For more than five decades we’ve been brainwashed to believe that saturated fat causes heart disease. It’s such a deeply ingrained belief that few people even question it. It’s just part of our culture now.
Almost every day I read or hear about someone proudly that they have a “healthy” diet because they don’t eat butter, cheese or red meat or any other foods high in saturated fat (nevermind that red meat isn’t particularly high in saturated fat, but that’s a subject for another post). Or I might overhear someone at the grocery store saying how much they prefer whole fat yogurt to the low-fat version, but they eat the low-fat stuff anyways because they want to make the “healthy” choice.
What most people don’t realize is that it took many years to convince people that eating traditional, animal fats like butter and cheese is bad for you, while eating highly-processed, industrial vegetable oils like corn and soybean oil is good for you. This simply defied common sense for most people. But the relentless, widespread campaign to discredit saturated fat and promote industrial oils was eventually successful.
Well, that’s what I’m telling you. We’ve been duped. Lied to. And we’ve suffered greatly as a result. Not only have we suffered from being encouraged to eat packaged and processed foods made with cheap, tasteless vegetable oils and refined carbohydrates (low-fat cuisine), but these very foods we were told would protect us from heart disease actually promote it!
The recent review I’m talking about is a meta-analysis published this week in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. It pooled together data from 21 unique studies that included almost 350,000 people, about 11,000 of whom developed cardiovascular disease (CVD), tracked for an average of 14 years, and concluded that there is no relationship between the intake of saturated fat and the incidence of heart disease or stroke.
Let me put that in layperson’s terms for you:
Eating saturated fat doesn’t cause heart disease.
Like what you’re reading? Get my free newsletter, recipes, eBooks, product recommendations, and more!
There. That’s it. That’s really all you need to know. But if you’d like to read more about it, John Briffa and Chris Masterjohn have written articles about it here and here.
I wonder how long it will take for this information to trickle down into the mainstream culture? Unfortunately it’s not going to happen overnight. Paradigm shifts don’t work that way. But I’ve seen some positive signs, and I do believe the tide is turning. Let’s hope it doesn’t take another 50 years.
To read more about heart disease and cholesterol, check out the special report page.
Sign up for a free e-mail series
Debunking 5 common (but dangerous) myths about cholesterol that could be putting you at risk.
Better supplementation. Fewer supplements.
Close the nutrient gap to feel and perform your best.
A daily stack of supplements designed to meet your most critical needs.
According to the study, there is no correlation between saturated fat consumption and heart disease, but could excess cholesterol in the diets of the subjects have skewed the results of the study?
Or is it just the acceleration of Gravity and its effects on the human body. This force varies from region to region of the world and is affected by the movement of large body of water. Combined with toxic elements in our environment the effects of gravitational acceleration force on the circulatory system over time may cause hypoxia that could result in damage to micro structures resulting in a disease state of infection, Obesity, Diabetes, Cancer, Dementia, Cardiovascular Diseases and Stroke. We could protect ourselves with light supportive garments if we migrate to areas where the Gravitational force negatively affect health.
Chris, that paper really deserved to be retracted. Did you watch the video by Dr. Greger which explains how the study was set up to fail? http://nutritionfacts.org/video/the-saturated-fat-studies-set-up-to-fail/
Articles show that saturated fat diets raise LPS levels.
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/86/5/1286.long
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2858203/
HFD also induced intestinal dysbiosis – lowering bifidobacaterium.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19865183
Studies in rats show, “HFD induces inflammation by increasing endotoxin levels in the intestinal lumen as well as in the plasma by altering the gut microbiota composition and increasing its intestinal permeability through the induction of TLR4, thereby accelerating obesity.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3473013/
Very bad article. This author is basing final conclusions on research involving meta-analysis design. These type of studies are biased and really do not provide an accurate picture of saturated fats. Prospective studies in humans and animal models all show saturated fats cause high LDL cholesterol and coronary artery disease.
The online video by Dr. Greger does really sum up the real evidence and I applaud him for making it. It is unfortunate that special interests are out there causing people harm. I am a physician and have studied research design.
Saturated fats do not cause high LDL, trans fats do
These discussions need to continue, and as a medical professional, I will be the first to admit that what we believed to be true 25 or 50 years ago ( that eating margarine , not butter, was better for us) We all need to do our own research, and try to separate what we have been taught… or what the pharmaceutical companies , with billions of dollars in their deep pockets, want us to believe ( especially read ” the Lipitor dilemma” as one example ) we need to question all manner of health related concepts. It’s better to learn as much as you can, educate yourself and even then , remain curious. Also , I know that many studies use rats… and testing has proven that many mice and rats died unnecessarily when someone in the lab left a bag of Doritos open. What does this prove ? Here are my conclusions 1. When offered Doritos, rats like eating salty snacks 2. Lab workers enjoy eating Doritos 3. Eating too many Doritos , in a controlled environment… will kill a rat( not all will gorge) 4. Lab rats are deprived 5.conclusion… 4 rats out of 5 prefer Doritos 5. Lab rats at Pennington biomedical research center would rather eat than not eat…. and rats do not worry about eating transfats…. all of this proves nothing … but someone could base their entire doctorial thesis on one bag of Doritos. We all need to allow people their opinions and beliefs. And question what you read… bashing another for having an opinion that differs from yours isn’t inculcated from years in the medical field.
We would all like to believe the latest pronouncements about saturated fats; but what about Finland? The original source of subjective thinking over the last 30 years. By reducing their intake of saturated fats their cardiovascular desease rates have dropped by 75%. This sounds like reasonable correlation of facts to me.
