EDITORIAL Nutrition and prevention of chronic diseases: a unifying eco-nutritional strategy

Increasing efforts are being made to address, in public health policy (PHP), both the persistence of nutritional dep-rivation in economically disadvantaged communities, and the increase in so-called "chronic disease " (abdominal obe-sity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, certain cancers, osteo-porosis, arthritides, and inflammatory disease) in communi-ties at all stages of economic development. The problems in the "chronic disease " descriptor are that its origins may be as early as conception, rather than during the postnatal ifes-pan, or even in previous generations; it may appear abruptly or slowly; and it may be amenable to environmental nd behavioural intervention well into its course and in older age groups. It is also not necessarily "non-communicable", a qualifier often used for "chronic disease " (chronic non-com-municable disease or CNCD) and often has inflammatory features, for example the inflammatory marker C-reactive protein is a predictor of macrovascular disease and ischaemic events can, in part, be prevented in the affected by influenzal vaccination. The nexus between immunodeficien-cy, inflammatory processes and nutritional status which is characteristic of "infective " and food-borne illness, is also more and more evident in "chronic disease". It may be more helpful to consider "chronic disease " as "eco-disease " wit