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For example, grab 10 people off the street and ask them if saturated fat causes heart disease. How many will say it does? Yet there has never been a scientifically conclusive causal link. Same goes for cholesterol, which is vastly misunderstood and still a controversial topic, even among researchers.
This is ironically just part of the misinformation created somewhat recently by the beef, dairy and egg industries to create a sense of doubt over what scientists have known for decades: intake of saturated fat increases your risk for heart disease. There is little to any controversy about this among actual scientists, though not all the details are known.
This is ironically just part of the misinformation created somewhat recently by the beef, dairy and egg industries to create a sense of doubt over what scientists have known for decades: intake of saturated fat increases your risk for heart disease. There is little to any controversy about this among actual scientists, though not all the details are known.
This may be going off topic a bit, but after years of low fat diet failure of curbing heart disease I think some new directions scientist are taking are exploring the possibility of too much sugar or chronic inflammation as drivers of cardiovascular disease - the debate is far from over among actual scientist
This may be going off topic a bit, but after years of low fat diet failure of curbing heart disease I think some new directions scientist are taking are exploring the possibility of too much sugar or chronic inflammation as drivers of cardiovascular disease - the debate is far from over among actual scientist
You seem to be alluding to typical line one years so much today. In which case, when you say "years of low diet failure" you mean that recommendations to consume a lower fat diet haven't had a dramatic impact on the rates of heart disease. Of course, people have to actually implement the recommendations....which they have not. But more seriously, low-fat diets are hardly "a failure" in relation to heart disease. Low-fat (whole foods based) diets have not only been shown to prevent heart disease, but they can also reverse it when fat intake is very low (<20%).
As for sugar (the refined sort), scientists have been nay-saying it for far longer than saturated fat and even its association with heart disease is hardly a "new direction". The American Heart Association recommends that you limit your sugar intake to less than 100 calories a day which is less than their recommendation for saturated fat.
But most importantly, what does sugar or low-fat diets have to do with whether saturated fat intake is associated with heart disease? Nothing...its just a diversion.
When 2/3 of the country is considered obese, then something is wrong with the food we are eating or the definition of obese is skewed. I think both. High carb high sugar foods contributes to overweight. Healthy whole grains are loaded with both and are making Americans fat.
Two-thirds of U.S. adults are overweight or obese (Flegal et al., 2012). In general, rates of overweight and obesity are higher for African-American and Hispanic women than Caucasian women, higher for Hispanic men than Caucasian and African-American men, higher in the South and Midwest, and tend to increase with age (Flegal et al., 2012; Gregg et al., 2009; Sherry et al., 2010). Research also shows that the heaviest Americans have become even heavier the past decade (Beydoun & Wang, 2009)
From Mayo Clinic, even thin people can be medically classified as obese:
Yes. You can have a normal weight, but if your body fat percentage is high enough, you may be considered obese — a situation known as normal weight obesity. Normal weight obesity means you may have the same serious health risks as does someone who's obese. Obesity is defined as having an excessive amount of body fat — not as weighing too much.
I think both. High carb high sugar foods contributes to overweight. Healthy whole grains are loaded with both and are making Americans fat.
Whole grains contain virtually no sugar. Europeans, among others, have subsisted on whole grains for thousands of years without getting fat. Whole grains aren't a new component to the western diet, so blaming them for the recent surge in obesity seems strange. Heck, even heavy use of refined grains pre-dates the obesity problems.
This is ironically just part of the misinformation created somewhat recently by the beef, dairy and egg industries to create a sense of doubt over what scientists have known for decades: intake of saturated fat increases your risk for heart disease. There is little to any controversy about this among actual scientists, though not all the details are known.
The best they can find is a correlation, not a causative link. And there are other variables that are in the mix, such as lifestyle habits, other dietary factors, lifestyle, etc. It's just that thanks to Ancel Key's flawed "7 Countries" study in the 1950's, saturated fat was targeted as the "bad guy".
