Readers of the Rainbow Diet will already understand why eating a diet full of colourful vegetables anfd fruit, olive oil, nuts, seeds, and low in salt, common sugar and refined carbs helps you build a healthy body. Over the years I have covered research suggesting its benefits in illnesses from cancer to diabetes to Alzheimers.
Now a research group from Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, (Annals of Internal Medicine) reports that middle-aged women who follow a Mediterranean diet increase their lifespans, avoiding physical or cognitive impairments and chronic illnesses in older age.
Yet again, an analysis of women participating in the Nurse’s Health Study, some 10,000 aged between their late 50s and early 60s and followed across 15 years, was used. All were free of major chronic diseases at the outset of the study and used a diet diary.
Researchers concluded that those who closely followed a Rainbow Diet were ‘Healthy agers’ and more likely to live past age 70 without heart disease, diabetes or other chronic diseases. The research did not focus on individual bioactive compounds but components such as resveratrol (red grape skins), vitamin D (sunshine), fish oils and olive oil, have each been shown to have important anti-ageing benefits. Previous research has shown that there is a ‘multiplier effect’. Consuming fish oils has its benefits, as does olive oil. But consuming both has an even greater effect.