The Blue Zones: 9 Lessons for Living Longer From the People Who've Lived the Longest

by Dan Buettner

After being starved for so many centuries, Okinawans seized this new food culture. They quickly developed a taste for canned meat (Hormel to this day still exports approximately five million pounds of SPAM a year to Okinawa) and fast food (Okinawans eat more hamburgers per capita than any of Japan’s other 47 prefectures). A sharp increase in obesity-related diseases such as diabetes has ensued. Okinawa now has Japan’s highest rate of obesity, and, among middle-aged men, one of the highest rates of premature deaths from cardiovascular diseases. While Okinawan women are still

lives 7.3 years longer than the average 30-year-old white Californian male. A 30-year-old Adventist female lives 4.4 years longer than the average 30-year-old Californian white female. “If you go to Adventists who are vegetarian,” said Fraser, “it becomes 9.5 years longer for men and 6.1 years longer for women. It is not surprising why this is so. About two-thirds of people either die of heart disease or cancer, and the Adventists do a number of things to protect themselves from heart disease and different cancers.”

“it turns out that most of the fat in nuts is unsaturated fat. And when we looked at that data, it was really so clear: The Adventists who consumed nuts at least five times a week had about half the risk of heart disease of those who didn’t. This was true of men, women, vegetarian, nonvegetarian—we split the population up about 16 or 17 different ways and each time asked the question, ‘Does nut consumption matter?’ And every time we saw that it did.”

Nuts. Whole grains. Fruits. Veggies. Where it’s at.

“Colon cancer also,” Fraser said. “We found that the Adventists who ate meat had a 65 percent increased risk of it compared to the vegetarian Adventists. And Adventists who ate more legumes like peas and beans had a 30 to 40 percent reduction in colon cancer.”

Adventist who are vegetarian are lighter by about 15 lb. vegan Adventist’s are 30 lb lighter. Less fat means less fat cells which are harmful and may cause cardiovascular disease and or cancer.