Finland used to be the odd one out in Scandinavia, far more poor than their neighbor Sweden, people of Finland simply didnt get a full diet and couldnt afford that much meat. The people who got heart diseases 30 years ago ago grew up during that time, the later generations grew up with a better economy and more dairy and meat and became healthier.
Statistics show that countries with high intake of plant oils has always had poor health, some places in Africa where they eat what westerners are encouraged to eat the life expectancy for men is 46 years old, and Philippines has been mentioned already having very poor health despite all their “healthy” plant oil/vegetables/fruits, now explain how dairy/butter and meat addicted Icelanders has life expectancy of 80 years?
Statistics simply leave NO doubt that countries with high intake of saturated fats and meat has the healthiest people.
There is no healthy oil, only some that are better than others.
Stop disseminating misinformation…
The five Blue Zones with the longest living people on the planet prove your statistics to be made up…
http://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/history-of-life-expectancy
The US has the 16th highest life expectancy and Iceland is 186th, second from the bottom.
Happy hunting!
Sorry, I did not get to finish my comment in the last message.
Those statistics I gave you were for 1960. The latest 2015, the US dropped to 31st, despite an increase in consumption of animal products, while Iceland moved way up.
In 1991 the three major occupations were agriculture, fishing and fish processing. Not a heavy consumption of meat or dairy and certainly the food is nothing like what is consumed in the US.
http://www.everyculture.com/Ge-It/Iceland.html
Not only do they rely heavily on fish instead of meat but the fish are primarily wild and not produced in farms like in the US.
30 years ago here in Finland people were not poor but wealthy, and ate healthier food than nowadays – with margarine etc. – Since 1965 Finland has had an efficient and good quality communal health care. Nowadays we have also quite a lot of over weight people, because of pizzas and junk food and sugary products. But we don’t have the enormous amount of obesity like in US. Where a lot of fat people eat vegetable oils and low-fat gunk.
Very interesting observation; it is similar to the case of Thailand where they have always eaten lots of coconut. Even though their diet was extremely high in saturated fat, they had very little heart disease.
With their new wealth and adoption of a western diet, they now die of heart disease just like the Americans they emulate.
On Coconut Oil and Filipino Heart Disease rates. It has nothing to do with Coconut Oil.
“In case you’ve never been to the Philippines; it is the worst food on the planet. Even the USA has better food. Lots of sugar, bread, rice, fruit (and fruit covered in bread, fried in grain oil, and coated in sugar sauce). Really bad quality meat and veggie, if you can even find it. The pork (lechon) is the only edible thing in that country, but it’s too expensive for the locals to eat, except on rare occasions. “
VERY true. Filipinos eat oil dripping deep fried food all day and use very little spices for creative and tasty cooking, the remedy is always to add oil to make it “tasty”. So many of my filipino friends gone impotent and even died at age 40, their health is amazingly weak, young men totally incapable of doing even very simple tasks like changing a wheel (a task lots of western men above 75 does with ease), meanwhile the cooking oil is flooding their food and making them weaker by the hour. This country is eating themselves straight into the grave.
http://www.foodpolitics.com/2013/11/conflicts-of-interest-in-nutrition-societies-american-society-of-nutrition/
AJCN is clearly bias /\
Body Builders use tons of drugs to stay lean, and most of them yoyo diet.
Bodybuilders are some of the leanest people out there (body fat %) and they eat tons of saturated fat foods (red meat, milk, butter). They also avoid carbohydrates (aka SUGAR) like the plague, especially before a show. And yes, I’m even talking about the NATURAL bodybuilders – the ones not on steroids.
Painfully clear youre just making $hit up. You need carbs to fuel your muslce, fat cant be converted to glucose. The reason they dont want to eat carbs before a show is because it depletes the glycogen stores in the muscles and loses water retention because it enhances the muscle striations. In that state, bodybuilders can barely go a posing session without nearly fainting from exhaustion afterward. Show me a natural 60 year old + bodubuilder who has eaten tons of fat in their life that doesnt have some kind of chronic disease now. All the wrestlers, strong men, bodybuilders who eat high fat diets without regard drop dead from heart disease left and right.
Dont go by doctors manipulated bull$hit studies, go by others examples. In my life meeting and talking with seniors, the truth is in the fruit, veggies and low fats. I have never met a single person over 80 years old who have loaded themselves up with fat. Societies that eat low fat in other countries dont even know what heart disease is. The truth is in the results of those before us, not a biased study by the meat and dairy industry to sell more!
“Fat can’t be converted to glucose”
In short, yes, it can.
Perhaps not directly but chemical processes in the body breaks down fat and protein and converts to glycogen, and glycogen converts to glucose.
Fat is the bodies natural energy source, not carbs. Hence the reason you store body fat, for energy and bodily functions in times of famine. And the reasons bodybuilder a are so weak and tired before a show is just that, the low body fat stores, there hormones are not functioning properly. And the ones that drop dead, strongmen, etc. typically ate very high carb, fat, trans fat, whatever they wanted diet, all to gain weight, very unhealthy.
