Another Nail in the Low Fat Coffin
A prescient excerpt from the Times – it’s what we’ve been saying all along:
“In the case of fatty foods, that confident voice belonged to Ancel Keys, a prominent diet researcher a half-century ago (the K-rations in World War II were said to be named after him). He became convinced in the 1950s that Americans were suffering from a new epidemic of heart disease because they were eating more fat than their ancestors.
There were two glaring problems with this theory, as Mr. Taubes, a correspondent for Science magazine, explains in his book. First, it wasn’t clear that traditional diets were especially lean. Nineteenth-century Americans consumed huge amounts of meat; the percentage of fat in the diet of ancient hunter-gatherers, according to the best estimate today, was as high or higher than the ratio in the modern Western diet.
Second, there wasn’t really a new epidemic of heart disease. Yes, more cases were being reported, but not because people were in worse health. It was mainly because they were living longer and were more likely to see a doctor who diagnosed the symptoms.
To bolster his theory, Dr. Keys in 1953 compared diets and heart disease rates in the United States, Japan and four other countries. Sure enough, more fat correlated with more disease (America topped the list). But critics at the time noted that if Dr. Keys had analyzed all 22 countries for which data were available, he would not have found a correlation. (And, as Mr. Taubes notes, no one would have puzzled over the so-called French Paradox of foie-gras connoisseurs with healthy hearts.)
The evidence that dietary fat correlates with heart disease ‘does not stand up to critical examination,’ the American Heart Association concluded in 1957. But three years later the association changed position — not because of new data, Mr. Taubes writes, but because Dr. Keys and an ally were on the committee issuing the new report. It asserted that ‘the best scientific evidence of the time’ warranted a lower-fat diet for people at high risk of heart disease.”
Further reading:
Why You Shouldn’t Eat Grains: Start with the Diabetes Pyramid
The Definitive Guide to Insulin, Blood Sugar, and Diabetes (and you’ll understand it!)
HT: Jim
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Posted By: Mark Sisson
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Check out Jimmy Moore’s latest rant–a perfect complement to this post:
http://livinlavidalocarb.blogspot.com/
Also NO relationship was found between animal fat consumption and coronary artery disease mortality WITHIN , WITHIN nations.
Coronary aretry disease rates varied 2-5 fold WITHIN nations.
“The Cretans had an average serum cholesterol level of 202; across Greece on the island of Corfu cholesterol levels were 198 YET DEATH RATES FROM CHD WERE 5 TIMES GREATER ON CORFU THAN IN CRETE” – This is from Anthoy Colpo’s book “The Great Cholesterol Con” The Cholesterol Theory of coronary artery disease is a complete sham and alwys was and Anthony Colpo supports this with the evidence from randomized clinical trials.
Robin Hanson has an interesting blog entry on the Framingham Heart Study over at Overcoming Bias:
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/10/health-hope-spr.html#more
Heart disease rates vary widely even among developed nations whose citizens have access to decent health care. I suspect there are a number of dietary and lifestyle factors that explain the gaps and that there is no “one size fits all” diet that is right for everyone, owing to significant genetic differences that impact how we metabolize food.
The nation with the lowest cardiovascular (heart disease and stroke combined) death rates is Japan. Having spent time in Japan, I can tell you that the Japanese eat a plant-based diet high in refined carbs like white rice and noodles. I do not think these foods contribute to their longevity; rather, I think it is the high consumption of produce, low consumption of refined vegetable oils, and modest food intake that sustains them for a long time. The Japanese have a saying “Harahachibu,” or “eat until you’re 80% full.” Gluttony is a deadly sin.