BARCELONA - With its mountains
of ripe tomatoes, red peppers, fresh fruit and glistening fish, Barcelona's
world-famous La Boqueria market is a celebration of healthy eating.
For centuries its produce has helped underpin a record of healthy hearts,
giving Spain's northern region of Catalonia one of the lowest rates of heart
attacks to be found anywhere in Europe.
But doctors meeting here for the World Congress of Cardiology warn that
traditional Mediterranean-style diets - rich in vegetables, fruit, fish and
olive oil but sparing in meat - are under siege from junk food.
Across Spain, as well as Italy and Greece, the story is the same, as young
people increasingly turn away from old-style family meals in favour of burgers
and fries.
"The Mediterranean diet is changing," Dr Ramon Estruch of the University of
Barcelona told Reuters.
"Young people are not eating well today -- obesity is increasing and we are
losing our diet. We need to return to the classical patterns of Mediterranean
diet that we had in the 1960s and 1970s."
The virtues of eating fresh produce and olive oil were first recognised by
medical researchers 50 years ago. Ever since, the scientific evidence has kept
piling up.
Estruch and colleagues, for example, demonstrated two months ago that
Mediterranean-style diets, rich in healthy fats, are even better than
conventional low-fat diets at improving cholesterol, blood pressure and blood
sugar levels.
DIETS CONVERGING
Yet doctors find that dietary patterns across Europe that were once very
different are now converging - to the detriment of the cardiovascular health of
those living on the Mediterranean rim.
"It's really a problem," said Dr Michal Tendera, president of the European
Society of Cardiology (ESC).
"In northern Europe we are seeing a tendency to a more healthy diet," he
added.
"Unfortunately, in those countries that traditionally have had a
Mediterranean diet, the situation is not improving but deteriorating. Diet is
getting worse and the amount of exercise that people take is very, very low."
Dr Valentin Fuster, president of the World Heart Federation, said economic
development and a poor diet often went hand in hand, as people ate more and more
of the wrong thing, while opting increasingly for fast food due to their busy
lifestyles.
One in four Spaniards under the age of 19 are now overweight and between 16
and 17 percent are obese, he said.
The price is likely to be a rising toll of heart attacks and strokes, putting
additional pressure on already strained public healthcare budgets.
In the Europe Union alone, the ESC estimates that cardiovascular disease
costs the economy around 170 billion euros ($218 billion) a year -- 100 billion
in healthcare provision and the rest in lost productivity.
