Saturated Fat-- The Myth
paulzli
Posts: 72 Member
Saturated Fat: Good or Bad?
tWe’ve been told that saturated fat is unhealthy.
It is claimed to raise cholesterol levels and give us heart attacks.
However… many recent studies suggest that the true picture is more complicated than that.
This article takes a detailed look at saturated fat and whether it is good or bad for your health.
What is Saturated Fat?
“Fats” are macronutrients.
That is, nutrients that we consume in large amounts and give us energy.
Each fat molecule is made of one glycerol molecule and three fatty acids… which can be either saturated, monounsaturated or polyunsaturated.
What this “saturation” stuff has to do with, is the number of double bonds in the molecule.
Saturated fatty acids have no double bonds, monounsaturated fatty acids have one double bond and polyunsaturated fatty acids have two or more double bonds.
This picture here shows the difference:
Saturated vs Unsaturated Fatty AcidsPhoto Source.
Another way to phrase this, is that saturated fatty acids have all their carbon (C) atoms fully “saturated” with hydrogen (H) atoms.
Foods that are high in saturated fat include fatty meats, lard, full-fat dairy products like butter and cream, coconuts, coconut oil, palm oil and dark chocolate.
Actually, “fats” contain a combination of different fatty acids. No fat is pure saturated fat, or pure mono- or polyunsaturated.
Even foods like beef also contain a significant amount of mono- and polyunsaturated fats (1).
Fats that are mostly saturated (like butter) tend to be solid at room temperature, while fats that are mostly unsaturated (like olive oil) are liquid at room temperature.
Like other fats, saturated fat contains 9 calories per gram.
Bottom Line: Saturated “fats” are fats that contain a high proportion of saturated fatty acids, which contain no double bonds. Saturated fats are solid at room temperature.
Why do People Think That it is Harmful?
A Single Butter Curl
Back in the 20th century, there was a major epidemic of heart disease running rampant in America.
It used to be a rare disease, but very quickly it skyrocketed and became the number one cause of death… which it still is (2).
Researchers learned that eating saturated fat seemed to increase levels of cholesterol in the bloodstream.
This was an important finding at the time, because they also knew that having high cholesterol was linked to an increased risk of heart disease.
This led to the following assumption being made:
If saturated fat raises cholesterol (A causes
and cholesterol causes heart disease (B causes C), then this must mean that saturated fat causes heart disease (A causes C).
However, at the time, this was not based on any experimental evidence in humans.
This hypothesis (called the “diet-heart hypothesis”) was based on assumptions, observational data and animal studies (3).
The diet-heart hypothesis then turned into public policy in 1977, before it was ever proven to be true (4).
Even though we now have plenty of experimental data in humans showing these initial assumptions to be wrong, people are still being told to avoid saturated fat in order to reduce heart disease risk.
Bottom Line: Saturated fats have been assumed to cause heart disease by raising cholesterol in the blood. However, no experimental evidence has ever directly linked saturated fat to heart disease.
Saturated Fat Can Raise LDL (The “Bad”) Cholesterol, But Also HDL (The “Good”) Cholesterol
It’s important to realize that the word “cholesterol” is often used inaccurately.
Older Male Doctor
HDL and LDL, the “good” and “bad” cholesterols, aren’t actually cholesterol… they are proteins that carry cholesterol around, known as lipoproteins.
LDL stands for Low Density Lipoprotein and HDL stands for High Density Lipoprotein. All “cholesterol” is identical.
At first, scientists only measured “Total” cholesterol, which includes cholesterol within both LDL and HDL. Later they learned that while LDL was linked to increased risk, HDL was linked to reduced risk (5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10).
“Total” cholesterol is actually a highly flawed marker because it also includes HDL. So having a high HDL (protective) actually contributes to a high “Total” cholesterol.
Because saturated fat raised LDL levels, it seemed logical to assume that this would increase the risk of heart disease. But scientists mostly ignored the fact that saturated fat also raises HDL.
