Mediterranean diet significantly reduces the risk of mortality in elderly people

From here: 

Following a Mediterranean diet can extend a person's lifespan and reduce the risk of mortality in elderly people, according to a new study.

Italian researchers from the Department of Epidemiology and Prevention of the IRCCS Neuromed, in Molise, Italy, analysing the relationship between a traditional Mediterranean diet and mortality found the life-prolonging link when studying participants over the age of 65 who adhered to the diet.

According to the findings, the diet, comprised of a mix of fruit, vegetables, fish, olive oil, and moderate wine consumption, is associated with a 25 per cent reduction of “all-cause mortality” and the effect remains when considering “cardiovascular or cerebrovascular mortality” as well.

Well, at least I eat plenty of fish and olive oil and nuts.  But very little in terms of vegetables and fruit (unless potatoes count), and no wine (although I drink lots of lager).



Similar to those who claim that studies reveal consuming 5 to 10 portions of fruit and vegetables a day will help prevent heart disease, diabetes and some cancers, and hence extends one's life, I would like to know how they know it's the consumption of these foods that are of primary importance rather than the avoidance of ultra-processed/junk foods?  That is to say, perhaps it's not so much what you eat, but what you don't eat?  I do not believe that studies distinguish between these 2 possibilities since eating through humongous amounts of vegetables and fruit every day will leave very little appetite for any junk foods.

Supermarkets targeted in the battle against obesity

Article says:

New laws to ban shops from offering special “two for the price of one” deals near supermarket checkouts for food high in sugar, fat or salt are to be introduced in an attempt to ease an obesity crisis that has made the UK the most overweight nation in western Europe.

One of the industry leaders Tim Rycroft objected to these proposed measures saying:

Advertising and promotions underpin the healthy, vibrant and innovative market for food and drink that UK shoppers love.

What does that mean? Advertising and 'buy one get one free' "offers" sell more junk food? But this is the whole point of the Government measures; namely to make the market for junk food not so "healthy" and vibrant.



These special offers aren't really special offers anyway. The offers are the price they should sell at all the time. Bouncing the price up and down all the time fools people into thinking they're getting a great deal when the product is at the low end of the price cycle.

Banning the advertising of Junk Food

I read the following article:
Labour vows to ban junk food adverts during X Factor and Hollyoaks


I hear people arguing that this is a ridiculous policy. They tend to say that:

a) Banning these advertisements would have no effect on the consumption of these foods.

b) It's the parents responsibility and the state shouldn't intervene.

If "a" then the manufacturers are wasting their money producing and buying the time for TV commercials. They should simply keep this money so they'll have higher profits. Or pass the savings on to the consumer. The latter would be good, cheaper prices and we don't have to suffer their adverts!

Frankly though I regard it as being preposterous to suggest these adverts have no effect at all. Especially advertising tasty food.

As for "b" it'll simply never work. Kids see junk food advertised, they'll go and buy it if they have the money, especially as their friends are all buying it.

Human beings are human beings. Many of them are influenced by adverts -- especially for nice tasting food. You can't change what human beings are. You can't change their nature -- you have to change society to accommodate their nature.

The advantages and disadvantages of online grocery shopping

I live in England and I buy virtually all my groceries online now from either Tesco or Asda, and on the odd occasion, Sainsbury's. I thought I'd list the advantages and disadvantages of online grocery shopping as I perceive them.



The Advantages


1. There could be a greater range of groceries to choose from online. This though will vary depending on where one lives. I live in Louth in Lincolnshire in England. There's a moderately sized Co-op, a moderately sized Morrison's, and a large Aldi here. I can do online shopping at Waitrose, Tesco, Asda and Sainsbury's (but not Ocado or Morrison's or Iceland unfortunately). None of these four supermarkets are located in Louth and are at least 11 miles away from me. So if I specifically like any of their groceries, it is much more convenient to simply order online. But, in addition, the range of groceries I can purchase in these supermarkets online is somewhat greater than the 3 local supermarkets. So I think this is a significant advantage.


2. It is very easy to compare the costs. Let's suppose I want to buy milk chocolate. I can put milk chocolate in the search box, perhaps filter appropriately if the website of the supermarket allows it, and it will display all the milk chocolate bars I can buy. But, in addition, it will show the price per 100 grams. So it's easy to compare prices. Interestingly, at Tesco, I have found that the multipack of small bars of Cadbury's or Galaxy chocolate are often cheaper per 100g than the single large bars.


