A new study has revealed that eating citrus fruits like oranges could reduce depression risk by 20%.
According to Medical News Today, a recent study published in the journal Microbiome has identified oranges as a fruit that could help in lowering the depression risk.
For this study, researchers analysed data of more than 32,000 middle-aged women who participated in the Nurses’ Health Study II between 2003 and 2017.
The lead author of the study and an instructor in medicine at Harvard Medical School, Raj Mehta, said in a press release, “We found that eating one medium orange a day may lower the risk of developing depression by about 20%.”
“And the effect seems to be specific to citrus. When we look at people’s total fruit or vegetable consumption, or at other individual fruits such as apples or bananas, we don’t see any relationship between intake and risk of depression,” he explained.
The researchers of the study discovered eating citrus fruits is linked to a healthy balance of good bacteria in the gut, especially an abundance of 15 species in the gut microbiome, including Faecalibacterium prausnitzii.
Faecalibacterium prausnitzii not only supports the immune system and lowers inflammation but also helps in reducing depression from affecting the brain's mood-boosting chemicals, serotonin and dopamine.
