People who eat diets in nuts are less likely to die from heart disease and cancer

diet rich in nuts, including peanuts, are less likely
to die from heart disease or cancer, new research
suggests. The more nuts consumed, the greater the apparent
benefit, according to the report. It included data
from nurses and other health professionals who
have been tracked since the 1980s. Heart disease and cancer - the biggest killers in the
U.S. - are responsible for more than one million
annual deaths nationwide. The International Tree Nut Council Nutrition
Research and Education Foundation helped pay for
the new report, which was published in the New
England Journal of Medicine. The findings dovetail with other research
suggesting regularly eating nuts may lower the risk
of common health problems such as heart disease,
colon cancer and type 2 diabetes. "Nuts used to be demonized because they're high
in fat. Now, 20 years later, they're recognized as a
healthful food," Jeffrey Blumberg told Reuters
Health. He is from the USDA Human Nutrition Research
Center on Aging at Tufts University in Boston and
wasn't part of the study team. "It's just like coffee and eggs used to be
demonized," Blumberg said. "Eggs used to be a
heart attack in a shell. Nuts are high in fat, but
they're high in good fats." The new study - the largest to look at deaths -
suggests the health benefits of nuts may translate
to a lower risk of premature death, researchers
said. The variety of nut, including peanuts, which are
actually legumes, did not seem to make a
difference, senior author Dr. Charles Fuchs told
Reuters Health. "The benefit really seems to span across nuts,"
Fuchs, from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in
Boston, said. The two databases used in the analysis included
about 76,000 women who are part of the ongoing
Nurses' Health Study and 42,000 men who are
regularly evaluated as part of the Health
Professionals Follow-up Study. The findings are
based on questionnaires in which the volunteers periodically recalled their eating habits. The researchers had to account for the fact that nut
eaters tended to be healthier when it came to
smoking, alcohol consumption, obesity, exercise
habits and other elements of their diet, such as
eating more fruits and vegetables. Yet even when those factors were taken into
account, they said, nut consumption seemed to be
tied to a lower risk of early death. During 30 years of the Nurses' Health Study, about
16,000 women died. About 11,000 men died over a
24-year period in the Health Professionals Follow-
up Study. Compared to people who never ate nuts, those who
ate nuts once a week were 11 percent less likely to
die during the studies and those who ate nuts every
day were 20 percent less likely to die. People who reported eating nuts at least five times
per week were 29 percent less likely to die of heart
disease, in particular, than those who avoided nuts.
They were also 24 percent less likely to die of
respiratory conditions like chronic obstructive
pulmonary disease and 11 percent less likely to die of cancer. Nuts were not linked to fewer deaths from stroke,
neurodegenerative disease, infection or kidney
disease. Nor were they tied to a lower risk of dying
from diabetes, even though some research has
suggested nuts may have a benefit in that disease. Fuchs said his personal recommendation is that
people eat an ounce of nuts each day, although
smaller amounts still seem to make a difference. The study also suggests people who eat a lot of
nuts are less likely to put on weight. 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," Fuchs said. It's not clear whether salted or spiced nuts are less
beneficial than raw ones, the researchers noted. Fuchs and his colleagues also cautioned that the
study can't prove nuts were responsible for the
lower risk of death. "However," they said, "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." SOURCE: http://bit.ly/1aCpto0 New England
Journal of Medicine, online November 20, 2013.