It’s Greek To Me

By Bonnie Jenkins, Advanced Natural Medicine Bulletin

Not long ago, I reported on a study which found that adopting a Mediterranean diet significantly improves the symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis. Since then, I’ve gotten a number of e-mails from readers wanting to know more about this way of eating.

Even if you didn’t see the arthritis study, you’ve probably heard something about the Mediterranean diet. For years, scientists have been dissecting the diet in an attempt to figure out why people who eat it have a lower risk of heart disease and cancer.

The scientist who started all of the ballyhoo on eating the Mediterranean way is Ancel Keys, PhD, professor emeritus at the University of Minnesota. It was this remarkable man who first identified cholesterol’s role in heart disease. Oh, and there’s one more thing you need to know – Dr. Keys was born in 1904 and shows little sign of slowing down. What does he credit his longevity to? You guessed it – the Mediterranean diet.

Dishing the diet

As a young scientist more than 50 years ago, Dr. Keys showed that among people in countries where fresh fruits and vegetables are plentiful and olive oil flows freely – Greece, southern Italy, southern France, and parts of North Africa and the Middle East – heart disease is exceedingly rare. In countries where people fill their plates with beef, cheese, and other foods high in saturated fat – places like the United States – it's a leading cause of death.

Does that me you can go hog-wild in your favorite Italian restaurants? Dream on! In the past few years, Italian scientists have linked refined bread, pasta and rice to an increased risk of certain cancers, particularly thyroid, colon and stomach cancers. Two separate nutrition studies published in 1998 found similar results. Meanwhile, the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) issued a scathing report on the food served in Italian restaurants. Menu staples like fettuccine alfredo are often laden with as much saturated fat as three pints of butter-almond ice cream, the center found. A serving of fried calamari may have the cholesterol equivalent of a four-egg omelet.

Unfortunately, somewhere between the Mediterranean and America, something got lost in the translation. Instead of sticking with the healthy components of the diet – olive oil, vegetables, fruit, fish and moderate amounts of wine, we add a great deal of meat, sugar and lots of cream sauces.

According to Dr. Keys, the original Mediterranean diet – the one that was eaten by rural villagers on the Greek island of Crete – was nearly vegetarian, with fish and very little meat.

Fruits and vegetables take center stage in the authentic version of the diet. Both are low in calories and fat and very rich in nutrients, including cancer-fighting antioxidants. Beans and legumes are also key components and provide an excellent source of fiber.

Olive oil is probably the best-known component of the Mediterranean diet. Technically classified as an omega-9, it isn’t an essential fatty acid like fish and flaxseed oil. But this monounsaturated fat contains more than 30 phenolic compounds with powerful antioxidant properties. Proponents of the Mediterranean diet say that substituting butter and other saturated fats with olive oil can prevent oxidative stress and reduce LDL (bad) cholesterol. But look for extra virgin olive oil since it contains considerably more phenols than later pressings, like refined virgin olive oil.

Breads made with whole grains and flours are also part of the Mediterranean diet. Whole grains provide additional fiber and are a rich source of vitamin E and the B vitamins. Refined flour, on the other hand, provides little nutrition and causes blood sugar levels to spike because they are so easily digested.

A healthy mix

Contrary to popular belief, the Mediterranean diet is about more than just olive oil. In the largest study ever done on the Mediterranean diet and one of the few to test it in adults of all ages – in Greece, no less – researchers recently found that the real bang of the Mediterranean diet is a combination of all food in the diet.

Not surprisingly, the researchers found that Greeks who follow the Mediterranean diet more closely have significantly lower death and disease rates than those who don't. But they also reported in The New England Journal of Medicine that olive oil itself produced no significant reduction in overall death rates. In fact, when the researchers looked at the individual components of the Mediterranean diet, they found no significant decrease in death with any one type of food.

The researchers studied some 22,000 adults, aged 20 to 86, from all regions of Greece. The participants answered detailed questionnaires about their eating habits throughout the four-year study. Then they were rated on how closely they followed the key principles of the Mediterranean diet.

Sticking to the Mediterranean diet cut the risk of death from both heart disease and cancer. Those subjects who most closely followed the traditional diet saw their death rate drop by 25 percent.

These findings may also help explain why Asians also have lower disease and death rates. Although they rarely use olive oil, they traditionally follow the other principles of the Mediterranean diet – lots of produce, legumes, nuts, and minimally processed grains, with little saturated fat.

One last thing . . .

One of the most impressive compounds in olive oil is a phenol called hydroxytyrosol. Australian researchers recently found that hydroxytyrosol works in two ways to prevent oxidative stress. First, the phenol prevents radical molecules from forming. Second, hydroxytyrosol combines with any of these radical molecules that have already formed and renders them harmless to healthy cells.

According to two new Italian studies, hydroxytyrosol’s ability to combat oxidative damage translates to significant anti-aging benefits. In one of the studies, human leukemia and colon cancer cells not only stopped growing, they actually committed suicide after being exposed to the phenol. In the second study, hydroxytyrosol along with several other compounds in red wine and olive oil prevented white blood cells from sticking to blood vessel walls, thereby reducing the risk of heart disease.

But you don’t need to guzzle olive oil to get these benefits. New research has found that the water left after the olives have been processed into oil offer an even richer source of this phenol. In fact, while olive oil contains between 100 and 300 mcg., lab tests have found that the concentration is 300 to 500 times greater in the olive water. And it’s this nutrient-rich water that’s used in hydroxytyrosol supplements.

This just in . . .

When I saw the headline, I thought, it’s about time. The story, “Diet as good as drugs for high cholesterol,” might be news to some in the medical community. But, if you read the e-bulletin that ran on July 24th, “How low can you go,” you’re well aware of how effective dietary changes can be in lowering cholesterol.

What is news is that this is the first mainstream study to show that a diet high in fiber, nuts, and vegetable proteins can reduce cholesterol levels to the same extent as statins. And, perhaps the most surprising thing of all – the study appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association. It doesn’t get more conservative than that!

In the study, 46 adults with high cholesterol were put on a low-fat diet, a low-fat diet plus a statin or a special diet for four weeks. The special diet included almonds, soy proteins, high-fiber foods like oats and barley, and margarine with plant sterols – chemicals found in leafy green vegetables.

But, before you get your hopes up too high, the study authors also made sure to note that, along with the special diet, the low-fat diet plus statin produced a much bigger reduction in both LDL (bad) cholesterol and C-reactive protein than the low-fat diet. 

You see, some things never change.

But, if you’ve got slightly elevated cholesterol, this new study might give you the willpower to resist the doctor’s recommendation to take statin drugs like Lipitor or Pravachol. Instead, adopt the Mediterranean diet. You might just surprise your doctor the next time your cholesterol levels are measured.

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Carluccio MA, “Olive oil and red wine antioxidant polyphenols inhibit endothelial activation: antiatherogenic properties of mediterranean diet phytochemicals.” Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular Biology. 2003; 23:622-629.

Fabiani R, et al. “Cancer chemoprevention by hydroxytyrosol isolated from virgin olive oil through G1 cell cycle arrest and apoptosis.” European Journal of Cancer Prevention. 2002; 11:351-358.

“Special diet as good as drugs for high cholesterol.” Reuters. 22 July 2003.

Trichopoulou A, et al. “Adherence to a Mediterranean diet and survival in a Greek population.” New England Journal of Medicine. 2003; 348:2599-2608.

Tuck KL, et al. “Major phenolic compounds in olive oil: metabolism and health effects.” Journal of Nutrition and Biochemistry. 2002; 13:636-644.