DIETARY FATS ARE PROTECTIVE, CARBOHYDRATES ARE HARMFUL
Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a global epidemic with 80% of the people affected as belonging to the low-income and middle-income countries. Diet is one of the most important factors which can increase the risk for CVD, and at the same time, the most modifiable of the risk factors that can prevent CVD.
Current guidelines recommend a low fat diet – meaning less than 10% of the total daily energy intake. Also, these guidelines suggest replacing the “very bad fats”, called saturated fats (see table) with the “good fats”, - the monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats.
In recent years however, the foregoing thinkings have been proven to be quite untrue, with the real culprit for CVD, and the Metabolic Syndrome, which increases the risk for CVD, are SUGARS and not FATS.
Metabolic Syndrome is a cluster of clinical states (type 2 diabetes mellitus, hypertension, high triglycerides and low HDL or good cholesterol which are driven by a fatty liver state, which in turn, is due to an abnormal response of the liver to insulin (insulin resistance). Metabolic syndrome (note that the cluster of clinical states does not include total cholesterol or the bad cholesterol, LDL) increases the
risk for CVD, all people (especially those with big bellies) to be susceptible for the Metabolic Syndrome. This Syndrome which is increasing worldwide in almost epidemic proportions, is due to unhealthy dietary habits – especially with the increased intake of alcohol, trans fats (the only bad fat, actually – see Table) and most especially to a sugar – FRUCTOSE.
A recent study called PURE (Prospective Urban and Rural Epidemiology) published online 29 August 2017 and reported at the recent European Society of Cardiology Congress which included both Asian and Western countries ( 18 countries in 5 continents) and involving 135,335 subjects showed that dietary fats are protective to CVD, while carbohydrates are harmful. The dietary habits of these subjects were categorized into nutrient intakes of carbohydrates, fats and proteins. These were then related – after a follow-up of 5 – 9 years – to the number of deaths in the subjects. There were 5796 deaths recorded and the highest carbohydrate intake was associated with an increased risk of total mortality. Intake of total fat and each type of fat was associated with the lower risk of total mortality. Higher saturated fat intake was associated with lower risk of stroke.
Total fat, saturated fat, and polyunsaturated fat were not significantly associated with risk of heart attack (myocardial infarction) or CVD mortality.
Their conclusions are summarized as follows:
1. Decreasing overall mortality with increasing consumption of saturated fat, but no effect on CVD mortality. 2. Increasing mortality with increasing consumption of carbohydrates. 3. Current guidelines recommending less than 10% saturated fat not supported by data. 4. Results challenge current guideline recommendations on intake of saturated fat and carbohydrates.
In an earlier study published in 2013, called An International Longitudinal Panel Analysis of Diet and Diabetes pointed specifically to sugars as the responsible component of carbohydrates as the real culprit. 1. Only changes in sugar availability correlated with changes in diabetes prevalence (and the Metabolic Syndrome, and hence CVD), 2. Every extra 150 calories increased diabetes prevalence by 0.1%. 3. But, if those 150 calories were a can of soda, diabetes prevalence increased to 1.1%. 4. These data estimate that 25% of diabetes worldwide is explained by sugar. And that sugar is FRUCTOSE, or fruit sugar.
The panel said: The sources of fructose are:
1.
Fruits. Fruit juice is not good, but fresh fruits in moderation are good. The difference between the two, is that fresh fruits contain roughage which prevents the rapid absorption of fructose into the body, and provides food for the good bacteria in our gut. 2. Honey and table sugar 3. High fructose corn syrup – the worst offender, which is the sweetener for a variety of sugar sweetened drinks – soft drinks and “power” drinks.
And so, as said in the article of Maryanne Demasi (investigative reporter), Robert Lustig (pediatric endocrinologist) and Aseem Malhotra (cardiologist) in their publication in Clinical Pharmacist of 4 July 2017, the cholesterol and calorie hypotheses are both DEAD!