Therefore, present results add another piece of evidence to our hypothesis that people genetically predisposed to a reduced cardiovascular risk, have less chance to develop CVD and, therefore, greater chance to live longer. Genetic polymor- phisms responsible for a low inflammatory response may result in an increased chance of

long lifespan in an environment with a reduced pathogen burden and improved control of severe infections by antibiotics since such a modern and healthy environment permits a lower grade of survivable atherogenic inflammatory response (Lio et al. 2004; Balistreri et al. 2004; Caruso et al. 2004, 2005; Grimaldi et al. 2006; Licastro et al. 2005; Candore et al. 2006a, b). In any case, all these data point out the strong relationship between genetics, CVD and longevity.

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Acknowledgements This work was supported by grants from the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research to GC, DL, GCR, CC. Funds from Italian min- istry of Health (Markers genetici di sindrome coronarica acuta e valutazione della L-arginina nella prevenzione di eventi ischemici) to CC and CF are also acknowledged. MPG is a PhD student at Pathobiology PhD course (directed by Prof. C.Caruso) of Palermo University and this work is in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the PhD.

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