All that being said, new research has shown that LDL isn’t necessarily “bad” because there are different subtypes of LDL (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16):
Small, dense LDL: These are small lipoproteins that can penetrate the arterial wall easily, which drives heart disease.
Large LDL: These lipoproteins are large and fluffy and don’t easily penetrate the arteries.
The small, dense particles are also much more susceptible to becoming oxidized, which is a crucial step in the heart disease process (17, 18, 19).
People with mostly small LDL particles have three times greater risk of heart disease, compared to those with mostly large LDL particles (20).
So… if we want to reduce our risk of heart disease, we want to have mostly large LDL particles and as little of the small ones as possible.
Here’s an interesting bit of information that is often ignored by “mainstream” nutritionists… eating saturated fat changes the LDL particles from small, dense to Large (21, 22, 23).
What this implies is that even though saturated fat can mildly raise LDL, they are changing the LDL to a benign subtype that is associated with a reduced risk of heart disease.
Even the effects of saturated fat on LDL aren’t as dramatic as you may think. Although they increase LDL in the short-term, plenty of long-term observational studies find no link between saturated fat consumption and LDL levels (24, 25, 26).
It also seems to depend on the “chain length” of the fatty acid. For example, palmitic acid (16 carbons) may raise LDL, while stearic acid (18 carbons) does not (27).
Now scientists have realized that it’s not just about the LDL concentration or the size of the particles, but the number of LDL particles (called LDL-p) floating in the bloodstream.
Low-carb diets, which tend to be high in saturated fat, can lower LDL-p, while low-fat diets can have an adverse effect and raise LDL-p (28, 29, 30, 31).
Bottom Line: Saturated fats raise HDL (the “good”) cholesterol and change LDL from small, dense (bad) to Large LDL, which is mostly benign. Overall, saturated fats do not harm the blood lipid profile like previously believed.
Does Saturated Fat Cause Heart Disease?
Old Man Taking Pills
The supposedly harmful effects of saturated fat are the cornerstone of modern dietary guidelines.
Because of that, this topic has received enormous amounts of funding.
However… despite decades of research and billions of dollars spent, scientists still haven’t been able to demonstrate a clear link.
Several recent review studies that combined data from multiple other studies, found that there really is no link between saturated fat consumption and heart disease.
This includes a review of 21 studies with a total of 347,747 participants, published in 2010. Their conclusion: there is absolutely no association between saturated fat and heart disease (32).
Another review published in 2014 looked at data from 76 studies (both observational studies and controlled trials) with a total of 643,226 participants. They found no link between saturated fat and heart disease (33).
We also have a systematic review from the Cochrane collaboration, which combines data from numerous randomized controlled trials.
According to their review, published in 2011, reducing saturated fat has no effect on death or death from heart disease (34).
However, they found that replacing saturated fats with unsaturated fats reduced the risk of cardiac events (but not death) by 14%.
This does not imply that saturated fats are “bad,” just that certain types of unsaturated fats (mostly Omega-3s) are protective, while saturated fats are neutral.
So… the biggest and best studies on saturated fat and heart disease show that there is no direct link. It was a myth all along.
Unfortunately, the governments and “mainstream” health organizations seem reluctant to change their minds and continue to promote the old low-fat dogma.
Bottom Line: The link between saturated fat and heart disease has been studied intensely for decades, but the biggest and best studies show that there is no statistically significant association.
Does a Diet Low in Saturated Fat Have Any Health Benefits, or Help You Live Longer?
Frustrated Young Woman With Vegetables on a Plate
Several massive studies have been conducted on the low-fat diet.
This is the diet recommended by the USDA and mainstream health organizations all over the world.
The main purpose of this diet, is to reduce the intake of saturated fat and cholesterol.
This diet also recommends increased consumption of fruits, vegetables and whole grains… along with reduced consumption of sugar.
