In a study of over a half-million survey participants, scientists found that eating healthy plant-based foods reduced the risk of severe Covid-19 by 41 percent, even after controlling for a number of factors.
TRISHA PASRICHA: During the pandemic, researchers from Harvard Medical School found that a healthy plant-based diet was associated with decreased risk of severe covid-19. In a study of over a half-million survey participants published in September in Gut, scientists found that eating healthy plant-based foods reduced the risk of severe covid-19 by 41 percent, even after controlling for a number of factors.
The study showed that diets highest in “healthy plant-based” foods, like whole grains or vegetables, were more beneficial than those containing less healthy plant-based groups, like potatoes and fruit juices, or those containing higher animal-based food groups, like seafood and dairy…
“What we’ve learned over the last year and a half is that the risk and severity of covid is not equally distributed across the population,” said Jordi Merino, instructor in medicine at Harvard Medical School and leading author of the study. He sought to understand why certain groups — the elderly or those with cardiovascular problems, for example — were more likely to get covid-19 and suffer from a more severe illness. “We realized that maybe a common underlying theme among all these factors was diet,” he said.
Still because of the study’s limitations, Merino cautions against over-interpreting the results. “Don’t think you can eat two pieces of fruit per day and your covid risk will be decreased,” he said. “But maybe the severity of the disease and its complications can be reduced through public health measures that involve healthy foods.” Diet influences immunity through nutrients that support antibiotic and antiviral defense, as well as through the microbiome.
“We’re colonized by microbes, and those colonizing patterns train the immune system to recognize which microbes are friends and which microbes are foe,” said Noel Mueller, assistant professor in epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Plant-based diets, rich in fiber, are well-established boosters of a diverse ecosystem of beneficial gut bacteria, although more studies to unravel a mechanism of benefit in covid-19 are needed. Mueller finds the Gut study’s conclusions “intriguing,” warranting additional research to further clarify any relationship between plant-based eating and covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus…
At the pandemic’s height, a majority of American households bought plant-based foods — with the greatest sales coming from milk alternatives, such as oat or almond milk, and from meat alternatives such as the soy-based Impossible Burger or wheat-derived seitan. Today, 1 in 4 Americans still report eating more protein from plant sources than in spring 2020, including foods like quinoa, lentils and tempeh, propelling the more than $7 billion dollar plant-based industry into what many are betting is the future of American cuisine…
The health benefits of a plant-based diet, including lowered risk of heart disease, play a big role in its growing popularity. Regular meat consumption is associated with increased risk of other conditions such as pneumonia, diverticular disease, diabetes and several cancers…
Eating plant-based diets can also positively affect climate change, which a pandemic-stricken humanity bore witness to being inseparable from health during the once-in-a-century event. Recent record heat waves, raging wildfires and swarming locusts galvanized many on the environment — particularly millennials and Gen Zs who are major adopters of plant-based eating…
“We don’t think that plant-based is a fad, we think that’s something that’s going to continue to grow over time,” said Kevin Hochman, KFC U.S. president and chief concept officer, in an interview with Bloomberg News. Experts predict the plant-based foods market will be valued at over $162 billion by 2030, spurred by the pandemic’s heightened awareness of health and the environment. SOURCE…
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