Clearly you re not of German ancestry. I know of a lot of Canadians from a German background that have lives well into thier eighties. Their diet seems to consist of mainly meats , potatoes and lot’s of dairy(natural if they can get it from Hutterites or Mennonites). They appear to live long. Small group maybe but on a personnal note my maternal Grandparents are full German. Grandpa is 96 and Grandma is 91. Grandma has arthritis. Both are alert and sharp. Grandpa has always exercises lightly on and off and grandma doesnt seem to slow down. Both have drank moderately(mostly ports wimes and spirits) and smoked in the till the 1970’s to 80’s. My Paternal English grandparents are dead. I saw alot of both maternal and paternal. The main difference i would state is the english side ate alot more grains….alot! and probable not as much exercise and more deserts. All four were born in the 1920’s. So you all keep reading and writing and debating and guessing. That will never stop as there is investments behind scientific opinions. I’ll simply BELIEVE and live.as much like my Maternal side as i can but that wont guarantee me long life as one major obsticle has to be overcome in all peoples life and it’s one that very seldom gets sighted in any heart health literature either pro high carbor saturated fat and that factor is STRESS!!!!! ATTITUDE TOWARDS LIFE. ? anecdotal but true.
This is interesting, given I’m in a class, Nutrition class, that emphasizes getting your info from legitimate sources. Yet the material on which the claim that sat fats are related to heart diseases is dubious, you say. Hmmm
After reading so many government research reports, blog sites and their reader comments like these, I am now so thoroughly confused as to what the truth is I am ready to give up.
It seems there is strong arguments that the government medical reports and studies are biased/propaganda and/or funded by lobbyists of certain food industries, one mainly presumed to me the meat and dairy.
WHAT IS THE TRUTH, WHY IS IT SO HARD TO FIND, regarding saturated fats, meat and it’s counter part “diet” eating complex carbs, fruits and nuts, and no animal meat.
I recently read the book The China Study and immediately believed most of it’s content only because it seems to make “sense” from a traditional point of view. Immediately thereafter I run across all these news studies, reports, opinion and “movements” that debunked the whole book, claiming that high fat diets work, high protein, low carb work. Fruit can make you hyperglycemic, sugar spikes, HBP, eating lots of fruits causes your Triglycerides to skyrocket…etc…etc.
Then on the other hand, there is equally convincing, powerful groups, information, blogs, research that says eating ONLY high fat, or high protein, very low carbs is the way to go and reduces over-all lipids. One of the big ones some of my friends swear by now is the HIGH FAT LOW CARB diet. He eats 20 strips of bacon every morning and says he is the fittest and healthiest he has ever been.
I’m starting to think that personal experimentation with food meals and testing your blood panel, and sensing your own over-all well-being during that trial may be the only way to go?
Anyone have any input for my frustration of getting the truth among so much propaganda regarding this subject?
I have asked two different nutrition professors from different universities about the China Study. Both have reviewed the raw data and tried to draw the same conclusions as Campbell. Neither was able to do it. There are some excellent rebuttals of the China Study online as well
There is so much self-promoting propaganda being published regarding nutitrition and causes of diseases. By self-promoting I mean that the source of the material is stating stuff primarily for the purpose of benefitting themselves irrespective of whether or not it is true.
Big Pharma obvious wants to promote Statins, etc. And the American Heart Association and various Universities, in bed with Big Pharma, do not want to back-track on BS they have been pushing for decades.
Examples of BS:
Do not eat foods with cholesterol (wrong. )
Saturated fat causes heart and vascular disease (wrong)
Statins are good for you (wrong)
High blood cholesterol levels cause cardiovascular disease (wrong)
It took me a long time to wade through conflicting statements to figure out which one were right and which ones were wrong.
Hi DanaLee, I think the lack of ‘physical activity level measurements’ in the studies are the source of all the confusion.
My theory is: The more saturated fat you eat, the more activity or exercise you need to do to stop ‘it’ ‘sticking’ to your arteries and causing problems.
This study has been requested to be recalled as it does not use the correct statistical analysis for such a relationship to be discovered; known as a type one error in science. It is worth noting that the main editor of this paper was financed by the dairy and cattle industries. This misleading information in order to confuse the public about what is healthy is incredibly dangerous. To promote high saturated fat diets is extremely immoral and the author of this article may be unaware of the damage he is causing. If you need any clarification on this subject check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ftoy6jqxm8
Don’t be fooled into an early grave like so many others are, the science is very clear on this and the only ones fighting are the ones who have the most to lose (the meat, dairy and egg industries).
You obviously work for big Pharma or Monsanto as your statement is ridiculous at best.
The proof is very simple, just look at the last 30 years that we have been told to eat a high carb and low fat diet.
During that span of time heart disease has continued unabated, cancer has sky rocketed and diabetes has gone through the roof in adults and more significantly in children as young as nine years old. the so called experts and doctors and the US Government are loath to admit the truth because they would have to admit that they were wrong.
So they keep pumping dangerous medication with very bad side effects into the american people while charging them big money while they make billions of dollars a year while congress turns the other way.
You’re assuming that because people were told to do something (and I would argue people weren’t really told to eat “low fat,” just slightly lower fat than they had been), that they did as they were told, and that resulted in the poor health of the nation. All I have to do to make you realize that this is ridiculous is to point out that the guidelines tell people to avoid sugary foods and limit sugar intake.
How people are told to eat is not necessarily how people eat. The folks at McDonalds aren’t consulting the USDA’s MyPlate guide before getting in line to order. The people who do follow the guidelines do actually have better health.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24572039
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24871477
What do you think food companies substitute the fat with (which is what makes food taste good)? Oh, that’s right, sugar, corn-syrup, or some fancy sugar molecule. Look at how many grams of sugar is is “non-fat” yogurt. Then tell me that it’s find to basically be eating a can of coke disguised as healthy food.
Over eating eating high fat high sugar foods will make unhealthy. Yet somehow people have been convinced it’s the bun of their double pattie bacon cheese burger that’s clogging up their arteries, really I mean really does that sound even convincing
Luke,
What utter nonsense you spout. Saturated fat DOESN’T cause heart disease. Study after study is proving this.