The Women’s Health Initiative was the biggest nutrition study in history. It was a randomized controlled trial with 46,835 women, who were instructed to eat a low-fat diet.
After 7.5-8 years, there was only 0.4 kg (1 pound) difference in weight and there was zero difference in heart disease, cancer or death (35, 36, 37, 38).
Other massive studies have confirmed this… the low-fat diet provides no benefit for heart disease or the risk of death (39, 40).
Several studies that replaced saturated fat with polyunsaturated vegetable oils showed that more people in the vegetable oil groups ended up dying (41, 42).
It is interesting to see that since the low-fat guidelines came out, the prevalence of obesity has skyrocketed (43):
Low Fat Guidelines and Obesity Epidemic
This graph shows that the obesity epidemic started full-force at the same time the low-fat advice was peaking. The type 2 diabetes epidemic followed soon after.
Of course, this graph alone doesn’t prove anything (correlation does not equal causation), but it does make sense that replacing traditional foods like butter and meat with processed low-fat foods high in sugar had something to do with it.
It’s also interesting when looking at the literature, that in almost every single study comparing the “expert approved” low-fat diet to other diets (including paleo, vegan, low-carb and Mediterranean), it loses (44, 45, 46, 47).
Bottom Line: Studies on the low-fat diet do not show a reduced risk of heart disease or death and some studies show that replacing saturated fat with vegetable oils increases the risk.
People With Certain Medical Conditions May Want to Minimize Saturated Fat
Suspicious Doctor
The results of most studies are based on averages.
The studies clearly show that, on average, saturated fat does not raise the risk of heart disease.
However, within those averages, there is room for individual variability.
Perhaps most individuals see no effect… while others experience decreased risk and yet others experience an increased risk.
That being said, there are definitely some people who may want to minimize saturated fat in the diet.
This includes individuals with a genetic disorder called Familial Hypercholesterolemia, as well as people who have a gene variant called ApoE4 (48).
With time, the science of genetics will most surely discover more ways in which diet affects our individual risk for disease.
Bottom Line: Some people may want to minimize saturated fat intake, including people with Familial Hypercholesterolemia or a gene called ApoE4.
Saturated Fat is Excellent for Cooking and Foods That Are High in it Tend to be Healthy and Nutritious
Saturated fat has some important beneficial aspects that are rarely mentioned.
Chef Holding Bell Pepper and Meat
For example, saturated fats are excellent for cooking. Because they have no double bonds, they are highly resistant to heat-induced damage (49).
Polyunsaturated fats, on the other hand, easily oxidize when they’re heated (50).
For this reason, coconut oil, lard and butter are all excellent choices for cooking, especially for high-heat cooking methods like frying.
Foods that are naturally high in saturated fat also tend to be healthy and nutritious, as long as you’re eating quality unprocessed foods.
These include naturally fed/raised meats, dairy products from grass-fed cows, dark chocolate and coconuts.
Bottom Line: Saturated fats are excellent cooking fats and foods that are high in saturated fat tend to be both healthy and nutritious.
The “Bad” Fats You Should Avoid Like The Plague
Bottles of Vegetable Oil
There are many different types of fat.
Some of them are good for us, others neutral, yet others are clearly harmful.
The evidence points to saturated and monounsaturated fats being perfectly safe and maybe even downright healthy.
However… the situation is a bit more complicated with polyunsaturated fats.
When it comes to those, we have both Omega-3s and Omega-6s.
We need to get these two types of fatty acids in a certain balance, but most people are eating way too many Omega-6 fatty acids these days (51).
It is a good idea to eat plenty of Omega-3s (such as from fatty fish), but most people would do best by reducing their Omega-6 consumption (52).
The best way to do that is to avoid seed- and vegetable oils like soybean and corn oils, as well as the processed foods that contain them.
Another class of fats, artificial trans fats, is also very harmful.
