Plant-based foods could slash a country’s healthcare costs by billions of euros, says study

15 Feb 2018 --- Billions of euros could be saved from a country’s annual healthcare bill over the next years if more people followed a plant-based diet. This is according to a new study published in the Journal of Nutrition which looked at the health and economic consequences of two plant-based eating patterns, a diet with a daily portion of soy foods and a Mediterranean-style diet.

The study suggests the British government could reduce its healthcare and societal costs over the next 20 years by £5.21 billion (€5.86 billion) if just 10 percent of the UK population would emphasize plant-based foods in their diet. Cost savings could be as high as £7.54 billion if 10 percent of the UK population could be encouraged to incorporate soy products in their daily diet.

Plant-based eating does not have to exclude all animal products, but places plant-based foods such as soya, fruits, vegetables, wholegrains, nuts, seeds and vegetable oils at the core of the diet.

“Our research demonstrates that increasing plant-based eating is cost-effective, reduces economic costs, such as hospital admissions and doctors’ bills, as well as increasing the number of healthy years people live, and enabling them to continue having an active life,” says Lieven Annemans, Professor of Health Economics at Ghent University, and the lead author of the paper. 

The researchers carried out an extensive review of the scientific literature and concluded that both plant-based and soy eating patterns reduce the risk of diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, stroke and certain cancers. Diets containing soya demonstrated the most favorable health effects from the two evaluated plant-based food patterns.

The researchers calculated the impact of these plant-based food patterns on “quality adjusted life years” (QALYs), which estimate the number of expected years of good health. To calculate disease costs, a societal perspective was taken, including direct and indirect costs. 

Direct costs are those directly associated with the disease or related conditions including costs related to diagnosis and treatment. Indirect costs include employment-related elements such as absenteeism and productivity loss due to sickness.

For the UK, a diet containing soy is estimated to yield 159 QALYs and 100 QALYs per 1,000 women and men, respectively. Similarly, adherence to a plant-based Mediterranean-type diet also results in living longer in good health and cost-savings to society.

This study provides yet more reasons to eat more plant-based foods and is in line with the UK “Eatwell guide” which champions plant-based foods for good health and sustainability. It follows a report published by the Sustainable Food Trust in November – The Hidden Cost Of UK Food – which found that poor diets add 37p of healthcare costs to every £1 spent on food.