It’s a universal desire to have a longer life span. To achieve this, we’re often taught that adopting healthy lifestyle choices like exercising, quitting smoking, and abstaining from excessive drinking are essential. Diet, it has been shown, may also lengthen one’s life expectancy.

Healthy diet may enhance life expectancy by six to seven years in middle-aged persons, and by roughly 10 years in young adults.

With the help of various studies that looked at nutrition and lifespan as well as the Global Burden of Disease study, researchers were able to put together a comprehensive picture of global health. According to the authors’ findings, the amount of fruit, vegetables, whole grains, refined grains, nuts, legumes… fish; eggs; dairy products; red meat; processed meat; and sugary beverages that people consume may affect life expectancy.

An ideal diet for longevity was then created by the authors and tested in comparison to the standard Western diet, which is heavy in processed foods and red meats as well as in high-fat dairy products and pre-packaged meals with a lack of fruits and vegetables. More legumes (beans and lentils) and whole grains like barley and brown rice were shown to be the best sources of protein, whereas less red and processed meat was found to be detrimental.

Researchers discovered that women and men in the United States, China, and Europe who started eating a healthy diet at the age of 20 might expect to live longer. They also discovered that switching to an optimum diet at the age of 60 increased life expectancy by eight years when compared to a western diet. By the time a person reaches the age of 80, they may expect to live for a further three and a half years.

It’s not always feasible to totally alter one’s eating habits, so scientists looked into what would happen if individuals went from a conventional Western food diet to a diet that was somewhere in the middle. This “feasibility approach diet” increased life expectancy for 20-year-olds by six years for women and seven years for men, according to the researchers.

Table showing how many grams of each food category one should aim to eat on each of the three diets the researchers looked at in their research.
People on various diets should try to eat a certain quantity of food each day, according to this table. Laura Brown, the author, made this information available.
These findings suggest that long-term food adjustments may have a significant impact on life expectancy at any age. However, the benefits are greater if these alterations are implemented from a young age.

No, not yet.

Life expectancy estimations derived from the most current and comprehensive meta-analyses on nutrition and mortality have been used in this research.

Since there is so much data in meta-analyses that they may often be the greatest evidence, they can also make assumptions about the data that can lead to major distinctions between studies being overlooked. The evidence supporting limiting egg and white meat intake was of poorer quality than that for whole grains, salmon, processed meats, and nuts, which is also worth highlighting.

In addition, the research failed to account for a number of factors. It took a ten-year period of time for individuals to realize the effects of the diet adjustments. As a result, it’s unclear if making dietary adjustments over a longer length of time would still increase people’s longevity. In addition, the researchers neglected to account for prior health issues, which may have an impact on one’s life expectancy. There are many additional variables that might affect an individual’s lifespan, such as their current health status, their family history, and their habits, such as whether they smoke, consume alcohol, or engage in strenuous physical activity.

Nonetheless, the study team’s findings were based on a wide range of studies on the issue. Additionally, prior studies have shown that small but long-term changes to food and lifestyle may have major health advantages, including lifespan.

The methods through which nutrition may lengthen one’s life span are not yet fully understood. However, the ideal diet discovered by experts comprises a wide variety of foods that are rich in antioxidants. It is possible that these compounds may decrease or prevent cell damage, which is one of the main factors contributing to aging. Research on the topic is still underway, so it’s not certain whether dietary antioxidants will have the same impact. Anti-inflammatory qualities of several of the foods examined in this research suggest that they may postpone the development of many illnesses, as well as the aging process.

Of course, making a total shift in your diet might be challenging. Even so, it’s possible that adding some of the foods that have been linked to a longer life span would be beneficial.