The real “danger” is promoting a low-fat diet rich in refined carbohydrates and sugar which has brought about a severe obesity epidemic.
You are all making sweeping generalizations and oversimplifying biology. Some humans who eat red meat will have heart disease while others may not due to differences in intestinal flora. People also have genetic mutations and differences. Human biology was designed to eat a 95% carbohydrate diet. The human body only requires a tiny bit of protein per day to survive. Humans are equatorial omnivorous animals. That means the natural diet is 90% fruits vegetables roots and seeds along with 10% proteins. Humans would be lucky to catch a fish or bird or rarely wild boar. Mostly humans catch insect and other small animals that fit in our hands. Our dentition is limited. Saturated fats do cause disease in large amount unless those saturated fats are a component of animal oils such as salmon. Wild animals are lean and humans would never intake so much saturated fat in nature. So the answer is very simple eat mainly fruits and vegetables, a little animal meat here and there and any saturated fat you will get will come mostly from the oils of plants and some in small amounts will come from wild fish, wild chickens and an occasional wild pig. Olive oil contains saturated fat but these are monosaturated oils. Fish have saturated fat but they are omega oils. It is the kind of oil that matters here when it comes to saturated fat. But in nature fat intake would generally be low. It is irresponsible to claim all saturated fat is not bad for you this is outright proven to be untrue and consuming large amounts is not natural for a human being I’m nature. You also need to stay active of course because exercise is related to food and affects how your food will react in your body once it gets inside it. It would be wise to walk or exercise before every meal as it is shown to blunt blood sugar spikes and increase metabolic efficiency. But again this is the natural state of a human to have to walk everywhere. There were no cars 2000 years ago.
That’s a guaranteed recipe for insulin resistance in a lot of people. Eating that way was when I suffered my worst symptoms of PCOS and became diabetic.
Now, after eating LCHF Paleo, It’s all good.
Your statements are very general.
Friend has diabetes. She can’t have a lot of fruit, bread, pastas… including whole wheat. So… what caused her diabetes? The meat or the carbs?
probably the pie
Probably her genetics, there, bud. You’re excluding that little bit in there, that someone with a specific type of diabetes has flawed genes.
The human body was also designed to DIE at less than 30 years of age.
Back then we ran ‘high performance’ all the time just to stay alive.
Now we have different goals – like not dying early – and the old rules no longer work.
I was a vegan for four years ( oh my teeth suffered). I was into this fruit fad for a while.
I take issue, respectfully, with the “equatorial omnivores” comment. I really believed we were a tropical species, hence lots of fruits, no clothes. However, my ancestors survived the ice age. That is enough to drive evolution.
Also you say we’re omnivorous, and I agree, but to me that means we eat more meat, not 95% carb. I think we were opportunist omnivores but in practice meant as much meat as we could get, and some like the Masai eat meat and milk primarily. Mainly we are not equatorial anymore. There’s a giant difference between an irish redhead and an Australian Aboriginal. As to adjusting to modern culture, evolution is still happening. Evolution doesn’t quit so we came from the tropics but we also came from pond slime
You stated that humans only need a small amount of protein? That flies in the face with the published requirements for about 60 grams per day for a 150 pound person—and more for an older person. 60 grams per day is not a small amount.
Eating just veggies at each meal won’t do it—unless you really pig-out.
Let’s use some common sense here brah, when you are born what’s the first thing you eat? Colostrum, then breast milk, both composed mainly of sat fats, fats, cholesterol, and protein. Humans are literally born to eat that way
Is there a recommended intake of saturated fats? (I know that this is a bit of an umbrella term considering that there are many different saturated fats with different length chains.)
I ask because although I realise that saturated fats have biological functions (I believe that they are the preferred fuel for the heart and myristic acid regulates PUFA bioabsorption) is it not true that the body can synthesize them? Thus if the body can synthesize then why is there a need to eat them?
Up until about 60 to 70 years ago peoples of the world consumed a saturated fat type diet and depending on their geographical location some consumed more saturated fats from coconut oil than saturated fats from meats but nonetheless saturated fats with obesity and heart disease being insignificant during this time . And it was not until big business and government got involved in the food industry and in the infinite wisdom decided that somehow all saturated fats were bad and that soybean and canola and corn oils and other polyunsaturated fats were best , the problem is that since they decided this and basically forced these garbage oils on the American public and animals too that obesity heart disease and all kinds of other health problems have grown significantly after making these changes ! Hmmm
There’s a connection there , saturated fat diet small amounts of obesity and heart disease etc ,etc , switch to polyunsaturated oil diet like soybean and canola and corn oil and skyrocketing obesity and heart disease levels along with many other serious health issues ! HELLO, guess what folks they feed soy products and canola products and corn to livestock to MAKE their livestock FAT !!! Studies suggest it makes livestock fat because these polyunsaturated oils and products interfere with the normal functioning of the thyroid glands ! Hmmmm , you don’t suppose that this would happen to humans also if they also ate the same diet as livestock ? You bet it would AND people who eat meat that is fed these UNHEALTHY oils and products made from soy and canola and corn oil will be eating unhealthy meat ! Simple neither people nor animals were meant to consume these unhealthy oils and by products from soybeans etc.
Also it should be noted that livestock were made to graze on fresh grass and various plants not on soy oil or soy meal or canola oil etc .
Unhealthy food whether its meat from animals fed unhealthy oils and the byproducts of these unhealthy oils or whether people consume these unhealthy fats/oils directly are GOING to make for unhealthy people , period , end of story .