3. It's quick and convenient. Walking or even driving somewhere, and walking around the supermarket, and possibly waiting in queues, will take vastly more time than simply ordering from home. In addition, the delivery person is always happy to take your groceries into your home should you wish (although I just carry the groceries in myself).

4. It's easy to find things. You just put the name of the food item into the search box, and voila! The page fills up with the appropriate food items. In the actual store I sometimes have to search quite a bit before finding what I'm looking for. It doesn't help that they periodically move the groceries around (this is so you'll see food items that you don't normally see. You might then buy that food item. However, it's inconvenient for the customer!).


5. The delivery charge is ridiculously cheap. I just pay a £1 every time. It's true you can pay up to £6 for weekend mornings. But why not just choose an evening on a weekday for delivery when it's often just £1?



The Disadvantages


1. The freshness of the food. First of all here is an interesting quote from another website:


The last thing that a grocery store wants is dissatisfied customers complaining about having received poor quality goods. This makes a lot of extra and unnecessary work for their customer complaints department. It is therefore good practice for them to only send the freshest produce out on the home delivery orders. A reputable store will give a guarantee that if you are not happy with your delivery then they will give you a refund.



The first sentence is nonsense. In my experience -- and indeed of other people I have read on the net -- the 'best before' dates and, more crucially, the 'use by' dates, leave a lot to be desired. If I'm actually visiting a supermarket I avoid the perishable food items at the front of the shelf and get one from the back as these normally have better 'use by' dates. But, when you buy online, it would seem the pickers of your groceries don't do this. On odd occasions I even end up getting delivered groceries that include perishable foods which have a 'use by' date that is the same date they are delivered! Since the supermarkets will have difficulty in selling these items to the customers who actually come into their store, I suspect that they deliberately deliver these perishable groceries that are close to their 'use by' dates to their online customers so they can make more money. Otherwise, they would need to sell them off cheaply to get rid of them quickly.


It's true you can refuse any of the items that are delivered. But, in practice, in order not to detain the delivery person, I tend to be in too much of a hurry putting all the groceries into bags to have time to examine the dates on the fresh food. If the 'use by' date is particular bad, like the very date they are delivered, you can telephone or contact the supermarket via a webform, and they will agree to refund you for the relevant item and you get to keep the item. This is a bit of a chew though. And I imagine the majority of people will not complain, and the supermarkets will be aware of this. So, contrary to the quoted website, it is still profitable for them to deliver fresh food with the poorest 'use by' dates to their online customers.


It can be particularly irksome if I'm buying some essential fresh product like milk. I can buy 4 pints for £1, or alternatively 2 pints for 75p from Tesco. Visiting a supermarket I can easily buy fresh milk whose use by date is 12 days ahead. I live by myself, but in 12 days, or not much longer, I can get through 4 pints. But when buying milk online, sometimes the use 'by date' is as little as 5 days ahead, which is not sufficient time for me to drink 4 pints. So should I order the 4 pints, or pay over the odds and buy 2 pints of milk? It's a bit of a gamble! The bottom line though is that I often end up throwing out food which I wouldn't do if I went into the supermarket itself to buy my groceries. Even if I am refunded, it's a waste of food.


I should state that in the past, unlike Tesco and Asda, Sainsbury's 'use by' and 'best before' dates were fine. However, since their delivery charges were reduced and are now more or less in line with the delivery charges of Tesco and Asda (as little as £1), I think Sainsbury's 'use by' and best before dates have gotten poorer. Also Sainsbury's range is not as extensive as Tesco's or Asda's.

2. Just because an item is apparently available on the website, most emphatically doesn't mean that you will actually get it delivered. Sometimes . . nay . . often they run out of stock. This is normally those groceries which I assume they tend to sell less of e.g. organic and free range food, tandoori flavoured chicken etc. And also for those groceries that are on a genuine special offer. But, often I have only shopped at the supermarket in question since it apparently selling specific groceries, or there is a special offer on a particular food item I'm interested in -- precisely those groceries which they are quite likely not to have in stock. It would be vastly more convenient if I knew upfront which groceries they actually have in stock. Because if they don't have the relevant item in, then frequently I wouldn't have bothered ordering and would have shopped at a different supermarket, or not bothered ordering on that occasion at all.


