Eating more fruit, particularly blueberries, apples and grapes, is linked to reduced risk of developing Type 2 diabetes, suggests a study in the British Medical Journal.
Blueberries cut the risk by 26 percent compared with 2 percent for three servings of any other whole fruit – but fruit juice did not appear to have the same effect.
The research looked at the diets of more than 187,000 people in the U.S.
But Diabetes U.K. said the results of the study should be treated with caution.
Researchers from the U.K., U.S. and Singapore used data from three large studies of nurses and health professionals in the U.S. to examine the link between fruit consumption and the risk of contracting Type-2 diabetes.
In these studies, 6.5 percent of participants (12,198 out of 187,382) developed Type-2 diabetes.
The studies used food frequency questionnaires to follow up with the participants every four years, asking how often, on average, they ate a standard portion of each fruit.
The fruits used in the study were grapes or raisins, peaches, plums or apricots, prunes, bananas, cantaloupe, apples or pears, oranges, grapefruit, strawberries and blueberries.
The researchers’ analysis of the data showed that three servings per week of blueberries, grapes and raisins, and apples and pears significantly reduced the risk of Type-2 diabetes.
While all fruit was shown to reduce the risk, these fruits appeared to be particularly effective.
The researchers said this could be because these fruits contain high levels of anthocyanin s, which have been shown to enhance glucose uptake in mice. The same fruits contain naturally occurring polyphenols, which are also known to have beneficial effects…
Read more: BBC Health
