2004-1-27
This is Phoebe Zimmermann with the VOA Special English Health
Report.
American researchers say that eating fatty foods can worsen the
progress of the eye disease called age-related macular degeneration
or A-M-D.
A-M-D is a major cause of
blindness among people over the age of fifty in industrial nations.
Experts say that five-hundred-thousand people around the world are
found to have A-M-D each year. They say more than
twenty-five-million people are affected by some kind of A-M-D. And
they expect the number to increase during the next twenty-five
years.
The cause of A-M-D is unknown. The disease destroys the central
part of the retina, the cells at the back of the eye that gather
light. This area of the eye is called the macula. Macular
degeneration causes abnormal blood vessels to grow there. These
blood vessels can bleed and damage tissue. A person with the disease
can see little or nothing out of the center of the eye.
There are two kinds of macular degeneration. The most common and
less severe kind is called the "dry form." It may or may not develop
into the other kind of A-M-D, known as the "wet form." This kind of
A-M-D causes most of the serious vision loss. It involves the
leaking blood vessels.
The first sign of the disease is usually a loss of visual
clearness. Later, people have trouble reading, driving and
recognizing faces. Blindness is the end result.
The new study was reported in the publication "The Archives of
Ophthalmology." It involved about two-hundred-sixty people with at
least some vision loss from macular degeneration. The researchers
studied them for more than four years.
They found that the chance of the disease getting worse was two
times greater in the people who ate highly fatty foods such as baked
goods sold in stores. They said both vegetable and animal fats were
responsible. The researchers said that diets high in meat and milk
products also increased the chances of the disease becoming worse,
but not as much as baked foods. And they said the people in the
study who ate a lot of fish and nuts reduced the chances that their
macular degeneration would get worse.
The researchers said little evidence exists about what affects
the progress of A-M-D. They called for more research into the link
between fats and A-M-D.
This VOA Special English Health Report was written by Nancy
Steinbach.