The 7 Wonders of Olive Oil by Alice Alech

Author:Alice Alech
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: The 7 Wonders of Olive Oil
ISBN: 9781944822361
Publisher: Familius
Published: 2017-04-14T16:00:00+00:00

WONDER 7

OLIVE OIL HELPS PREVENT STROKES AND HEART ATTACKS

The celebrities in their stunning red dresses parade elegantly down the runway. They were there to present the American Heart Association’s “Go Red for Women” Red Dress collection, a colorful event which took place at the department store Macy’s in February 2016. The gathering of top models, designers, and celebrities wanted to show their support and to help raise awareness of cardiovascular disease, an illness that affects 44 million women in the United States.

Wearing red for this illness is the obvious choice because red stands out and is the color associated with our hearts. Women suffer more than men from diseases of the heart, and the only way to bring down these high figures is by education. The American Heart Association asks women everywhere to wear red every first Friday in February; it is a ritual they say is beginning to bear fruit, as 90% of women have made at least one healthy behavior change. In the UK, the statistics are also high; the country observes National Heart Month in February as well. With more heart awareness taking place worldwide, women are now checking their cholesterol, increasing their exercise, and making lifestyle changes to prevent cardiac events from happening.

We’d all like our blood to be freely flowing through our bodies, but blood vessels can sometimes get obstructed, and when they do, they can wreak havoc. If blood flow to the brain is not progressing correctly, the body suffers a stroke—a brain attack that disrupts the abilities related to the affected part of the brain; it can come on suddenly, causing numbness, sudden confusion, and dizziness. Strokes occur when a clot (a fatty deposit) blocks the artery in the brain. Equally serious is a heart attack, which causes damage to the heart’s muscles when vital oxygenated blood cannot get to those tissues. This, too, is mainly due to a blood clot, blocking the coronary artery supplying blood to the heart. We are familiar with blood clots; we can see the sticky blood cells appear whenever we injure ourselves and form a scab over the cut. That is how the body responds to injury. However, what we do not want are those clots in our blood vessels. The risk factors are the same for strokes and heart attacks: smoking, diabetes, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure, all of which provoke changes in our blood supply system.

In the last chapter, we addressed some of the factors of cholesterol as related to diabetes, but it is perhaps an even more significant risk when considering cardiovascular health. The process that causes the narrowing of the arteries is called “atherosclerosis,” said to be caused mostly by the bad cholesterol LDL. All conditions involving the heart and circulation are called “cardiovascular diseases” (CVD), which is one of the leading causes of death in our world today.

You might not be surprised to know that there are fewer incidences of cardiovascular diseases in Mediterranean countries. The American Ancel Keys was the first to study diets, lifestyle, and the incidence of heart disease.

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