Eating eggs can reduce the risk of stroke: Study

Whether you eat them fried, scrambled, poached or boiled, researchers have discovered eating an egg a day could do wonders for your health.

Cardiovascular disease is one of the leading causes of death and disability around the world, but a new study by the Peaking University Health Center in China has found people who eat an egg daily reduce their risk of these diseases compared to eating no eggs at all.

What’s more, eating an egg a day could reduce the risk of stroke, which are often linked to cardiovascular disease (CVD), by 26 per cent. 

Researchers believe eggs could be the key to reducing strokes because they contain not only dietary cholesterol, but also high-quality protein, an array of vitamins and bioactive components including phospholipids and carotenoids. While previous studies have analysed the health benefits of egg consumption, researchers at the Peaking University Health Center in China set out to determine just how effective eating eggs was when it came to cardiovascular disease, ischaemic heart disease, major coronary events, hemorrhagic stroke and ischaemic stroke. The results were published in the Heart Journal. 

Using data from more than half a million adults aged between 30 to 79 from 10 different geographical areas in China as part of the China Kadoorie Biobank (CKB) study, researchers were able to ask participants about their egg consumption and determine the impact it had on their health.

Read more: The simple trick to making eggs last longer in the fridge

Each participant was recruited between 2004 and 2008 and researchers focused on 416,213 people who had no prior cancer, cardiovascular disease or diabetes. After 8.9 years, researchers documented 83,977 cases of cardiovascular disease. A total of 9,985 CVD deaths were reordered, while an additional 5,103 major coronary events were noted.

Before the study, 13.1 per cent of participants said they consumed an egg a day (0.76 eggs to be precise), while 9.1 per cent never or very rarely ate an egg each day. Researchers found daily consumption appeared to lower the risk of CVD. An egg a day had a 26 per cent lower risk of haemorrhagic stroke, a 28 per cent lower risk of haemorrhagic stroke death and an 18 per cent lower risk of CVD death.

The results also found a 12 per cent reduction in risk for ischaemic heart disease (coronary heart disease) for people who consumed eggs daily, compared with people who ate around two eggs a week.

“The present study finds that there is an association between moderate level of egg consumption (up to one egg/day) and a lower cardiac event rate,” the research authors said in a statement. “Our findings contribute scientific evidence to the dietary guidelines with regard to egg consumption for the healthy Chinese adult.”

What do you think? Do you regularly eat eggs? Do you think eating them would reduce the risk of a stroke?