For those who follow this blog or have attended some of my classes, it will be a familiar topic…saturated fat. The kind of saturated fat I am talking about is from animal sources and a few plant sources such as cold pressed coconut oil and extra virgin red palm oil…not processed or hydrogenated oils, which are also considered saturated fats.
Saturated fats are part of every cell in our body. They maintain cell integrity, structure and resist oxidation. This is good. To be healthy, we need saturated fats. Additionally, saturated fats are heat resistant. On the other hand, poly unsaturated fats (PUFA’s), which the primary sources are industrialized, processed seed and vegetable oils, oxidize very easily and are not heat resistant. I explain this more in my post Healthy Vegetable Oils. PUFA’s can a be good source of Omege-6 and Omega-3’s, which are essential fatty acids (EFA’s)…meaning we have to have them, in small amounts, or we get really sick and die…pretty extreme I know, but true. PUFA’s that are not processed, or come from cold pressed sources or occur naturally in nature are good sources. The biggest source of PUFA’s in the western diet is from these processed sources, which are excessively high in Omega-6’s which up-regulate inflammation…a bad thing.
The fact that these industrialized PUFA oils contain essential fatty acids is one of the “selling points” that is used to convince folks they are healthy. The problem is once they are processed, anything that was healthy about them, including antioxidants, is gone and they are rancid and toxic. And to add fuel to the fire, we cook with them! PUFA’s, EFA’s…whatever you want to call them…also occur in animal sources especially grassfed meats and wild caught fish.
So why is it everywhere we turn we are exposed to them? It may help if we understand a little history first.
We, as humans, have been here a long time and during that time we ate a lot of animal sources of protein and fat, which are extremely nutrient dense, and, according to many paleontologists, is the largest contributing factor to our brain development. During these times, meat sources were very different than those available today. They were all grassfed or pastured or wild caught, meaning their health profile of Omega-6’s, Omega-3’s and antioxidants were very high. Also during this time, we did not experience the level of degenerative diseases that we have now, if at all. Cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity, arthritis, Alzheimer’s, multiple sclerosis and others were almost non-existent. The point is we ate a lot of saturated fat and were extremely healthy.
Well, during the 1800’s, PUFA’s entered into the picture. They were used in paints and varnishes because, when exposed to oxygen, they oxidize or harden very easily…yes, this is the same thing that happens in arteries. Later the PUFA industry began to struggle as they were being replaced with synthetic chemicals. So it was decided to take PUFA’s and put them in animal feed and sell them to farmers. This worked for a little while until the farmers realized that this enriched feed would fatten their animals but it would also cause them to die early. So since it isn’t good for animals what do we do with them? How about sell them for human consumption. This started to occur around the turn of the century, 1900, in
Why did we change our fat sources? Well the short answer is much of that was industry driven and several emerging scientists were looking to make a name for themselves and speculated that cholesterol is linked with cardio vascular disease. Cholesterol is found in animal sources. So if we convince folks cholesterol is bad, we push them away from saturated fats and steer them to buy these “healthy” industrialized vegetable oils. And that is exactly what happened. One of these scientists was Ancel Keys who came up with the Lipid Hypothesis, which is what it remains today…an educated guess that has never been proven. I would agree a diet high in any fat, including saturated fat and PUFA’s, along with a high level of carbohydrates can have some harmful effects on our health. Carbohydrates, primarily sugar, is another topic altogether but is something that has increased several times over in the last one hundred years. One study stated that in 1900 the average American consumed about 15 lbs of sugar a year and now we consume about 150 lbs per year!!
We now know that cholesterol does not cause cardio vascular disease and is needed for a variety of functions including:
· Acting as a powerful antioxidant to heal inflammation
· Building block for all hormones and Vit-D
· Nerve and brain function/Myelin shealth
· Repair vascular endothelial damage
· Used to make bile
· Provide structure to cell wall
Yes cholesterol plays a role in cardio vascular disease because it is trying to heal inflammation in the endothelial lining of our vascular system. This inflammation is often driven by poor nutrition, excessive Omega-6 and sugar consumption which accelerates plaque development, more oxidative damage and up-regulates the immune system. This is bad. Cholesterol is not something we want to mess if we want to be healthy.
In 2010, finally, one of the lead medical sources of information, the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (ACJM), released the results of a meta-analysis of over 350,000 test subjects. The results simply state that there is no conclusive evidence that saturated fats are linked or cause heart disease. Check it out.
Saturated fats not linked to heart disease
If you are one of those folks who believe cholesterol is the cause of heart disease then you may buy into some of the misinformation that is out there. It's not your fault, that is the information that has been feed to us for decades. Cholesterol consumption has only risen 1%, if that, in the last 100 years yet Cardio Vascular Disease has risen 400%!!! Hmmmm? Doesn't add up, I know. So, the notion that cholesterol=cardio vascular disease is garbage.
If you don't believe the cholesterol myth, then you are ahead of most. Here is a link to some info on the Framingham Study. It was a large study done in the late 40's that was "designed" to show the risks of saturated fats. The study continued for almost 50 years and the results.....you guessed it....no correlation was found between CVD and saturated fats or cholesterol. Needless to say the industries that set up the study were pissed and the Framingham Study was quickly forgotten about...sort of. Check it out.
Framingham Follies by Dr. Eades
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| Statistics from Center of Disease Control Click on Image to Enlarge |
The message is that for a long time we ate and cooked with saturated fats and did not have the level of degenerative diseases that we do today. We are biologically designed to have saturated fats in our diet. Identify sources of PUFA’s in you life. For many folks, these sources are industrialized oils, which are toxic and loaded with Omega-6’s and break down further with heat. If this is a primary source in your life then consider reducing that. If your sources of PUFA’s are raw nuts, veggies, grassfed or naturally raised meat sources then you in pretty good shape. All we cook with in our house is coconut oil, grassfed butter (Kerrygold is awesome) and occasionally extra virgin palm oil. Extra virgin olive oil is great and loaded with antioxidants and monounsaturated fats but begins to break down under high heat, so we use this mostly for salads. Additionally, despite not being mentioned in great detail, identify sources of sugar and consider reducing the overall load. Just by following these simple guidelines not only can we decrease our chance of disease but also increase our overall long term health. Cool huh?
