What the World Eats

re: What the World Eats

bertrand — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 06:37:00 GMT

Hi guys. Have you seen a sudden surge in the number of healthcare portals and websites worldwide ? Wanted to share a lot about the latest trends in the online health portals and the online resources.

A new thing that I have been seeing is that all the health portals are providing yellow pages directory as well. Everyone lists down thousands of doctors and hospitals and most of the data records are either incomplete or wrong. What’s the use for such data when anyone can get it from online yellow pages within seconds. The idea is to make use of the data and then provide services to the patients like fixing appointments or getting discounts. The pull of a portal is not because the portal has a few hundred thousand doctors listed. The strength is in providing me only 10 doctors in my city but they should be good and recommendable doctors.

Another aspect which is commonly seen is the Symptom tracker. The health websites are linked to sites like Harvard medical school or Mayo Clinic. Again, I feel it is useless after trying atleast 5 such sites. The point is that I get even more confused when these symptom trackers throw up 5-10 possible causes of my problem. I tried sore throat and fever. The result generated included all diseases that can cause sore throat including Throat Cancer. Can you imagine !! I come for a simple thing like sore throat and I get Throat Cancer as the cause. Never to visit such sites again. Best is to either call or have live chat with a doctor. If not, atleast send an email and get a response from a real doctor and not through an automated tool.

Third item which is slightly troublesome is the static content. I see sites with content from all over the world on it. Why so much of effort when I can google out the best content from parent sites or I can go to sites like wikipedia for authentic content.

The trend that is missing is the concept of Wellness and Health, Personalization and Real time Medical Advice. Community Feeling. I have listed do

re: What the World Eats

pat4life — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 22:43:56 GMT

It's always interesting to me how much people spend on food. Actually, I think most people have no idea how much they spend. I keep track of everything I spend and separate out the food from the household goods. The first six months of this year, I spent an average of $232 a MONTH for my husband and me. We also entertain frequently. Our food includes any meals we eat out (usually once a week). I buy no processed food as it all contains preservatives which aggravates my husband's migratory arthritis. He stays pain-free on food I cook from scratch. We are certainly not deprived and buy items we could sure do without if necessary. I buy some organic as well. Seeing all the junk in these pictures nauseates me.

re: What the World Eats

savannahcat — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 07:16:19 GMT

They should have come to my house. I have a freshly butchured goat aging in the freezer right now.

You wont find much more then home grown/ locally grown meats and some produce here. Whole foods far number packaged/ processed foods in this house! -This applies to humans and animals under our roof.

re: What the World Eats

angelovearth — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 13:51:11 GMT

I loved this food trip around the world. Oh...only to be as happy as the family from Ecuador! All fresh foods in their abode.
All the soft drinks in everyones pictures really surprised me. I knew americans drink a lot of sodas, and I knew that in South America they consume Coke like crazy. Even the kids. The missing water bottles in the pictures don't really bother me. I have a private well and we only drink that water. Our state for some reason doesn't recycle plastic. So I'm happy to avoid throwing all those empty bottles away.
I've found the book "The Raw Food Detox Diet" by Natalia Rose. This was the book for me which changed my life.
Thank you so much, Dr. Mercola for these pictures! I loved them.

re: What the World Eats

Lilly — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 02:03:25 GMT

If you travel further south in America (Ecuador, Peru, Chile...) you'll realize that consumption of canned food, sodas and chips is not as abundant as in the US, and that might be the reason of the big smile in the faces of the family from Tingo (Ecuador)

re: What the World Eats

Qigong — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 02:57:05 GMT

Wonderful photos aren't they.... one thing that would be helpful is if the "price" for a week's worth of food were expressed differently.
Say in the number of hours necessary to work to get the food. Not only would this help with comparing countries with gross disparities between earning power but also comparisons could be made which include people who grow their own food. Still a set of photos which caught the attention of everyone I've shown it so far ....

