Senior News Line: Dark chocolate actually good for us

I knew that someday they’d figure this out: Chocolate is good for us!

I ran across a few studies about chocolate and blood pressure. It appears that dark chocolate — not milk chocolate or white chocolate — lowers blood pressure.

In one study, test subjects (with prehypertension or stage 1 hypertension) received either dark chocolate or white chocolate for 18 weeks. At the end of that time, they switched to the other chocolate. The results showed that while they were on the dark chocolate, blood pressure was lowered. The difference wasn’t radical, but it was enough to decrease the expected rate of mortality from hypertension.

In another study the results were even more impressive, but the subjects were given more chocolate than any of us would normally want to eat.

Researchers think it’s the polyphenol antioxidants in the cocoa that do the trick. And that makes sense. Dark chocolate has more antioxidants than raspberries, blueberries, cranberries or red grapes — all the things they’ve been telling us to eat for the antioxidant health benefits. Even more, says the researcher in charge of the study, the polyphenols caused the body to increase nitric oxide, which makes blood vessels open, thus lowering blood pressure.

The problem, of course, is overdoing it. A chocolate bar can’t take the place of hypertension medicine, and there’s the issue of maintaining a balanced diet and not gaining weight.

If your doctor agrees it’s good for you to have a small amount of dark chocolate every day, choose a brand with the highest cacao percentage you can find! The higher the percentage of cacao, the more polyphenols you’ll be getting.