Eating fish protects against eye disease

WOMEN who regularly eat fish and omega-3 fatty acids greatly reduce their risk of suffering a chronic eye disease.

The Women's Health Study, posted online yesterday, makes the claim over age-related macular degeneration - loss of central vision caused by damage to the macular, a small part of the retina.

The authors, whose report will appear in June's issue of Archives of Ophthalmology, conducted a ten-year study of more than 38,000 women.

The academics, led by William Christen of Harvard Medical School, tracked the women's eating habits, following how much omega-3 and fish they consumed.

The authors found women who had the most omega-3 had a 38 per cent lower risk of developing macular disease.

And women who ate fish once or more a week were 42 per cent less likely to develop it than those eating it less than once a month.