Cardiovascular risks are significantly lower in individuals who excrete higher levels of magnesium and taurine, indicating their protective roles. - GreenMedInfo Summary

BACKGROUND: Since taurine (T) administration was proven to decrease blood pressure (BP) and stroke mortality in stroke-prone spontaneously hypertension rates (SHRSP) in the 1980's and our WHO-coordinated CARDIAC (Cardiovascular Diseases and Alimentary Comparison) Study demonstrated that among 5 diet-related factors, namely total cholesterol (T-Cho), body mass index (BMI), sodium (Na), magnesium (M), and T to creatinine (Cr) ratio in 24-hour urine (24U), both T/Cr and M/Cr were inversely related to coronary heart disease mortalities in males and females and T/Cr was inversely related to stroke mortalities in males and females. We further analyzed the associations of individual T/Cr and M/Cr levels to cardiovascular risks in the present study. METHOD: From WHO-CARDIAC Study populations, 61 populations of 25 countries in the world, Japanese populations with obviously higher 24U T excretion because of their common fish eating custom and the other populations in which both data of T and M were not available were excluded and the data of 3960 individuals from 41 WHO-CARDIAC Study populations were used for the following analyses. RESULTS: The means of 24U T/Cr and M/Cr ratios in total individual data were 639.4 and 82.8, respectively. The average of BMI, systolic and diastolic blood pressure (SBP, DBP), T-Cho and atherogenic index (AI) in the individuals with more than the means of T/Cr or M/Cr were significantly lower than those of individuals with less than the means. The CARDIAC Study participants were divided into the following 4 groups by these means: A (T/Cr and M/Cr>or = mean), B (T/Cr>or = mean, M/Cror = mean), D (T/Cr and M/Cr