Frustratig

[cluwal894]

Just viewed the story of Nonna on YouTube, an Italian woman, age 107. She is sharp, fully functioning, and leads a very active lifestyle. She still shops for her food and still cooks. A very charming woman, indeed

She eats the typical Italian-style diet. Plenty of meat, cheese, salt, dairy, eggs and loads of olive oil, etc. Certainly, nothing approaching a plant-based diet.

No one in the Blue Zones eats a plant-based diet, exclusively.

So, where are the long-lived people who eat only plant-based? Nowhere in the world that I can find. I only hope that all our plant-based doctors live to at least 100.

I might be the first McDougaller to reach that magic number, five years to go.

Sal Liggieri (95)

[michaelswarm]

There are soldiers that survive murderous battles. Doesn't mean you want those odds. A subset of Adventists (Loma Linda Blue Zone) eat exclusively plant based. Don't get caught up by exclusive. Many places eat vast majority of plants.

Both of my parents are alive and active in mid 80s despite SAD. Some hearing aids, blood pressure pills, gall bladder removed, and pacemaker, but you wouldn't know that if you saw them.

My amazing tasting meals today included espresso, banana oat pancakes with apple sauce, blueberry muffins, fresh mango snack, pizza with onions, pineapple and tomato. Do not miss meat, dairy, eggs or oil in the least. A bit richer than most days because it's my birthday (58).

Hope to make 90. That would be 30 more active years. 100 would be bonus.

[QubitBob]

Hi Sal,

You've made a number of posts like this one, expressing frustration after watching videos of long-lived people who don't follow the whole-food, plant-based way of eating.

All I can say is, let statistics be your friend. In any sample population there will always be outliers like Nonna who live to old age despite a sub-optimal diet. However, there are many more who will suffer the chronic diseases--like heart disease and type 2 diabetes--which plague our Western countries. You shift the odds of living a healthy, active, long life dramatically in your favor by adopting a WFPB diet.

As to the Blue Zones--while most of the Blue Zone regions are not exclusively plant-based, they are largely plant based. Whenever this subject comes up, I refer back to the graph at this Web site: ( https://tinyurl.com/395mj4x4 ) which gives a wonderfully-detailed description of the Okinawan Blue Zones diet. This is 85% whole-food carbs, 9% protein, and 6% fat. People in the Blue Zones are not eating a lot of animal products.

[JeffN]

https://www.drmcdougallforums.com/viewt ... =22&t=7875

In the WHO report, 'Preventing Chronic Diseases: A Vital Investment' 06/06/2005, the WHO identified 10 misunderstandings that were obstacles to changing these modifiable risk factors. A few were relevant to your comments...

1) Chronic diseases are often viewed as primarily affecting old people.

One quarter of all chronic disease deaths occur in people under 60 years of age.

2) The solutions for chronic disease prevention and control are too expensive to be feasible for low and middle income countries (populations).

In reality, a full range of chronic disease interventions are very cost- effective for all regions of the world. Many of these solutions are also inexpensive to implement.

3) Half Truths and kernels of truth. In these cases, the kernels of truth are distorted to become sweeping statements that are not true. Because they are based on the truth, such half-truths are among the most ubiquitous and persistent misunderstandings. Two principal half-truths are refuted below.

“My grandfather smoked and was overweight and he lived to 96”.

Answer: In any population, there will be a certain number of people who do not demonstrate the typical patterns seen in the vast majority. For chronic diseases, there are two major types: 1) people with many chronic disease risk factors, who nonetheless live a healthy and long life; 2) people with no or few chronic disease risk factors, who nonetheless develop chronic disease and/or die from complications at a young age.

These people undeniably exist, but they are rare. The vast majority of chronic disease can be traced back to the common risk factors, and can be prevented by eliminating these risks.

4) ”Everyone has to die of something"

Answer: Certainly everyone has to die of something, but death does not need to be slow, painful, or premature. Most chronic diseases do not result in sudden death. Rather, they are likely to cause people to become progressively ill and debilitated, especially if their illness is not managed correctly. Death is inevitable, but a life of protracted ill-health is not. Chronic disease prevention and control helps people to live longer and healthier lives.



I am not sure making it to 100, in and of itself is the goal or would prove anything.

It's not mine.

In Health
Jeff

[landog]

https://www.drmcdougallforums.com/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=7875
I am not sure making it to 100, in and of itself is the goal or would prove anything.

It's not mine.

In Health
Jeff

lol -- I'm going to ask you about this when you're 95!

[JeffN]

https://www.drmcdougallforums.com/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=7875
I am not sure making it to 100, in and of itself is the goal or would prove anything.

It's not mine.

In Health
Jeff

lol -- I'm going to ask you about this when you're 95!

I don’t mind making it to 95 or 100, it’s just not a goal.




In Health
Jeff

[Ron4310]

Just viewed the story of Nonna on YouTube, an Italian woman, age 107. She is sharp, fully functioning, and leads a very active lifestyle. She still shops for her food and still cooks. A very charming woman, indeed

She eats the typical Italian-style diet. Plenty of meat, cheese, salt, dairy, eggs and loads of olive oil, etc. Certainly, nothing approaching a plant-based diet.

No one in the Blue Zones eats a plant-based diet, exclusively.

So, where are the long-lived people who eat only plant-based? Nowhere in the world that I can find. I only hope that all our plant-based doctors live to at least 100.

I might be the first McDougaller to reach that magic number, five years to go.

Sal Liggieri (95)

To me there is a big difference between 100% plant diet and a plant based diet. 100% plants is plants only, plant based is allowing other foods not 100% plants. I think this "plant based" has become misunderstood term.

[Taggart]

Aside from a very few international transit stops over the years in either Los Angeles airport on San Francisco's starting in 1970, I've never been to California, let alone Loma Linda. Now that that's out of the way......

I hope I'm not going senile already, but I've read all the Blue Zones books, including the original National Geographic about them that came out in Nov 2005, and I've never read that all Adventists in Loma Linda are vegan. They may eat a lot of plant based foods, but that's not quite the same.

[f1jim]

One must look at human history to put this topic into perspective. Most of human existence(maybe 99.9%) has been lived trying to avoid starvation and getting enough calories in to survive another season. When that has been your focus, choosing to eat plants only takes a very distant back seat to eating anything that provides enough calories. Why are there no long lived vegan cultures that ate a vegan diet? Because for so much of our existence that was near impossible. Couple that with the way we learn to eat. From our parents and grandparents. If there is no history of eating vegan it's hard for that way of eating to become common. This is all outside of the argument about what diet is or isn't the healthiest. When you are in survival mode "healthiest" doesn't come into play.
We are quite fortunate to be living in a time of great plenty. We don't have to look under every rock or spend all day hunting down calories to avoid death. Our daily nutritional needs are but minutes away at a place that can provide our needs in a multitude of dietary styles. Trying to prove or disprove the worth of a meatless diet by looking at our past or present for trends makes as much sense as proving the worth of all music based on Brittany Spears record sales. (think about it.)
There is value in looking at the data. There is value in looking at trends in eating and their outcomes. When we do this the value of this diet becomes clear.
All else is clutter.
f1jim

[toad]

I hope I inherited some of those Italian long living genes, I'm half southern Italian but culturally American.

I just hope however long or short I live, not to go into a nursing home and need other people to care for my basic needs. I always hear abuse stories from nursing homes, rapid decline, bad food, hope I don't end up in one.