The impact on our health of what we eat has long been played down by mainstream healthcare, in spite of considerable research demonstrating the connection, such as the recent study showing a link between multiple sclerosis and diet.
The truth about the importance of diet for health is now at last becoming more widely realised, but only since the advent of the internet and amongst those with the discernment, or luck, to find the nuggets of truth among the boulders of misinformation.
Unfortunately, government agencies still often issue dietary advice that is flawed, or aimed at the wrong target, as in the report recently released by the UK National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE) saying that junk food high in saturated and trans fats and salt is responsible for thousands of unnecessary deaths.
While it is true that processed trans fats are bad news, a far greater problem is created by sugar and refined carbohydrates, which are arguably the most important driver of chronic disease today, but this truth is effectively kept under wraps by the efforts of a very powerful sugar lobby, a situation that is repeated across the entire dietary spectrum.
Fortunately, a new approach has cast fresh light onto all of this confusion by offering an alternative to flawed official information and commercially-driven dietary guidance.
A leading UK nutritionist has carried out a large survey to establish exactly which foods are associated with optimal health, surveying over 55,000 Britons to compare subjective ratings of health with consumption of specific food groups in order to derive a research-based guideline for healthy eating.
Whereas most research into diet and health compares diet intakes with the prevalence of diagnosed diseases, the online ‘100% Health Survey’ – the largest ever comprehensive health and diet survey carried out in Britain – has, uniquely, compared the diets of those in robust health with those who have a plethora of health issues that may reasonably be expected to progress to disease unless the underlying causes are addressed.
The results show how the sub-optimal health that is the lot of so many today is closely related to diet, and reveal exactly which types of food are associated with good and poor health.
Foods most frequently associated with good health
* Nuts and seeds
* Fresh fruit
* Vegetables/salad
* Oily fish
* Water
Foods linked to neither really good nor really bad health
* Red meat
* Restaurant/processed meals
* Refined foods
* Tea, coffee and cola
Foods most frequently associated with poor health
* Dairy products
* Added sugar
* Wheat
* Salt
* Sugar-based snacks
Consumption of sugary snacks and drinks was by far the best predictor of poor health for every measure of health looked at (energy, digestion, immunity, hormonal and mental health), confirming that sugar is the worst of the ‘bad’ foods – much worse than alcohol or salt. In fact, indulging in sweets and sugary snacks more than double one’s chances of being in poor health, while avoiding them will make one six times more likely to enjoy optimal health.
These findings cut across much conventional dietary wisdom. For example, nuts and seeds, which are often avoided today because of their fat and calorie content, come up as excellent predictors of good health, and both wheat and milk, which are considered by many to be staples and are in almost every form of convenience food, are shown to be associated with poor health.
Another surprise was the impact of alcohol. Results showed that those drinking a unit of alcohol a day, eg a small glass of wine, were less likely to be in poor health than abstainers, although this relationship does not hold up for larger amounts of alcohol.
Collating all the data from the survey, the following general dietary recommendations emerged.
* Increase consumption of fresh, raw seeds and nuts to 3 servings per day.
* Increase consumption of fresh fruit and vegetables to a combined total of 8-10 servings a day.
* Increase consumption of oily fish to 3 servings per week.
* Increase consumption of water to 8 glasses per day (approximately 1.5 litres).
* Reduce the consumption of red meat to a maximum of 2 servings per week, particularly those already in poor digestive health.
* Minimise the consumption of restaurant and processed meals.
* Reduce consumption of refined foods (white bread, flour and rice etc.) to a maximum of 1 serving per day.
* Eliminate tea, coffee and cola consumption or limit these to very occasional use.
* Reduce dairy product consumption to a maximum of 1 serving per day.
* Avoid adding sugar to food or drinks.
* Reduce wheat consumption to a maximum of 1 serving per day (bread, pasta, pizza etc.)
* Avoid adding salt to food.
* Eliminate sugar-based snacks (chocolate bars, biscuits, etc.) or limit these products to very occasional use.
Advocates of the Paleolithic Diet will note with interest the fact that the top six food types identified by this study as being most associated with good health are essentially the same as those eaten by our early human ancestors.
One of the reasons why this type of diet is so good for us is likely to be that adopting a diet for which our digestive system is best adapted alters the balance of our indigenous microbes, favouring intestinal bacteria that are most beneficial to us.