I learned about Blue Zones recently through Zac Efron’s new Netflix travel show, Down to Earth with Zac Efron. Episode 4 brings Zac and the audience to Sardinia where Zac meets with Dr. Giovanni Pes, nutritionist and medical statistician, and Dr. Valter Longo, bio-gerontologist, to discuss their research on the centenarians who live there. Blue Zones are regions of the world where people live much longer on average than everywhere else. This concept was coined by Dan Buettner and there are five Blue Zones in the world:
- Sardinia, Italy
- Okinawa, Japan
- Loma Linda, California (side note: California is also home to some of the world’s oldest-known living trees)
- Nicoya Peninsula, Costa Rica
- Icaria, Greece
According to Wikipedia, these Blue Zones have the highest rates of centenarians (i.e. people age 100 or above), and the people who live there suffer a fraction of the common diseases that ails the rest of the world and they enjoy more years of good health.
During the episode, Zac also visits a local woman who was born on April 15, 1920. She was 98 years old when the episode was filmed. Her husband had lived to 103 years old before his passing. According to Dr. Longo, it is extremely rare to have a couple with such longevity. Thereafter, Liliana was asked to do a cognitive test that one-third of centenarians or people with dementia will have trouble with, but Liliana does this with flying colours by accurately drawing the numbers on a clock and overlapping shapes on camera.
Liliana’s test was administered in her native language. In North America, the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (also known as the MOCA) is commonly administered to seniors as a screening tool for cognitive impairment like dementia. The MOCA is in the news recently as a result of Donald Trump’s interview with Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday. Trump didn’t actually identify the exact cognitive test involved but he was proud to have “aced” the test.
Thanks for reading!