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Saturated Fat is not the major issue

bmj.com

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Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#21

Post by yetanotherphd »

scotch_drinker wrote: post #19
yetanotherphd wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are ignoring the medical researchers who advocate for a diet low in saturated fat, and ridiculously characterizing mainstream doctors as not caring about prevention, and perhaps even wanting to cause disease so that they can treat it. I'm on the fence on saturated fat, but it is an issue that is being debated by people who on both sides want to discover the best diet for preventing disease and lengthening life.

I'm not ignoring them, I'm specifically speaking to that population who advocate a diet low in saturated fat as a preventative measure for heart disease when there is NO causal evidence linking the two. Also, I said nothing about them wanting to cause disease, I said they wanted to prescribe a pill to fix it, glossing over the known issues with the pill (statins in this case) in populations with no elevated risk of c…

First, I'm still not clear on your logic.

On the one hand, there is a debate about whether consuming saturated fats cause heart disease.

On the other hand, there is the issue of whether statins prevent heart disease.

To me these are logically separate issues, yet you seem to think they are related, and my best guess at what you were hinting at seems to be wrong. So can you tell me: how would whether a doctor wants to prescribe a pill for X instead of preventing X, have anything to do with whether Y causes X.

On the evidence of saturated fat and heart disease, I will as usual defer to Wikipedia:

"Whether saturated fat is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a question with numerous controversial views. Although most in the mainstream heart-health, government, and medical communities hold that saturated fat is a risk factor for CVD, some recent studies have produced conflicting results."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturated_fat_and_cardiovascula...

Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#22

Post by Volpe »

wwweston wrote: post #10
achileas wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most things in the biological sciences are correlations, to be as precise as we are in the sciences, you have to point out that some relationship is correlational unless you specifically test for causation (which is unfeasible in most cases)...if you assume causation, even when there seems to be very little doubt as to the causative agent, your paper is going to get sent back to you by the reviewers (in most cases).…

> Nothing bad is going to happen by reducing saturated fat intake From what I've read, it depends on what you eat instead. For example, as the article says: "a JAMA study revealed that a 'low fat' diet showed the greatest decrease in energy expenditure, an unhealthy lipid pattern, and increased insulin resistance (a precursor to diabetes) compared with a low carbohydrate and low glycaemic index (GI) diet."

Insulin resistance is caused by sugar intake (completely unrelated to cholesterol)... Arguing that in order to lower cholesterol you have to consume more sugar seems rather strange.

Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#23

Post by tolmasky »

Volpe wrote: post #22
wwweston wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nothing bad is going to happen by reducing saturated fat intake From what I've read, it depends on what you eat instead. For example, as the article says: "a JAMA study revealed that a 'low fat' diet showed the greatest decrease in energy expenditure, an unhealthy lipid pattern, and increased insulin resistance (a precursor to diabetes) compared with a low carbohydrate and low glycaemic index (GI) diet."

Insulin resistance is caused by sugar intake (completely unrelated to cholesterol)... Arguing that in order to lower cholesterol you have to consume more sugar seems rather strange.

Although individuals did not consciously decide to replace fat with sugar in their diets, the reality is that this policy advisement lead food producers to reduce fat in their products and replace that fat with sugar -- so the practical result was indeed this. Most products that advertise low-fat have accomplished this with sugar. Sure, it didn't have to happen this way, but thats irrelevant because it did happen this way: their was public policy that labeled fat as the bad guy, fat was reduced (sugar increased), and these actions were applauded.

Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#24

Post by Volpe »

scotch_drinker wrote: post #11

There have been a lot of people saying this for quite awhile. Malcolm Kendrick wrote an entire book about the poor science behind our current belief that cholesterol causes heart disease. There are many others. But in the current medical environment where doctors want to prescribe a pill to fix everything and the biogen companies have enormous influence over public policy, dissent never rises above the level of a whi…

Those with higher cholesterol have a higher percentage of heart attacks.

Doctors (in Australia at least) prescribe when your risk (calculated on your cholesterol, smoking, stress, exercise, etc) is lowered by reducing your cholesterol, and dietary restriction hasn't worked (i.e. your liver just isn't as good as it used to be). Is that not how its done in the U.S?

Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#26

Post by Volpe »

tolmasky wrote: post #23
Volpe wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insulin resistance is caused by sugar intake (completely unrelated to cholesterol)... Arguing that in order to lower cholesterol you have to consume more sugar seems rather strange.

Although individuals did not consciously decide to replace fat with sugar in their diets, the reality is that this policy advisement lead food producers to reduce fat in their products and replace that fat with sugar -- so the practical result was indeed this. Most products that advertise low-fat have accomplished this with sugar. Sure, it didn't have to happen this way, but thats irrelevant because it did happen thi…

But I've seen no evidence that, that is what happened. There doesn't seem to be a logical reason as to why you'd need to increase sugar in order to lower cholesterol, so why would companies do that?

Can you point to an example food(s) that had high fat, and low sugar, and then after this policy, low fat, and high sugar... ?

Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#27

Post by JunkDNA »

About 10 years ago the journal "Science" ran a cover story called "The soft Science of Dietary fat". If you have access to back issues through a library (sadly it's paywalled), go pull it and read it. Your mind will be blown at how thin the evidence is for many dietary recommendations. We know shockingly little about how our bodies actually work.

Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#28

Post by a8da6b0c91d »

wwweston wrote: post #8

A related pet peeve: It's becoming difficult to find products with "all" the fat (vs "low/reduced" fat). Prime example for me: chocolate milk. It's pretty rare nowadays that I ever see anything over 1% milk used in it -- and of course the label touts the low fat formulation, but doesn't mention there's more sugar pumped in it than a can of soda. Even if this was healthier than full-fat/less sugar chocolate milk, I'd…

They need to sell you skimmed milk so they can also sell the fat as ice cream, butter, and cream.

Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#29

Post by artichokeheart »

cam_l wrote: post #20

Good response to this article with, like, facts and that.. http://theconversation.com/its-not-even-debatable-saturated-...

Such a shame that the author apparently didn't read all of the linked "facts".

eg. "This cause and effect is now beyond reasonable doubt; science shows (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8043072) that high levels of cholesterol cause arterial damage and this, in turn, causes coronary heart disease."

The linked paper and the comments to that paper disputing the findings completely contradicts the author's "beyond reasonable doubt" argument.

I don't have a "team" in this debate, personally I wish scientists would put their pride aside, stop the furious debating and find a definitive answer. I'm just pointing out an obvious flaw in this response.

Re: Saturated Fat is not the major issue

#30

Post by mistermann »

Volpe wrote: post #26
tolmasky wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Although individuals did not consciously decide to replace fat with sugar in their diets, the reality is that this policy advisement lead food producers to reduce fat in their products and replace that fat with sugar -- so the practical result was indeed this. Most products that advertise low-fat have accomplished this with sugar. Sure, it didn't have to happen this way, but thats irrelevant because it did happen thi…

But I've seen no evidence that, that is what happened. There doesn't seem to be a logical reason as to why you'd need to increase sugar in order to lower cholesterol, so why would companies do that? Can you point to an example food(s) that had high fat, and low sugar, and then after this policy, low fat, and high sugar... ?

Yogurt is one. I don't know about the previous sugar levels, but it is extremely difficult to find anything other than low or no fat yogurt, and they typically have what I consider to be very high sugar levels, even many brands of plain yogurt.
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