Cut a third of your food, you might live to be 100

There's a buzz about how eating less can extend your lifespan. Cornell University in the US had reported as early as in the 1930s that the lives of lab animals were extended when their diets were significantly restricted. And surprisingly, cutting down a third of the calories did not lead to lower energy levels.

The concept is not entirely a new one. You may have noticed that as people get older, they start eating less. It could be for any number of reasons - the appetite flags, or metabolism slows down so you stay full, tastes change. But what if it was a subliminal survival instinct?

Khaleej Times spoke with clinical dietitian, diabetes educator and weight management specialist Ghida Shaar, at our offices. Shaar has been practising in the US for nearly 18 years, and for the last one year with the Saleh Clinic in Dubai Healthcare City. "It's not just about eating less, it's the quality of the food that you consume that is important. Today there is an abundance of food - particularly in the west," she points out - that has resulted in people eating more than they need, which causes health issues. Some of the blame lies with food lobbies that promote consuming, keeping corporate bottomlines in view. Their role and our own health requirements become a sort of clash of civilisations.

The diet that scores the highest with nutritionists is the predominantly plant-based Mediterranean diet, which includes fruit, vegetables, fish and healthy fats like olive oil. It's an ideal way of eating says Shaar, and also, you don't eliminate meat entirely from your plate.

Shaar has no time for the latest popular dieting trends. Says she, "I'm a clinical dietician - we don't do the fad stuff." We have such an overload of information today that we're confused. Says Shaar, "We attend to patients who have developed deficiencies because they follow fad diets: cabbage soup, liquid, high fat, no-fat diets. When you deprive yourself like that, you will overeat afterward."

When children who fuss about food are planted in front of a television set and their favourite cartoons put on, how wise is it to use it as an opportunity to feed them? A critical part of the development of the brain that is used to choose what is eaten and how much, lags in this scenario. These children are more likely to grow up without actually knowing when they are full, leading to a skewed relationship with food. Type-2 diabetes makes an appearance at an increasingly younger age today - it is caused by wrong dietary practices and obesity in the young.

As a species, it sometimes appears that our satiety index is not functioning very well. Could ?it be that we are genetically conditioning ourselves to lose the ability or the judgment to make that call?

On the opposite end of the scale, eating less can boost healthier ageing - sprucing up the body's cells, protecting them from harmful deterioration and the risk of cancer. Evolutionary biologist Dr Margo Adler, who led the research, said that cutting back on food leads to increased rates of 'cellular recycling' and repair mechanisms in the body. Dr Adler, of the University of New South Wales in Australia, believes this evolved to help animals continue to reproduce when food is scarce. Their bodies adapt by recycling and reusing nutrients stored in the cells.

Shaar's explains: "We surely do not want to urge people to just eat less. We want them to cut down on portion sizes if they exceed their daily energy needs to prevent weight increase, prevent comorbidities [secondary or parallel diseases]. This may hold the promise of longer, healthier lives for humans."

'Fasting' is not an unfamiliar concept in many cultures, though the channels may be religious or cultural. Right now, we are observing the month of Ramadan. In India, fasting is practised fairly often among many communities in a religious context. From ancient times, when people visit the holy city of Varanasi, the Hindu practice is to give up one each of a fruit, vegetable and leaf. This is done at every visit, and the idea is to give up a favourite - for the rest of your life.

The late Singapore icon Lee Kuan Yew, statesman and architect of the modern city-state said in his memoirs, that he ate to 80 per cent capacity, to which he partly attributed his ripe old age, apart from daily exercise.

Similarly, the Confucian philosophy of Hara Hachi Bun Me requires that you eat until you are eight out of ten parts full. This is practised by the residents of Okinawa in Japan who have a calorie intake of only 1300 and a bit, and can boast the highest density of people in the world who live to 100 years and beyond.

A simple graphic from the US Department of Agriculture prescribes the plating system. Half of your plate should be made up of non-starchy vegetables or salad. A quarter should comprise rice or pasta - basically, your carbohydrate intake. The last quarter should contain lean protein. This can be further drilled down to include fruit in the veg/salad half of the plate, and other foods.

Exercise is an obvious component of the day. Shaar points out that earlier the American Heart Association had prescribed a minimum of 150 minutes of cardiovascular exercise. Today, that number has been redrawn: now, your weekly requirement is 240 minutes of cardio activity. This could be walking, swimming, cycling, running - anything you choose to get your heart rate going. Shaar says that mobility will contribute to a longer life.

The issue obviously is a familiar one: people are more sedentary as work and stress pile on the pounds even as our dietary patterns remain static - we eat as we did in our twenties. So people add kilos and then the other guests arrive in the shape of diabetes, high blood pressure and other conditions.

At the heart of it, the concept and the practice is a simple one: eat until you are 80 per cent satisfied. Wait till you are hungry before you eat, and be mindful of what you consume. Love that body temple!

harveena@khaleejtimes.com

Harveena likes horses, recycling, upcycling, berries, contrails. In no particular order