The nutritional rationale and its influence on the medicalization of food in Brazil/A racionalidade nutricional e sua influencia na medicalizacao da comida no Brasil

• Published in: Ciência & saude coletiva Vol. 22; no. 2; pp. 447 - 456
• Main Authors: Viana, Marcia Regina, Neves, Alden Santos, Camargo, Kenneth Rochel, Jr, Prado, Shirley Donizete, Mendonca, Andre Luis Oliveira
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: Portuguese
• Published: Associacao Brasileira de Pos-Graduacao em Saude Coletiva - ABRASCO 01-02-2017
• Subjects: Brasil
• ISSN: 1413-8123; 1678-4561
• DOI: 10.1590/1413-81232017222.25432015

This is an article based on a theoretical and conceptual reflection on the concept of nutritional rationale and its relation to the medicalization of food. The objective is to highlight the influence that eating habits suffer from the alleged condition of supremacy that science holds, which proclaims the need for health in its discourse. Based on the assumption of nutritional rationale as an eating obligation, it is assumed that it is responsible for the process of the medicalization of food. This is achieved by disqualifying the individual from self-care in terms of food, instilling the idea of the risk that comes from supposedly inadequate eating habits and fomenting the idea that to eat well is to eat accordingly to scientific principles. The dissemination of scientific studies and the results of research to the general public reveals the part played by eating in promoting a state of "better" health at the expense of the existentiality of food and its role as the aggregator in intersubjective relations.