Two thousand years ago, Hippocrates said, "Let your food be your medicine, and your medicine be your food." Was he anticipating the advent of functional foods? And, will functional foods follow the difficult path supplements are now experiencing?
From mom’s ringing endorsement to the FDA’s first food-specific health claim, oats are well established as an important component to a healthful diet. In fact, beta-glucan, the active ingredient in oat soluble fiber, has been shown to provide significant heart-health benefits, such as lower cholesterol levels and reduced hypertension.
Lactobacilli and bifidobacteria are both beneficial microflora naturally present in the intestinal tract, and studies show they promote enhanced gut function and stability, improve protection against infection and cancers, reduce blood cholesterol, enhance immune response and more.
A health claim petition requesting the FDA allow use of eight dietary supplement health claims associating chromium picolinate supplementation with reduced risk of insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes and related disease conditions has been submitted.