Overview
- The Journal of the American College of Cardiology published an analysis of 6,550 U.S. adults from NHANES III showing that people who never ate breakfast had roughly a 75% higher risk of cardiovascular mortality.
- Participants were surveyed between 1988 and 1994 and followed through 2011 via the National Death Index, providing 17 to 23 years of outcome data.
- Nutrition specialists, including Rob Hobson, cautioned that breakfast skipping may be a marker for patterns such as smoking, poorer diet quality, or irregular eating, rather than a direct cause of heart disease.
- Related research and commentary note associations between regularly missing breakfast and higher rates of overweight or obesity, dyslipidaemia, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome, coronary heart disease, and stroke.
- A separate study of about 3,000 UK adults reported an estimated 10% rise in mortality risk for each hour breakfast was delayed, reinforcing observational links but not causal proof.