A study shows that following a vegan diet for just eight weeks can lower a person’s biological age and help them lose weight.
In the volunteers who ate only plant-based foods, the ages of the heart, hormone balance, liver, and inflammatory and metabolic systems also decreased.
However, according to researchers at Stanford University in California, these changes were not observed in participants who ate meat, eggs and dairy products.
People who followed a vegan diet during the study lost an average of two kilos more than people who did not.
This is likely because they consumed 200 fewer calories per day through the meals they were given during the first four weeks.
According to experts, weight loss may have played a role in the observed differences in biological age between the two groups, rather than the nature of the food itself.
Following a vegan diet for just eight weeks can lower a person’s biological age and help them lose weight, a study suggests
Volunteers who were fed only a plant-based diet also achieved decreases in heart age, hormone balance, liver, and inflammatory and metabolic systems.
Some argue that a vegan diet can lead to nutritional deficiencies in the long term and that it is not suitable for all ages.
The findings, published in the journal BMC Medicine, are based on a small study of 21 pairs of 39-year-old identical twins. Half of them ate vegan, while the other half ate everything.
At the end of the study, the researchers saw a decrease in estimates of biological age based on the degree of DNA methylation, a type of chemical modification of DNA used to estimate biological age.
Biological aging refers to the deterioration in the functioning of tissues and cells in the body, as opposed to chronological age.
Previous research has shown that increased DNA methylation levels are associated with aging.
However, Varun Dwaraka of the epigenetic testing company TruDiagnostic Inc. and Christopher Gardner of Stanford University in California and colleagues said it’s unclear to what extent the differences between the pairs can be attributed to differences in diet.
More research is needed to determine the relationship between diet, weight and aging, in addition to the long-term effects of vegan diets, they add.
Tom Sanders, emeritus professor of nutrition and dietetics at King’s College London, who was not involved in the research, said the study did show some difference in ageing among vegans, but it failed to take into account that vitamin and mineral deficiencies often take years to reveal.
He added that research also suggests that a vegan diet may not be good for the health of older people.
Those who followed a vegan diet during the study lost an average of two pounds more than those who did not. This is likely because they consumed 200 fewer calories per day in the meals they were given during the first four weeks (file photo)
Professor Sanders said: ‘While observational studies show that vegan diets can have beneficial effects on health in middle age (such as a lower risk of cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes), this is not the case in older vegans, who appear to be more likely to experience muscle loss, low bone density and neurological disorders, which have a significant impact on quality of life.
‘The life expectancy of vegans is indeed no different from that of people who follow a mixed diet.’
According to Dr Duane Mellor, dietitian and spokesperson for the British Dietetic Association, although the study compared a vegan diet with an omnivorous diet, the diets were not fully comparable in terms of calories.
He added: ‘It is possible that reducing energy intake affected the way the participants’ DNA was changed.’
Dr Mellor pointed out that the vegan group had to eat twice as many portions of vegetables, more fruit and more legumes, nuts and seeds than the omnivorous group. This could also partly explain the reported differences.