicine ingredients, or at least the use of food that has dual medicinal and dietary properties. As for chicken soup or rice, they are mainly used as carriers.
Domestic and foreign dietary therapy restaurants also add various traditional Chinese medicine ingredients to achieve their effects. Not consuming any medicinal ingredients and relying solely on long-term daily diet to improve diseases, although advocated domestically and internationally, usually takes a longer time to show effects and is no longer the quick-acting dietary therapy that people expect.
Nutrition belongs to preventive medicine. It mainly focuses on maintaining health through balanced nutritional and health-promoting components, and reducing the risk of various diseases. Nutrition also focuses on controlling chronic diseases through diet and lifestyle adjustments, such as how to control blood sugar and blood lipids. If done well, it may reverse disease indicators in the long term, reduce the dosage of medication, or even stop taking medication. However, these dietary adjustments do not rely on one or two types of food, and they are completely different from folk remedies for treating diseases.
Misconception 5: Chronic diseases can be cured with folk remedies.
According to Western medicine, chronic diseases are multifactorial and cannot be cured for life. This statement seems objective but not as pleasing as the idea of a remedy that can cure diabetes forever. Therefore, once people hear that a certain medicine can cure diabetes, there will always be someone eager to believe it, rushing to be fooled, even though experts in the field can tell immediately that it is a scam.
The same goes for dietary matters. Whether it is diabetes or high blood lipids, they are largely caused by diet, and they can indeed be significantly improved through dietary methods. However, this is completely different from folk remedies for treating diseases.
Diseases caused by diet, such as diabetes and fatty liver, are all the result of long-term nutritional imbalances. How can we expect them to be cured with one type of food in just ten days or so? To solve these problems, it is necessary to comprehensively change dietary habits, balance nutrition, increase exercise, adjust lifestyles, and eliminate the causes of the diseases. As long as we can adhere to a healthy lifestyle, these "diet-induced diseases" will naturally improve gradually.
