How often have we heard this age-old adage? But how much of this saying is actually true and do we behave as if we have taken heed of this saying?

On an average day, we treat our body as a dumping ground for all kinds of food. While some of the food we eat may be nutritious, most of what we eat is driven by our taste buds and convenience rather than by what our body actually requires.

Our body needs fuel to build, run, maintain and repair itself and its fuel is the food we eat. The quality of the food that we provide our bodies determines how well our body is able to function or how it begins to malfunction by manifesting diseases.

One clue to how important a nutritious diet is for us, lies in Barker’s Hypothesis (1986). David Barker, looking at historical data from England, noticed that regions with high infant mortality rates in the 1920s had more deaths from heart disease in the 1970s. Therefore, Barker hypothesized that what a pregnant woman eats and the quality of that nutrition can affect how the genes are expressed in the foetus/ the unborn child

Research on populations that faced acute malnutrition during pregnancy, such as the Dutch during the Dutch Hunger Winter of 1944 also provided corroborating data. Children who were in their mother’s wombs during this famine had higher rates of obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases in adult life. Large scale studies in non-western populations have also confirmed Barker’s Hypothesis. Data from remote Aboriginal populations and studies from India have also confirmed the same pattern of diseases in later life in people whose diet was restricted when they were in their mothers’ wombs.

This effect is known as Foetal Origins of Adult Diseases (FOAD) or Developmental Origins of Adult Diseases (DOAD). Faced with adverse conditions in the womb, the foetus remodels itself, altering the structure and function of various organs such as the pancreas or kidneys to help in the overall survival of the foetus, but this has the earlier mentioned disadvantages in later life.

The growing foetus in a deprived environment ‘learns’ to slow down metabolism, alter organ development and conserve fat by altering the expression of genes without affecting the gene sequence itself. This is known as epigenetics. When it (foetus/child) is exposed high energy food in later life, these ‘adaptations’ backfire and lead to metabolic disease. This is particularly the case when in later life when the child is exposed to a (energy rich diet) western diet. .

If just a few months of nutrition received in the mother’s womb can affect how our genes function and our disease risk factor in later life, what are the implications for our lifelong nutrition habits on our genes and overall health throughout the rest of our lives? Though we are not considered as readily malleable in our later lives as during our foetal life, nutrition nevertheless plays an important role.

We go through many important phases in life such as puberty, adulthood, mid-life or menopause in the case of women and old age. The body’s and mind’s functions are affected in all of these stages and the body needs nutritious food to cope with these changes. If nutritious food can affect foetal development, it is equally necessary in these later stages of life. In fact, the food we eat is important not just at various life stages but during every single day of our lives. Our everyday choices matter.