This is completely false. Most people ate largely fruits and vegetables 100 years ago and very rarely ate meat. The industrial revolution led to more people eating meat as a function of showing off much as we see now in China where wealthier classes no longer eat rice and have steak every night. One needs only to look at the Thanksgiving day meal to see historical diets in America. Huge cornucopias of fruits and vegetables and a massive turkey to celebrate. It was very rare to even be able to get a turkey in those days it was a luxury.
Haven’t you ever read the claim that the human brain evolved to its large size because for hundreds of thousands of years humans have been eating meat?
I don’t know if the brain evolution part is true—but apparently humand have been eating lots of meat for more than 100 years (your claim)
Not just seed oils but huge quantities of sugar and fructose as well.
Somehow you failed to mention that the study cited here was supported by the American Dairy Association
The main cause of heart disease is inflammation!
Inflammation which is caused by our out of balance omega 3 to 6 ratio. Inflammation caused by spiking glucose levels due to excessive carbohydrate intake and obesity also causes inflammation.
By saturated fats not having high amounts of omega 6, which are high in plant oils, we actually decrease our inflammation.
And where are you going to get all this great saturated fat? Meat, eggs and cheese??? Good luck, it is your body!
Well I am 68 years old in May 2016, and growing up I never saw oil in our home, if anything was fried it was fried or roasted, it was cooked in animal fat, and I don’t remember any obese kids at all, America with there bullshit garbage foods and fast food(shit food) outlets, is the reason for all the food illnesses we now suffer from. Your Government can’t even get these multi-million $ food companies(think coke) etc, all your sugar laden huge money making breakfast cereal companies to lay off the added fructose/sugar. Open your eyes, we didn’t have a fat/ health problem before seed oils and sugar laden franken foods.How in the name of science did a food (animal fats) we have been consuming for millions of years, suddenly become dangerous to our health, when johnny come lately foods like seed oils and fructose corn oils, are ok, and mixing these fats in with sugar, to make franken foods, all in the name of money. Certain people on here think animal meats and fats will kill us, well they weren’t dangerous for a million years. sugar/carbs drive insulin, insulin stops fat burning, causing it to be stored, and turns off leptin signalling.
The entire cholesterol thing is untrue. People that have naturally high cholesterol fight infections better. Heart disease is an infection in the lining of the artery. the Oxided LDL is combating the infection. YOu get the infection through your MOUTH/ teeth and it goes in the blood. That’s what causes the problem. The Statins suppress the infection fighting LDL and might stabilize the plaque. I am nobody, but that’s what I think.
You are nobody. Facts are facts. Lipitor has saved hundreds of thousands of people from heart attacks. Do a little reading of scientific studies.
we didn’t have a heart disease industry until America introduced franken seed oils, and franken grains, and frankeb high fructose corn syrup, then allowed muliti-million $ companies to add it to most of our foods. Do some investigating dumbo.
check the facts.
Half of the people who have heart attacks are people with low levels of blood cholesterol. Did you KNOW this??? Probably not.
It takes work to read a lot and figure out which articles are true and which articles are BS. Please do not take your doctor’s word for why he is giving you a statin. He makes money by doing that. He is NOT going to tell you the truth about Statins.
To avoid cardiovascular problems just avoid sugar and instead eat a lot of veggies(anti-oxidant) and take Vit C (800 mg per day) and Vit E. Both vitties are anti-oxidants. And take a baby 81mg Asperin once a day to fight inflammation.
The doctor won’t tell you this because he can makes lots of money if he does.
“To avoid cardiovascular problems just avoid sugar and instead eat a lot of veggies(anti-oxidant) and take Vit C (800 mg per day) and Vit E. Both vitties are anti-oxidants. And take a baby 81mg Asperin once a day to fight inflammation.”
No. Yes to avoiding all that processed sugar and junk food, no to veggies being a lot. Lots of vegetation causes bowel inflammation. A healthy person also does not need vitamins, just eat food with that vitamin and no processed food, eat plenty of animal foods and even coconut oil and olive oil, eat lots of fish, and health will be optimal. Coconut oil and olive oil, as well as eggs, have anti-inflammatory properties, so the aspirin isn’t necessary. Aspirin, itself, is okay to use as it is willow bark extract, though.
The rest of your statement is true. The most recent studies also found that there’s no link between ingested saturated fats and blood cholesterol. Funny, eh?
That’s true. Just stay away from sugar—because that is what oxidizes LDL—and oxidized LDL causes arterial inflammation.
LDL is not problem—only oxidized LDL is.
To prevent LDL from getting oxidized stay away from sugar–which oxidizes LDL.
Doctors can’t make any money by just telling you to stay away from sugar—so they lie to you and tell u that you need their money-making prescription for a stain or other drug. What a bunch of crooks.
your statement was that one does not need vitamins. That is a pretty “idealistic” statement. Very few people eat a sufficiently varied diet to be sure of “getting all your vitamins.” So I take vitamins to make sure I am getting the vitamins that a varied diet would provide.
And I stand by my statement to eat vegetables (for the their fiber and anti-oxidants). OK!–I agree!—Don’t eat “LOTS” of vegetables–but just eat vegetables. (Whew! 🙁 )
Avoid sugar as much as possible. Sugar does nothing “good” for your health. It can cause diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular problems by causing oxidation of LDL –which is not a problem until it is oxidized. Cholesterol above 100 is NOT a problem–Doctors just claim it is so that they can write prescriptions for you for statins—which are harmful. And they lower inflammation no more than a 5 cent baby asperin–but doctors can’t make any money telling you that.