Trans fats are made by exposing polyunsaturated vegetable oils to a chemical process that involves high heat, hydrogen gas and a metal catalyst.
Studies show that trans fats lead to insulin resistance, inflammation, belly fat accumulation and drastically raise the risk of heart disease (53, 54, 55, 56).
So eat your saturated fats, monounsaturated fats and Omega-3s… but avoid trans fats and processed vegetable oils like the plague.
Bottom Line: The truly harmful fats are artificial trans fats and processed vegetable oils high in Omega-6 fatty acids.
Blaming New Health Problems on Old Foods Doesn’t Make Sense
The health authorities have spent an immense amount of resources studying the link between saturated fat and heart disease.
Despite thousands of scientists, decades of work and billions of dollars spent, this hypothesis still hasn’t been supported by any good evidence.
The saturated fat myth wasn’t proven in the past, isn’t proven today and never will be proven… because it’s just flat out wrong.
Not only is this myth NOT supported by scientific evidence, it is easily refuted with some plain common sense…
Humans and pre-humans have been eating saturated fat for hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of years, but the heart disease epidemic started a hundred years ago.
Blaming new health problems on old foods just doesn’t make sense.
http://authoritynutrition.com/saturated-fat-good-or-bad/?utm_source=Conscious+Box&utm_campaign=c45170d6d3-7_31_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b452303f93-c45170d6d3-326658909&mc_cid=c45170d6d3&mc_eid=a641930229
tWe’ve been told that saturated fat is unhealthy.
It is claimed to raise cholesterol levels and give us heart attacks.
However… many recent studies suggest that the true picture is more complicated than that.
This article takes a detailed look at saturated fat and whether it is good or bad for your health.
What is Saturated Fat?
“Fats” are macronutrients.
That is, nutrients that we consume in large amounts and give us energy.
Each fat molecule is made of one glycerol molecule and three fatty acids… which can be either saturated, monounsaturated or polyunsaturated.
What this “saturation” stuff has to do with, is the number of double bonds in the molecule.
Saturated fatty acids have no double bonds, monounsaturated fatty acids have one double bond and polyunsaturated fatty acids have two or more double bonds.
This picture here shows the difference:
Saturated vs Unsaturated Fatty AcidsPhoto Source.
Another way to phrase this, is that saturated fatty acids have all their carbon (C) atoms fully “saturated” with hydrogen (H) atoms.
Foods that are high in saturated fat include fatty meats, lard, full-fat dairy products like butter and cream, coconuts, coconut oil, palm oil and dark chocolate.
Actually, “fats” contain a combination of different fatty acids. No fat is pure saturated fat, or pure mono- or polyunsaturated.
Even foods like beef also contain a significant amount of mono- and polyunsaturated fats (1).
Fats that are mostly saturated (like butter) tend to be solid at room temperature, while fats that are mostly unsaturated (like olive oil) are liquid at room temperature.
Like other fats, saturated fat contains 9 calories per gram.
Bottom Line: Saturated “fats” are fats that contain a high proportion of saturated fatty acids, which contain no double bonds. Saturated fats are solid at room temperature.
Why do People Think That it is Harmful?
A Single Butter Curl
Back in the 20th century, there was a major epidemic of heart disease running rampant in America.
It used to be a rare disease, but very quickly it skyrocketed and became the number one cause of death… which it still is (2).
Researchers learned that eating saturated fat seemed to increase levels of cholesterol in the bloodstream.
This was an important finding at the time, because they also knew that having high cholesterol was linked to an increased risk of heart disease.
This led to the following assumption being made:
If saturated fat raises cholesterol (A causes
and cholesterol causes heart disease (B causes C), then this must mean that saturated fat causes heart disease (A causes C).However, at the time, this was not based on any experimental evidence in humans.
This hypothesis (called the “diet-heart hypothesis”) was based on assumptions, observational data and animal studies (3).
The diet-heart hypothesis then turned into public policy in 1977, before it was ever proven to be true (4).
