In Annia Ciezaldo's April 1st article in the "New York Times Magazine," she asks, "Does the Mediterranean Diet even exist?" She suggests that since half of Spain, Portugal and Italy's populations are overweight -- with Lebanon rapidly following suit -- then, contrary to popular belief, the Mediterranean people now have the worst diets in Europe.
She states that the Greeks "are the fattest: about 75 percent of the Greek population is overweight." From Ciezaldo's perspective, the Mediterranean Diet research, which spanned over 50 years, was in fact -- flawed.
Research on the health benefits of the Mediterranean Diet has been well-documented and includes the Harvard School of Public Health and many esteemed medical researchers. Among them are Ancel Keys and Paul Dudley White, who later became Dwight D. Eisenhower's cardiologist.
Shortly after World War II, Keys and his colleagues set out to examine whether or not the Mediterranean dietary and lifestyle patterns were directly connected to improved health outcomes identified in Crete, Greece and southern Italy during the 1960s. These outcomes recorded the lowest rates of chronic disease in the world, and the life expectancy of adults in these regions was among the highest. This was particularly remarkable given the limited amount of medical care and services that were available to this population and the poverty these regions experienced.
Keys then began the long running Seven Countries Study and monitored the lifestyle and dietary habits of 12,700 middle-aged men in the U.S., Finland, the Netherlands, and then Yugoslavia, Italy, Japan and Greece.When the data was examined, the people who were the healthiest ate a diet where fruits and vegetables, grains, beans and fish were the basis of daily meals and valued vigorous physical activity and high social interaction. At the top of the list were the residents of Crete.
Scientists have intensely studied the eating and lifestyle patterns characteristic of the Mediterranean Diet for more than half a century. And with dozens of research studies, the evidence is that this way of eating and living results in an across-the-board reduction of chronic disease and increased longevity.
This evidence confirmed that certain Mediterranean lifestyles and dietary patterns were connected with good health. As a result, in the 1990s, Old Ways, an internationally respected nonprofit organization, joined in partnership with the Harvard School of Public Health to provide global education and information on this important disease-preventing evidence.
What the article has apparently overlooked is that the Mediterranean Diet is not just about what people eat. It is about the values, habits, relationships, quality of how food is grown and the quantity of how food consumed by these particular groups -- not just how or what they eat. A point that is often missed by the media is that health is not isolated to one's diet. The whole health of an individual is about the physical, emotional, nutritional, environmental and even spiritual components that create our overall state of health. Our dietary choices and habits can be seen as a metaphor of what the overall or whole picture of that individual's health is expressing. We eat how we think, feel, work and behave, all of which are influenced by our environment, values, age, financial and education levels and even by our gender.
Beyond just nutritional health, the Mediterranean Diet promotes a way of living that includes the following components, which could explain the positive health benefits.
Intense physical activity that includes work and all its forms of movement; farming, building, planting, gardening, dancing, sports, house work, child care or any activity that provides a non-sedentary daily routine.
Consuming many types and varieties of food in moderation as a form of nourishment -- both physically and socially, as well as sharing with others.
Is it any surprise that Europeans, who now have McDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken, electronic messaging that is replacing relationships and high credit card debt (none of which were there when the Seven Countries Study began), are becoming as obese and unhealthy as Americans are?
What is missing from many "nutrition books of the week" is the organic, common sense understanding that the food we eat is just part of a multi-faceted set of choices we make in how we choose to live and behave. Many of these choices are based on our personal and collective social values.
I was recently asked, in a conversation with an advisor to the U.S. Surgeon General, what I thought was the solution to health care cost reduction. I stated and firmly believe that until we as a nation return to the values we embraced and lived by up until the mid-1980s, a time when the "The Lifestyles of The Rich and Famous" became the national obsession, we will remain a nation of countless individuals who feel in many ways marginalized from contributing our skills and talents -- who are hungry to be seen, heard and valued.