Your comment is way off the mark….what do you call low cholesterol, 180 to 250?
List the people in the Framingham Study of over 45000 that had heart disease with long term cholesterol below 150….
I am waiting!
By low-cholesterol I meant less than 100 which is the current recommendation I do not call 180 to 250 low-cholesterol I was referring to 100 which is the present recommended cholesterol level
You made up your facts why can’t anyone else do the same?????
My research has provided methods to reverse heart disease and diabetes. None of those methods require drugs in every case and only a few participants needed the assistance of drugs…
LDL is not a problem. for one–it is NOT cholesterol. It just carries cholesterol around the body. When it drops off its load of cholesterol in the arteries it gets small (like a bullet) and HDL grabs it and takes it back to the liver to get refilled with cholesterol.
HOWEVER—if the LDL got oxidized by free-radicals then the HDl can not grab it and the small bulletlike HDL can enter the artery wall where plaque can develop.
OK–What causes the LDL to get oxidized??? ANSWER: Sugar !!! Sugar is the main culprit here.
How to solve the problem?–Eat lots of anti-oxidants–like veggies, Vit C, Vit E. And take a 81mg asperin once a day to fight inflammation.
There are more details than I just gave–but what I just wrote is the main story.
You do NOT need Statins to lower cholesterol. Our body NEEDS cholesterol–especially the brain.
Blaming cholesterol for cardiovascular disease is like blaming food because people get sick from eating spoiled food.
I’m not promoting a low-fat diet. (Don’t know where u got that idea. 🙁 ) Your diet sounds good—except for the high carbs–which u admit are only for your particular medical condition)
Most people do not eat a varied enuf diet and therefore probably do not get enuf of the needed vitamins. Therefore taking some vitamins is probably a good idea–especially the anti-oxidants vit E and Vit C.
Obesity is the main cause of heart disease. Sure you’ll see a few skinny guys drop dead from heart attacks, but they’re the exceptions. Obesity kills, and everyone knew 50 years ago what made people fat, and it sure as hell wasn’t meat – it was cheap carbs (i.e., sugar, pastries and white bread). Carbs are cheap materials to make foodstuffs out of, and food manufacturers pushed these cheap food because it gave them a huge profit margin and made them rich. They almost certainly knew they were going to kill millions with their cheap foods at the time, but couldn’t care, ergo Ansel Keyes and his propaganda. Tell people the big lie that what’s not their problem at all, is the their problem, and tell it to them long enough, and they’ll eventually believe it. Same thing with margarine – cheap to produce, better profit margin, and most likely worse than the thing people ate for thousands of years during the centuries when heart disease wasn’t much of a problem at all. But, the real big problem is sugar. Sugar is what really causes heart disease, because it’s what is really behind a 100+ year obesity epidemic.
Well obesity is not the cause of most heart disease, at all, if you listen to scientists who give you the other side of the story, but i think your mind may be closed, your loss.
I agree with you on all you say, but listen to dr lustig on sugar and he will show you that obesity is not the largest cause of heart disease, sugar is because it causes so many other health problems. have a listen, you will like it I am sure
Yes—but lots of sugar winds up making u obese—so obesity tends to go hand in hand with heart attacks.
If I have learned anything from the multitude of studies and reports on health problems and their causes it is that our experts, doctors, and scientists don’t know half as much as they claim, and the other half is questionable. For years I have been hearing that Saturated fat is so bad for you. Well now everyone is saying that is not true and that it is good. This is just one example of why I pay less attention to our medical industry (whose interest lies in making sure we stay sick and have to go to the doctor) and more attention to alternative health resources.
“Alternative” sources are a billion dollar industry and are just as driven by motivated reasoning to make profit and are almost always based on faulty science, cherry picked data or simply no science at all. It often claims to be scientific and reject science at the same time.
There is no coffin so there certainly can not be a nail in it!
Maybe in one hundred years science will be able to provide a definitive answer but right now it is all up for grabs so I will continue to limit all fats, especially trans fats, and consume my fat from vegetables, seeds and nuts with infrequent wild salmon to the tune of around 15% of daily calories.
There IS a coffin!
If one is not allowed to eat meat then he can easily develop muscle-wasting from lack of protein.
If he has to get his protein from vegetable sources–then to obtain the right amount of protein he will have to eat a large amount of veggies–and can easily become over-weight–which CAN lead to a coffin.
I don’t know if you are getting the required amount of protein.
An adult man needs at least 60 grams per day and more if elderly.
Many vegetarian or quasi-vegetarian persons are not getting the right amount of protein–and don’t know it.
Therefore, eliminating meat (with its saturated fat) can cause health problems that have to be solved
Fats have to be at LEAST 35% of your daily calories, just for proper hormone functions
the problem with studies about fats is that there are never any controls. seriously, do people not understand how science works?
you need to isolate AT LEAST the issues of processed foods and sugar before you can even begin discussing what fats are good or bad for you. and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. you also have to take into account what kinds of vegetables people are eating, in what quantities, and how much omega-3 is being consumed…amongst other things.
given all the studies i’ve seen, i’ve come to my own personal conclusion that saturated fat is neutral. this is likely. it’s not a FACT however because i’ve never seen a study that has enough controls to provide legitimate results. this is why the verdict remains to be out on saturated fat, and why the debate continues to go back and forth. if scientists would actually do some proper science, they might get to the bottom of it.
