22 May Did you know that Spain is #1 in the top 10 healthiest countries in the world?

According to the Bloomberg Global Health Index, Italy, Iceland, Japan, Switzerland, Sweden, Australia, Norway, Singapore and Israel are also on the list. All these are beautiful countries with stunning nature and a fairly good ecology. But Spain was in the first place of this rating last year and the year before. Why do you think that is?

Tip: healthy eating habits and the Mediterranean diet.

The Bloomberg Healthiest Countries Index for 2021 is a ranking of 169 countries by overall health status based on data from the World Health Organization, the United Nations Population Division, and the World Bank. Spain received an overall health score of 92.8 out of 100.

The researchers hypothesized that the exceptional health of Spanish citizens was largely due to their eating habits. As in Italy, Spain’s commitment to a Mediterranean diet with a focus on olive oil, cereals, beans and nuts has been proven to be more beneficial than a low-fat diet to protect against serious cardiovascular disease.

Bloomberg suggested that this may be one of the reasons that countries with low-fat food in the population, such as Japan, did not score as high. The Mediterranean diet has also been linked to healthy brain aging, a lower risk of depression, a lower risk of stroke in women, a lower risk of obesity, and a host of other benefits.

According to the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies, the Mediterranean region has seen a decline in the number of cardiovascular diseases and cancer deaths over the past decade. According to the UN, Spain has the highest life expectancy in the EU and the third-highest in the world, behind Japan and Switzerland. By 2040, the average life expectancy of Spaniards is projected to be almost 86 years, which will be the highest in the world.
By comparison, China ranked fifty-second, and the average life expectancy in this Asian country is expected to be higher than in the United States by 2040.