# How important is a balanced diet, really?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-important-is-a-balanced-diet-really/400242>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [April 15, 2007, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-important-is-a-balanced-diet-really/400242 "2007-04-15T19:22:56Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 11

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**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\
**Post date:** [April 15, 2007, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-important-is-a-balanced-diet-really/400242/11 "2007-04-15T23:17:03Z")

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I’ll go first.

While not literally testing a “balanced” diet, the diet in the following three randomized control trials all included high fibre, low fat, high vegetables, and high fruit - so approaching, if not identical to, what I think a reasonable person would call “balanced”:

- [a low fat diet (with lots of fibre, veggies, and fruit) doesn’t reduce the development of colon cancer](http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/295/6/643)

- [a low fat diet (with lots of fibre, veggies, and fruit) doesn’t reduce the development of invasive breast cancer](http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/295/6/629)

- [a low fat diet (with lots of fibre, veggies, and fruit) doesn’t reduce the development of cardiovascular disease](http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/295/6/655)

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