- Living a Mediterranean lifestyle could reduce your chances of dying, according to a study.
- You can reap the benefits even if you don't live in the Mediterranean, it suggests.
Having a Mediterranean lifestyle — even if you don't live in the Mediterranean — could reduce your chances of dying, including from cancer and cardiovascular disease, according to a new study.
The Mediterranean diet has long been lauded as the "gold standard" of healthy eating. It emphasizes vegetables, fruit, whole grains, olive oil, fish, and legumes, as well as wine in moderation, and minimal amounts of red meat, highly processed and fried foods, refined grains, sugar, and saturated fat.
A Mediterranean lifestyle is more than just the diet, though. It involves eating with loved ones and taking the time to savor food, resting and sleeping enough, maintaining strong social connections, and exercising regularly, according to the authors of the study published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings.
Researchers found that adults in the UK who lived a Mediterranean lifestyle had a 29% lower risk of dying from any cause, and a 28% lower risk of dying from cancer, than those who didn't. People who adhered to the lifestyle's emphasis on rest, exercise, and socializing with friends in particular had a lower risk of dying from cardiovascular disease.
The team looked at the results of questionnaires filled out by 110,799 people aged between 40 and 75 from a population-based study called the UK Biobank. The participants were scored according to whether they followed a Mediterranean-style diet; how they ate, such as limiting salt or drinking healthy beverages; as well as their social habits and how much they exercised and rested.
Nine years later, 4,247 of the participants had died, 2,401 from cancer and 731 from cardiovascular disease.
The researchers found that those who'd followed the Mediterranean lifestyle most closely, and particularly the third category, had the lowest risk of death.
Lead researcher Dr. Mercedes Sotos-Prieto, a nutrition epidemiologist at the Autonomous University of Madrid, Spain, and adjunct professor at Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, told Insider that the Mediterranean lifestyle is "a traditional and cultural healthy way of living."
Sotos-Prieto said people should try to follow the Mediterranean lifestyle in a way that aligns with their own cultures.
"This study suggests that it's possible for non-Mediterranean populations to adopt the Mediterranean diet using locally available products and to adopt the overall Mediterranean lifestyle within their own cultural contexts," he said.
How you eat could be as important as what you eat
While the Mediterranean diet is made up mostly of particular foods and cooking habits — seasoning meals with spices rather than excess salt, for example — the study suggests that how the food is consumed is as important as what it is.
Meals are enjoyed with family and friends, and the conviviality and social aspect are a key feature of the lifestyle, Sotos-Prieto said.
Keeping active is also seen through the lens of community, often being something people do together, such as a walk with friends, he said.
Resting also appears to be key, with many Mediterranean countries favoring a short mid-afternoon nap or "siesta" as well as prioritizing sleeping six to eight hours a night.
"All those items have been shown to be related to cardiovascular disease; however, this study assesses the association of all of them in an all-inclusive Mediterranean Lifestyle index, as a better way to evaluate the synergy among all of them and a way of living," Sotos-Prieto said.