Dr. C.V. Alert, MB BS, DM.
Family Physician.
Nutrition plays a significant role in health promotion and in disease prevention and management. To avoid various disease states, advising persons on variety, balance, and moderation of foods, is important in promoting a healthy lifestyle. It is perhaps unfortunate that, in Barbados today, we have so many unhealthy persons that the focus of many physicians has switched towards attempting to treat, rather than prevent, disease.
I was a participant in a webinar a few nights ago where it was pointed out that the mayor of New York City, after a diagnosis of diabetes, was able to change his life around, and improve his health, by adopting a healthy lifestyle plan and changing his eating habits, moving towards a plant-based diet. He was also in a position to suggest that many medical institutions in New York should adopt plant based diets as their nutritional offering and advise to clients attached to their institutions.
But what is a plant-based diet? A plant-based diet is exactly what it sounds like. The diet consists primarily of food made of plants: fruits and vegetables in addition to nuts, seeds, whole grains, and legumes. A plant-based diet is not (exactly) the same as a vegetarian or vegan diet: one can still eat eggs, fish, meat (including proper pork and chicken, if/while you can afford them), and have dairy products. The plant-based diet simply means that you are consuming less animal products and consuming more fruits, vegetables, nuts, cereals, peas and beans.
Fruits and vegetables are rich in vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and fiber. Fiber is a nutrient that most of us don’t get enough of. In fact, the Health of the Nation (HotN) study, of adult Barbadians 25 years and older, found in 2015 that as much as 90 percent of them did not consume sufficient fruits and vegetables that our Nutritionists recommend for good health.
A well-balanced plant-based diet can provide many health benefits, such as a reduced the risk of our chronic diseases (ncds), including:
- Obesity.
- Heart disease.
- Hypertension (high blood pressure)
- Diabetes.
- Some types of cancer.
This is the same list as the main causes of sickness and death (morbidity and mortality) around here, so preventing these illnesses should be high on our national priority thing-to-do list.
People who don’t eat meat generally eat fewer calories and less fat, so they tend to weigh less. Cholesterol is an essential component of animal-based products, red meat in particular ( beef, lamb). And since cholesterol is an important villain in both heart diseases and strokes, the plant-based diet can keep you out of the hospital and delay your encounter with the undertaker.
Eating a plant-based diet improves the health of your gut so you are better able to absorb the nutrients from food that support your immune system and reduce inflammation. A strong immume system, and low (body) inflammation, are important pillars of good health.
Fiber, in plant-based diets, can lower cholesterol and stabilize blood sugar; this can help in both the prevention and management of cardiovascular disease and diabetes. Fiber is also important in good bowel management, preventing/treating conditions like constipation, diverticulitis and even colo-rectal cancer.
The American Institute for Cancer Research says the best way to source cancer-protective nutrients, including fiber, vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals, is to eat a diet rich in vegetables, fruit, grains, beans, nuts, seeds, and some animal foods.
One large meta-analysis ( pooling of a number of studies to have a large sample size) found that middle-aged people who ate more plant-based foods were less likely to develop type 2 diabetes than their peers who ate more meat, fish, eggs, and dairy. The researchers do acknowledge that the evidence does not directly show cause and effect, but it does suggest a possible role for vegetarianism and veganism in protecting against diabetes.
Plant-based diets carry some risk of inadequate protein, vitamin, and mineral intake. But these risks are readily overcome by choosing the right vegetarian foods and, when necessary, supplements. For example, soy, quinoa, and nuts are good sources of protein, and tofu, lentils, and spinach are good sources of iron. This is where variety, balance moderation and advice from a nutrition/dietitian come in. Periodic visits to your family physician should ensure that you get on, an stay on, the healthy tract.
Another benefit of the plant-based diet, in this era of climate change and the realization activities of homo sapiems is having an adverse effect on planet earth, the production of plant based foods has a less toxic effect on this environment than the production of animal based foods.
Some Trinidad-based participants at that webinar, attached to a couple of Regional Health Authorities in TNT (roughly equivalent to the polyclinics here), spoke of health-centre led community efforts to establish kitchen gardens, and one noted that, in the good old days that she hoped could be revived, one kitchen garden once supplied a significant proportion of the vegetables used in one regional hospital. Even without factoring in our rising food prices, there is significant merit in producing, and consuming, a plant-based diet.