People who ate a daily handful of nuts were 20 percent less likelyto die from any cause than those who didn't consume nuts, aU.S. study said Wednesday.
The research, published in the U.S. journal New England Journalof Medicine, also found regular nut-eaters were more slenderthan those who didn't eat nuts, which would alleviate thewidespread worry that eating a lot of nuts will lead to overweight.
"The most obvious benefit was a reduction of 29 percent in deaths from heart disease -- the majorkiller of people in America, " Charles Fuchs, senior author and director of the Gastrointestinal CancerCenter at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, an affiliate of Harvard Medical School, said in a statement.
"But we also saw a significant reduction -- 11 percent -- in the risk of dying from cancer," addedFuchs, who is also affiliated with the Channing Division of Network Medicine at Brigham andWomen's Hospital.
It couldn't be determined whether any specific type of nuts was crucial to the protective effect,said the researchers. However, the reduction in mortality was similar both for peanuts and for "tree nuts" including walnuts, hazelnuts, almonds, Brazil nuts, macadamias, pecans, cashews,pistachios and pine nuts.
Several previous studies have found an association between increasing nut consumption and alower risk of diseases such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, colon cancer, gallstones, anddiverticulitis. Higher nut consumption also has been linked to reductions in cholesterol levels,oxidative stress, inflammation, adiposity, and insulin resistance. Some small studies have linkedincreased nuts in the diet to lower total mortality in specific populations.
But no previous research studies had looked in such details at various levels of nut consumptionand their effects on overall mortality in a large population that was followed for more than 30years, the researchers said.
In the new research, the researchers looked at the association of nut consumption with total andcause-specific mortality among 76,464 women between 1980 and 2010 in the Nurses' HealthStudy and 42,498 men from 1986 to 2010 in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study.
Participants in the studies filled out detailed food questionnaires every two to four years. With eachfood questionnaire, participants were asked to estimate how often they consumed nuts in aserving size of one ounce. A typical small packet of peanuts from a vending machine contains oneounce (about 28 grams).
"In all these analyses, the more nuts people ate, the less likely they were to die over the 30-yearfollow-up period," said Ying Bao, of Brigham and Women's Hospital, the first author of the report.
Those who ate nuts less than once a week had a seven percent reduction in mortality; once aweek, 11 percent reduction; two to four times per week, 13 percent reduction; five to six timesper week, 15 percent reduction, and seven or more times a week, a 20 percent reduction in deathrate.
The researchers noted that this large study cannot definitively prove the cause and effect but thefindings are strongly consistent with "a wealth of existing observational and clinical trial data tosupport health benefits of nut consumption on many chronic diseases."
Nuts contain important nutrients such as unsaturated fats, high quality protein, vitamins, mineralsand phytochemicals, all of which may offer cardioprotective, anticarcinogenic, anti- inflammatoryand antioxidant properties.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration concluded in 2003 that eating 1.5 ounces (about 42.5grams) per day of most nuts "may reduce the risk of heart disease."
相关新闻：美国研究人员20日说，迄今时间最长、涉及人数最多的一项研究表明，与不吃坚果者相比，每天都吃坚果的人死亡风险会降低20%左右。研究人员建议，人们在坚持健康的生活方式之外，可以经常吃点坚果。
这项发表在《新英格兰医学杂志》上的研究还发现，也许是因为坚果中含有对健康有利的不饱和脂肪酸，经常吃坚果的人要比不吃的人苗条，这或许有助消除多吃坚果会导致肥胖的担忧。
此前的一些研究就表明，吃坚果会使患心脏病、糖尿病、结肠癌、胆结石等疾病的风险降低，也有助于降低胆固醇水平与炎症。而新研究结合1980年至2010年间对近7.7万名女护士及1986年至2010年间对4.2万多名男医生的饮食等调查数据，分析了吃坚果与人群总死亡率之间的关系。
研究第一作者、哈佛大学医学院讲师鲍英对新华社记者说，与不吃坚果的人群相比，每周吃坚果7次以上的人群死亡率低20%，每周吃5到6次的低15%，每周吃2到4次的低13%，每周吃一次的低11%，每周吃不到一次的低7%。如果按照疾病类型分，每周吃坚果5次以上的人群心脏病死亡率低29%，而癌症死亡率低11%。
研究还表明，不同种类的坚果对降低人群死亡率而言基本没有差别，所以无需在意吃哪种坚果。此外，无论是老年人还是年轻人，无论是否积极锻炼，无论是否素食者，坚果对他们都有保护效果。
“根据我们的调查，建议每周吃坚果两次以上，这将有助于健康与长寿，”鲍英说，“当然，这不是说吃了坚果，就可以不运动，就可以多吃肉。人们还是要保持低脂饮食，多吃水果蔬菜，多运动。”
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