Nurturing Healthy Lifestyles in A World of Metabolic Diseases

Anastasija Petrovic
5 min readFeb 4, 2021

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In a lunch bag, most students hold healthy, well-prepared food, but how can it be ensured that the people not a part of the “most” also have access to the same healthy food?

The human agenda not until long ago consisted of tackling famine, disease and war. Today, instead of famine, we’re looking at metabolic diseases and disorders.

A metabolic disorder occurs when the metabolic process fails and allows the body to have too much or too little of the necessary substances required to remain healthy. Our bodies are very susceptible to metabolism errors, and therefore these disorders/diseases are common.

Setting It Straight: What is healthy?

When thinking of healthy food, we are looking at foods that constitute a diet that maintains the body’s overall health, whether through macronutrients or appropriate calories. Together, this notion of balance constitutes a lifestyle: balancing between nutrition, physical activity and sleep.

With the components intertwined into the definition of a healthy lifestyle, it seems pretty standard and fundamental, but not everyone has equal opportunity.

Accessibility is all about providing equal opportunity to indulge. By utilizing youth entrepreneurship, leveraging supermarket partnerships, and keeping informed on alternatives, we can access healthy food.

Space for Youth Entrepreneurship

Looking at it right now, it can be inferred that entrepreneurship is cultivated at young ages. Entrepreneurship flourishes when bright minds come together, like those in, for example, in Business Clubs or TKS.

For instance, suppose an organization would utilize youth entrepreneurship to raise money for community food banks. In that case, money could be more sustainably distributed through a possible funding opportunity. The question that remains is that of possible youth engagement.

Questions To Still Have

How can this proposed model maintain potential?

Through the interconnectedness with the student body and student benefits like volunteer hours. The same volunteer hours that are a requirement for a high school diploma. Let’s say that a student would start seeing traditional artifacts at weekly entrepreneurship get together and would, with that money, fund a local healthy food drive, like that in Save On Foods. If we utilize the intricate minds of youth minds, we can adequately fund healthy food drives.

Leveraging Local Business Partnerships

Food is the building block of every cell, and the suppliers of nutritionally adequate foods are supermarkets like the local Denny’s Farm Market. This local business supplies fresh produce, grain, protein products, and a company-wide healthy food drive every June.

Additionally, this local business promotes youth engagement with the filled bulletin boards full of “High School Appropriate” volunteering opportunities, business classes and partnership applications.

Following the notion of funding youth entrepreneurship programs, partnerships with local healthy food grocers, like Denny’s Farm Market (a local Vancouver Business), could benefit both sides. On one side, company to community relations would improve, Denny’s would be in the talk and for students, it would allow for the allocation of resources and a steady source of healthy food input. The application of programs to provide accessible nutrition is a community job, as it takes a village to produce food and a village to ensure fair food accessibility.

Keeping Informed on Cellular Agriculture

For every one hundred animals, one carnivore, also known as a human being, is fed. The surge in animal product (one of the sources of protein) prices explains the affordability of purchasing adequate protein sources. Protein comes in all shapes and sizes; cellular agriculture looks at this notion. Cellular agriculture isn’t just technical; it’s changing how the world perceives the need for animal-based protein.

We do not need animal products. When it comes down to people consuming 100 animals for a piece of meat, possibly 1–3 times a day, there has to be an alternative. There is no sustainability. No balance. It is up to consumers to spread the word about this discovery.

Organizations like Agriculture Canada Community (CAC) educate communities of the possibility and situations already existing, like, for instance, Beyond Meat. The new piece of the puzzle, just off the press, cellular agriculture has great potential. To make the potential possible, education of implementation and general information needs to be widespread.

Redefining Approaches to Accessibility

Accessible doesn’t need to mean free; it needs to mean access to equal opportunities. The structures in place preventing people from accessing these entities require the protocol all systems have; procedure and education. The people holding a delicious sandwich need to understand their privileged perspective and help introduce youth entrepreneurship, local business partnerships and education of the alternatives/possible solutions.

In a world of McDonald’s and Burger King, the rewards, as people see them, aren’t rewards in nature. The real rewards are the nutritionally appropriate foods (home-cooked dinners). Therefore, it is up to us to ensure these rewards are open access by fostering the community.

TL;DR

  • The human agenda not until long ago consisted of tackling famine, disease and war. Today, instead of famine, we’re looking at metabolic diseases and disorders.
  • A metabolic disorder occurs when the metabolic process fails and allows the body to have too much or too little of the necessary substances required to remain healthy.
  • We can utilize communal youth entrepreneurship to raise funds for local food drives.
  • Local grocery businesses provide the most supplies, and by leveraging partnerships into the process we can power the youth entrepreneurship program.
  • When it comes down to people consuming 100 animals for a piece of meat, possibly 1–3 times a day, there has to be an alternative.
  • It is crucial to keep informed of novel approaches to alternatives or solutions like the field of cellular agriculture to best adapt it in the future!

Ciao, I’m Anastasija, a 15 y/o interested in the intersection between bioinformatics and biotechnology! Check out my website, connect with me on LinkedIn and follow me on Twitter!

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Anastasija Petrovic

I’m Anastasija, a 17-year-old interested in the intersection between biotechnology and bioinformatics. I also write about mindsets and emerging technologies!