A friend of mine passionately follows New York Times articles about new medical diet studies, e.g., “eat blueberries and you won’t get Disease X.” My response to her admonishments to read and then adhere to these diet fads was always “You can read all of the best medical literature on diet and by the end of the project you won’t know any more than a good physician in Ancient Rome. The Roman doctor would have said ‘Don’t eat too much meat. Eat a lot of vegetables. Maybe some fish. Get exercise.’ What more or different would a modern doctor say?”
Now it turns out that even the New York Times is confirming what I was telling my friend for the last 10 years with “Mediterranean Diet Is Shown to Ward Off Heart Risks”. After 2000 years of progress the 10 lb. heads behind the study advocate that people eat “olive oil, nuts, beans, fish, fruits and vegetables, and even drink wine with meals.”
So that gets back to my question… what do we know today that the Romans didn’t know about diet and lifestyle? The main thing that I can come up with is the dangers of lead exposure.
[Separately, this video is a very thoughtful analysis of the latest diet bestseller… Wheat Belly
What the Romans knew about universal health care that we don’t.
The Romans also provided what sounds a lot like universal health care:
According to “Health and Hygiene,” the Roman government “provide[d] free, publically paid medical services for the poor.”
http://hum111.wikispaces.com/Roman+Medicine
And in fact the lead exposure thing was probably overblown. A) They knew about it (just read Vitruvius). B) The Romans sourced hard water for human consumption whenever possible. This deposited thick calcium carbonate deposits on the pipes, insulating the water from the lead. In any case almost all Roman hydraulic systems were constantly running, so water never was in contact with the pipes for more than a couple of minutes.
The whole idea that the Romans died in large numbers due to lead poisoning is bull . The slaves that worked with lead were noted to become sickly rather quickly, but that’s about it.
Thanks, Jeffrey, for that Roman universal health care link. I bet that they did it without spending 20 percent of their GDP also! More evidence that it is simply hubris that leads us to believe that we are so much smarter than our counterparts 2000 years ago.
How to measure calories, what macronutrients are and (roughly) what they do, how to measure and treat high blood pressure/high cholesterol, how to treat diabetes, how generally to limit the damage of infectious disease (lifestyle), how to wash our hands with soap, much more about how to treat wastewater (yes, Rome was better than what followed, but we’re much better than they were), what vitamins are, how to measure vitamin prevalence, what diseases lack of specific vitamins cause, how to treat those diseases.
I could drone on for even longer, but the point is that I think it’s fair to say that the answer is: a lot.
That doesn’t change the fact that general diet advice for a healthy person hasn’t changed in that time, but you overstated your point.
Stay away from 100LL, lol.
I read the first 3.5 paragraphs with an urgent need to point out that lead exposure was a major trouble of the Romans. I’m interested in Andrea’s post, though; too bad it comes with no references.
I’d add that we know a lot more about infectious microbes in food and water and various means of measuring and killing them. That was a world-historical earthquake changing the path of human life in the nineteenth century. We’re still adapting to the idea that people can routinely expect their infants to live to adulthood.
There are a lot of micronutrient deficiency diseases we can spot and treat now. Scurvy, neural tube defects, and a bunch more things can be cured or prevented if you just know what to eat.
Mediterranean Diet requires
the Mediterranean Sun, Mediterranean Weather, Mediterranean Pollution,
Mediterranean Work Ethic, Afternoon naps, Shorter height, being Thin, etc.
It is not just Olive oil. Romans didn’t have Sugar. Didn’t have Pasta, no Rice,
No tomatoes, no potatoes, no spices.
If Mediterranean diet is so great than Turks, Greeks, Lebanese, Egyptians, Tunisian,
Moroccans should also be included. I am sure their health numbers are no so great.
Don’t forget #1 reason for heart disease is Exercise and #2 is hypertension.
and only way Fat contributes to the heart is that more cells means more blood
supply, the larger the heart has to work. So if you are storing fat cells is
the reason for heart trouble. Whether that Fat is Olive oil or some other Fat doesn’t
matter.
They knew not to be a fat f%^k? Perhaps in Roman times it was easier to avoid since they didn’t have an economy devoted to the production and maintenance of fat people.
“What more or different would a modern doctor say?”
Eat less carbs, especially refined ones (sugar, pasta, white bread, rice, potatoes) and drink less carbs (all refined ones > soda and fruit juices).
Eat as much meat as you like and don’t forget the fat (can someone please pass the bacon?)
Don’t worry about excercise. May be good for other things, but in relation to nutrion it works up an appetite and makes you eat more.
Read Gary Taubes on what 200 years of nutrition science has brought us.
http://www.amazon.com/Good-Calories-Bad-Controversial-Science/dp/1400033462/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1362163663&sr=8-1&keywords=gary+taubes+good+calories+bad+calories
It is not about eating less and excercise more. It is not about the quality of the calories we eat.
How do we know what the Roman doctor said? How do we know how healthy the Romans were?
For a really thoughtful analysis of this study: http://eatingacademy.com/books-and-articles/is-a-mediterranean-diet-best-for-preventing-heart-disease?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=is-a-mediterranean-diet-best-for-preventing-heart-disease
Thanks, Guido. I hadn’t realized that doctors in Ancient Rome were telling patients to eat potatoes (then cultivated in South America) and wash them down with soda.
I misread your question and answered in relation to a modern diet.
“what do we know today that the Romans didn’t know about diet and lifestyle?”
Carbohydrates seemed to be an essential part of their diet. Especially for the poor.
http://library.thinkquest.org/26602/diet.htm
http://www.slideshare.net/articsail/ancient-roman-food-and-food-today
The only information I could find (quick scan) on their health seems to be the habit of bathing and the fact that they buid aquaducts (fresh water) attributed positively to their health.
The mummies have been studied. Their diet seems to be quite similar (Mediterranean) to that of the Ancient Romans, but their health was not that good:
“The evidence speaks of a people afflicted with rotten teeth and severe atheriosclerosis, suffering from elevated blood pressure and dying in their thirties with heart attacks.”
http://www.drbass.com/eades.html#2
A possible explanation for this is that the products of agriculture (and therefore wheat) were introduced only around 10.000 years ago in the human diet. This increased the intake of carbohydrates in favor of fat and protein. We weren’t built genetically to process this amount of carbohydrates. So it might be better to look at what our ancestors ate before agriculture entered (paleolithic age) and base our diet on their habits.
Fortunately, there are still some tribes in modern times who have a similar lifestyle as their ancestors. Studies deliver positive results on their health and absence of modern western diseases.
http://www.drbriffa.com/2012/07/27/hunter-gatherers-most-likely-to-be-leaner-than-us-due-to-differences-in-diet-not-activity/
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/paleolithic-diet/books-that-changed-my-life/
http://www.drbriffa.com/2011/10/11/it-looks-like-our-ancient-ancestors-ate-a-low-carb-diet/
So Dr. Davis might be onto something the Ancient Romans didn’t know.
Guido: That the poor in Rome subsisted on carbs does not mean that a good physician of the day was recommending that diet. Even if rich people stuffed themselves with carbs that also is not evidence that doctors were telling them to do it. Dunkin Donuts is very popular here in Massachusetts (the company was founded here), but that doesn’t mean that doctors from Harvard Medical School are telling patients to go out and enjoy a Boston Cream donut every morning.