People should eat beans or tofu every day, and fish twice a week. Do you eat more than three pieces of fruit and vegetables like carrots, sweet potatoes, broccoli and peppers more than five times a day? Altogether, doctors advise eating 30 kinds of food a day. If that sounds a tall order, just take one tablet of multivitamin-mineral formula. It is the cheapest health insurance.

Drink two shots of alcohol

Only two shots of an alcoholic drink are good for your health, whether it is soju or beer. If you habitually drink until you are drunk, alcohol is absorbed in the body faster and faster and the brain will develop resistance, so you have to drink more and more to get drunk. And habitual heavy drinking has inevitable side effects like memory loss, neural damage, stomach ulcers and obesity. It also increases the chances of a stroke. Temperance in drinking is also necessary to prevent car accidents.

Don’t miss a meal

Don’t miss breakfast. If you don’t eat breakfast, the part of the brain controlling appetite gets excited and makes you physiologically unstable. As a result, you cannot concentrate and think straight, and you will overeat at lunch and dinner to make up for the lack of energy. Such irregular dietary habits cause gastrointestinal diseases. Sudden voracity causes the blood sugar level to soar and insulin to pour out. The excessive secretion of insulin is a cause of obesity and diabetes, since it stimulates the creation of fat. Eat three square meals, but not until you are too full.

Consider smoking a synonym of death

Your blood pressure and pulse return to the normal level 20 minutes after you stop smoking. Eight hours later, the oxygen concentration in the blood returns to the recommended level. Twenty-four hours later, the lung starts cleaning phlegm and chemical residue of cigarettes. Forty-eight hours later, accumulated nicotine leaves your body. You don’t smell bad any more, and you regain your sense of taste. If you quit smoking for 72 hours, you breathe more easily and feel invigorated. Five years later, the probability of heart disease decreases more than 50 percent. Staying away from cigarettes for 10 years reduces the probability of lung cancer by more than 50 percent.

Eat fruit and vegetables

Linus Pauling, the Nobel laureate for chemistry, claims that humans once had the ability to create Vitamin C in the body. However, they lost it since they began farming and eating vegetables and fruit grown in the fields. Unfortunately, that means that humans must eat as much vegetables and fruit as possible. Eat variously colored fruit and vegetables more than five times a day.

Control stress

Resolve stress, the cause of many diseases, with the power of positive thinking. Staying in an upbeat mood helps digestion and blood circulation. Laugh out loud more than three times a day, call friends frequently, praise people and thank everyone. You can also resolve stress through meditation, having a lifetime hobby or spending more time with your family.

Sleep more than seven hours

For a deep sleep, go to bed and get up at a regular time. If you get up early, you can sleep early. Don’t sleep late during the weekends. Intense exercise at night, watching TV and computer work make you sleepless. Drinking coke, coffee and alcohol, and smoking also keep you awake. Bask in sunshine during the daytime. It helps the secretion of melatonin, which controls the physiological clock.

Move

If you can’t spare time to exercise, just move around a lot; it can increase the consumption of calories by up to 20 percent. Use stairs instead of the elevator and stand up while watching TV. Walk around the room while talking on the phone. Move away from the desk and stretch your body frequently. Get off the bus one stop before your destination and walk there. Just doing equipment-free gymnastics every morning is very effective for good health.

Brush your teeth

The condition of teeth is directly related to the health of the whole body. A study shows that neglect of paradontitis increases the probability of a stroke, since harmful materials and germs that cause inflammation move along blood vessels and spread throughout the body, leading to blood vessel inflammation and artery blockage. Simple brushing prevents all these health woes. Also floss your teeth and gargle.

Weigh yourself frequently

Humans have a gene that has been passed on from the Stone Age. It was designed to help people store energy efficiently to survive the Ice Age and famines. But it makes it hard for modern people in the age of affluence to avoid diseases caused by bad lifestyle habits. Check your weight constantly to prevent becoming overweight. However, a sudden weight decrease can also be a sign of cancer or a thyroid disorder.

Have a medical checkup once a year

Get a stomach endoscopy every year, since more than 80 percent of 30-somethings suffer from chronic gastritis. People in their 40s are advised to have an ultrasound scan to check the liver, and various examinations to diagnose diseases resulting from bad lifestyle like cancer, hypertension and diabetes. A colon endoscopy is essential for those over 50. People in this age bracket should take extra precautions against stroke and heart disease. People older than 60 years should be careful of respiratory diseases. Remember the phone numbers of a nearby hospital and family members you can call in an emergency.

Wash your hands

Washing hands frequently with soap can prevent more than 60 percent of infectious diseases like cold, flu, cholera, dysentery, food poisoning and eye diseases. Wash your hands after returning home, using the toilet, touching a pet and cooking fish and meat -- and of course before eating or cooking.

(englishnews@chosun.com )