The Avocado and your Health
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I was in my early 20's when communes were a popular way for hippies to gather and live, and have a vivid memory of spending a weekend with a friend in Maine who was living in a commune while she and her husband were building their dream home in the woods. I met some of the people there, including a little toddler who was happily eating a piece of an avocado, the green of it all over him. Here is an interesting article about the health benefits of the avocado, enjoy!
The Avocado was once a luxury food reserved for the tables of royalty, but
now avocados are enjoyed around the world by people from all walks of
life.
Lutein is a carotenoid that acts as an antioxidant and has been linked
to a reduced risk of prostate cancer in previous studies. According to Dr. David Heber, director of the UCLA Center for Human Nutrition, the study focused on inhibition of human prostate cancer cell growth when exposed to an extract of whole avocado fruit versus treatment with pure lutein. UCLA lab tests showed that when avocado extract was added to two types of prostate cancer cells, cell growth was inhibited by up to 60%, whereas purified lutein alone was ineffective. In other words, when a single nutrient, lutein, was extracted from avocados it did not offer the same anti-cancer results as the whole avocado extract. Dr. Heber commented: "What's really exciting about this study is that the results indicate that the carotenoids, vitamins, and diverse compounds in avocados might have additive or synergistic effects against prostate cancer compared with pure lutein alone". The moral of this story seems to be that whole foods, in their original whole form, offer the best nutrition possible for the human body. Article courtesy of The Wholefood Farmacy, our source for healthy and delicious snacks. |
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