I agree with you Sarah on most points. Scientific studies leave a lot to be desired mainly because humans are involved. However, what I don’t get is why there are so few alternatives to the high sugar (carb) processed foods we are practically forced to buy at our grocery store.
Unfortunately, low carb diets like Atkins, Paleo, etc., though yielding excellent results, are hard to adhere to for any length of time because the allowable number and type of foods is so narrow. If you want low carb bread, chips, crackers, pizza, etc. you generally have to make them yourself.
There ARE solutions!!!!
Just avoid sugar. Eliminate it to the extent possible.
Avoid processed and fast foods
Eat lean meat like turkey and chicken.
Eat veggies (lots of anti-oxidants)–especially kale
Take Vit C (800mg per day) and Vit E as anti-oxidants
Take a baby 81mg Asperin/day to fight inflammation
That’s IT !!!
What is so hard about THAT ??? 🙂
Stop promoting low-fat propaganda. Beef is very healthy in a grass-fed state and is high in B12, the vitamin essential for your nervous system. Eating them lean or not doesn’t matter. Fat does not make you fat, nor does it cause disease.
Taking vitamins is unnecessary and is only needed by people with SEVERE deficiencies. This is why ignorant groups like vegans have to take several supplement types — they are starving to death on a poor diet that in the past was caused only by meat famine and did cause many deaths.
Pill-popping is not the answer, going back to a natural diet is. On a natural diet, humans can thrive.
I’m on a high fat, animal protein rich and high GOOD carb diet. Zero processed foods. Lost 55 lbs in 4 months without exercise and my bloodwork has drastically improved. The high carbs are for a medical condition and aren’t necessary for a healthy person with good genetics. Fructose is minimal, glucose is high intake.
Example: Grapes, pomegranate, pineapple, squash, oranges – all high in glucose and healthy.
I do not eat processed garbage. That’s not even food.
“Taking vitamins is unnecessary and is only needed by people with SEVERE deficiencies. This is why ignorant groups like vegans have to take several supplement types — they are starving to death on a poor diet that in the past was caused only by meat famine and did cause many deaths.”
My suspicion is that today, due to our terrible farming methods, all of our fruit and vegetables are so nutrient-poor that vitamins may be the only way to GET those basics.
Plants don’t magically create minerals and vitamins, mostly they pull them from the soil. After a couple of generations of “strip-mining” the soil by pulling out but never allowing the minerals to be replaced, we have beautiful, huge, pest-free but useless vegetables.
So I have to agree with all that you have rebutted – but only if you are able to afford organic produce that is grown by farmers who understand the basics of crop rotation and soil nourishment (this also may explain the starving vegans).
True Sarah, but a million years of eating animals and their fats, hasn’t had the affect that seed oils and huge quantities of sugar/fructose, and grains have had in the last 70 odd years, I know that is only anecdotal, but a million years and we weren’t wiped out with heart disease, diabetes, and the other dozen modern plagues.Over consumption of omega 6 seed oils + over consumption of grains, and sugar/fructose, would seem to be a good place to start the investigation. We have no scientific evidence that cigarettes cause death, Or that alcohol is dangerous, but we do have cause to believe it is true. Belief enough to put controls on them, why not on sugar and seed oils, especially foods with huge quintities of added sugar.
Very easy to find misleading articles on the Internet and this one is right up there near the top of the list.
LDL above 100 does increase the risk of heart disease and saturated fat is one thing that appears to increases LDL.
The only truthful statement on the issue is that more long term study is needed to fully understand this…
So why is LDL above 100 bad, but 100 and below is not? This is not how your body functions! It’s all about probability distributions.
Saying “LDL is bad” is like saying “mushrooms are poisonous”. In your case more like “more than 10 mushrooms a day are poisonous”.
Clearly, such statements are misleading. And, in a logical sense, plain wrong.
Only specific forms of LDL are bad (mainly oxLDL). Eating saturated fats does not increase your oxLDL. So LDL may be (weakly) associated with certain diseases – because of the oxLDL fraction. But saturated fats are not – because they don’t raise oxLDL. (But carbs do.)
Wishing does not make it true….
The ins and out are not scientifically available and all we can do is study at the long-lived peoples in the Blue Zones and see how so many got to be over 100 years old with clear arteries.
If the level of cholesterol is not important why is it so few heart disease occurrences below 150? The facts indicate that the range of 180 to 250 is not the one important to study because their is little correlation between levels and heart disease…
You do not seem to think ldl below 100 is important but studies indicate differently. Personally, I do not care what you do or think…
All LDL ist not created equal. There are VLDL, IDL (both mostly harmless) but also small dense and oxidated LDL – those are dangerous.
Talking about LDL levels is futile if you don’t check how much of each subspecies is there.
Saturated fats in your diet raise LDL, nobody denied that. But they raise the *harmless* fractions. Excessive carbs raise sdLDL and promote development of oxLDL – which is bad.
Again: It’s all about inflammation and oxidative stress. Neither saturated fatty acids nor high LDL do make you sick.
Besides that, your premise is wrong: Most CHD patients have LDL levels around 100. So 150 is just as “safe” as 50. On average, LDL levels are around 140 for non-patients.
http://www.thefatemperor.com/blog/2014/11/12/ldl-its-not-the-bad-cholesterol-thats-simplistic-foolery
You give much too much credulance to nutritional science. We are at least fifty years away from knowing the truth about which foods are best for us humans and another fifty or longer from knowing the details that you are trying to cite.
My diet is based on long-living cultures like the five Blue Zones. To cite how the American Indians ate is useless to me because for the most part those animals are no longer available.