Now, it might be thought that I could easily ring up the number on the website and find out if they have a particular item in stock. I have tried that. At Asda for 3 boxes of becks, each containing 15*275ml bottles of becks for the special price of £20 (they cost £8 to buy for a single box). I imagined the conversation would be something like me asking if they have these boxes of 15 bottles in stock for the Supermarket that delivers to me in Louth, the customer service person saying "hold on sir for 1 minute, I'll just check", that person looking on some database, then responding literally around a minute later with the response of yes or no, and if no when they would expect them in stock.

But no, it was nothing like that . . nothing like that at all. First of all I got put through to someone with a strong Indian accent whom I could scarcely understand at all. I didn't think that would be too bad since they normally seem to understand me OK, if not me them. I think I can distinguish them saying yes or no. But, things didn't pan out as I anticipated. He asked an apparent endless stream of questions, such as the code on the product, which supermarket delivers to me and other questions that I continually had to ask him to repeat since I had such difficulty understanding him. I kept saying, look it's just the standard sized bottles of becks, I just want to know if they have any boxes of 15 in. Can you not ring the appropriate store up and ask them?? Eventually, after he asked yet another question which I couldn't hear, no matter how often he repeated it, I simply put the phone down!

So it's impossible to find out what they have in stock, at least at Asda (and I suspect other supermarkets too), you just have to order and hope for the best. And, since the order normally has to be at least £40, I'm disinclined to order another £40 of groceries in the following few days on the off chance they'll have restocked the relevant item. Moreover, even if I did, it's quite likely they still won't have it in. And some items are rarely available. Over the past 6 months I've ordered fresh tandoori chicken thighs from Asda perhaps around 8 times, but they have only been delivered twice, despite always being advertised as available on their website.

The supermarkets do deliver substitutes, but rarely do I find them satisfactory. For example, I've ordered cod loin before that was on special offer. They didn't have any left. I would have expected to be substituted standard fresh cod, or failing that fresh haddock, or maybe even frozen cod. No, I got substituted farmed salmon! (I never eat farmed salmon because of the health issues, I only eat wild salmon). Another time I had ordered haddock fillet fish fingers, but they substituted frozen sausages! I've ordered John West tins of red salmon when they have been on special offer. What was their substitute? Not Princess tins of red salmon which you might expect, but tins of John West pink salmon! Why? Well, I suspect because the tins of pink salmon were roughly the same price as the discounted John West red salmon, where as the Princes red salmon, not being on special offer, was around double the price. They ain't gonna lose out by giving me the Princes! I've ordered 760g porridge oats for £4, and they've substituted 648g for £4.88 i.e they've charged more and given me less! And the number of times they don't have fresh haddock and gave me cod in its place you wouldn't believe. Are the oceans heaving with cod or something?

 
3. I tend to search out those groceries that at a particular time cost less than the they do on the other supermarket sites. Sometimes they're on special offer and have a date when the price will go up. But often they don't. Now, when you buy groceries online from a supermarket, you don't pay the price they are on the day you order, but rather the day they are delivered (normally the next day in my case). For example, on one occasion I ordered 16 cans of fanta zero for £5 at Asda (December 2012). These were not claimed to be on special offer, and no date was given that specified they would go up in price at a certain date. When they were delivered the following day I got charged £8.96 for them; they had increased in price by 79.2% in the space of 24 hours. No warning was given to me that they had increased in price. The same thing happens at Tesco. For example in June 2015 I'd ordered 15 bottles of becks (in a box) for £7.50. That was good value and wasn't on "special offer". But the next day when delivered it had gone up to £10! (As a matter of interest, on the relevant Tesco page the Becks had not only increased in price by 33%, but had a message saying “Now Cheaper”. Surely, since it had increased in price by a whopping 33% in 24 hours, the message should have said “Now Vastly more Expensive” instead??).

4. You miss out on the social aspect of shopping. You might bump into friends or neighbours or people you recognise from the pub.

So these are the advantages and disadvantages of shopping for groceries online. I still think the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, especially with where I live since there's a much greater range of groceries to choose from if I order online compared to the local supermarkets.

Dietary Advice

From this Guardian article:

There’s no conclusive evidence a morning meal makes you lose weight and feel great, but the idea that breakfast is the most important meal of the day is widely ingrained. This is largely thanks to the efforts of grain companies. Kellogg’s, for example, funded an influential study that linked breakfasting on cereal with lower BMI. And The Quaker Oats Center of Excellence financed research showing that a daily breakfast of porridge reduces cholesterol.

