This is Phoebe Zimmermann with the VOA Special English HealthReport.

American researchers say that eating fatty foods can worsen theprogress of the eye disease called age-related macular degenerationor A-M-D.

A-M-D is a major cause ofblindness among people over the age of fifty in industrial nations.Experts say that five-hundred-thousand people around the world arefound to have A-M-D each year. They say more thantwenty-five-million people are affected by some kind of A-M-D. Andthey expect the number to increase during the next twenty-fiveyears.

The cause of A-M-D is unknown. The disease destroys the centralpart of the retina, the cells at the back of the eye that gatherlight. This area of the eye is called the macula. Maculardegeneration causes abnormal blood vessels to grow there. Theseblood vessels can bleed and damage tissue. A person with the diseasecan see little or nothing out of the center of the eye.

There are two kinds of macular degeneration. The most common andless severe kind is called the "dry form." It may or may not developinto the other kind of A-M-D, known as the "wet form." This kind ofA-M-D causes most of the serious vision loss. It involves theleaking blood vessels.

The first sign of the disease is usually a loss of visualclearness. Later, people have trouble reading, driving andrecognizing faces. Blindness is the end result.

The new study was reported in the publication "The Archives ofOphthalmology." It involved about two-hundred-sixty people with atleast some vision loss from macular degeneration. The researchersstudied them for more than four years.

They found that the chance of the disease getting worse was twotimes greater in the people who ate highly fatty foods such as bakedgoods sold in stores. They said both vegetable and animal fats wereresponsible. The researchers said that diets high in meat and milkproducts also increased the chances of the disease becoming worse,but not as much as baked foods. And they said the people in thestudy who ate a lot of fish and nuts reduced the chances that theirmacular degeneration would get worse.

The researchers said little evidence exists about what affectsthe progress of A-M-D. They called for more research into the linkbetween fats and A-M-D.

This VOA Special English Health Report was written by NancySteinbach.