Food: Medicine for Travel

Not only does food provide energy and nutrients to help our bodies run on a daily basis, but it contains nature’s cure to many ailments you may experience while traveling. There is a growing body of knowledge that supports the use of whole foods in the maintenance of health and the treatment of illness.

Did you know herbs and spices can offer many of the same benefits found in fresh fruits and vegetables AND help remedy common travel-related sicknesses? For example, basil has been shown to help fight colds, diarrhea, and kidney disease. Unlike the pills and syrups found in your medicine cabinets, these natural “medicines” promote the healing process, rather than suppress symptoms. Spices are the seasonings for food that come from the bark, buds, fruit or flower parts, roots, seeds or stems of various aromatic plants and trees. Herbs are the leafy parts of woody plants.

Nature is doing her best each moment to make us well. She exists for no other end. Do not resist. With the least inclination to be well, we should not be sick. - Henry David Thoreau

























Student Ambassadors should look for these foods and seasonings during travel to help combat minor illnesses:











Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food. - Hippocrates

We can all take a lesson from Hippocrates and improve our health during travel through natural food sources. Explore, learn, and live well!



Warmly, 

April D. Davis, RD, CD, ACSM CES

[Image Credits - Fresh Basil: www.happybellyfood.wordpress.com; Dried Turkish Apricots: http://www.driedfruits.com.cn; The Power of Bell Peppers: www.gayot.com]