Vegetarian diet and heart disease:
A vegetarian diet may prove a beneficial intervention for patients with heart disease. A randomized, single-blind prospective trial by Singh et al tested a vegetarian diet intervention on 406 patients for 6 weeks starting 24-48 hours after having an acute myocardial infarction (acute MI). A vegetarian diet group compared to a control diet showed a decrease of total cardiac disease events of 34.5% which included fatal acute MI, non-fatal acute MI, and sudden cardiac death. (44)
Fruit, vegetable intake, and mortality:
An analysis was conducted on 19,496 men and women, ages 45 to 79, in the U.K. The participants’ blood was tested for ascorbic acid (a form of vitamin C) and they were placed in five groups (quintiles) according to their serum ascorbic acid levels. Men and women were tracked separately. The researchers observed how many people died of cardiovascular disease, ischemic heart disease, cancer, and all causes in each of the blood ascorbic acid quintiles. In every case (except for women at risk of cancer), death rates were significantly lower among those with higher blood ascorbic acid levels. People with the highest ascorbic acid levels had half the risk of dying from all causes combined. Additionally, a 20 micromol/L increase in blood ascorbic acid concentration, the same as a 50 g per day increase in fruit and vegetable intake, was associated with about a 20% reduction in risk of all-cause mortality. (29)