Live longer by drastically restricting your calories

Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 20 Apr 2004 - 0:00 PST


There is growing evidence that you will live longer by drastically restricting your calories. There is a small group of people who are significantly restricting their calorie intake in order to live longer, they are beginning to get results which seem to support this idea.

A study has revealed that these people have much lower levels of cholesterol, blood pressure, much lower risk of diabetes, cancer and Alzheimer's.

John Holloszy, study leader said "These people are definitely protected against the major killers. It should definitely increase longevity " The study was carried out at Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, USA.

This is not a question of just not overeating and being careful. These people have extremely low-calorie diets, and have done so for many years. They are not only being protected from major diseases, they may be extending their life expectancy much more than we would expect.

Previous studies have shown that mice and rats on very low calorie diets live much longer than the other rats and mice in the studies. It seems that this may also apply to humans. Scientists are beginning to wonder that possibly our production of free radicals is reduced so significantly that it lengthens our lifespan if we follow a drastically calorie reduced diet.

In a study, 18 people have been following a very low calorie diet from 3-15 years. They are from the USA and Canada.

You will be able to read about this study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences soon.

The researchers say that further studies are needed in order to be completely sure it really is the diet that extends life or just the fact that not being overweight has huge benefits. They say their findings encourage them to think there is more to this than just not being overweight.

The team came across an organisation on the internet, which consisted of 1,000 people who belong to the Calorie Restriction Society.

Dean Pomerleau reduced is calorie intake to 1,900 per day (from 3,000) four years ago. He has two meals a day. He only eats fruits, vegetables, nuts and non-sweetened herb teas.

Pomerleau said "I'm a very disciplined person, and food has never been a critical, driving force in my life. So I've never found it as difficult as many may have. For many it is difficult, especially in the beginning. But what you find is that once you get into it it's not a hardship at all. We actually consider it a preferable way to live."

Others in the society eat fish, chicken and a variety of foods. You can find them at www.calorierestriction.org.

The average member of the society had kept to their diet for about six years, eating from 1,100 t0 1,900 calories a day. Hooloszy examined these people and compared the results with these people's earlier medical records. He also compared them to other people, for example, another group who were on about 1,975-3,500 calories a day and had typical Western foods.

The very low calorie group had lower levels of bad cholesterol (much lower), very elevated levels of good cholesterol, less triglycerides and low blood pressure. These middle aged adults had arteries like kids'. Their body's response to insulin was high and their blood sugar levels were low. This means they had virtually no chance of developing diabetes.

Their levels of C-reactive protein (CRP) was also very low. CRP is a marker for inflammation in the body. Experts believe low CRP levels significantly reduce your chances of developing heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's and a host of other things. Holloszy "It's very clear from these findings that calorie restriction has a powerful protective effect against diseases associated with aging. We don't know how long each individual actually will end up living, but they certainly have a much longer life expectancy on average because they're most likely not going to die from a heart attack, stroke or diabetes."

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