Did you Consume Enough Tomato Concentrate Today? 20 Jan 2012

Did you Consume Enough Tomato Concentrate Today?

Remember the headlines in November? “Pizza is a Vegetable? Congress Defies Logic, Betrays Our Children?”  “Pizza is a vegetable? Congress says yes” “Pizza as a Vegetable? Congress Proposes New School Lunch Bill”. The end result was that Congress decided to count tomato paste on pizza as a vegetable.

Well, Sesso and colleagues examined the association between tomato-based food product intake (pizza, tomatoes, tomato juice, tomato sauce) and coronary biomarkers (total cholesterol, HDL and LDL-cholesterol, hemoglobin A1c). Based on data collected from 27,261 women >45years of age free of cardiovascular disease and cancer participating in the Women’s Health Study, those consuming 10 or more servings/wk vs <1.5 servings/wk were:

  • 31% less likely to have elevated total cholesterol levels
  • 40% less likely to have elevated LDL-cholesterol levels
  • 66% less likely to have elevated glycosylated hemoglobin levels

Eating a diet high in fruits and vegetables is part of a healthy diet. Unfortunately, Blanck and colleagues assessed daily consumption of fruit and vegetables by 1.27 million Americans. They found virtually no change in the proportion of men (20%) or women  (29%) eating fruits or vegetables or both 5 times or more per day between 1994 and 2005. In fact, there had been a slight decline in the mean frequency of consumption.

Masala and associates studied vegetable and fruit consumption patterns of 31,000 European women (36-64y) and found the consumption of raw tomatoes was associated with a reduced risk of breast cancer. According to the USDA, 8% of Americans over 2y eat spaghetti with tomato sauce and 20% eat pizza at least once in 2 days. In May 2009, EFSA approved a health claim for food or beverage products containing a proprietary tomato concentrate, 3 grams of concentrate or 150 mg powder per serving, to carry a statement “help maintain normal platelet aggregation which contributes to healthy blood flow”.

Maybe Congress was onto something. It seems people will benefit by consuming more tomato products.