Eating fruit may reduce a leading cause of blindness in the elderly, according to a new study.
Researchers found that people who ate at least three servings of fruit a day had a 36 per cent lower risk of developing age-related macular degeneration than people who ate fewer than 1.5 servings a day.
The team from Harvard University in the US studied data from 118,428 men and women over a period of up to 18 years.
All participants were 50 years of age or older when first enrolled in the study, with no evidence of age-related macular degeneration.
Participants completed surveys over the period of the study about their diets as well as their vitamin and supplement use.
The researchers found bananas and oranges provide the best protection against developing neovascular ARM, the severe form of the disease. But, they also noted eating more vegetables did not appear to show any benefit.
A statement from the study's authors, read: 'In these large prospective cohorts of women and men, we found that higher fruit intake was related to a reduced risk of neovascular ARM. However, none of the vitamins or carotenoids examined was clearly related to disease. Further studies are needed to confirm our findings and to identify the relevant compound(s) in fruits.'
