Source - The Hindu :
Cocoa is rich in flavanols, which are known to dilate blood vessels and so allow blood to flow more freely.
Cocoa is rich in flavanols, which are known to dilate blood vessels and so allow blood to flow more freely.
People who eat a bar of dark chocolate in the morning
and drink a glass of red wine at night are lowering their blood pressure
and so prolonging their lives.
Even better would be to also cut down on salt and step up exercise, Adelaide University’s Karin Ried said.
“Eating chocolate reduces blood pressure by about 2-3 millimetres of
mercury (while) exercise and other dietary measures can reduce blood
pressure by 3-7 millimetres.”
Reid and her team of
fellow Australians picked apart 20 studies involving 856 participants
that looked at the effect on blood pressure of a daily dose of cocoa for
two weeks.
Cocoa is rich in flavanols, which are
known to dilate blood vessels and so allow blood to flow more freely.
“Smaller dosages may be as effective as larger dosages,” she said. But a
100-gram bar of dark chocolate would be a handy dosage.
Flavanols are also present in green tea, dark berries and red wine.
Salt is known to elevate blood pressure. Exercise helps reduce blood
pressure.
“Dark chocolate has 50-85 per cent cocoa
and milk chocolate up to 30 per cent,” Ried said. “As the flavanol
content is responsible for blood pressure reduction, cocoa-rich foods
are preferable.”
Unsurprisingly, only one in 20 of
those who agreed to help the march of science by eating a daily bar of
chocolate reported any unpleasant side effects. The study was reported
in the Cochrane Library.
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