Hippocrates, the founder of Western medicine, manifested an amazingly modern perspective in his treatise entitled On Airs, Waters, and Places that was published in the fifth century before the common era. Here are some excerpts:

“Whoever wishes to investigate medicine properly, should proceed thus: in the first place to consider the seasons of the year, and what effects each of them produces.”

“…We must also consider the qualities of the waters.”

“…and the mode in which the inhabitants live, and what are their pursuits, whether they are fond of drinking and eating to excess, and given to indolence, or are fond of exercise and labor, and not given to excess in eating and drinking.”