EVOO is the last thing to give up because of price

The last thing to give up because of the price

In the kitchen of nutritionist Emilia Gómez Pardo: “EVOO is the last thing to give up because of the price.” We visited the kitchen of the cancer-fighting diet expert, who advocates the Mediterranean diet and EVOO as guarantors of health.

Even the kitchen of a biochemist and nutritionist who specializes in anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory, and antioxidant diets. Emilia Gómez Pardo, who promotes the cancer-friendly lifestyle as a scientific advisor to the CRIS Foundation against cancer, finally has a perfectly normal kitchen at home.

Very normal for someone who lives in a Mediterranean country and fills her pantry with the typical products of this diet, led by extra virgin olive oil, or EVOO. Because half the world’s population doesn’t eat properly. Nearly 900 million people suffer from involuntary malnutrition. And many more, just over a billion people, are obese.

Ticking time bombs for global health
Fortunately, our body’s machinery runs much better thanks to perhaps the most important and characteristic food of the Mediterranean diet: olive oil. EVOO in particular. But due to drought and war, the price of olive oil has increased by 67% over the past year, and many families have begun to look for alternatives.

As part of the anti-inflammatory diet, is our health at risk, not because of poisoning, but because of the abandonment of our star food, EVOO? Are we eating worse and worse, without realizing it, because healthier ingredients are being replaced with cheaper ones hidden in ultra-processed foods?

The anti-inflammatory diet is the diet without ultra-processed foods

In her book More Life, Less Cancer (Arpa, 2023), Emilia Gómez Pardo presents a basic recipe to prevent “up to a third of tumors, which are preventable” and EVOO, “the healthiest fat that exists,” as its basis.

Each ultra-processed food we consume daily increases cardiovascular risk by 9% and increases the risk of colorectal cancer. The consumption of ultra-processed foods is linked to overweight and obesity, high blood pressure, metabolic syndrome, and type 2 diabetes. It’s even associated with inflammatory activity and muscle pain.

Does the rising price of EVOO have harmful consequences for our health?

Things are getting complicated these days on the shelves of olive oil stores. With a liter of EVOO around 10 euros, for half that price you can find other presentations of olive oils without the “extra virgin” label. “Rather than replacing EVOO, I would cut costs by reducing its consumption; “I wouldn’t suggest alternatives to what exists until there is no other option.”

During refining, the beneficial properties are lost and a certain degree of processing is added. This doesn’t mean they are harmful to health. But Gómez Pardo is watching “with concern” what is happening with EVOO prices. “It’s unfortunate that, for reasons beyond health, its consumption is being compromised,” especially among the poorest families.

“I think [removing EVOO from the diet] should be the last resort, the last thing to give up because of the price,” he says bluntly, but he understands the shivers in many people’s checking accounts. “Each of us, in our own personal circumstances, must know what is a priority. But as long as health criteria prevail, I won’t propose alternatives until there is no other choice.

It’s good to have them on the table, but I would prefer to consume less, reduce expenses by reducing consumption, rather than swapping [EVOO for another oil]. Therefore, alternatives to olive oil will never be as healthy.

Sugar and ultra-processed foods, on the verge of “bearing labels like those of tobacco”

The anti-inflammatory diet doesn’t rely solely on vegetables, to the detriment of meats, especially processed meats, “which have been shown to be carcinogenic.” Sugary drinks and ultra-processed foods “are like tobacco. Maybe they don’t have the same impact in terms of numbers, but they definitely have the same impact in terms of the relationship with disease.” They cause cancer [technically, they talk about “increasing the risk of cancer”]. It is proven.”

How? Through a dual pathway: the induction of obesity, which is a risk factor “associated with 19 cancers.” Obesity involves a state of chronic inflammation. Because an anti-inflammatory diet – supervised by a doctor – can reduce the risk of cancer.

On the other hand, these ultra-processed products, consumed regularly, or red meat, cooked frequently at very high temperatures, produce substances “that can lead to mutations or create a cellular metabolic environment that favors the development of cancer.”

We must prioritize “healthy eating education from childhood,” without moralizing or guilt, but with quality information.

Public Health

For the time being, the EU does not offer such labels, and up to a quarter of them obtain a “good” score on nutritional traffic lights such as Nutriscore. Various European countries have begun to regulate their advertising more strictly.

Basically, it’s about promoting stigma-free, “moral-free” food education, based on information, “from childhood,” without promoting guilt, nutritional anxiety, or a false morality related to food. “And permissiveness, please. We’re human. Eating should be a pleasure, but there’s as much food in abundance as there is information. It’s difficult to choose. It’s still worth betting on health.”