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Hey, Hippocrates: Food isn’t medicine. It’s just food

The concept that food is medicine, something that Hippocrates supposedly espoused, does a disservice to both food and medicine.

Hippocrates supposedly said, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” I disagree. Food is not medicine.

I can hear people saying, “But, Dylan, you have type 1 diabetes and a Ph.D. in human nutritional sciences. Surely you of all people know that food has a powerful impact on health?”

I do. But that still doesn’t make food medicine.

Hippocrates’s maxim is — one that many. It is also frequently used by reputable people trying to promote the importance of healthy diets, but they should shelve it so they aren’t confused with the quacks.

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