What is the EAT-Lancet diet?

Adhering to a plant-forward diet is associated with a lower risk of developing chronic kidney disease, a new study published in CMAJ suggests. The association was even stronger for people who didn’t have access to green space near their home, hinting that a diet rich in vegetables may make the health impacts of green-deprived environment less severe.The plant-forward diet in question is the EAT-Lancet diet, which not only takes human health into account, but also planetary health. As well as emphasizing consumption of vegetables, fruits and nuts and discouraging eating red meat, it emphasizes limiting added sugars and fats. Previous studies have shown the EAT-Lancet planetary health diet has been linked to lower risks of type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and mortality.Researchers from the Southern Medical University and Nanfang Hospital in Guangzhou, China, examined data from the U.K. Biobank cohort to see if adherence to the diet was linked to a difference in risk of chronic kidney disease. They studied 179,508 participants, aged 40 to 69 years old, who had no chronic kidney disease at baseline. Of these, 4,819 participants developed chronic kidney disease over a 12-year-long follow up. The researchers scored participants’ dietary recall questionnaires to determine if they adhered to the EAT-Lancet diet. They found that the greater the adherence to the diet, the stronger the association to a lower risk of disease.The researchers also looked at a subgroup of people who had little access to green space where they lived. A previous study by this team suggested that poor access to green space near the home is linked to a higher risk of developing chronic kidney disease. In this study, they found that the association of adhering to the EAT-Lancet diet to a lower risk of chronic kidney disease was significantly stronger for those without nearby green space compared to those who lived closer to green space. “This may indicate a compensatory role of diet in mitigating environmental risks,” the authors suggested.The diet also had a greater associated impact on people with specific genetic variants, including one on the AK6 gene that is involved in adenosine metabolism. The variant may change adenosine signalling, impacting inflammation, oxidative stress and fibrosis, all of which play a role in chronic kidney disease.The degree of reduction in risk for chronic kidney disease was comparable to that of other plant-forward diets, namely Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH), alternate Mediterranean diet (aMed) and healthful plant-based diet index (hPDI), the authors noted. These diets all stress the consumption of vegetables, fruits and nuts and reduced intake of red meat. Since the EAT-Lancet diet suggests further limits on sugars and fats, it “may further mitigate kidney risk through modulation of inflammation and oxidative stress pathways,” the authors wrote.“The EAT–Lancet diet may provide a practical, evidence-based dietary framework for chronic kidney disease prevention, with clearly defined recommendations across 14 food groups that facilitate clinical application and patient adherence,” the authors conclude.A recent review in Metabolism notes that there is no standardized method to measure adherence to the EAT-Lancet diet, so some studies may vary depending on the scoring system used. The researchers from Guangzhou used four different scoring systems.The paper was published in the CMAJ.

What is the EAT-Lancet diet?

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