Dogliotti, Veronesi Foundation: "There are no foods to demonize"

It would seem that the Mediterranean diet is among the best in the world. Ancel Keys, an American biologist, was convinced of this and observed the eating habits of his fellow countrymen for more than 30 years, who were particularly prone to cardiovascular diseases. His multicenter study, the first in the history of nutrition, found that diet influences the duration and quality of life of people. Elena Dogliotti, scientific supervisor of the Umberto Veronesi Foundation, during the 2019 Food Journalism Festival, in the panel dedicated to health food choices, takes stock of what has been discovered so far.

"In reality we still know very little about choosing the foods to prefer to live in good health. We have made many steps forward in the scientific field and we know a lot more about drugs and the molecular mechanisms of food that even influence our DNA. We have come to study nutrigenomics. But in fact we always say things to people that are taken for granted: that the Mediterranean diet is the best also because it is the one that is a little closer to the eating habits of Italians ”. Elena Dogliotti, goes on to underline that "many are the figures that deal with nutrition. The word nutritionist is inadequately exploited because it includes all the subjects that deal with nutrition. The public is led to listen and trust those subjects who have a demonizing approach to specific categories of food. There are no totally wrong or totally miraculous foods; there are food groups to favor and others to limit, but never to be excluded. It is evident that if we mainly consume foods containing saturated fats foods of animal origin, we will run into an imbalance of nutrients. The controversy on vegetarianism and veganism also starts here. A good diet must be adequate, that is balanced ".