A three-course Udemy series built on WHO, ABS, AIHW and ICMR data helps people in both countries read labels, question food marketing and use everyday food choices as their first line of health, with bonus lectures on Indigenous Australian and Indian food traditions.
SYDNEY, Australia, 4 October 2026 – Worldwide, non-communicable diseases such as heart disease, Type 2 diabetes, stroke and cancer now cause three in four deaths. In Australia, two in three adults are overweight or obese, and fewer than one in twenty eat the recommended daily serves of both fruit and vegetables. In India, home to some of the oldest food traditions on earth, an estimated 101 million people were living with diabetes in 2021, with another 136 million at the prediabetes stage.
Communications and change practitioner, author and educator Dr. Aniisu K. Verghese, who has lived and worked in both countries, says one reason for these numbers is rarely discussed: most people were sold food long before anyone taught them about it. His response is Food as Your First Medicine, a three-course series on Udemy that gives general learners, families and community members in Australia, India and beyond a clear, practical grounding in how everyday food choices relate to health, healing and healthy ageing.
Two countries, one pattern
Australia
| 65.8% of adults are overweight or obese ABS National Health Survey 2022 | 4.2% of adults meet both the fruit and vegetable guidelines ABS National Health Survey 2022 | ~170,000 new cancer cases estimated in 2025, more than 460 a day AIHW, Cancer data in Australia |
India
| 101 million people estimated to be living with diabetes in 2021, up from 77 million in 2019 ICMR-INDIAB, Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology 2023 | 136 million more people living with prediabetes, a stage at which food choices matter most ICMR-INDIAB, Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology 2023 | 315 million people estimated to have high blood pressure, alongside 254 million with generalised obesity ICMR-INDIAB, Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology 2023 |
Global context: non-communicable diseases account for about 74% of all deaths worldwide (WHO), and roughly two in three deaths in India by WHO estimates. Sources: World Health Organization; Australian Bureau of Statistics; Australian Institute of Health and Welfare; Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR-INDIAB).
The gap between information and understanding
People in Australia and India alike are surrounded by food messaging: front-of-pack claims, health halos, shelf placement and packaging designed to influence what lands in the trolley or the shopping bag. Very little of it is designed to help people understand what they are actually eating, or how that connects to how they feel and how they age. Awareness, Dr. Verghese argues, tends to arrive after a diagnosis, when it is hardest to act on.
The series is built to close that gap before it becomes a medical one. It teaches learners to classify any food using the NOVA framework, decode label claims, understand how the gut, brain and immune system respond to what they eat, and turn the evidence into a personal, culturally grounded food plan they can sustain.
Three courses, three entry points
Each course stands alone, and together they move from understanding to application. Learners can start where their interest is, or work through all three in sequence:
- Course 1 – The Science of Diet & Healing: how food drives or prevents chronic illness, how to read the food environment (labels, additives and the NOVA system), the evidence behind therapeutic whole foods from Indian and global traditions, and how to build a personal 30-day food-as-medicine plan for an Australian or Indian kitchen. Includes a bonus lecture on meal planning for busy lives. View course
- Course 2 – Eating for Longevity: what the world’s longest-lived communities, the Blue Zones, have in common, what research says about food and the biology of ageing, the ageing gut and traditional fermented foods such as idli, dahi and chaas, and eating for muscle, bone and metabolic health after 40. Includes a bonus lecture on separating evidence-based supplements from wellness noise. View course
- Course 3 – Eating to Heal: condition-specific modules on diabetes and blood sugar, heart health, cancer prevention and mental health, grounded in landmark research such as the PREDIMED, DiRECT and SMILES trials, and with Australian and Indian dietary contexts side by side, and designed to make learners informed participants in conversations with their own health team. Includes a bonus lecture on building a food-as-medicine culture at home. View course
Why this series: a personal reason, and a professional one
For Dr. Verghese, the series began close to home. Over the years he has watched people around him, among colleagues at work, in his community and within his own family, fall ill without understanding what was happening in their bodies, largely because nobody had ever explained it to them in plain terms.
