A varied whole foods diet has numerous preventive effects. One of them relates to the likelihood of developing depression. The data is from Great Britain but the dietary issues certainly apply in the U.S., as well.
The team said the study was the first to look at the UK diet and depression.
The UK population is consuming less nutritious, fresh produce and more saturated fats and sugars
Dr Andrew McCulloch, Mental Health FoundationThey split the participants into two types of diet – those who ate a diet largely based on whole foods, which includes lots of fruit, vegetables and fish, and those who ate a mainly processed food diet, such as sweetened desserts, fried food, processed meat, refined grains and high-fat dairy products.
After accounting for factors such as gender, age, education, physical activity, smoking habits and chronic diseases, they found a significant difference in future depression risk with the different diets.
Those who ate the most whole foods had a 26% lower risk of future depression than those who at the least whole foods.
By contrast people with a diet high in processed food had a 58% higher risk of depression than those who ate very few processed foods.