Many people are very adamant that eating breakfast is incredibly important. Indeed they seem to think I'm completely lacking in common sense when I question it. I hope they are not relying on research funded by those with vested interests. I've read that such research is of no value whatsoever and should be disregarded. And it wasn't someone merely just claiming it. They backed it up with statistics which seemed to me convincing at the time. Unfortunately I'm unable to recollect the source!

Indeed it is claimed by many that we ought to eat breakfast regardless of whether we're feeling hungry. Likewise many people claim we shouldn't wait until we are thirsty before we drink since we are already dehydrated by that point. But it seems strange to me that we should simply ignore our bodily signals. Surely one should eat when one is hungry only? And only drink when we are thirsty?

Presumably non-human animals do not eat and drink when they're not hungry and thirsty? Do they have an obesity epidemic? Er . .no. animals apart from our pets never get fat! Not even when they're in an environment where there is an abundance of food. Do they suffer adverse health consequences since they don't eat when not hungry and drink when not thirsty? Do they get more cancer, suffer more heart disease, dementia etc more frequently than we humans do? I don't think so.

Does eating fat make you fat?

The National Obesity Forum and the Public Health Collaboration recently demanded a “major overhaul” of dietary guidelines. Most noteworthy is their contention that avoiding fat has been a huge mistake. This has provoked a backlash from those who defend the standard dietary advice. Anyway, the ubiquitous Michael Mosley weighs in on the debate.
5:2 author Michael Mosley: 'I'm proof low-fat diets don't work'




I'm pretty much in agreement with Mosley, and think standard dietary advice is a mistake. The fact that people are getting fatter and fatter and type 2 diabetes is becoming more and more prevalent, suggests to me that standard mainstream dietary advice is a mistake. I don't think the counter-argument that people are exercising much less and are not really eating less fat, really stacks up.



So my own view is that we shouldn’t bother avoiding fat. Contrariwise, I'm of the opinion that it is a good idea to try and minimise sugar intake and refined carbs and other processed foods. By processed food I mean food where man has interfered and altered food from its natural state by adding sugar etc. I should think complex carbs will be absolutely fine. Although, on the subject of complex carbs, I’ve noticed I put on weight the next day after eating a lot of wholemeal bread! More so than when I eat my home-made oven chips.



The 5-2 diet seems more promising than other diets in addition to having various alleged health benefits. I managed to lose weight permanently by pursuing this diet. See a blog entry by me:

How to lose weight and keep it off permanently

How to lose weight and keep it off permanently

Diabesity

 John Lanchester on sugar as the new tobacco, from earlier this year from this article:

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v38/n02/john-lanchester/short-cuts

‘Eighty per cent of all foods in British supermarkets contain added sugars. Once you start looking at sugar content you find yourself again and again recoiling in horror. My personal unfavourite is Sainsbury’s “American-style mustard”, which clocks up an astounding 16.8 per cent sugar. Well, OK, I thought, after my first encounter with that horror, but this is really the fault of the American mustard they’re trying to emulate. Not so. French’s mustard, immediately next to Sainsbury’s concoction on the supermarket shelf, is a mere 0.9 per cent sugar. It contains no added sugar at all. Sainsbury’s mustard is 19 times more sugary than the thing it’s emulating.’

80% of all foods in British supermarkets contain added sugars. But most people say it's the fault of the individual that they get obese and get diabetes since they choose what to put in their mouths. So we should all just buy the 20% of food which hasn't had any sugar added?  I submit that this is completely unrealistic. For a kick off, even if people read the ingredients (which are always in very small writing), the different types of sugar come under a variety of names. And the sugar laden foods tend to always be available and on apparent special offers. And they generally taste nicer.

If a food is widely available, cheap, and nice, then inevitably many people will buy it. Blaming the individual is essentially to ignore human nature. We can't expect human nature to change to ignore the environment, we have to change the environment to accommodate human nature. In short this 80% figure has to be drastically reduced, or the diabesity epidemic will continue.

The so-called Fat Haters Organisation

I was reading an article in the Daily Mail yesterday.  It says:

A commuter was left in shock after she was given a card by a stranger dubbing her a 'fat, ugly human.'

British Transport Police are investigating after Kara Florish, 30, of Southend-on-Sea, Essex, shared a picture of the card she was given by someone working for 'Overweight Haters Ltd', on Facebook.

The card, which had the tag line: 'It's really not glandular, it's your gluttony,' read: 'Our organisation hates and resents fat people. We object to the enormous amount of food resources you consume while half the world starves. We disapprove of your wasting NHS money to treat your selfish greed.

