According to recent statistics, heart disease and cancer are the leading causes of death for both men and women in the United States–yet adding one simple food to your diet may reverse that.
According to a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, people who ate nuts everyday were 20 percent less likely to die from heart disease or cancer.
This, say researchers, could be “groundbreaking.”
“Nuts used to be demonized because they’re high in fat,” says Jeffrey Blumberg of the USDA Human Nutrition Research Center of Aging at Tufts University, who did not participate in the study. “Now, 20 years later, they’re recognized as a healthful food. Nuts are high in fat, but they’re high in good fats.”
Why Nuts Can Save Your Life
In the new study, which was first reported by Reuters earlier this week, researchers looked at the eating habits of 76,000 women and 42,000 men, who were initially questioned as part of two studies: The Health Professional Follow-Up Study and the Nurses’ Health Study. They specifically looked at how many servings of nuts they consumed weekly–with results ranging from a serving everyday to a few servings every week.
And for those who made it a daily habit, the benefits were clear: They were 20 percent less likely to die from cancer or a heart attack.
That’s not all either–they were also 24 percent less likely to die from respiratory conditions, such as chronic obstruction pulmonary disease.
“The variety of nut, including peanuts, which are actually legumes, did not seem to make a difference,” says Dr. Charles Fuchs of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, who helped author the study. “The benefit really seems to span across nuts. Our data are consistent with a wealth of existing observational and clinical-trial data in supporting the health benefits of nut consumption for many chronic diseases.”
Unfortunately, researchers did not find that eating more nuts decreased their risk of dying from other conditions such as kidney disease, stroke, or an organ infection. There wasn’t a lower risk of dying from diabetes either, despite previous evidence indicating that it might stop it.
Nevertheless, Fuchs says this presents strong evidence that eating more nuts should be something included in all Americans’ diets.
“[My] personal recommendation is that people eat an ounce of nuts each day, although smaller amounts still seem to make a difference,” says Fuchs. “It’s possible that people who like nuts tend to have a thinner body type, but even after adjusting for lifestyle choices, we definitely see that people who eat nuts tend to be thinner and are less likely to be obese.”
The International Tree Nut Council Nutrition Research and Education Foundation helped fund the study, though they reportedly did not influence the study’s outcome.
Readers: How many nuts do you eat every week?
Sources:
Why Eating Nuts Lowers Your Cancer Risk – Reuters.com
Study: Nuts May Lower Cancer Risk – NEJM.org
Study: How Nuts May Fight Cancer – NLM.NIH.gov
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