You’ve heard it before — “breakfast is the most important meal of the day.” But that still doesn’t stop you from slapping the snooze button and skipping out on the first meal of the day in favor of a few extra quality minutes of shuteye. But you might want to think twice. We already know a good breakfast can help you lose weight, but a new study suggests that skipping breakfast might increase your risk of death from heart disease.
The study was recently published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Researchers used data from 1988-1994 on more than 6,500 people between the ages of 40 and 75, who had been asked how often they ate breakfast in the morning.
Responses showed that 5.1% almost never ate breakfast; 10.9% rarely ate breakfast; 25% had breakfast somedays; and 59% had breakfast every day.
The researchers followed up with the same respondents in 2011 and found that 2,318 people had died, including more than 600 from heart disease. Those who never ate breakfast had an 87% higher risk of stroke or heart disease-related death, the study revealed.
Unfortunately, the data didn’t show what the respondents ate or drank for breakfast, just if that ate or not.
Of course, not eating breakfast doesn’t mean you’ll succumb to an early death, but you should be wary that there is a strong association between the two.
So if you simply must have those few extra minutes of sleep in the morning, be sure to stock your kitchen with some healthy grab-and-go items.
And if you’re short on time, know that even pizza isn’t too bad of a breakfast pick.
Also see, How the ‘continental breakfast’ got its name.
