The British Are Coming! The British Are Coming!

Many of us in North America, especially in the States, have been enthralled with The Duke & Duchess of Cambridge's first royal visit since their widely viewed wedding just over 2 months ago.  Therefore, I thought that turnaround would be fair play and decided to take a look at the 6,379 men & 3,074 British women of Whitehall II followed for 20 years in a study released last month.

Specifically, the authors noted in this ongoing observational study that the rate of myocardial infarctions declined by three-fourths or 74% due to lower non-HDL cholesterol (34%), higher HDL cholesterol (17%), lower blood pressure (13%), and less smoking (6%).  Fruit & vegetable intake did not make a statistically significant (7%) contribution to the decline.  However, an increase in body mass index undid much of the benefit by at least 11%.

The point of this post is that gaining weight, most likely fat, can undo much of the good that we achieve in preventing heart disease.  Let's make sure our efforts aren't corrupted.