In a study that will provide comfort to chocolate enthusiasts everywhere, researchers in Sweden have found evidence that people who eat chocolate have increased survival rates

after a heart attack — and it may be that the more they eat,

the better.

The scientists followed 1,169 non-diabetic men and women who had been hospitalised for a first heart attack.

Each filled out a standardised health questionnaire that included a question about chocolate consumption over the past 12 months. Chocolate contains flavonoid antioxidants that are widely believed to have beneficial cardiovascular effects.

The patients had a health examination three months after their discharge from the hospital, and researchers followed them for the next eight years.

They found that the more chocolate people consumed, the more likely they were to survive. The results are reported in The Journal of Internal Medicine.

But before concluding that a box of Godiva truffles is health food, chocolate lovers may want to consider some of the study's weaknesses.

It is an observational study, not a randomised trial, so cause and effect cannot be definitively established.

Even though the researchers controlled for many variables, chocolate consumption could be associated with factors they did not account for — mental health, for example — that might reduce the risk for death.

The scientists did not ask what kind of chocolate the patients ate, and milk chocolate has less available flavonoid than dark chocolate. Finally, chocolate consumption did not reduce the risk for any non-fatal cardiac event.

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