Elin and Hosseini provide interesting data suggesting that the relatively high magnesium content of nuts may be one reason for their possible protective influence on coronary heart disease events. We agree that this is a reasonable suggestion, given that the quantities of nuts described as protective in our analyses do, indeed, provide a substantial proportion of the recommended intake of magnesium. As the average nut serving size in our population was about 56 g (2 oz), an individual consuming 56 g of mixed nuts daily would take in about 140 mg of magnesium each day, accounting for 40% to 50% of the recommended dietary allowance. Hypomagnesemia is well documented to be associated with ventricular arrhythmias1-3 and may, thus, be a contributor to sudden death in the community. One possible difficulty is that our data suggest equal protection for acute nonfatal myocardial infarction as for fatal coronary events. The genesis