Each year, dietary risk factors are expected to lead to the loss of 11 million lives as well as 255 million disability-adjusted life-years worldwide. However, until now, research has only shown the health benefits associated with separate food groups or specific diet patterns. This research was based on limited information on the health impact of other diet changes. e.g., the health benefits of the Mediterranean Diet
This new study, which used existing meta-analyses and data from the Global Burden of Diseases study, clearly identifies the effect (positive or detrimental) sustained consumption of more or less of each specific food group would have on life expectancy.
The researchers have formulated a user-friendly online tool called the Food4HealthyLife calculator. The calculator enables a person to not only see their life expectancy based on their current diet but also will show how specific changes would affect this figure, as well as calculate the optimal diet that they should be following and the effect this will have on the figure.
The calculator and this survey covers the United States, Europe, Norway and China, and provides life expectancy figures by location, age and gender.
It is anticipated that this calculator would be of great benefit to policymakers and clinicians, as well as laypeople, and will help them to understand the health impact of dietary choices.
This study readily showed, for example, that a young adult in the US could add more than a decade to their life expectancy by changing their diet from a typical Western diet to an optimized diet, which could include more legumes, whole grains and nuts, and less red and processed meat. For older people, the anticipated gains to life expectancy from such dietary changes would be smaller but still substantial.