Talk about following a healthy diet and we often shift our focus to essential nutrients like proteins, minerals et al, but forget about a category of foods that are known to help a great deal in fighting against free radicals that causes diseases like cancer - antioxidants. There are many sources of antioxidant rich foods that could prove to be beneficial, particularly for men. According to a new study done by Ohio State University, eating tomatoes every day helps to slash skin tumour risks.
The findings suggest that eating tomatoes can halve the risk of skin cancer in men, which was found in their experiments on male mice. However, they found no such effect in females.
Tomato, the healthy fruit, is rich in carotenoids - potent antioxidants that mop up cell-damaging molecules called free radicals. Professor Tatiana Oberyszyn, a pathologist at Ohio State University, said, "This study showed us that we do need to consider sex when exploring different preventive strategies. What works in men may not always work equally well in women and vice versa."
Earlier studies have also found that eating tomato products 10 or more times a week reduced prostate cancer risk by a third. It was credited to the pigmenting compounds that give tomatoes their pretty red hue - lycopene, possibly protecting the skin against UV damage. Lycopene is the primary carotenoid in tomatoes, and has shown to be the most effective antioxidant of these pigments.