Jaap Seidell

At a glance

• Jaap Seidell is a Dutch nutrition scientist and author. Since November 2024 he has been professor emeritus at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, where he headed the Department of Nutrition and Health.
• His research focuses on diet, lifestyle and obesity, with an emphasis on prevention and on how the environment makes healthy behaviour easier or harder.
• He has advised the World Health Organization and Dutch governments, among others, and argues for measures such as a sugar tax and restrictions on junk-food advertising aimed at children.
• He was involved in the Dutch Youth at a Healthy Weight approach, in which municipalities make schools, sport and neighbourhoods healthier together.
• With psychologist Jutka Halberstadt he wrote Het hongerige brein (2019, ‘The hungry brain’), on why we overeat in an environment full of temptation. He is a regular voice in the Dutch media.
• For longevity, he matters because he sees a healthy weight as a shared responsibility, not just an individual choice.
• Takeaway: make healthy choices easy in your own surroundings, for example by not keeping sweets at home and having water within reach.