Building on prior research that produced inconsistent results, scientists from Harvard School of Public Health and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston evaluated data from two separate studies on more than 173,000 men and women who answered questions about their medical history, risk factors, disease incidence and lifestyle.
The researchers also measured mercury concentrations in the stored toenail clippings — a reliable storehouse of long-term mercury exposure — of nearly 7,000 participants, an equal number of whom had or had not suffered a cardiovascular event during the study follow-up period.
The team found no sign that the mercury levels hiked cardiovascular risk.