Can Chocolate Prevent Diabetes?

Probably not.

I quite literally had to go out and buy chocolate just to get through this piece. The pictures, they are too good. Photo by Heather Barnes on Unsplash

Chocolate is one of those wonderful foods that we all really want to be good for us. Like red wine and even ice cream, chocolate is something that we all kind of know is probably bad for us but would love to be proven wrong about. How great would it be if you could make yourself healthier by eating just a bit of the sweet, rich treat?

According to recent headlines, there’s cause for celebration. A range of publications have been celebrating the news that chocolate, and dark chocolate in particular, may reduce your risk of diabetes. Good news for those of us who occasionally like to indulge in one of the most delicious foods that humanity has ever discovered.

Unfortunately, the data is very unconvincing. It’s possible that dark chocolate is good for you, but realistically it’s incredibly unlikely. I’d stick to having the rare chocolate treat rather than filling up your shopping trolley with the sweet stuff regularly.

Let’s look at the data.

The Study

The newest piece of research on chocolate is a large observational trial looking at three cohorts of US health professionals. These are the Nurses Health Study, the Nurses Health Study 2, and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study. All three studies had a similar protocol — the study…