His professional background sharpened that concern. Dr. Verghese began his career in advertising, marketing and communications, and understands how products are designed, positioned and sold to consumers, and how habits formed early in life are cultivated into loyalties that last for decades. Everyday food choices are shaped by that machinery long before anyone reads a nutrition label. He wants to put the same understanding to work for the consumer.
The third strand is education. Dr. Verghese is a third-generation educator who has taught across continents, and he has seen that people learn best when complex subjects are made practical, visual and relevant to their own lives and food cultures. As founder of Friends for Life, a not-for-profit focused on road safety and injury prevention, he has also seen first-hand how community awareness can change outcomes.
Dr. Verghese designed the series with two audiences in mind at once, Australians and Indians, because he has lived in both worlds. In Australia, many South Asian families move between two dietary contexts, while in India traditional food knowledge now sits alongside a fast-growing packaged-food market and one of the largest diabetes burdens in the world. The research on both, he says, is compelling and underserved.
“Most of us were sold food long before anyone taught us about it. I have seen people close to me, at work, in my community and in my own family, become unwell without ever knowing what they were dealing with, simply because no one had helped them understand it. I know from my years in advertising and marketing how food gets sold to us and how habits get built early and kept for life. Having lived in Australia and India, I see the same story in both: strong food traditions, rising disease, and too little understanding in between. I come from a family of educators, and I believe awareness is the first step. These courses are my way of giving people the understanding I wish more of them had earlier.”
— Dr. Aniisu K. Verghese
Food traditions, culture and access
Alongside the core lectures, the series includes bonus lectures on Indigenous Australian and Indian food traditions, food waste and food equity. They reflect the view that healthy eating is shaped by culture, community, cost and access, and not only by nutrition facts. Learners explore Australian Indigenous foods such as Kakadu plum and wattleseed, India’s tribal and traditional food systems, and why food waste and food inequity are health issues as well as environmental and social ones. India alone wastes an estimated 78 million tonnes of food a year, according to the UN Environment Programme, even as many of its people go hungry.
Who the series is for
- Individuals and families who want a clearer, calmer understanding of food and health
- Adults over 40 and people with a family history of diet-related conditions who want to understand their risk
- Learners in India and in the Indian diaspora who want evidence-based food education rooted in their own food culture
- South Asian Australians and other culturally and linguistically diverse communities navigating two food worlds
- Carers, community leaders, volunteers and educators looking for accessible discussion material
- Anyone curious about how food, culture and wellbeing connect
About Dr. Aniisu K. Verghese
Based in Sydney, Australia, Dr. Aniisu K. Verghese is a change management and communications practitioner, consultant, author and educator with over 25 years of experience across organisations including Tesco, Fidelity Investments, Sabre and Accenture. He operates under the Intraskope brand and has been writing on internal communications since 2006. He is the author of three books, including Internal Communications: Insights, Practices and Models, Get Intentional and Inclusive Internal Communications, and has spoken on four continents. His recognition includes the IABC Asia-Pacific Communicator of the Year 2022 and LinkedIn Top Voice 2023. His Udemy courses span communication, personal branding, workplace skills and food education.
Availability
All three courses are available now on Udemy:
Course 1: https://www.udemy.com/course/food-as-your-first-medicine-the-science-of-diet-healing/
Course 2: https://www.udemy.com/course/food-as-your-first-medicine-eating-for-longevity/
Course 3: https://www.udemy.com/course/food-as-your-first-medicine-eating-to-heal/
Media contact
Dr. Aniisu K. Verghese
Important information: The Food as Your First Medicine courses are educational and are not a substitute for professional medical or dietetic advice, diagnosis or treatment. Learners with a health condition, or who take medication, should speak with their doctor or an accredited practising dietitian before changing their diet.
