Is Canned Tomato Soup Good For You? Here’s What We Know – Health Digest

The big benefit of tomatoes is the carotenoid and antioxidant lycopene, which gives the tomato its beautiful red color, according to a 2019 article in The Pharma Innovation Journal. If you consume tomatoes with some sort of fat, it makes the lycopene more easily absorbed by the body. Lycopene may also be able to lower your LDL cholesterol. A 2022 article in Nutrients found that 72 studies showed that lycopene can help fight cancer, particularly prostate cancer. Lycopene reduces inflammation and oxidative stress, and it prevents cancer from spreading throughout the body.

Tomatoes also have vitamin C, beta-carotene, and ferulic acid that can help fight cancer and reduce plaque buildup in your arteries, according to a 2022 article in Biology. Tomatoes can also reduce age-related inflammation and protect your nervous system against degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. The carotenoids in tomatoes may also help with insulin resistance to protect against type 2 diabetes. Tomatoes improve your immune system, fertility, and the diversity of bacteria in your gut.