Healthy juice for the body - CRANBERRY JUICE

Cranberry Juice—A Cocktail for the Heart

Cranberry-juice cocktail contains just 27 percent berry juice but still is the second-most potent source of antioxidants among popular fruit juices.
Cranberry Institute

Three years ago, for instance, he reported data showing that molecule for molecule, the antioxidants in chocolate exceed the potency of vitamin C. Now he finds another powerful stash of these protective compounds in cranberries and their juice. Moreover, the University of Scranton scientist reports this week at the American Chemical Society's spring meeting in New Orleans, regular consumption of that juice yields cholesterol benefits in middle-age men and women.

Many plant-based foods, especially the colorful ones, contain large quantities of polyphenols. As antioxidants, these compounds quash the damage that natural oxidants can do in the body. Indeed, a large number of disorders associated with aging—including cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and several types of dementia—have been linked to damage caused by a slow and unremitting onslaught of oxidants.

In his latest study, Vinson and his colleagues provided 20 men and women 8-ounce servings of cranberry juice cocktail, which contains 27 percent juice. He offered his recruits the type available in stores, which is heavily sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup and supplemented with extra vitamin C, or a low-calorie alternative that the Scranton scientists concocted daily from pure juice. Twelve chose the low-cal juice, which was sweetened solely with a sugar-free compound.

Drinking cranberry juice three times a day over the course of a month increased all the volunteers' blood concentration of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol—the so-called good cholesterol—by 10 percent. The juice didn't affect low-density lipoprotein (LDL) or triglycerides, which are other fatty substances in the blood. However, epidemiological studies by others have correlated HDL-cholesterol increases of this magnitude with about a 40 percent drop in heart-disease risk, Vinson notes.

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