re: What the World Eats

mcalderon777 — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 15:59:39 GMT

Thought I'd put in my two cents...
First of all, the picture representing a Mexican diet, obviously does not represent the average Mexican family, in Mexico. However, it is, unfortunately, fairly accurate for a Mexican family in the U.S. with the money to spend.
Secondly, as much as we are tempted to praise the diet, for example, of the family from Ecuador, I can tell you, it would not be difficult to become malnourished rather quickly.
My family occasionally travels to Mexico to visit my husband's family. He grew up extremely poor in rural Mexico. His family didn't have electricity until 1995, and they still don't have running water.
Anyway, when we go down, we start off eating a varied diet, with a bit more meat than what they'd normally eat, for example. After about three weeks or so, we start being a bit more frugal, and our diet becomes more conservative, more like what you would imagine from someone just buying basic needs.
Then something interesting happens....after a couple weeks we begin to lose our appetite. Dinner's ready, the food is good, intellectually you know you should eat, etc., but you simply do not want to eat. Taste bud fatigue is real, and I suspect is the reason, indigenous cultures adopt a Western so easily, yet suffer from it so terribly.
I think the diet portrayed by the Egyptian family would probably be more "doable" and less likely to result in rebound gluttony.
IMHO, anyway.

re: What the World Eats

Aqua — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 14:37:04 GMT

Look at the smiling faces on the family from Tingo! no idea where that is but I find it fascinating that they have so little (not even a kitchen it seems??) and smile so big. very inspiring

re: What the World Eats

messenger66 — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 10:29:21 GMT

Sorry but I think the prices per week are GREATLY exaggerated.
I live in Belgium with my wife and we spend about 80 Euros per week on food. And I assure you we are not starving - quite the opposite actually :(
The $500 per week for the German family is a total nonsense. I know that kids can eat a lot but looking at what they have there, $500 is unbelievable. (Unless they pay $20 per bottle of wine...).

re: What the World Eats

Cas_203 — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 05:26:21 GMT

I was surprised to see so many Lays, Coca Cola, and Kelloggs cereal in so many of the photos. I haven't drank soda pop in a few years, but even when I did, I hated Coca Cola (tasted like dirt compared to Pepsi). Of course it all tastes bad to me now. Looks more like advertisements for terrible food than it looks like educational photographs. I know americans eat really poorly, but I changed my eating habits many years ago, and am still 50 lbs. overweight. I have been fed awfully since birth. How many years does it take for the health benefits to show in the weight dept.? lol

There was even McDonald's in one of the photos!! GAG!!

re: What the World Eats

Sandy in Nevada — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 23:46:45 GMT

Thanks Dr. Mercola, I truly enjoyed this article. I keep going through the photos -- fascinating. I think I am going to purchase the book -- it would be good for my kids (and the rest of my family) to get a taste (bad pun) of what the rest of the world is doing. I am working bit by bit on my family's diet. The kids often complain that they don't get to eat what their friends eat (or as much (sodas!)). I wish I had known more about nutrition when they were little, because now I really have to work on them to limit their junk food. I often point out to them that they are lean, muscular and healthy and that many of their friends (sadly) are not.

re: What the World Eats

Chrisso — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 21:14:01 GMT

I always get strange looks from others in the supermarket when I go through the checkout because I'm not buying anything processed. I dish out the same look to others for the opposite reason. I feel like saying "what you never knew real food existed?"

re: What the World Eats

ryree — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 18:55:18 GMT

Its odd how the weight of the people corresponds to the amount of soda they have. The family from Mexico may have the most fruit and vegetables overall but unfortunately also the most soda. They also look to be the heaviest of all the other families. Even though some of them seem to have quite a bit of candy on the tables it seems that the soda has more to do with being overweight. That large amount of soda is consistent with all the people I know who are obese. I dont know one heavy person or child that doesnt have a 4+ cans- a- day soda habit.
I thought it was sad too that the Americans had the least amount of fruit and vegetables. It looks like a days serving for that size of a family.
I felt sorry for the family from Chad but I wonder how many overweight American's lives could be saved by sending them there for several months to live on that diet. Hmm sounds like a plot for new reality show.

re: What the World Eats

Drstrange — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 18:10:01 GMT

I wonder how many people understand that a vegetarian diet would feed the world seven times over. There isn't a lack of food, water, shelter, or clothing. There is only a lack of sharing.

re: What the World Eats

Immortal_health — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 17:56:12 GMT

Probably my favorite blog of the year!... very interesting.... if all those families just did what the chinese did and had a keosan style water filter they'd all be a lot better off:-P