^{Chilli peppers may hold the key to a long life}

However Dr Nita Forouhi from the University of Cambridge said it was still too early to tell whether it was the food itself, or other behaviours of those eating it, which was causing the effect.

Future research is needed to establish whether spicy food consumption has the potential to improve health and reduce mortality directly or if it is merely a marker of other dietary and lifestyle factors,” said Dr Forouhi.

Should people eat spicy food? It is too early to say, but the debate and the research interest are certainly hotting up”

Other health experts warned that a balanced diet was still the best way of staying healthy.

Dr Amelia Lake, Lecturer in Knowledge Exchange in Public Health, Durham University, said: While there is some evidence that this broad group of foods called spices may have some beneficial effects, the take-home message is to carry on with a balanced, varied diet where a bit of spice may have some benefits.”

Prof Kevin McConway, Professor of Applied Statistics, The Open University, added: Maybe it has something to do with the sort of people, in China, who tend to eat more spicy food. For instance, it’s interesting that the people in the study who ate spicy food almost every day were very much more likely to live in rural areas than were the other participants.”

The research was published in the British Medical Journal.