Eating lots of dairy foods, especially low-fat varieties, may cut the chances of a man developing type 2 diabetes, according to a report released Monday.

Dr. Hyon K. Choi, from Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and colleagues analyzed data from 41,254 men who participated in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study. The subjects were initially free from diabetes, cancer, and heart disease and were tracked for 12 years.

A total of 1243 cases of type 2 diabetes were diagnosed during follow-up, the investigators report in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

After adjusting for weight, physical activity, and dietary factors, men with the highest intake of dairy foods were 23 percent less likely to develop diabetes than those with the lowest intake, the researchers found.

Looked at another way, the data indicate that each serving-per-day rise in total dairy intake was linked with a 9 percent reduction in Diabetes risk.

Further analysis showed that the possible benefit of dairy intake was confined to low-fat items. Each serving-per-day increase in low-fat dairy intake cut the risk of diabetes by 12 percent, whereas intake of high-fat items had no significant effect.

“Our findings are most directly generalizable to men 40 years old and older with no history of type 2 diabetes,” the investigators state in their article. Further studies are needed to see if they apply to men with diabetes or to women.

In a related editorial, Dr. Janet C. King, from Children’s Hospital Oakland in California, notes that the “role of dairy foods in health is very complex and probably varies with the (makeup) of the individual.”

Nonetheless, she says, this study by “is a further reminder of the potential importance of dairy intake and the continuing value of research in this area.”

SOURCE: Archives of Internal Medicine, May 9 2005.