Eating Peppers and Tomatoes May Reduce Parkinson’s Risk

New research suggests that eating nicotine-containing foods from the Solanaceae family, such as peppers and tomatoes, may reduce the risk of developing Parkinson’s disease. Dr Susan Searles Nielsen and colleagues from the University of Washington in Seattle questioned 490 patients newly diagnosed with Parkinson’s and 644 individuals without neurological conditions about their lifetime diet. Participants were also questioned about tobacco use as previous research has suggested that cigarette smoking and other forms of tobacco (also a plant of the Solanaceae family), may reduce the risk of developing the disease. Results showed that Parkinson’s disease was inversely associated with consumption of fruit and vegetables from the Solanaceae family, especially peppers. Consumption of other vegetables had no impact on Parkinson’s risk. The apparent protection from Parkinson’s occurred mainly in men and women with little or no prior use of tobacco, which contains much more nicotine than the foods studied. “Our study is the first to investigate dietary nicotine and risk of developing Parkinson’s disease,” said Dr Searles Nielsen. “Similar to the many studies that indicate tobacco use might reduce risk of Parkinson’s, our findings also suggest a protective effect from nicotine, or perhaps a similar but less toxic chemical in peppers and tobacco.”