Category Archives: Longevity

We’ve heard or suspected for years that whole foods are healthier for us than processed and ultra-processed foods. But is it true?

The British Medical Journal earlier this year published a study concluding that:

…a higher intake of ultra-processed foods was associated with slightly higher all cause mortality, driven by causes other than cancer and cardiovascular diseases. The associations varied across subgroups of ultra-processed foods, with meat/poultry/seafood based ready-to-eat products showing particularly strong associations with mortality.

You can read the study for yourself free online. Did Big Food (e.g., Archer Daniels Midland, Con-Agra, Monsanto) exert any pressure on the researchers. I dunno.

From the Intro:

Ultra-processed foods are ready-to-eat/heat industrial formulations made mostly or entirely from substances derived from foods, including flavors, colors, texturizers, and other additives, with little if any intact whole food.1Ultra-processed foods, which are typically of low nutritional quality and high energy density, have been dominating the food supply of high income countries, and their consumption is markedly increasing in middle income countries.2 Ultra-processed food consumption accounts for 57% of daily energy intake among adults and 67% among youths in the US according to the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).34

Ultra-processed foods usually disproportionately contribute added sugars, sodium, saturated fats and trans fats, and refined carbohydrates to the diet together with low fiber.56 As well as having low nutritional quality, ultra-processed foods may contain harmful substances, such as additives and contaminants formed during the processing.

Neurologist Steven Novella wrote a brief post about this study over at Science-Based Medicine. You may also find the comment section there enlightening.

Steve Parker, M.D.

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Fruits and veggies are good for us, right. We should eat more more of them, right?

UK’s Daily Mail published a worrisome article about pesticide residues (PFAS) on many fruits and veggies: strawberries, grapes, cherries, spinach, tomatoes, peaches/nectarines, etc. The tested foods were from UK supermarkets but I bet the numbers are just as bad or worse in the U.S. PFAS stands for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances. These man-made and long-lasting chemicals are implicated in causation of cancer, immunity impairment, infertility, impaired kidney function, thyroid disease, and low birth weight.

Thrice in the last six months I’ve heard that compared to the European Union, U.S. regulators allow many more chemical contaminants in food. That sounds like a deep and circuitous rabbit hole that I’m not ready to explore. Please mention in the comments an authoritative book or website on the subject.

I’ve been trying to grow food here in the Sonoran Desert for the last three years. I’m about ready to give up. My primary pests have been mealy bugs, caterpillars, mice, pack rats, and squirrels.

Steve Parker, M.D.

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Jim Goad is one of my favorite living cultural commentators. On par with a young P. J. O’Rourke, who died in 2022 at age 74. Last year Goad wrote a thoughtful and thought-provoking article on why women outlive men. A sample:

This disparity is not exclusive to the United States. In fact, it’s worse elsewhere. Worldwide, women outlive men by an average of seven years. According to a 2001 report, the only five countries on Earth where men outlived women were the flea-bitten open-air latrines we call Afghanistan, Nepal, Papua New Guinea, Namibia, and Zimbabwe. But a report from 2017 says there’s no longer any country on the planet where men outlive women.

It wasn’t always this way.

According to data from developed countries, men lived longer than women throughout most of the 1800s, only for the longevity stats to tip in favor of females during the 1890s — an advantage that women have held ever since. Women are supposedly more vulnerable than men to infectious diseases, but once male scientists got a grip on the microbes and brought those pesky critters to heel, women started living longer than men.

As far as I know, women have never thanked men for it.

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For another example of Goad’s work, check out his valentine, Why I Never Gave Up On Women.

  Steve Parker, M.D.

Proper diet undoubtedly promotes healthier aging and longevity. But what’s the right diet? A meta-analysis diet studies proposes an answer. Or more accurately, answers, based on diet-related biomarkers linked to disease and aging. Half of the studies were done in Europe, the rest from North America and Asia. The February, 2023, article was published in Nutrients. You can read the entire article online.

“….the main goal of this systematic review was to perceive the quantity and quality of different diets or aspects in nutrition, how they could modulate biomarkers and prevent aging-related diseases, in order to enlighten new intervention strategies. Biomarkers that are linked to aging-associated metabolism, inflammation processes, cognitive decline, and telomere attrition were scrutinized in order to understand how these mechanisms could actually influence healthy aging. Moreover, it could provide information to future health professionals.”

The researchers conclusions:

“In conclusion, this systematic review demonstrated the necessity for individuals to improve their diets, to reduce the emergence and development of several comorbidities and promote healthy aging. Diets rich in vegetables, fruits, nuts, cereals, fibers, fish, unsaturated fats, containing antioxidants, vitamins, potassium, omega-3—and reducing red meat and ultra-processed food intake—could prevent obesity, CVD [cardiovascular disease], and inflammation, and promote favorable glycemic, insulinemic, and lipidemic responses. Moreover, the Mediterranean diet and ketogenic diet, or a combination of these diets (MMKD), and increasing consumption of vegetables and green tea catechins, could improve one‘s working memory and decrease destabilization of the brain network and the attention domain, preventing cognitive decline. Finally, the Mediterranean diet, supplemented with CoQ or virgin olive oil, or a low-fat diet, also rich in antioxidants, could help to decrease the prevalence of atherothrombosis [arterial blood clots], hepatic steatosis, diabetes, and telomere attrition, as well as prevent oxidative and DNA damage. These diets can enhance one‘s quality of life and increase life expectancy. Moreover, a putative panel of molecular markers would follow the impact of diet/nutrition alterations during aging.”

The biomarkers tested included C-reactive protein, telomere length, HOMA-IR (insulin resistance), cholesterols, fibrinogen, platelet activating factor acetylhydrolase in HDLs, glucose, white blood cells, apolipoproteins, adiponectin, leptin, visceral adiposity index, etc.

Diets mentioned in the article include DASH, modified Alternative Healthy Eating Index, Southern European Atlantic (SEAD), Baltic Sea (a Nordic alternative to the Mediterranean diet), Mediterranean, and ketogenic Mediterranean.

This article is pretty dense reading. For science nerds only!

I was gratified to see several mentions of the ketogenic Mediterranean diet. It deserves more attention from the general public.

Steve Parker, M.D.

PS: If you have my Advanced Mediterranean Diet (2nd edition), you already have the Ketogenic Mediterranean Diet. It’s there in addition to the traditional Mediterranean diet.

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