What will it take for the olive to have a global impact on public health? Dr. Harris Pastides considered this question in his keynote address at the 6th International Yale Symposium on Olive Oil & Health. Part of his answer: share information on olive oil’s benefits with consumers worldwide. And make olive oil generally affordable and widely available.
Speaking to an interdisciplinary audience of scientists, educators, and health and olive oil sector professionals who came to Heraklion, Crete from across the globe in December, Pastides discussed longstanding concerns. This President Emeritus at the University of South Carolina and Professor Emeritus of Epidemiology had explored the impact of diet on health for decades.
For example, Pastides reported that life expectancy increased from 47 to 73 years worldwide from the 1950s to the ‘70s. It then remained around that level. On the other hand, healthspan, defined as “being free of significant disease and self-reported as in good health,” as he explained, “did not follow this trend” of a substantial increase. Pastides called for more large cohort studies using olive oil and the Mediterranean diet in order to gather stronger evidence for their ability to help increase people’s healthspan.
One potential contribution to healthspan: “there is some hope,” Pastides said, that olive oil can help prevent dementia and Alzheimer’s. However, additional large cohort studies are needed to provide convincing proof of this. For now, there is only lecanemab, an extremely expensive medication that provides very small gains in cognition after biweekly infusions. Lecanemab also has serious side effects: brain swelling and brain bleeding. All that for $28,000 per year for the patient and another $83,000 annually for the health system. “Wouldn’t it be great to show that people do even better on the Mediterranean diet” that’s rich in olive oil? asked Pastides.
Make information and olive oil available to the general public worldwide
“Drug companies won’t subsidize a study on olive oil, because it’s a direct competitor of these drugs,” Pastides added. Yet he insisted that studies must be conducted so we can offer strong support for claims about olive oil and the Mediterranean diet. “We have to have a grounding,” he said, “a foundation in the best science we can do.”
Moreover, Pastides urged widespread dissemination of scientific findings about olive oil, “not only to the few or to the educated or rich,” as well as wider availability of olive oil itself. He called for adapting production processes, packaging, transportation, and distribution in order to “reach populations that are always left behind.” Of the world’s most populous countries, such as India, China, Indonesia, Pakistan, Nigeria, Brazil, and the USA, “only two are really familiar with olive oil. Well over half the population of our planet is unaware of olive oil. Do we care about truly making a global movement?”
If we do, Pastides asserts, it is essential to engage communities, and especially young people. “Efforts must touch everybody. Without community engagement, we run the risk olive oil will be a fad, not a movement.” As he reminded the audience, “every important public health intervention in modern time has involved educating children.” (Think of smoking and seatbelts.) For a belief in the goodness of olive oil to be sustained, it is important to “create a youth olive oil movement” and help children become accustomed to the flavors and aromas of olive oil.
How to make olive oil affordable and communicate its value for public health
Pastides emphasized that a global olive oil movement must also include working families. To make olive oil more affordable, he advocates new strategies of production and distribution. Mentioning major changes in the wine sector in recent decades, he highlighted nine actions that could help with olive oil (as others have also suggested).
1. Support Local Producers
2. Sustainable Farming Practices
3. Bulk Purchasing Programs
4. Improved Distribution Channels
5. Education and Awareness
6. Subsidies and Support
7. Alternative Sources
8. Community Co-ops
9. Innovative Packaging
That list and the goal behind it offer rich food for discussion in various groups and venues.
In addition, Pastides provided a more specific agenda for the coming year. Including actions already underway following initiatives by others, he encouraged better communication and intensified efforts in another nine areas.
1. Highlight Health Benefits
2. Promote Versatility in Cooking
3. Use Tasting Events
4. Promote Mediterranean Lifestyle
5. Educational Content on Quality
6. Engage Chefs and Influencers
7. Package in Convenient Formats
8. Highlight Sustainability
9. Create Familiarity in Advertising
Subsequent sessions at the Yale Symposium touched on the usefulness of these types of olive oil education, adaptation, and engagement in marketing.
Some marketers and olive oil producers argued later that consumers are more influenced by flavor than health. Pastides seemed to side with those who recognized the importance of both, while leaning toward greater interest in what olive oil can do for our health. He assured the audience that the contention that “you are what you eat” remains “as relevant as ever, but drug companies don’t want us to think so.”
Use olive oil and the Med diet to shift from treatment to prevention
In closing remarks at the Symposium, co-organizer Dr. Tassos Kyriakides of Yale School of Public Health emphasized the importance of “shifting the paradigm from treatment to prevention. That’s what the Mediterranean diet and nutrition can give us, for a global movement.” Coming from 15 nations, Symposium participants are working to spread the word about the benefits of olive oil and the traditional Mediterranean diet, and to provide more scientific evidence for those benefits all the time.
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