BOSTON, May 18 (UPI) -- A Mediterranean diet decreases the risk of developing progressive inflammatory lung disease, or COPD, says a study of 43,000 U.S. men.
Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston tracked the men, already part of the U.S. Health Professionals Follow-up Study, which began in 1986 and involved more than 50,000 healthcare professionals ages 40 to 75 who were surveyed every two years.
Eating patterns fell into two distinct categories: those who ate a diet rich in fruit, vegetables, whole grains and fish, or the Mediterranean diet; and those who ate a diet rich in processed foods, refined sugars, and cured and red meats, or the Western diet.
Between 1986 and 1998, 111 cases of COPD were newly diagnosed.
The Mediterranean diet was associated with a 50 percent lower risk of developing COPD than the Western diet, even after adjusting for age, smoking and other risk factors, according to the study published in Thorax.
Men who ate a predominantly Western diet were more than four times as likely to develop COPD.
