Mediterranean diet at risk: we are abandoning it

Recently in an interview on Runradio we talked about how the Mediterranean diet was born , and the work of the physiologist Ancel Keys , who first hypothesized that the countries of the Mediterranean basin had a better diet than both the American one and that of northern Europe. : it was he who theorized that the Mediterranean diet , with its consumption of whole grains, legumes, fruit and vegetables, its conscientious and prudent use of olive oil instead of sweets, red meats and excess fats, was related to a lower incidence of cardiovascular disease and a lower risk of senile dementia.

I have read a lot about Ancel Keys, and for example few people know that Dr. Keys, who lived for 28 years in Pioppi, died at the age of one hundred, and that his wife, Margaret Haney, lived for about 97 years. In the interview (we do one every Tuesday morning), however, I mentioned that in Italy we eat less Mediterranean than we think and that we often take Crete as a sample for studies on the benefits of the Mediterranean diet.
In fact, it seems that compared to the Italians, the Cretans still have a simple diet that is very close to that of their grandparents. And new research seems to confirm the data I already knew. Yes, because we Italians are increasingly abandoning the Mediterranean diet

Don’t worry, we are not the only ones.
According to the World Health Organization, in fact, in countries that were previously a bulwark of the Mediterranean diet such as Italy, Spain and Greece, there is a worrying increase in childhood obesity. Out of a sample of 250,000 children examined in 38 countries, ours are the heaviest. Children of the Mediterranean area.

In fact, children are educated less to eat fish and vegetables, and are more inclined to tastes close to those of young Americans : sweets and fast food are also doing damage to us, for which the burger and fries have become the whim from allow yourself even once or twice a week;industrial products are the basis of our diet as well as that of our children. In fact, in homes we find packaged snacks, ice creams and biscuits, and when you go outside, the bag of chips or the fast food prize always escapes. In schools, the machines encourage you to buy bars, packets of sweets or chips. By contrast, children in Sweden consume more fish, vegetables and fruit. In France, Norway and Ireland, the childhood obesity rate ranges from 9 to 20 per cent. England has not provided data, but we know that the emergency from them is even more serious.
Commenting on the data, Dr. Joao Breda of the WHO does not mince words: the Mediterranean diet, he says, is doomed, in practice it no longer exists.Parents can and should do something to educate their children for a healthy lifestyle, making them find simple and fresh ingredients at home and encouraging them to do activities.