saturated fat isn’t your enemy
We have been told that saturated fat is unhealthy and it’s responsible for many heart diseases.
However, what you hear isn’t always supported by science and here’s the truth about saturated fats:
What Is Saturated Fat?
Saturated fat is a type of fat that present in certain foods like fatty meats, lard, full-fat dairy products like butter and cream, coconuts, coconut oil, palm oil and dark chocolate.
Fats that are mostly saturated (like butter) tend to be solid at room temperature, while fats that are mostly unsaturated (like olive oil) are liquid at room temperature.
Why they say it’s harmful?
In the 20th century, there was a hypothesis called the diet-heart hypothesis.
This hypothesis assumed that since saturated fats raise cholesterol levels and high cholesterol is linked to increased risk of heart diseases, then this must mean that saturated fat causes heart diseases.
However, at the time, this was not based on any experimental evidence in humans and there is not studies that directly linked high intake of saturated fats to heart diseases.
Even though we now have plenty of experimental data in humans showing these initial assumptions to be wrong, people are still being told to avoid saturated fat in order to reduce heart disease risk.
Does saturated fats raise cholesterol?
There are 2 types of cholesterol, HDL and LDL, the “good” and “bad” cholesterols.
The good cholesterol has many health benefits and it’s important for natural processes in our bodies, including:
- Production of vitamin D.
- Production of steroid hormones like estrogen, progesterone and testosterone.
- Production of bile acids, which help digest fat.
At first, scientists only measured “Total” cholesterol, which includes cholesterol within both LDL and HDL. Later they learned that while LDL was linked to increased risk, HDL was linked to reduced risk.
Because saturated fat raised the total cholesterol levels, it seemed logical to assume that this would increase the risk of heart disease. But scientists mostly ignored the fact that saturated fat also raises HDL.
So overall, saturated fats may raise the total cholesterol levels, but it won’t affect the balance between HDL and LDL.
Does Saturated Fat Cause Heart Disease?
There was decades of research and billions of dollars spent on this topic, but scientists still haven’t been able to demonstrate a clear link.
On the other hand, several recent review studies that combined data from multiple other studies, found that there really is no link between saturated fat consumption and heart disease.
Related: The truth behind egg yolk being bad for your health
This includes a review of 21 studies with a total of 347,747 participants, published in 2010. Their conclusion: there is absolutely no association between saturated fat and heart disease.
Another review published in 2014 looked at data from 76 studies (both observational studies and controlled trials) with a total of 643,226 participants. They found no link between saturated fat and heart disease.
So… the biggest and best studies on saturated fat and heart disease show that there is no direct link. It was a myth all along.
References
1-https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa021993
2-http://archinte.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=601301
3-https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19476581
4-https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/full/10.1161/01.cir.0000154555.07002.ca
5-https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20071648
6-http://annals.org/article.aspx?articleid=1846638
