The long term benefits of olive oil, endorsed for the first time by American research

Professor Miguel Ángel Martínez-González, of the University of Navarra and researcher with CIBEROBN, is one of the authors of the work, published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

Researchers from Harvard School of Public Health including Miguel Á. Martínez-González, Professor of Preventive Medicine at the School of Medicine of the University of Navarra and researcher with CIBEROBN, associated for the first time in the United States a higher intake of olive oil with a lower risk of total and cause-specific mortality. The study, "Consumption of Olive Oil and Risk of Total and Cause-Specific Mortality Among U.S. Adults" published in the 'Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC)', also reveals that replacing other fats with an equivalent amount of olive oil reduces premature mortality.

"The research was carried out using data from the best known and most reliable American studies on nutrition, which are a cohort of nurses, with 60,582 female participants, and that of healthcare professionals, with 31,801 male volunteers. The work is led by Harvard University and has a follow-up of 28 years, during which more than 36,000 deaths were verified and their cause identified", says Professor Martínez-González, a visiting professor at the same university since 2016.

As the researcher explains "doubts could arise when thinking that the fact of consuming olive oil was only a global marker of a healthy life. However, the abundant information collected from these participants every 2 years including an extensive nutritional evaluation repeated every 4 years, as well as the study of many other aspects of diet and life style, allow us to identify with validity what the long term effect of olive oil consumption is, once participants are matched for age and a multitude of other factors".

Reduced cardiovascular, cancer or neurodegenerative disease mortality

The work was led by researchers Marta Guasch-Ferré and Frank Hu. Also the University Rovira i Virgili participated. Olive oil consumption was compared in different categories and it was observed that, all other characteristics being equal, those who consumed more olive oil had relative reductions of 19% in cardiovascular mortality, 17% in cancer mortality, 29% in neurodegenerative disease and 18% in respiratory mortality. Martínez-González added that "In addition, it was observed that replacing 10 grams per day of other fats, such as margarine, butter, mayonnaise or dairy fats, with olive oil, was associated with an 8-34% lower risk of total and cause-specific mortality".

These results support those already obtained for olive oil and the Mediterranean diet in other pioneering studies in Spain, such as the SUN (Seguimiento Universidad de Navarra) study, with 23,000 participants, and the PREDIMED (Prevención con Dieta Mediterránea) trial, with more than 7,000 participants and a 5-year follow-up. Although these and other previous studies already recommended olive oil and the Mediterranean diet for cardiovascular disease prevention, "they could not identify such a direct long-term relationship between olive oil consumption and a reduction in premature mortality", says the doctor. "The new U.S. results are decisive in confirming the longer-term preventive effects on premature mortality. As it is such a robust work, they undoubtedly help to reinforce the nutritional advice we have been giving", he adds.

"This is scientific evidence that we have already explained in detail and in a practical way in informative books such as PREDIMED: Date el gusto de comer sano (EUNSA, 2006), Salud a ciencia cierta (Planeta, 2018) o ¿Qué comes? (Planeta, 2020), to which these important results and those of much-needed future research will undoubtedly be added", he concludes.

Foto Cedida / Marta Guasch-Ferré, Miguel Ángel Martínez-González y Frank Hu