Eating for Longevity

Longevity and agelessness are hot topics in the world of health and fitness these days. Everyone wants to know the one magic exercise to perform or food to eat to prevent them from aging.

Well, we have good news and bad news. 

The bad news is there is no one magic exercise or one superfood to eat to prevent aging. But the good news is that what you eat can have a dramatic impact not just on how you feel, but how you physically age.

The American Medical Association recently shared the results of a study that analyzed approximately 75,000 women and 44,000 men over the course of three decades. The study found a significant association between four healthy eating patterns and a 20% risk reduction of early death. The lower mortality risk included mortality due to cardiovascular disease and cancer. 20% is a huge difference!

The healthy eating patterns analyzed in the study included the Mediterranean diet and a plant-based diet, along with following a “healthy eating index” developed by scientists at Harvard.

The difference between diets was not overly significant - what was significant was that all diets, “contained higher amounts of minimally processed kinds of foods and relatively lower amounts of ultra processed foods.”

The main takeaway here is that a diet with protein, whole grains, fruits and vegetables, nuts and legumes is going to provide the best results along with avoiding sugars and heavily processed foods.