Even though we now have plenty of experimental data in humans showing these initial assumptions to be wrong, people are still being told to avoid saturated fat in order to reduce heart disease risk.
Bottom Line: Saturated fats have been assumed to cause heart disease by raising cholesterol in the blood. However, no experimental evidence has ever directly linked saturated fat to heart disease.
Saturated Fat Can Raise LDL (The “Bad”) Cholesterol, But Also HDL (The “Good”) Cholesterol
It’s important to realize that the word “cholesterol” is often used inaccurately.
Older Male Doctor
HDL and LDL, the “good” and “bad” cholesterols, aren’t actually cholesterol… they are proteins that carry cholesterol around, known as lipoproteins.
LDL stands for Low Density Lipoprotein and HDL stands for High Density Lipoprotein. All “cholesterol” is identical.
At first, scientists only measured “Total” cholesterol, which includes cholesterol within both LDL and HDL. Later they learned that while LDL was linked to increased risk, HDL was linked to reduced risk (5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10).
“Total” cholesterol is actually a highly flawed marker because it also includes HDL. So having a high HDL (protective) actually contributes to a high “Total” cholesterol.
Because saturated fat raised LDL levels, it seemed logical to assume that this would increase the risk of heart disease. But scientists mostly ignored the fact that saturated fat also raises HDL.
All that being said, new research has shown that LDL isn’t necessarily “bad” because there are different subtypes of LDL (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16):
Small, dense LDL: These are small lipoproteins that can penetrate the arterial wall easily, which drives heart disease.
Large LDL: These lipoproteins are large and fluffy and don’t easily penetrate the arteries.
The small, dense particles are also much more susceptible to becoming oxidized, which is a crucial step in the heart disease process (17, 18, 19).
People with mostly small LDL particles have three times greater risk of heart disease, compared to those with mostly large LDL particles (20).
So… if we want to reduce our risk of heart disease, we want to have mostly large LDL particles and as little of the small ones as possible.
Here’s an interesting bit of information that is often ignored by “mainstream” nutritionists… eating saturated fat changes the LDL particles from small, dense to Large (21, 22, 23).
What this implies is that even though saturated fat can mildly raise LDL, they are changing the LDL to a benign subtype that is associated with a reduced risk of heart disease.
Even the effects of saturated fat on LDL aren’t as dramatic as you may think. Although they increase LDL in the short-term, plenty of long-term observational studies find no link between saturated fat consumption and LDL levels (24, 25, 26).
It also seems to depend on the “chain length” of the fatty acid. For example, palmitic acid (16 carbons) may raise LDL, while stearic acid (18 carbons) does not (27).
Now scientists have realized that it’s not just about the LDL concentration or the size of the particles, but the number of LDL particles (called LDL-p) floating in the bloodstream.
Low-carb diets, which tend to be high in saturated fat, can lower LDL-p, while low-fat diets can have an adverse effect and raise LDL-p (28, 29, 30, 31).
Bottom Line: Saturated fats raise HDL (the “good”) cholesterol and change LDL from small, dense (bad) to Large LDL, which is mostly benign. Overall, saturated fats do not harm the blood lipid profile like previously believed.
Does Saturated Fat Cause Heart Disease?
Old Man Taking Pills
The supposedly harmful effects of saturated fat are the cornerstone of modern dietary guidelines.
Because of that, this topic has received enormous amounts of funding.
However… despite decades of research and billions of dollars spent, scientists still haven’t been able to demonstrate a clear link.
Several recent review studies that combined data from multiple other studies, found that there really is no link between saturated fat consumption and heart disease.
This includes a review of 21 studies with a total of 347,747 participants, published in 2010. Their conclusion: there is absolutely no association between saturated fat and heart disease (32).
Another review published in 2014 looked at data from 76 studies (both observational studies and controlled trials) with a total of 643,226 participants. They found no link between saturated fat and heart disease (33).
