As commutes take longer and more women work outside the home, people have less time and energy to prepare their own meals. Encouraging and pushing that trend are the many advertisements for readymade foods, many of which have little if any nutritional value while being high in fat, sugar, salt, and calories. The change in diet is accompanied by a similarly dramatic change in physical activity patterns. Traffic and the fear of strangers cause people to avoid walking and cycling, and instead use inactive modes of travel. But as people consume more soft drinks, fast food, and junk food and get less exercise, rates of various diseases that are not contagious (known as non-communicable diseases or NCDs) continue to rise. Those diseases include heart disease, stroke, cancer, and diabetes, and they are taking a rising toll in the poorer as well as richer countries. Global successes in tobacco control will be of little use in reducing early deaths if the other major causes of NCDs (which in addition to tobacco, unhealthy diet, and lack of physical activity also include excessive use of alcohol) continue to rise. On the bright side, promoting healthier diets and lifestyles has significant additional benefits in terms of how our cities would look and how our lives would be improved. HealthBridge works on reducing NCD risk factors through our NCD and liveable cities programs; I will discuss in a later blog the synergies among these activities.