by Kelsey Murray
Women around the world, rejoice! Chocolate is once again being named as a healthy food for people to eat. This time, research shows that the tasty treat is good for your heart health.
Recently, five studies have shown a connection between high chocolate consumption and a significant reduction – 37 percent – in a person’s risk for cardiovascular disease. Consuming chocolate also caused a 31 percent reduction in one’s risk for diabetes and a 29 percent decrease in one’s risk for stroke.
Of course, everything is better in moderation, so don’t take these new studies as an excuse to go to your local candy store and stock up on hundreds of chocolate bars.
“Although over-consumption has harmful effects, the existing studies generally agree on a potential beneficial association of chocolate consumption with a lower risk of cardiometabolic disorders,” said Adriana Buitrago-Lopez of the University of Cambridge.
“This paper merely shows us that the association between habitual intake of chocolate and lower cardiometabolic risk is ‘statistically robust,'” said Dr. David Katz, the director of medical studies in public health at Yale University.
The review of these studies included data from more than 114,000 people and the findings proved accurate even when various factors, such as smoking, age, diet, BMI, and physical activity were accounted for.
So how much and what kind of chocolate should we eat each day in order to reap the health benefits?
“Our conclusion is that dark chocolate – 60 percent cocoa or higher – and liquid cocoa have clear, potential benefits in terms of overall cardiac risk,” said Katz. “We don’t yet know enough about optimal dosing to best use this food ‘as medicine.'”
Well, even if they haven’t decided how much chocolate is best for overall health benefits, I have decided that my daily chocolate treat is now a good thing. Ladies, who else is with me?
Via ABCNews.com
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