We also have a systematic review from the Cochrane collaboration, which combines data from numerous randomized controlled trials.
According to their review, published in 2011, reducing saturated fat has no effect on death or death from heart disease (34).
However, they found that replacing saturated fats with unsaturated fats reduced the risk of cardiac events (but not death) by 14%.
This does not imply that saturated fats are “bad,” just that certain types of unsaturated fats (mostly Omega-3s) are protective, while saturated fats are neutral.
So… the biggest and best studies on saturated fat and heart disease show that there is no direct link. It was a myth all along.
Unfortunately, the governments and “mainstream” health organizations seem reluctant to change their minds and continue to promote the old low-fat dogma.
Bottom Line: The link between saturated fat and heart disease has been studied intensely for decades, but the biggest and best studies show that there is no statistically significant association.
Does a Diet Low in Saturated Fat Have Any Health Benefits, or Help You Live Longer?
Frustrated Young Woman With Vegetables on a Plate
Several massive studies have been conducted on the low-fat diet.
This is the diet recommended by the USDA and mainstream health organizations all over the world.
The main purpose of this diet, is to reduce the intake of saturated fat and cholesterol.
This diet also recommends increased consumption of fruits, vegetables and whole grains… along with reduced consumption of sugar.
The Women’s Health Initiative was the biggest nutrition study in history. It was a randomized controlled trial with 46,835 women, who were instructed to eat a low-fat diet.
After 7.5-8 years, there was only 0.4 kg (1 pound) difference in weight and there was zero difference in heart disease, cancer or death (35, 36, 37, 38).
Other massive studies have confirmed this… the low-fat diet provides no benefit for heart disease or the risk of death (39, 40).
Several studies that replaced saturated fat with polyunsaturated vegetable oils showed that more people in the vegetable oil groups ended up dying (41, 42).
It is interesting to see that since the low-fat guidelines came out, the prevalence of obesity has skyrocketed (43):
Low Fat Guidelines and Obesity Epidemic
This graph shows that the obesity epidemic started full-force at the same time the low-fat advice was peaking. The type 2 diabetes epidemic followed soon after.
Of course, this graph alone doesn’t prove anything (correlation does not equal causation), but it does make sense that replacing traditional foods like butter and meat with processed low-fat foods high in sugar had something to do with it.
It’s also interesting when looking at the literature, that in almost every single study comparing the “expert approved” low-fat diet to other diets (including paleo, vegan, low-carb and Mediterranean), it loses (44, 45, 46, 47).
Bottom Line: Studies on the low-fat diet do not show a reduced risk of heart disease or death and some studies show that replacing saturated fat with vegetable oils increases the risk.
People With Certain Medical Conditions May Want to Minimize Saturated Fat
Suspicious Doctor
The results of most studies are based on averages.
The studies clearly show that, on average, saturated fat does not raise the risk of heart disease.
However, within those averages, there is room for individual variability.
Perhaps most individuals see no effect… while others experience decreased risk and yet others experience an increased risk.
That being said, there are definitely some people who may want to minimize saturated fat in the diet.
This includes individuals with a genetic disorder called Familial Hypercholesterolemia, as well as people who have a gene variant called ApoE4 (48).
With time, the science of genetics will most surely discover more ways in which diet affects our individual risk for disease.
Bottom Line: Some people may want to minimize saturated fat intake, including people with Familial Hypercholesterolemia or a gene called ApoE4.
Saturated Fat is Excellent for Cooking and Foods That Are High in it Tend to be Healthy and Nutritious
Saturated fat has some important beneficial aspects that are rarely mentioned.
Chef Holding Bell Pepper and Meat
For example, saturated fats are excellent for cooking. Because they have no double bonds, they are highly resistant to heat-induced damage (49).
Polyunsaturated fats, on the other hand, easily oxidize when they’re heated (50).
For this reason, coconut oil, lard and butter are all excellent choices for cooking, especially for high-heat cooking methods like frying.