'And we do not understand why you fail to grasp that by eating less you will be better off, slimmer, happy and find a partner who is not a perverted chubby-lover, or even find a partner at all.

'We also object that the beatiful pig is used as an insult. You are not a pig. You are a fat, ugly human [sic].'

Ridiculous. Fat people -- and especially fat woman -- are constantly on diets and trying to limit their calorie intake. But they're constantly fighting against their hunger and this is why they eventually fail.  Yes they'll be able to reduce their weight and keep it off for a few weeks or a few months.  But our bodies will constantly strive to regain that weight by increasing our hunger.  Human beings are human beings and like it or not the vast majority of us will not be able to endure constant hunger all the time, year in year out, for the rest of our lives.  If a sizeable percentage of us are fat it is simply the wrong target to blame people.



It's the big food manufacturers who are to blame. They add sugar, salt, fat etc in just the right proportions to trigger the various chemical reactions in the body encouraging us to eat. All for the sake of maximising profits. And impotent Governments who refuse to do anything.


And besides which being fat is not a crime! If they are so concerned about half the world starving then they should be concerned about limiting population growth, reducing the consumption of meat, reducing food wastage etc.

People might be interested in a relevant article about losing weight in my other blog.

How to lose weight and keep it off permanently

This is a chart of my weight since the 23rd of August 2012 until around a week ago.  You'll notice 2 sharp drops in my weight, one occurring at the beginning of the chart in August 2012 and another one in June of this year.  I'll talk about the latter one first.

This latter drop in weight occurred in June of this year and was precipitated by moving to another area of the country (in England).  This was very stressful for me and when I worry or am stressed I tend to eat somewhat less than I do normally.  As can be seen I regained the weight after about 3 months or so.  I never tried to keep this weight off, nor did I try to regain my weight.
I just ate what I liked during this time period. The fact that it has gone back up to what it
was originally, but then stayed there without going further up,
suggests to me that I have a natural weight or "default" weight which my body will strive
towards. Thus if I lose weight for whatever reason over a few weeks, my body will make me sufficiently hungry so that I eventually regain
that weight. But the same might happen if I eat too much over a few
weeks. My body will reduce my hunger so that I lose it again.



I
further suggest this is why the vast majority of diets fail-- namely because people can only keep up a diet for a few weeks or months since they are
constantly having to struggle against their hunger. Once they give up
their bodies will make them sufficiently hungry so that they regain all
the lost weight. So dieting was a fruitless endeavour because all that happens
is that whilst you're on the diet you're hungry for a few weeks or months, you eventually give up, and you just end up putting all the weight back
on. So people go through all that suffering (being hungry all the time)
for nothing. Moreover, I have heard that constantly dieting, then falling off the wagon,
might be deleterious to one's health.

But what about the first drop in weight back in August 2012? Did I move home then too? Was I
worried about something? Was I stressed about anything at all?  No, I went on the 5-2 diet i.e a diet where
for 2 days in every week I restricted my calorie intake to 600 calories on
each of those 2 days. These days were not consecutive. The other 5
days I just ate what I liked. 



So I kept on this 5-2 diet for a
few months and lost close to a stone (a stone is 6.5kg or 14 lbs). At
that point I wasn't really losing any more so I came off the diet. Why
didn't I regain the weight? I'm not sure. One possibility is that the 5-2
diet is more successful than other diets. But I suspect it was because even when I came off my 5-2 diet I still weighed myself every day. On those days where my weight seemed to be a
tad high I cut back on my food intake slightly on that day. Those days
where my weight was slightly lower I just ate what I liked. At this
point I wasn't on a slimming diet, but just frequently checking my
weight and reducing my food intake accordingly on occasional days.  I did this for a few months, but I don't do that any longer. I just eat what I like now.  However my
"default" weight has changed from what it was prior to August 2012.  It
has gone down by almost a stone.

I suggest to lose weight permanently
one has to change their "default" or natural weight. The only other alternative to
permanently lose weight is to deliberately restrict your calorie intake
and fight against your hunger for the rest of your life!  I
suspect one can change their default weight by first of all going on a
diet (probably the 5-2 diet isn't necessary, but I'm not sure). Then
once you're down to a desirable weight to keep checking your weight
every day and make slight adjustments as necessary to one's calorie
intake. After a few weeks or months then perhaps your body will have
adjusted to a new "default" weight and you won't have to do this any more.
This seems to have happened to me anyway.