Affordable heart-friendly diets: from nutritional paternalism to balanced lifestyles
At the SME Connect & Herbalife webinar on “SMEs and the Safe Hearts Plan: Towards Affordable, Heart-Friendly Diets,” I argued that affordability in public health should not be reduced to price alone. A truly heart-friendly lifestyle depends on people’s ability to access, sustain and balance movement, nutrition, mental well-being and healthier daily routines. If obesity, cardiovascular diseases and NCDs are multifactorial, prevention must move beyond one-size-fits-all restrictions toward empowerment, innovation and balanced lifestyles. The discussion brought together distinguished experts and policymakers, including Prof. Adam Drewnowski, Amelie Baracat–Empereur, MEP Emanuela Ripa and Horst Heitz, around the future of affordable, heart-friendly and sustainable prevention policies in Europe.
Key takeaways
- Affordable does not simply mean cheap: it means sustainable, achievable and accessible over time.
- Diet comes from the ancient Greek diaita: a way of life, not merely a restrictive food regime.
- Obesity, cardiovascular diseases and NCDs are multifactorial problems that cannot be solved through single-nutrient policies alone.
- SMEs are essential to affordable prevention because they innovate, adapt quickly and remain close to communities and consumers.
- Europe should move from punitive and paternalistic nutrition policies toward empowerment, personalised prevention and balanced lifestyles.
When we hear the expression “affordable diets,” we usually think about price. We think about whether healthier food is cheap enough and whether consumers can buy it.
But affordability is broader than cost.
Affordable refers to something people are able to sustain, manage and carry forward over time. In this sense, cardiovascular prevention is not only about reducing prices. It is about making healthier lifestyles realistically achievable and accessible for ordinary citizens.
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The same reflection applies to the word diet itself. Diet comes from the ancient Greek diaita, meaning a way of life. Not simply a restrictive food regime, but a broader balance between food, movement, habits, body and mind.
This is also the deeper meaning of the Mediterranean diet, too often reduced to a list of foods. In reality, it is a method of balance based on moderation, variety, portions, frequency, movement and conviviality.
If obesity, cardiovascular diseases and non-communicable diseases are multifactorial, prevention cannot be reduced to one nutrient, one ingredient or one production process. These conditions emerge from the interaction of genetics, metabolism, physical inactivity, sleep deprivation, stress, socio-economic conditions, urban environments, culture and nutrition.
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For most of human history, human beings moved because survival required movement. In recent decades, however, the context has radically changed. Food availability increased, living conditions improved and life expectancy rose dramatically. At the same time, physical activity collapsed while calorie availability expanded.
This means the challenge today is not simply “what people eat.” It is the broader imbalance between energy intake, movement, stress, sleep, portions, frequency and lifestyle.
This is why prevention should focus more on positive determinants of health:
- movement,
- food literacy,
- sleep,
- mental balance,
- urban design,
- accessible physical activity,
- better nutritional quality,
- and healthier behavioural environments.
I call this positive nutrition within a broader balanced lifestyle approach.
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And this is where SMEs become essential.
Across the agri-food chain, SMEs innovate, adapt quickly to changing consumer needs, bring diversity to the market and remain deeply connected to local communities and territories. If Europe wants healthier diets to remain affordable and accessible, SMEs must be empowered rather than overburdened with excessive administrative complexity and poorly calibrated regulation.
Innovation is another crucial dimension of affordable prevention. Innovation in food systems, personalised nutrition, wearable technologies, AI-based health support, movement tracking and precision lifestyle tools can help citizens better understand and manage their own balance.
This is fundamentally an empowerment approach.
Empowerment means helping citizens become more capable: capable of understanding, choosing, balancing and sustaining healthier lifestyles over time.
Unfortunately, many public health debates continue to prioritise faster and more visible tools:
- taxes,
- warning labels,
- prescriptive front-of-pack systems,
- mandatory reformulation.
These policies may generate political visibility and some market changes. But changing markets does not automatically mean improving health outcomes. Evidence on durable reductions in obesity and cardiovascular diseases remains limited, while unintended consequences can include regressivity, food anxiety, reduced consumer trust and greater pressure on SMEs.
When policies fail to deliver expected results, the tendency is often to intensify them further through additional restrictions and stronger paternalism.
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But if the problem is complex, the solution cannot be simplistic.
Europe should move beyond nutritional paternalism and toward a more realistic, human-centred and empowering prevention model.
- Not fear-based prevention.
- Not one-size-fits-all prevention.
But balanced lifestyles supported by innovation, education, resilient food systems, empowered SMEs and citizens who are increasingly able, not simply increasingly controlled.
