Doctors are prescribing an apple a day, or least some form of fruit and veg, to help keep patients away from life threatening conditions.
Up to 200 potential victims of heart disease are being given vouchers to exchange for produce as part of a programme designed to kickstart changes in their diets and lifestyles.
The experiment on the Wirral, north-west England, is also helping adults learn new shopping and cooking habits and introducing fitness regimes from gentle walking to state aided workouts in the gym.
The fruit and veg element costs less than £1 a day for 10 weeks, and is thought to be the first in the country to target adults at risk of ill health, although the government is already financing free fruit for primary school children in deprived areas. It is seeking to promote the value of eating five portions of fruit and vegetables a day.
The initiative is run by Health Links, a specialist service funded by local government and health authorities in a health action zone. It involves vouchers worth £6 a week being redeemed in local Co-op stores for fresh, tinned, frozen and dried food.
The patients must have been referred by GPs or practice nurses to an exercise and lifestyle programme, which are becoming increasingly common nationally. Anthony Cummins, a GP and clinical director of the Wallasey Heart Centre, said: "It is amazing the difference this can make, and it is cost effective. Changing behaviour happens gradually. There is a learning process.
"You need to support people, making something accesible and worthwhile. Doctors here can buy what they like and drive where they like. Not all our patients can."
Co-op local stores had been chosen as partners in the scheme because they were easier to reach than bigger, out-of-town competitors, and generally cheaper.
Colin Butler, from New Brighton, who has already completed one exercise programme, has lost three stone, and is down to 13st 4lb. He is now on the voucher scheme. He rarely ate fruit in his "pie and pint" days.
"Before, my fruit consisted of maybe an apple a month. Now I am into avocado, sweet potatoes, peas, beans and butter beans.
"Instead of a tin of stewed steak and six or seven slices of bread when I am hungry, I will have an apple or pear."
Mr Butler, 56, who is married with two teenage children, is on invalidity benefit because of chronic obstruction of the airways and other problems.
But he has radically reduced his medication, and wishes the NHS could still help fund his visits to the gym when the programme ends. His fruit and veg bill last week was nearer £15 than the £6 "on prescription".
There is increasing evidence that eating five portions of fruit and veg a day could cut deaths from heart disease, cancer and strokes by about a fifth, but recent surveys have indicated that one in five children eat none in a week and those that do eat an average of two portions a day.