Science does not know what causes prostate cancer, for example, so following what cultures that have very low rates of it is not a bad idea even the details of why are not known yet. People that have two or more glasses of milk per day have much higher rates of prostate cancer. I have no idea if it is really the milk or what in it might be the reason. There is no valid reason for me to drink two or more glasses of milk a day…
I think you are stuck on the cholesterol number itself as an indicator of all things. I think we all know that it’s not the actually number but the ratio of good to bad cholesterol in the system that matters. Just because you have a cholesterol level of over 200 does not mean you are not healthy. Big Pharm would like to label you as that to sell their destructive cholesterol drugs, but it just but that doesn’t make it so. If your system is running more good cholesterol than bad, changes are you are very healthy. The cells of our body absolutely require cholesterol to survive.
People in blue zones don’t drink coke or eat maccas, use your common sense, we are sick because America has given us franken foods and we have allowed big food companies to manipulate the ingredients in our every day foods with sugars and high fructose corn syrup, our grains are not like the blue zone grains, they eat whole foods, Meats and fats are not the problem. show me an old world blue zone where they are consuming high amounts of sugar and seed oils and sugar coated grains with added seed oils. Eat whole foods, even our fruits are manipulated to attain maximum sweetness.
Saturated fat changes the dreaded LDL from small and hard particles to large fluffy ones that are healthy for you . They also increase the amount of HDL as well. Whereas the dodgy oils that we have out now that are recommended by doctors etc DECREASES HDL and though it brings down the LDL they become the smaller more dangerous ones.
We must get back to natural fats.
Thank to fear of communism in the 50’s I believe people strayed away from palm oil and cocnut saying you’re not American if you eat those.
I have not read all the comments but enough to know some of you do not beIieve saturated fats can be good for us.
Five years ago I decided to change the way I eat.
I was pre diabetic with elevated cholesterol and my new doctor wanted to put me on a statin for life.
I am no longer pre diabetic and my cholesterol numbers are in range. I added more fat in my diet such as coconut oil, olive oil, avocados and nuts, even dark chocolate with at least 70% cacao. I cut back on carbs and eat very little wheat. Best of all, I lost the cravings and can easily pass on junk food, sauces and prepared desserts.
I am not on pharma drugs and I lost weight naturally.
Rules: no trans fats period! no fats made from GMO crops!
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/fats-full-story/
In 2013, I broke my jaw, two eye sockets, nose and pretty much any other bone you can name in my skull.
After surgery which left me with my jaw wired shut for 3-4 months, I unwilling had to change my diet.
I ended up with a diet that by necessity, had virtual no added sugar and very very little carbs.
My diet was insanely high in saturated fats found in peanut butter, whole milk etc
After about a month of this diet (probably three weeks or so, I started to notice that I stopped craving foods (sugary junk food items mostly) I also was completely content and never hungry considering the fact I was not actually chewing/eating my food but instead drinking my calories.
The end result was I felt great! Clearer thinking, mood was better, energy levels felt awesome and to top it off I lost another 20 pounds despite consuming like 200% percent of the “normal” recommended daily intake on food labels.
I recently got my testosterone checked when I had a complete bloodwork done at my Dr. And my testosterone levels were awesome!
The normal range for testosterone for my age was 350-1100 and I had tested for 1050 ( the average for my age was actually aroind 600-700 I believe) and when I tested I haven’t even stepped into a gym in 3-4 months so I was shocked.
Saturated fats and cholesterol work wonders for testosterone and in my opinion have been smeared by people in the nutritional industry in a bid to try and sell man-made/artificial industrial oils in their place
The healthiest I’ve been in years and I get a large chunk of my calories from saturated fats from olive oil, peanut butter, whole milk/cheeses etc
Good on you Dianne, if you waited for proof you would need to live a very long life, I think all whole foods are ok to eat, but if you have damaged health keep the carbs low, use fat for energy and keep the protein in line with your amount of exercise, eat as many green, and coloured veges as you can without pushing your insulin up.
Carbs increase bad LDL, saturated fats don’t. Total LDL is not a good predictor of heart disease, but LDL particle count is quite good.
Low total cholesterol increases all cause mortality. Ideal total cholesterol is 200-240 mg/dL in an adult.
Not so. The Helsinki Heart Study in 1984 recommended an LDL/HDL ratio of 3.5/1 or lower was cardioprotective, regardless of absolute values. One exception to this is that some think an HDL value of 60 or greater (very common in premenopausal women) is cardioprotective regardless of ratio. It took years for the HHS to be born out by data in this country but it has. For an example, my father had an LDL of 70 (less than 100 and common in some diabetics), but his HDL was 14, an LDL/HDL ratio of 5. He died of heart disease. As a practicing physician, I saw this scenario repeatedly and without exception. Many women are needlessly alarmed when their Total Cholesterol is > 200 but their HDL is greater than 60 and their LDL/HDL ratio is extremely low.
LDL is NOT the cause of cardiovascular disease.
ONLY Oxidized LDL is a problem.
To prevent oxidizing LDL –Eliminate SUGAR.
SUGAR is the main culprit for lots of diseases lie cardiovascular and diabetes. Just stop eating sugar–as much as you can.
every time you eat sugar you are oxidizing your LDL and making it dangerous.
LDL is not dangerous–as it carries cholesterol which the body and the brain desperately needs. You do NOT want to get rid of LDL. You just want to stop oxidizing it. So stop pigging out on sugar!!!
Blaming cholesterol and LDL for Cardiovascular disease is like blaming food for people getting sick by eating spoiled food.
Can somebody tell me what n% means when talking about colesterol-lowering diets?