This lack of belonging leads to poor nutrition and behavior choices, which serve in our efforts to self-sooth and self-medicate, as the world we inhabit continues on its trajectory of financial and societal misdirection. Yes, the Mediterranean Diet does exist, but the values that make it a healthy way of life are rapidly fading.
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Beautiful pictures of you children! France was not included in the Seven Countries Study, although for sure there would be many similarities. Thank you for your comment and thanks to all who have commented on this blog!
All the best,
Georgianna
shed some light on the import of your article and that is that the so-called "Mediterranean Diet"
is not just about food.
I am of Greek descent. I was raised to acquire a taste for what today is known as the "Medi-
terranean Diet". But there is more to that diet than meets the eye. My comments are strictly
anecdotal, as I do not have professional expertise in this area. But I do have life experience
that I believe is relevant to this discussion.
In 2007 my daughter and I visited our relatives in Greece. These folks are members of our fam-
ily who I never knew until we went there. One thing I noticed is how sociable the Greeks are.
They tend to do things together. There seems to be less of a barrier between your house and
the street where you live, than there is here. A Greek home is always open to neighbors. And
while Greeks are ever anxious to partake in food, it is very much a social event. Nobody eats
alone. Greeks are also avid outdoor enthuiasts and engage life in a physical way. It's not just
about the food but it's a way of life. Since humans are basically social creatures, we shouldn't
be surprised by how much an active social lifestyle may contribute to our well being.
~ James Ampela (nee, James Ampelakiotis)
I grew up in the eighties when when VCRs and video game players were coming into American homes. My mom didn't let me sit and vegetate in front of them. We had to go outside and play or do sports. So many problems with pets and with kids could be taken care of if they shut off all of the electronic devices and went outside to play.
It's easy to gain weight ANYWHERE, whether you're in the Mediterranean or America, the idea is to eat small and move more.
[I got news for you, America - it's really easy to be stupid, no training or guidance necessary].
What puzzles me is that the Europeans should be normally very mindful of and resistant to the creeping Big Brother corporate takeover of life on planet Earth, part of which is to make a majority of people fat, stupid and lazy, as successfully implemented in the US since the early 1980s. But they appear to have lost some of their mental edge in that respect.
today- most young city dwellers have adopted the 'american' model of cuisine - fast food, take out (there is even a new word in greek -deliverάs-for the person who brings take out to your door). children are bulging out of their clothes - and each year only gets worse. globalization's gift to the rest of the world i guess...
There are certainly packaged foods on the market here, I cannot argue with that. But for the most part I still see people eating simple, real food. Nothing complex or gourmet but as I said, simple, real and fresh.
But...there is a but...
The sad thing is that although Italy has one of the more slim adult populations in the developed world, we also have a high childhood obesity occurrence, which suggests that we'd better start worrying. :-(
The positive thing is that most cities here have initiatives to get people riding bikes more often. There are even bike sharing programs that cost practically nothing. Hopefully that will help somewhat.
I stopped eating fast food over two years ago and joined a gym. Believe me, I had no particular self-esteem myself and was a homebody. I just said to myself, "enough is enough". Since then, I have lost 40 pounds, I'm at my ideal weight and have more sex than you could have convinced me of before. It all goes together as a package. It starts with determination, but then it's what you eat, how much and how hard you exercise. If you do those two things, your stress will go down and your sex life will improve on it's own.
There is a new hypothesis that suggests that each infant sets up a digestion pattern that may play a key part in every aspect of his life (including both overweight and underweight problems).
He develops, over the first year of his life a pattern of a) breaking down food into usable nutrients - from mouth to stomach, b) absorbing those nutrients - in small intestine, and c) excreting out waste - from large intestine.
Therefore each child sets a 3 part pattern in infancy of how he will digest food, use food, and excrete out waste. This seems to subconsciously program a lot of unconscious behavior from then on.
This pattern is in the ENS, or Enteric Nervous System or digestion brain. It is unconscious motivation, and it is very difficult to change.
These three patterns may be mostly set up through breast feeding and weaning.
Generally problems with breast feeding will lead to overweight problems, and problems with weaning will lead to underweight problems.