Healthy aging with the right diet
A new study shows: Eating a plant-based diet and avoiding highly processed foods significantly increases your chances of healthy aging!
Healthy food keeps you healthy. Photo: Unsplash
A recent study, published in the renowned journal Nature Medicine, provides convincing data on the effect of our diet on quality of life in old age. People who follow a healthy, plant-based diet in the long term while avoiding sugar, highly processed foods and red meat have a much better chance of staying physically and mentally fit.
The study is based on long-term data from over 105,000 participants. It shows that people who followed a healthy diet based on the Alternative Healthy Eating Index (AHEI) or the Mediterranean diet for years had around twice the chance of being healthy at the age of 75 – in other words, staying physically and mentally fit, having a lower risk of chronic diseases and maintaining good mental health.
“These ground-breaking findings once again confirm the central role of a healthy, plant-based diet for the so-called healthspan – the period of a healthy life. By reducing the consumption of highly processed foods and instead focusing on fresh, unprocessed ingredients, we can not only prevent chronic diseases, but also sustainably improve the quality of life in old age,” emphasizes Dr. Nadine Gutmann, immunologist at the preventive medicine institute SIPCAN.
The link between highly processed foods and health in old age was particularly clear: those who consumed a lot of these products had a significantly lower chance of reaching the age of 70 in good physical and mental health. It is therefore advisable to consume fruit, vegetables, whole grains, pulses, nuts and unsaturated fatty acids.