Age-related deafness, and hearing loss caused by loud noise, may be reduced by the antioxidants in red wine, green tea and aspirin, it was claimed yesterday. 

    The compounds they contain could help protect the delicate hairs of the inner ear that are vital to hearing, new research suggests.
Destructive chemical agents called oxygen-free radicals, produced by normal cellular processes and in response to loud noise and exposure to powerful antibiotics, can damage the hairs. 

    But antioxidants such as resveratrol, found in red wine and green tea, and salicylate, the active ingredient in aspirin, should be able to neutralise them. 

    To test whether this was the case, scientists in the United States used salicylate to prevent damage to hair cells in patients' ears caused by the strong antibiotic, gentamicin. 

    Hearing loss affected just 3 per cent of patients who were given gentamicin plus aspirin for acute ear infections, compared with 13 per cent treated with the antibiotic plus a non-active placebo. 

    人們都知道，阿司匹林、紅酒和綠色蔬菜對人的心臟有好處。而美國最新一項研究結果顯示，它們對人們的聽力健康也大有裨益，能推遲因年齡引起的耳聾，還能降低因抗生素和噪音引起的聽力下降。 

    據法新社5月10日報道，研究人員得出上述結論的間接證據來自對抗氧化劑對聽覺毛細胞具有保護效果的研究。內耳微小的毛細胞對聽力起著至關重要的作用。 

    美國密歇根醫療學院大學的約欽·沙赫特和其同事發現，水楊酸鹽（阿司匹林中含有的重要的抗氧化成分）能夠保護那些使用抗生素類藥物的患者的聽覺毛細胞。 

    研究顯示，那些同時使用慶大霉素和阿司匹林的人中，只有3％的人出現了聽力下降的癥狀；而那些同時使用慶大霉素和安慰劑的人中，則有13％的人出現了聽力下降的癥狀。

    報道說，抗氧化劑是一種能夠有效阻止自由基破壞作用的化學物質。在紅酒、綠色蔬菜、蘋果、綠茶和其他一些食物和飲料中，也能發現抗氧化劑的存在。盡管，目前還沒有直接的證據說明，從日常飲食中攝入抗氧化劑（如飲用適量的紅酒等），能夠預防人類出現的聽力下降的癥狀，但在老鼠身上進行的相關試驗則為此提供了間接證據。