Human Nutrition: Malnutrition and Diet

Humans have survived on a wide variety of foodstuffs over time supporting the flexibility of eating patterns in omnivores. Two goals of optimum nutrition include variety and moderation. Variety assures that humans avoid toxic levels of compounds in particular foods as no one food is eaten every day in large quantities. Variety also assures that humans obtain all the essential nutrients they need as no one food can provide all of these nutrients. Successful diets over time have allowed adequate digestion and absorption of nutrients, contained adequate calories for growth and development, and included foods with adequate protein quantity and quality. Malnutrition is most often found when foods are scarce, such as famine, or the staple food is too low in protein to sustain growth.