Mediterranean diet tribute

[Guest guest]

Hi All,

The below is one of many tributes to a long-lived

healthy eating advocate and practitioner.

Nutr Metab (Lond). 2005 Feb 14;2(1):4 [Epub ahead of print]

Ancel Keys: A tribute.

Vanitallie TB.

Ancel Keys, Ph.D., who died in November, 2004, at the age of 100,

was among the first scientists to recognize that human

atherosclerosis is not an inevitable consequence of aging, and that a

high-fat diet can be a major risk factor for coronary heart disease.

During World War II, he and a group of talented co-workers at the

University of Minnesota conducted a large-scale study of

experimentally-induced human starvation. The data generated by this

study--which was immediately recognized to be a classic-- continue to

be of inestimable value to nutrition scientists. In his later years,

Keys spent more time at his home in Naples, Italy, where he had the

opportunity to continue his personal study of the beneficial effects

on health and longevity of a Mediterranean diet.

PMID: 15710049 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

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http://www.nutritionandmetabolism.com/content/2/1/4

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Ancel Keys, who died in November, 2004, was an excellent

testimonial to the health-promoting effects of his beloved

Mediterranean diet. He lived to be 100 and, as the New York Times

obituary put it, " remained intellectually active through his 97th

year. " His latter years were spent mostly at his home in Naples,

ItaIy. I never had the privilege of knowing him well, but encountered

him occasionally at scientific meetings where we were both speakers.

He was friendly but, I thought, reserved. What struck me about Ancel

was his remarkable absence from the counsels of the nutrition

establishment. Despite his acknowledged expertise and importance in

the field, he was not a member of AMA's Council on Foods & Nutrition

(at least not during the many years I served on that organization). I

never saw him at any of the NIH advisory committees on which I

served. He did not play a role in the deliberations of the Food and

Nutrition Board of the National Research Council. He was not involved

in the American Society for Clinical Nutrition during its heyday. Why

was this? Perhaps the fact that he was a physiologist (later an

epidemiologist) and not a physician played some role. Also, I think

he preferred to go his own way, and – to some extent – he remained

aloof from " academic nutrition. " Yet he was willing to lecture to

many audiences and was not considered to be a scientific eccentric;

to the contrary, his epidemiological work was frequently cited and

praised, and his monumental study of experimentally-induced

semistarvation in human subjects [1] was immediately recognized to be

a classic.

Keys and his capable associates conducted careful physiological

and psychological studies of 32 initially healthy conscientious

objectors (to World War II) through 6 months of experimentally

induced semistarvation, followed by a year or more of rehabilitation.

These studies generated a cornucopia of data – data that are all the

more valuable now because such an experiment would not have a chance

of being approved by today's Institutional Review Boards. Protein-

calorie malnutrition (PCM) – in effect, famine – remains endemic in

many parts of the world; moreover, PCM is the most common nutritional

problem encountered in U.S. hospitals and nursing homes. The studies

carried out by Keys and his co-workers make it possible for us to

distinguish the effects of semistarvation on the body's strength,

composition, physiological status, and mood from the confounding

effects of such underlying diseases as cancer, intestinal

malabsorption, renal insufficiency, emphysema, etc. – illnesses that

often give rise to conditioned PCM. The Minnesota group showed

clearly that semistarvation can be independently responsible for an

array of psychological problems such as anxiety, depression, and

hypochondria. From their studies, it is possible to demonstrate a

clear relationship between a decline in fat-free mass and PCM-

associated morbidity.

Keys's major scientific achievements are enumerated in some detail

by Jane E. Brody in her New York Times obituary, dated November 23,

2004. For those of us who worked for so many years to call attention

to the relationship of serum total cholesterol to risk of coronary

heart disease (CHD), and to the cholesterol-raising effects of

certain saturated fats, Keys will always be one of the major prophets

who provided the early evidence that atherosclerosis is not an

inevitable concomitant of aging, and that a diet high in saturated

fat content can be a major risk factor for CHD. The practical outcome

of the work in this field – to which Ancel contributed so much – is

the extraordinary decrease in mortality from coronary heart disease

that has occurred during the past half-century. Cancer has finally

replaced heart disease as America's number one killer. Ancel had his

well-deserved reward – a long, productive life unencumbered by an

excess of committee meetings, and the opportunity to contemplate the

Tyrrhenian sea while enjoying the benefits of a Mediterranean diet.

References

1. Keys A, Brozek J, Henschel A, Mickelsen O, HL: The

biology of human starvation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota

Press; 1950.