With the ever-growing wave of fad diets like the controversial paleo one (based primarily on meat, nuts and berries and getting away from processed and more "modern" foods) or Atkinson's; however, in spite of all the rage one way or another, over and over again research has proven that certain eating habits, such as a high fiber diet, are the healthiest.
Usually a diet becomes fashionable under the promise of severe weight loss; however, it's been proven that others like the Mediterranean way of eating and the high fiber diet could also reduce risk of illnesses, from different types of cancer all the way to heart disease.
Now, Science Daily reports that following a high fiber diet could actually aid consumers in reducing their risk for colon cancer; researchers from the Imperial College London (along with scientists from other universities across the world, including the Netherlands, South Africa and Helsinki) made the discovery and published it recently in the journal Nature Communications, under the name "Fat, fiber and cancer risk in African Americans and rural Africans."
According to The Huffington Post, the researchers had two groups in their investigation, comprised of African-Americans on one side and African volunteers on the other; they swapped both groups' eating habits, giving Americans a high fiber diet and Africans a diet rich in protein.
Forbes reports that the results were quick and staggering, as it turns out that, after following the high fiber diet for only two weeks, American subjects reduced their risk of colon cancer significantly.
The idea for the study came to Stephen O'Keefe, a University of Pittsburg School of Medicine professor, when he opened a practice in South Africa and noticed how rare it was for patients to get colon problems and less so cancer, mostly having great health in their colons.
It's a wide contrast to the US, where colon cancer is the second leading killer of the disease.
Besides being a high fiber diet, South Africans' eating habits have been described as being low in fat, including foods like spinach, red pepper, onions and corn fritters.