Foods that are naturally high in saturated fat also tend to be healthy and nutritious, as long as you’re eating quality unprocessed foods.
These include naturally fed/raised meats, dairy products from grass-fed cows, dark chocolate and coconuts.
Bottom Line: Saturated fats are excellent cooking fats and foods that are high in saturated fat tend to be both healthy and nutritious.
The “Bad” Fats You Should Avoid Like The Plague
Bottles of Vegetable Oil
There are many different types of fat.
Some of them are good for us, others neutral, yet others are clearly harmful.
The evidence points to saturated and monounsaturated fats being perfectly safe and maybe even downright healthy.
However… the situation is a bit more complicated with polyunsaturated fats.
When it comes to those, we have both Omega-3s and Omega-6s.
We need to get these two types of fatty acids in a certain balance, but most people are eating way too many Omega-6 fatty acids these days (51).
It is a good idea to eat plenty of Omega-3s (such as from fatty fish), but most people would do best by reducing their Omega-6 consumption (52).
The best way to do that is to avoid seed- and vegetable oils like soybean and corn oils, as well as the processed foods that contain them.
Another class of fats, artificial trans fats, is also very harmful.
Trans fats are made by exposing polyunsaturated vegetable oils to a chemical process that involves high heat, hydrogen gas and a metal catalyst.
Studies show that trans fats lead to insulin resistance, inflammation, belly fat accumulation and drastically raise the risk of heart disease (53, 54, 55, 56).
So eat your saturated fats, monounsaturated fats and Omega-3s… but avoid trans fats and processed vegetable oils like the plague.
Bottom Line: The truly harmful fats are artificial trans fats and processed vegetable oils high in Omega-6 fatty acids.
Blaming New Health Problems on Old Foods Doesn’t Make Sense
The health authorities have spent an immense amount of resources studying the link between saturated fat and heart disease.
Despite thousands of scientists, decades of work and billions of dollars spent, this hypothesis still hasn’t been supported by any good evidence.
The saturated fat myth wasn’t proven in the past, isn’t proven today and never will be proven… because it’s just flat out wrong.
Not only is this myth NOT supported by scientific evidence, it is easily refuted with some plain common sense…
Humans and pre-humans have been eating saturated fat for hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of years, but the heart disease epidemic started a hundred years ago.
Blaming new health problems on old foods just doesn’t make sense.
http://authoritynutrition.com/saturated-fat-good-or-bad/?utm_source=Conscious+Box&utm_campaign=c45170d6d3-7_31_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b452303f93-c45170d6d3-326658909&mc_cid=c45170d6d3&mc_eid=a641930229
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Replies
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I wish my doctor knew about this. She told me to eat low fat to help my cholesterol. Sigh.0
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This is nice. I'm reading the cholesterol myth which includes this line of thinking. Recommended reading for anyone looking at reducing cholesterol. The evidence seems that everyone are watching the wrong thing. It's dis heart ing that 25% that are labeled high risk are still given drugs to reduce cholesterol. Thst isn't the bad guy in this scenerio.0
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The science has always been there, but political and economics decisions along with the confirmation bias that was needed to support those decisions is slowly been eroded and I suspect it will take another decade or so before major change takes place. Low fat was their platform and saturated fat the enemy and the confusion was differentiating between SFA's in the blood and the dietary kind, and it's still confused by most GP's.0
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Currently reading The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet (2014) by Nina Teicholz and liking it a lot. It seems to be very well-researched and exhaustive.
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I love reading sciency stuff like this.0
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I don't want to believe that things we evolved to eat and thrive on, would be bad for us. Thank you
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@kommodevaran it's best to read up on it to make sure it matches yorparticular situation. It's a little scary (and could be life threatning). I have to see if I really belive this stuff and tell my own mother to go off satins..
imagine if I was wrong (for an unrelated reason)
Touching on what you mentioned 'evolved to eat'. We do not eat like hunger gatherers. We process, and refine. Butter is not a 'natural' existing substance without manipulating milk solids.
