Metabolic Response to Western vs. Indigenous Diets in Hispanic Women

Chronic disease risk, including breast cancer risk, is not uniform across race and ethnic groups in the United States. This variation in disease risk may be due to environmental exposures (including diet), genetic susceptibility, disparities in access to health screening, diagnosis and medical care, or combination of these factors. Here we have shown that Hispanic women in the U.S. are more likely to be overweight or obese compared to non-Hispanic whites. Some of the excess obesity risk is likely due to the lack of neighborhood availability and affordability of fruit, vegetables, lean protein and whole grains. Whether an inexpensive and widely available highly processed/refined, nutrient poor diet superimposed on a genetic background favoring adipose deposition (i.e., the "thrifty genotype") is metabolically detrimental has not been investigated. Research to test the metabolic response to Indigenous and Western diets in Hispanic women may provide important information about the etiology of obesity and obesity-related diseases in Hispanic women, including risk of breast cancer. Since reducing disparities in obesity-related diseases, including breast cancer, is an important public health goal, identifying potential programs for prevention should receive high priority.

Mexicans are the largest immigrant group in the United States with an estimated 10 million Mexican-American women currently in the U.S. As they acculturate to this country, Mexican immigrants change their dietary habits from traditional (indigenous) foods with plentiful fruit, vegetables and complex carbohydrates rich in fiber and other compounds to a Western-style diet high in fat and refined carbohydrate, but low in plant foods. Particularly concerning is that the food choices made by Mexican immigrants, many of whom are of lower socio-economic status, are driven partly by their inability to procure and purchase healthy foods. The disparity in both food availability and purchasing power fuels a tendency to obtain and consume a low-cost, Western style diet. When this diet is superimposed on persons with a "thrifty genotype" who are evolutionarily adapted to diets high in legumes and complex carbohydrates, it may lead to an abnormal metabolic response that favors adipose deposition and numerous health risks. Thus, ancestral genetic characteristics likely have an important role in metabolic response to specific dietary patterns and subsequent health risks. This phenomenon may partly explain the tendency for Mexicans and other immigrants from the Americas to become obese after just one generation in the United States.