Only Rich People Reduce Heart Disease Risk with Mediterranean Diet

A new study revealed a huge limitation to the Mediterranean diet. It only works if you live in a household earning £35,000 and can afford quality food and are highly educated. This would suggest that the Mediterranean diet doesn't benefit everyone.

Italian researchers at the Department of Epidemiology and Prevention at the Neurological Mediterranean Institute (Neuromed) studied 18,000 men and women over a four-year period on reducing heart disease with a Mediterranean diet. Their paper was published in the International Journal of Epidemiology.

Given that the Mediterranean diet is known to be rich in fresh fruit, vegetables, olive oil, fish and nuts, now the researchers believe that the quality of food is crucial for seeing the benefits of the lifestyle. It's because their analysis shows the risk of heart disease is reduced by 15 per cent but only for households with an income of £35,000 or higher. From this interpretation, it is believed these families are able to buy better quality foods higher in antioxidants, polyphenols and contain lower pesticides.

Researcher Dr Marialaura Bonaccio said "The cardiovascular benefits associated with the Mediterranean diet in a general population are well known, yet for the first time our study has revealed a person from a low socioeconomic status is unlikely to get the same advantages as a person with higher income, despite the fact that they both similarly adhere to the same healthy diet".

“These substantial differences in consuming products belonging to Mediterranean diet lead us to think that quality of foods may be as important for health as quantity and frequency of intake".

So, does that mean the health message of the Mediterranean diet is beneficial for everyone needs to change?

Dr Giovanni de Gaetano, director of the Department at Neuromed, said: "We cannot keep on saying that the Mediterranean diet is good for health if we are not able to guarantee an equal access to it".

With that in mind, maybe it is not just down to "equal access" because the idea that the Mediterranean diet is beneficial for everyone is untrue. Of the 18,000 people involved in this study, only 295 people might benefit from a Mediterranean diet.[1] Albeit, the lifestyle is healthy, yet it falls short of being the silver bullet to diseases. It is worth considering the fact that those with a lower education or income have almost double the risk of heart disease compared with better educated and wealthier people.

As a matter of fact, the continuous rise in food prices could start to bring down the wealthier population too. As they begin to weigh up their options over their purchases and find themselves balancing nutrients over pleasure, they too could begin to follow the trend seen in other countries. It has been noted that as food prices inflate, wealthy women start to fall into the obese category. So, no matter your status chose nutrition over pleasure first to be sure to fight against diseases.