The Link Between Fruit, Vegetables and Health

"Everyone knows" that fruit and vegetables are good for you. Just go into your local bookstore and see the many titles that claim to know how diets that have large quantities of various different kinds of fruit and vegetables (depending on the author!) will enhance your everyday life experience, improve your health, and extend your longevity. It would almost seem that to write a best-selling diet book, all one needs to do is include words such as Phytochemicals, Antioxidants, Flavonoids, Carotenoids, and a few other less well known buzz words.

What is the evidence? It turns out that there is less hard evidence than can be found in the medical research literature than the hype would justify. In the following we show results that fruit and vegetables are important factors in reducing heart disease and other cardiovascular illnesses, but not the ultimate panacea that some would have you believe they are.