Starting healthy habits early on can add nearly a decade to your life in the end, a massive new study finds.
The study — which tracked more than 350,000 men and women over decades — showed that non-smokers with low cholesterol and no other risk of heart disease lived on average up to nine years longer than others.
Its findings add to a growing mountain of proof that a low-fat diet, exercise and avoiding cigarettes help people live longer, healthier lives.
“These findings are relevant for the national effort to end the coronary heart disease-cardiovascular disease epidemic,” said Dr. Jeremiah Stamler of Chicago’s Northwestern University Medical School, which conducted the study.
“For upcoming generations, this means encouraging favorable behaviors beginning in early childhood in regard to eating, drinking, exercising and smoking.”
Stamler’s comments and the study’s results are published in today’s issue of the Journal of the American Medical Society.
The researchers screened study participants between 1967 and 1975 and then tracked them for up to 22 years, and learning the precise cause of death of those who died.
But despite the study’s overwhelming evidence, old habits die hard, The Post learned from some food shoppers yesterday.
Most said they already knew the mantras of healthy living — but not everyone was abiding by them.
Manhattan resident Cheryl Martin, who is six-months pregnant, playfully hid the Milky Way bar she was about to hand the check-out clerk at Sloan’s supermarket on Eighth Avenue and 54th Street.
“I sort of indulge in sweets, once in a while,” she sheepishly explained.
But Martin also carried a bag with low-fat chocolate milk and fruit — her healthful lunch.
Deepak Ghosh, who was deciding which olive oil to buy at Westerly Health Foods a block away, said he was a true believer.
“This is the first time I’m thinking of cooking with olive oil,” he said. “I’ve just learned it has a high content of monosaturated fat.”
“I’m educating myself,” said Ghosh, a Staten Island resident who works for a law firm. He said he got frightened into good health habits and lost 50 pounds after his mother recently had a stroke.