Speaker Spotlight: Food as Medicine

Sep 15, 2023 8:00 AM ET

Part of the DNA of the WELL Summit is bringing our community closer, and one way to do that is getting to know more about our speakers–and staff–and what personally drives their commitment to the movement. In putting people first, we want to highlight their perspectives on place and space, as well as the role of well-being in their everyday life.

Meet Nancy Roman, CEO of Roman Leadership and former President and CEO of Partnership for a Healthier America (PHA)

Nancy will join A Conversation with Dr. Mark Hyman: Food as Medicine to facilitate a fireside chat.

What is the one thing you do every day that helps protect your health and well-being?
I swim in the ocean every day – even in the coldest weather – perhaps especially in the coldest weather.

What’s your favorite place—to work, relax, stay or be—and why?
On the ocean shores of Carolina. The older I am, the more important I realize being outside is, and the ocean is my happy place – in it or beside it.

What is the most pressing issue regarding food and health today?
That we eat too much ultra-processed food – rather than whole foods and that ultra-processed foods are much more prevalent throughout every corner of the built environment.

In your work leading the Partnership for a Healthier America, what policies helped drive the most significant change in food access?
Realizing that if we wanted health and nutrition outcomes, we couldn’t keep using reached metrics. In other words, we had to shift from pounds of food delivered to nutritious pounds of food delivered.

What is your hope for the future of food and nourishment?
My greatest hope is a national leader – ideally the President of the United States – will set a goal of improving public health.

Anything else you’d like to add?
Food can be a powerful tool for health and well being, but for people to leverage that fact we need dramatic changes to our built environment – from grocery stores to offices.

More about Nancy
Nancy Roman, CEO of Roman Leadership and former President and CEO of Partnership for a Healthier America (PHA), will lead Dr. Hyman in a fireside-chat conversation. As CEO of PHA, Nancy worked to create lasting, sustainable change and transform the culture of food and activity so that all children grow up healthy. Prior, Nancy was the President and CEO of the Capital Area Food Bank in Washington, D.C. Nancy sat on the leadership team of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), chaired WFP’s Investment Committee with more than $1 billion under management and served on the Nutrition Advisory Committee of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Among several professional accomplishments and commitments, Nancy also serves as a member of IWBI’s Governance Council.

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