Here's a study that often gets brought up during these discussions:
A meta-analysis of prospective epidemiologic studies showed that there is no significant evidence for concluding that dietary saturated fat is associated with an increased risk of CHD or CVD. More data are needed to elucidate whether CVD risks are likely to be influenced by the specific nutrients used to replace saturated fat.
Many cultures have an extremely high intake of saturated fat yet show little to no heart disease. As already mentioned, it likely has more to do with our intake of processed and refined "food-like" products, which are relatively new to our diet and high in sugars and nutritionally-worthless flours, than with foods we have consumed and thrived on for millions of years.
As soon as any culture switches from their traditional diet of whole foods to one of refined and processed sugar and grain-based products, they gain weight, become diabetic, and suffer heart disease and other health issues. We are a nation of heavy soda and snack-food consumption. When that changes, so will our health results.
Whole grains contain virtually no sugar. Europeans, among others, have subsisted on whole grains for thousands of years without getting fat. Whole grains aren't a new component to the western diet, so blaming them for the recent surge in obesity seems strange. Heck, even heavy use of refined grains pre-dates the obesity problems.
No, but the whole grains touted in our food products bear little to no resemblance to the whole grains our ancestors used. They are predominately GMO, contain higher levels of appetite-stimulating proteins, and are almost always accompanied by artificial flavors, colorings, and substances to make them more palatable. Almost every product branded as "whole grain", from cereals to snack foods, are still highly processed and refined.
For example, what we commonly call "bread" would not be recognized in any early culture as a real food.
No, but the whole grains touted in our food products bear little to no resemblance to the whole grains our ancestors used. They are predominately GMO, contain higher levels of appetite-stimulating proteins, and are almost always accompanied by artificial flavors, colorings, and substances to make them more palatable. Almost every product branded as "whole grain", from cereals to snack foods, are still highly processed and refined.
For example, what we commonly call "bread" would not be recognized in any early culture as a real food.
Depends on what 'whole grains' you are eating. I think you are referring to 'whole grains' in prepackaged foods. Plenty of nutritious whole grains out there.
The best they can find is a correlation, not a causative link. And there are other variables that are in the mix, such as lifestyle habits, other dietary factors, lifestyle, etc. It's just that thanks to Ancel Key's flawed "7 Countries" study in the 1950's, saturated fat was targeted as the "bad guy".
A single study cannot establish a "causative link", but there are hundreds of studies on saturated fat and taken together they provide strong evidence of a causal link. That is why the American Heart Association and just about every major medical association under the sun recommends that one limit saturate fat intake.
As for Ancel Keys, he was a prolific researcher, and there is nothing "flawed" about his so called 7 countries study. Keys started to suspect saturated fat because that is where the evidence took him. But its just one study, as such you can't conclude much from it, but hundreds of studies can been conducted since then. The low-carb diet book authors like to talk about this study a lot, but the idea that a single observational study tainted thousands of scientists into thinking saturated fat was bad...is just a bit crazy.
Anyhow, you seem to be referencing a lot of low-carb diet authors. I find if you ask people on the street about saturated fat, you'll find mixed answers. The beef, dairy, etc industry have gone a good job at obscuring the research on saturated fat and have utilized low-carb diets as a marketing vessel for their products. From a marketing perspective, its all pretty brilliant.
But this has been my point here, all the major food industries and producers use the same tricks and it all goes well beyond TV commercials. For the beef industry, they are obviously going to want to cloud the research on saturated fat and cholesterol. The processed food industry is going to want to cloud research on refined oils, grains, sugar etc. They will also want to discourage home cooking. The only thing they have in common is that they have powerful interests to subvert science that conflicts with the products they sale.
The only foods that tend not to have huge marketing associations are fruits, vegetables, grains (except wheat/corn) and legumes (except soy). Incidentally Americans consume very little of these foods....
Depends on what 'whole grains' you are eating. I think you are referring to 'whole grains' in prepackaged foods. Plenty of nutritious whole grains out there.
Yes, I was mostly referring to the products that food manufacturers are marketing as healthy choices because they contain "whole grains".
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