Mediterranean diet cuts blindness risk by 26 percent

London: You may want to start taking Mediterranean diet as fish, vegetables, fruit, olive oil and nuts are powerful enough to help you with the sight loss.

Scientists who made the discovery say their findings show diet is of the utmost importance in the fight against age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the Daily Express reported.

Adults who regularly ate Mediterranean-type foods were 26 per cent less likely to lose their sight and among those carrying a gene which puts them at higher risk of AMD, the danger was cut by a third.

Cathy Yelf, chief executive of British charity the Macular Society, said that AMD is now the biggest cause of sight loss in the industrialised world.

US experts from Harvard Medical School and Tufts University in Boston quizzed 2,500 volunteer men and women on their eating habits. Each was then tracked for 13 years.

Regular consumption of oily fish and vegetables seemed to give most of the protection. One antioxidant thought to protect eyes is lutein, found in abundance in foods such as kale. A Mediterranean diet is thought to protect the eyes by reducing the risk of inflammation.

The Royal National Institute for the Blind said: "Eating a mixed healthy diet with plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables is important for general and eye health, as is wearing quality sunglasses." It also urged people not to smoke.

The study is published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.