All foods in excess is bad for you. The issue now is that there is so much nutrient and empty dense calories you can easily make or buy something that can easily outpace our TDEE.
Reading up on 'wheat belly' also a necessary read. You understand that the entire grain industry, from corn, to wheat to a multude of other things have been breed (or even GMO) into substances that didn't occur in nature. This is why that book recommends you avoid all modern grains.
This was all done for the purposes of feeding the planet. The result was it made the perfect material for the baking industry but also introduced foods we may never have meant be eaten because that is also 'modern foods'.
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Depending on your issue, saturated fat is fine or it's not. For specific diseases, let's say, MS, low saturated fat diets have definitely been shown to improve long term progression of the disease.
I think too many people jump on a bandwagon of 'that's bad for you!' or the opposite of, 'nothing is bad for you!' You really have to evaluate your own specific health concerns0 -
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You'll have problems finding any food that "existed at the dawn of man", since man has always been really adept at selectively breeding plants and animals to make them more tasty so much that they don't have all that much in common anymore with what it was back then.0
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@stevencloser yes. I realize that. I wish there was more consensus.. now refined sugars and highly metabolised carbs and lack of exercise are the big enemies.. With all this fat is okay, do we just go out and eat all the fats we want up to what bodies needs?0
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Nutritional science has a very steep learning curve and due diligence is a tiring task master. Jumping on nutritional band wagons is acceptable in my opinion because it leads or should lead to the research that is in direct conflict and a balance is found or a better understanding if you will. For example wheat belly's author Dr. Davis used wheat as a foundation for his diet book and basically said lose the wheat, lose the belly, but then went on and said if your replacing the wheat with other starchy Carbs your no better off....... basically he's selling a low carb diet, and just to add, there is no GMO wheat and there's lots of heritage wheat out there to choose from if you look.@stevencloser yes. I realize that. I wish there was more consensus.. now refined sugars and highly metabolised carbs and lack of exercise are the big enemies.. With all this fat is okay, do we just go out and eat all the fats we want up to what bodies needs?0 -
@bigguy47, ice cream did not exist at the dawn of man. and I'm not making it as if all man made substances are evil. It's just having an awareness of what you are eating which includes what it does physiologically.
Nothing in the grocery store existed at the "dawn of man". I believe its the Masi in Africa that bloodlet their cows to help with their protein intake - should we do that? How about eating ants or termite grubs? Yummy!
Or how about being reasonable?
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@neanderthin, exactly just because you can choose to eat outside of whats made in a monocrop.
I'm not suggesting we reject everything, just be knowledgeable and do a best guess and the least risk. And yes it is possible it's all wrong.0 -
Thank you for this - it was superbly set out and interesting to read. I have a passion for chemistry, like this, and I study a similar subject. I understand what you have said and I really do believe in the majority of what is said here. However, people need to realise that this can be different, depending on your genetic make-up and numerous other factors. Saturated fat cannot be solely seen as Good or Bad; the truth is dependant on who you are.
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This includes individuals with a genetic disorder called Familial Hypercholesterolemia, as well as people who have a gene variant called ApoE4 (48).
With time, the science of genetics will most surely discover more ways in which diet affects our individual risk for disease.
Bottom Line: Some people may want to minimize saturated fat intake, including people with Familial Hypercholesterolemia or a gene called ApoE4.
I've been having this same discussion with the paleo/primal MFP board.
One important note regarding ApoE4 genetic variant. People with this, which is fairly common in society, have to avoid a high carbohydrate diet also. Both high fat/low carb and low fat/high carb result in the same horrible lipid profile. It's a result of the mutation. The only success in dealing with this has been low fat/low carb diet.0 -
Saturated fat has been demonized, but it is not the leading cause of heart disease. It actually raises HDL- the "good" cholesterol.0
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