Recent research has assigned mango “functional foods” status. Mango can help clear up skin, promote eye health, stave off diabetes and even prevent the formation and spread of cancer

“There is no sincerer love than the love of food.”— George Bernard Shaw

Conventional thinking is that mango is bad for diabetics and the obese. However, recent research reveals an altogether new vista about the super-food status of mango. In scientific parlance, mango can be assigned the ‘functional foods’ status which have, in addition to the food value, therapeutic value too. Among the most popular fresh fruits in the world, mangoes are more than just a delicious, refreshing treat produced by nature. As evidenced by scientific research, mangoes are also a powerful medicinal food, as they contain nutrients that can help “clear up skin, promote eye health, stave off diabetes and even prevent the formation and spread of cancer.”

At a recent meeting of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), it was revealed that eating mangoes daily can help moderate blood sugar levels. In three months, the blood sugar levels of the mango-eating animals compared with the ones without mango in their diet showed a significant fall. This is good news for diabetics!

“Although the mechanism by which mango exerts its effects warrants further investigation, we do know that mangoes contain a complex mixture of polyphenolic compounds,” was the opinion of Dr Edralin Lucas, PhD, author of the study. Similar research in Australia, way back in 2006, had found that eating mangoes can also help decrease inflammation and the resulting high cholesterol, as well as many other abnormalities, together called the metabolic syndrome.

However, I am a bit sceptical about research on animals, that too in mice, that is extrapolated to humans. We have burnt our fingers in the past. Teaching nature a lesson or two by manipulating animals in place of humans might not be the future direction for research. Future is for bio-mimicry, where we learn from nature to see how animals maintain their health in the wild without outside interference.

Mangoes have been shown to help cancer management. Most of the thousands of anti-oxidant phytochemicals found in the plant kingdom are also present in mangoes. The phytochemicals inside a mango primarily scavenge damaging free radicals in the body and protect our body cells. The cell damage by free radicals is the basis of most cancers. If one were to isolate the anti-oxidants in mangoes and make drugs from those chemicals, they will not work because of hormesis which shows how small quantities of a drug in natural habitat could be bio-positive. But the same drug in larger doses, as a reductionist chemical in isolation, becomes bio-negative.

Dr Susanne Talcott and her husband who, together, found that mango compounds kill cancer cells, especially of breast and colon cancers, think that mango is a super-food. All cancer cell lines do not seem to respond to mango. Breast and colon cancer cells respond very well to mangoes and showed increased apoptosis-programmed cell death of the cancer cells. Curiously, mango does not damage normal cells. Mango does effectively kill cancer cells while protecting normal cells. Nobel Laureate biologist, Albert Szent-Györgyi, worried about cancer treatment as he felt that there could be no way one could use a drug to kill cancer cells while protecting the normal cells as both cells work identically. Nature is a wonderful doctor.

Indians can benefit from this wisdom as we have plenty of mangoes even for the poor man. However, that said, I must admit that animal studies alone could be misleading, to say the least. If I were a diabetic, I would not gorge on mangoes. Rather, I would cautiously eat mangoes for a month and see what happens to my sugar levels. If they are fine or better, I would continue to eat mangoes.

A word of advice for all diabetics is in order. Please do not eat fruits with a meal. Every diabetic needs fresh fruits; but that fruit must be a stand-alone meal between two main meals. If I were a diabetic, I would eat small meals at least six times a day to keep the metabolism on an even keel. Two of such meals could be only fruits. Hope mangoes will soon be proven to be a super-food through human research.

Professor Dr BM Hegde, a Padma Bhushan awardee in 2010, is an MD, PhD, FRCP (London, Edinburgh, Glasgow & Dublin), FACC and FAMS