Read this article about studies looking at the health benefits of eating chocola
ID: 1047074 • Letter: R
Question
Read this article about studies looking at the health benefits of eating chocolate from “NIH News in Health” at http://newsinhealth.nih.gov/issue/Aug2011/Feature1. Write a 1-2 paragraph summary of the article while answering the following questions. 6 pts
How strong is the evidence that eating chocolate has a beneficial effect on any aspect of the average American’s health?
Flavanols are believed to be “responsible for the beneficial aspects” of eating chocolate. How can you determine the flavanol content for a given chocolate?
Compare the health effects of the three types of chocolate – dark, milk and white chocolate.
What are the detrimental effects of eating chocolate?
Explanation / Answer
The idea that chocolate might be good for us stems from studies of the Kuna Indians, who live on islands off the coast of Panama. These people were found to have low incidences of the lifestyle diseases like heart disease and high blood pressure but they were not protected by their genes when they moved away from the island. The striking factor about them was that they consumed ten times more cocoa than any of us. However, the coaoa they consume is nothing like what most of us eat. They drink dried and ground cocoa beans processed very differently to the chocolate that reaches us in the form of black, brown and even white chocolate. Cocoa beans are composed of cocoa solids and cocoa butter. The colour of the chocolate depends on the amount of cocoa solids and added ingredients like milk. In general, the darker the chocolate, the more cocoa solids it contains which means that white chocolate has no cocoa solids at all.
Cocoa contains compounds called flavanols which are considered to be responsible for making chocolate the superfood it is now considered to be. Flavanols can also be found in tea, wine and even the humble vegetables and fruits. In fact, the magical flavanols are removed during the industrial processing of cocoa, leaving it without any health benefits. Also, the added sugars and dairy render it more harmful and is in fact directly responsible for the increase in obesity, diabetes and tooth decay.
In conclusion, one can safely say that the case for chocolate is not strong. If one were to indulge in chocolate, one must eat the dark variety with little processing to ensure that the flavanols are not destroyed. Like everything in life, chocolate in its most natural form is good, anything processed and that which is far from the original chemically is of no use to man!
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