Mediterranean Diet: Worth Taking a Second Look
It's not terribly sexy.
As diets go, it floats under the radar. It's not promoted heavily by any celebrities and if it were, it wouldn't get much press anyway. It's been permutated, repackaged and resold by diet book authors, and it quietly goes about its business preventing disease, prolonging life, cutting heart disease risk, dodging type II diabetes, curbing Alzheimer's and fighting allergies among other health-boosting attributes.
The latest on the Mediterranean diet is its impact on cancer, with a recent study showing a 12% reduced risk by implementing just a couple of Mediterranean-inspired easy-to-make changes.
Adding olive oil to the diet cut the risk by 9% and eating less red meat while adding beans, peas and lentils cut the risk by 12%
The study featured 26,000 Greek men and is published in the British Journal of Cancer.
Dr Dimitrios Trichopoulos, who led the study, said "Adjusting one's overall dietary habits towards the traditional Mediterranean pattern had an important effect."
It is very difficult to pinpoint what is responsible for the health effects of any particular diet - there are just too many variables. It's probably safe to assume that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts when it comes to the traditional Mediterranean diet.
Some Bits on the Mediterranean Diet
- The traditional Mediterranean diet is rich in fruits, vegetables, and olive oil and encourages moderate consumption of wine.
- The diet promotes moderate amounts of poultry and fish and advises eating red meat and sweets sparingly.
- The diet varies in its fat content, from under 25% to over 35% of total calories
- Emphasis on minimally processed foods and seasonal produce
- The traditional Mediterranean diet truly is a way of life in those who value the tradition. People who eat this way generally take the time to prepare and enjoy the food and see food as celebration. This mindset is absolutely crucial to any dietary regime but seems to be prominent in the Mediterranean countries.
- Mediterranean regions are experiencing more obesity as they gravitate towards convenience-based westernized lifestyles.
A Bid to Save the Mediterranean Diet
The Italian Parliament has appealed to Unesco (the UN's educational and cultural arm) to save the Mediterranean diet by recognizing it as part of the world's heritage. The initiative is also backed by Spain, Greece and Morocco. All four countries agree that the diet is being threatened by the spread of fast food and convenience foods.
Hopefully this movement gains some publicity and helps make people of those countries (and the rest of the world) aware of the importance of preserving traditions that promote healthy living.
Via: Oldways
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yeah you are spot on. It is really interesting because although people in the Mediterranean are largely overweight, the have some of the lowest instances of cancers and heart disease in the world. Olive oil is definitely key. Obviously is very high in calories but has some tremendous health value. The same can be said for Eskimos who have very unhealthy diets but due to thier extremely high fish intake (with fish oils high in Omega 3), again have low heart disease rates.
ReplyHow does a UN designation save the Mediterranean diet?
If people want to eat Big Macs with Red Bull shooters, how is a UN or gov't sponsored program going to stop them?
Unless they are going to consider putting massive taxes on the foods that they consider to be un-Mediterranean.
I love the Mediterranean diet. I try to get all my clients on a version of it to achieve a long lasting healthy body weight.
But how do you legislate poor eating?
How do you legislate stupid?
ReplyI blogged here - http://healthhabits.wordpress.com/2008/05/30/mediterranean-diet-prevents-type-2-diabetes/ - about a study, published in the British Medical Journal that concluded that people who eat a Mediterranean style diet are 83% less likely than the rest of the general population to develop type 2 diabetes.
ReplyYou're so right when you say "People who eat this way generally take the time to prepare and enjoy the food and see food as celebration." My family is Mediterranean and food is totally a celebration - and it's always freshly prepared.
ReplyMike, thanks for brining this to your readers' attention. I read and analyzed the original study you cite, and blogged about it here:
http://advancedmediterraneandiet.com/blog/?p=53
We've known for some time now that the traditional Mediterranean diet - I'm not talking about The Olive Garden restaurant - is associated with lower incidence of cancers of the colon, breast, prostate, and uterus. The study at hand helps to quantify the amount of cancer reduction. And it may be much more than 12%.
For those interested in eating Mediterranean-style, the Oldways Preservation and Exchange Trust has good advice:
http://www.oldwayspt.org
-Steve
ReplyI think that we could put any title on a diet to make it special and unique for marketing purposes. The one thing that the goverments of the world is to promote a diet that is loaded with water rich foods about 80% of what we should eat should be fruits and vegtables. The 20% that remains are our meats and fats.
ReplyI am all about changing your diet to be healthy but to lose weight and be fit you need to excercise 30 minutes a day 3 days a week. I like to run but I am thinking about getting a wii fit to maybe replace my running, it is bad for my joints.
ReplyThe great thing about the 'mediterranean diet is that it is a life long diet. Not something you pick up and put down. Like any diet, it will only work if the person is willing to stick to it permanently. The great thing about the mediterranean diet is that the food is so tasty, it really is easy to stick to
ReplyNot every body system reacts well to the mediterranean diet. It will have a better affect on people of Mediterranean extraction, but within those limits it's a good plan to follow, especialy if you love food.
ReplyI enjoy the types of food included in the Mediterranean diet, so I am more inclined to recommend it. I think it's somewhat intuitive that this is a diet that promotes healthy hearts and decrease in cancer. Studies continue to show that eating fruits and vegetables can help decrease cancer and cardiovascular disease risks.
ReplyIt's not considered terribly sexy now, but wasn't it big back in the 80s? I seem to remember all sorts of news stories about how revolutionary it was, but I may be mis-remembering as I was quite young at the time.
ReplyI'm not aware of any other diet that can legitimately claim to prolong life, reduce rates of cancer (colon, breast, prostate, uterus), prevent dementia, prevent type 2 diabetes, AND reduce cardiovascular disease. You can't beat the flavors. Get free, unbiased information on the diet at Oldways Preservation and Exchange trust (www.oldwayspt.org).
-Steve
ReplyThe Mediterranean diet is one of the healthiest diets you can follow as it's based on eating so many colourful fruits and vegetables which are high in antioxidants, as well as nuts, seeds, fish and olive
Replyoil. One of the most common ingredients used in the Mediterranean diet is tomatoes which contain lycopene a very powerful cancer fighting antioxidant. Eating a diet rich in tomatoes may help prevent certain cancers and reduce the risk of prostate cancer in men by up to 45%.
I am the program dietitian for Oldways. We created the Mediterranean Diet Pyramid and it is a copyrighted image. If you choose to post it, please give us credit for it. You may find our information at (www.oldwayspt.org).
Thank you,
Adriene Worthington, RD, LDN
Reply