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Obesity and the metabolic syndrome in Mediterranean countries: A hypothesis related to olive oil
Author(s) -
Soriguer Federico,
RojoMartínez Gemma,
de Fonseca Fernando Rodriguez,
GarcíaEscobar Eva,
García Fuentes Eduardo,
Olveira Gabriel
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
molecular nutrition and food research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.495
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1613-4133
pISSN - 1613-4125
DOI - 10.1002/mnfr.200700021
Subject(s) - mediterranean diet , context (archaeology) , olive oil , mediterranean climate , calorie , metabolic syndrome , obesity , biology , environmental health , food science , medicine , endocrinology , ecology , paleontology
Abstract In Mediterranean countries people would previously have consumed a diet with a high proportion of MUFA. Physical activity would have been intense with a low level of stress. The stearoyl‐CoA desaturase (SCD1) system selected over thousands of years of this type of behavior must have adapted to a particular capacity of self regulation. Now, this pattern, called the “Mediterranean diet”, has been broken and many people living by the Mediterranean consume a high quantity of calories, mainly from saturated or n‐6‐rich fats and the relative intake of MUFA has decreased. Simultaneously, physical activity has decreased and the pattern of stress has changed towards what is called a western lifestyle. In this new context, if people have a favorable, genetically conditioned SCD1 activity that will let them confront the new situation or else have some other compensatory mechanism, such as being keen on sport, etc, then they can prevent the appearance of some of the complications associated with the metabolic syndrome. If, on the other hand, the SCD1 pattern is genetically unfavorable for this new situation and they have a new cultural context, then they do not have the alternative compensatory mechanisms and the probability of developing the metabolic syndrome is high.