Inflammation in our bodies can heal infected areas through increased blood flow. But, constant inflammation can lead to digestive issues, stiff joints and muscle pain, among other serious health conditions. If you avoid four types of foods, you can minimize your risk of chronic inflammation, says Dr. Jacqueline Wolf, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, for CNBC.
You want to ensure you have healthy bacteria in your gut that work to fight inflammation. The solution is to reduce your consumption of fatty meats, ultra-processed foods, drinks with added sugar and foods with coconut and palm oil. Put differently, eat more plant-based foods—fruits and vegetables—as well as fish and chicken, whole grains, extra virgin olive oil and flaxseed oil.
Don’t eat:
- Fatty meats. Avoid beef, lamb and pork as much as possible. By so doing, you should improve your colon health.
- Ultra-processed foods. Avoid hot dogs, sausages, bacon, ham, deli meats, and pepperoni. Don’t eat snack foods like oreos and goldfish either. Their salt, extra sugar and lack of antioxidants are bad for your gut. Eating these foods can lead to colorectal cancer, diabetes, dementia, heart disease and other serious health conditions. Eating these foods can change your gut’s microbiome, causing chronic inflammation. In turn, your blood pressure can rise, along with your risk of death. (N.B. One large 2021 study performed in Britain concluded that for every additional 25 grams—about one ounce—of processed meat in a person’s daily diet, the risk of dementia increased by 44 percent, and that of Alzheimer’s disease increased by 52 percent.)
- Drinks with sugar. Avoid sodas, lemonade and sweetened iced tea. One study, published in JAMA Internal Medicine found that people who drank as few as two glasses (16 ounces) of soda a day, including diet soda, had a greater chance of dying from any cause than people who drank fewer than 12 glasses of soda a year. After 19 years of drinking sugar-sweetened sodas, including diluted syrups, both men and women had a greater risk of dying from digestive disorders than people who did not.
- Foods with coconut and palm oil. Avoid products with high levels of saturated fat. Coconut oil has been found to raise both LDL and HDL cholesterol levels relative to unsaturated fats.
N.B. If you want to reduce your soft drink intake, consider doing so gradually rather than going cold turkey. You probably will have a greater likelihood of success. You might try substituting ice water for soft drinks. If you like carbonated drinks, you can substitute soda water for soft drinks. For extra flavor, you can add a small amount of juice to the soda water.
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