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Saturated fat and cholesterol good for you

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I've been researching whether eating saturated fat and cholesterol is really the main contributors to heart disease. I have found some good websites explaining why they actually contribute to good health and not the other way around. I suggest everyone inform themselves on the issue because it could be critical. For this thread, I want people to give their opinion on the matter and/or explain why the information presented in these websites is true or false.

Multiple studies: http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/cholesterol_myth_2.html

Saturated Fat: http://www.health-report.co.uk/saturated_f...th_benefits.htm

Saturated Fat/Cholesterol: http://www.mercola.com/2002/feb/23/vegetar...sm_myths_06.htm

Cholesterol Myth: http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/cholesterol_myth_1.html

General: http://www.biblelife.org/saturated_fat.htm

I suggest browsing around on these sites and others. This information goes against the mainstream scientists and organizations, and we all know how often they're wrong. I think it's proven here.

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I've read that our organism is adapted genetically to the kind of foods our ancestors ate, and that these are the kinds of foods our metabolism can process best. At around that point I've decided that counting vitamins and calories is not really the way to go about what you eat. I didn't do a systematic research, but I did read many articles on the topic of food and what food is good/best for you, and many contradicted each other. Of all these, the one about genetic adaptation was the most sound in principle, which is why I chose to follow that theory. You can read some of my own musings, and find a link to the article on my blog, http://pinpoint.wordpress.com/2007/05/15/the-perfect-diet/ .

I've been practicing what I wrote there ever since. Back then I was just a bit overweight, but by merely reducing the amount of food I ate, I lost 6kg. No specially designed diets and no pills. I didn't even change the foods I ate, I simply ate less. Now I'm maintaining my weight at about 75-78 kg.

I first read about this in a magazine called Geo, so if you visit their site you might find the articles on diets in the archives. I just couldn't find the English edition. Here's the Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GEO_(magazine) .

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I didn't mean for this to be a weight loss thread. My topic is that a high saturated fat and cholesterol diet is better than one with a low amount. And also that the main cause of heart disease and diabetes is from eating processed foods(white flour, hydrogenated oils, refined sugar, etc), not from eating saturated fat and cholesterol.

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My topic is that a high saturated fat and cholesterol diet is better than one with a low amount.
Do you have experimental evidence to support that claim, or do you simply deny that there is evidence that saturated fat and cholesterol have a causal relationship to health problems?
And also that the main cause of heart disease and diabetes is from eating processed foods(white flour, hydrogenated oils, refined sugar, etc), not from eating saturated fat and cholesterol.
Similar question about evidence. On the face of it, the claim seems bizarre from a simple causal point of view. It's perceptually evident what the physical nature of atherosclerosis is (when arteries can be inspected), so the finger points at lipids, and not the number of steps involved in creating a food. Your reasoning would suggest that the most "heart-smart" way to eat wheat is to eat the whole stalk, most of which is not digestible; next best would be whole unhulled seed; next the uncracked seed; as a last resort, raw whole-wheat flour. By the time that you've gotten to whole-wheat flour in a bag, it is so processed that you might as well eat rat poison. Now I have a question about processing tradeoffs. Is it better to eat white flour out of the bag, which has been processed a fair amount, or to eat whole-wheat muffins, which have been processed more? What I'm not getting is, how do you compute the tradeoff in degradation of the product that arises from one kind of processing versus another.

Anyhow, do you have any proof that processing food causes heart disease?

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Interesting topic for me because my boss had been reading Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes in which he asks if saturated fat is the evil everyone makes it out to be. One of the examples in the book are of indigenous peoples (such as the Masai and Eskimos) and how they have very low cancer, diabetes and heart disease rates, (non existent in some cases) yet much of their diet is saturated fat. (The Masai eat virtually every part of the cow, including drinking its blood :thumbsup: while Eskimos are known to eat blubber.)

It is looking more and more like refined carbs/sugar (and/or the subsequently high insulin levels) is the main culprit for most health concerns today. Taubes thinks that many "experts" are just too unwilling to admit to any mistakes in their findings to come out and report the truth. (Reminds me of what Rand discusses in Philosophy: Who Needs It in the essay Establishing the Establishment. I don't have the book with me here at work, but she discusses how the so-called "experts" establish their theory as fact, then it becomes difficult for anyone else after that to discredit their "expert" findings.)

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Do you have experimental evidence to support that claim, or do you simply deny that there is evidence that saturated fat and cholesterol have a causal relationship to health problems?

Both. I have seen lack of experimental evidence showing that eating saturated fat and cholesterol is harmful to humans and a substantial amount of experimental evidence showing they contribute to good health. Some of the largest and most expensive clinical trials have shown that saturated fat and cholesterol is not unhealthy for human consumption. For me to believe these things are bad for me, I'm going to need more than a few government organizations telling me so, which is pretty much all I've seen. If you have evidence, please show me.

1. Here are several studies in support of my claim: http://www.mercola.com/2002/aug/17/saturated_fat1.htm

2. A study: http://www.webmd.com/cholesterol-managemen...s-heart-healthy

3. The American Paradox(I suggest searching using keyword "american paradox" for plenty of information: http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/80/5/1102

4. Explained here is heart disease, cancer, diabetes became much more prevalent when

Similar question about evidence. On the face of it, the claim seems bizarre from a simple causal point of view. It's perceptually evident what the physical nature of atherosclerosis is (when arteries can be inspected), so the finger points at lipids, and not the number of steps involved in creating a food.

White flour, refined sugar, hydrogentated oils(trans fat) can be shown to cause heart disease and cancer.

1. "Over the last fifty years since the introduction of hydrogenated oils, this disease has increased over 1000%": http://www.dldewey.com/hydroil.htm

2. Research done here explains this trend: http://trusted.md/blog/vreni_gurd/2007/04/...rstood_nutrient

3. Studies and information: http://www.newstarget.com/white_flour.html

4. Do a search on the topic and you will find plenty.

Now I have a question about processing tradeoffs. Is it better to eat white flour out of the bag, which has been processed a fair amount, or to eat whole-wheat muffins, which have been processed more?

I think the main negative consequence that arises from refined carbs is it causes a high insulin spike in the body and also gets free radicals in the body. So my guess is whichever is less prone to those, but I don't know the specifics.

Edited by progressiveman1
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Both.
Only the third link leads to any content, and there is no experimental evidence provided. Shall I conclude that you don't know of any experimental evidence?
White flour, refined sugar, hydrogentated oils(trans fat) can be shown to cause heart disease and cancer.
Well, you have to separate the last point from the first point; you claimed that processing causes heart disease. Link 1 supports the lipid explanation; I don;t see that there is any reason to believe link 2 (I don't even care what they are claiming, they don't point to any objective facts); Link 3 is clearly from one of those New Age quack med sites and again provides no evidence, just empty claims.

In other words, there is no hard science to support your claim.

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Shall I conclude that you don't know of any experimental evidence?

Link 1 shows several studies under the heading "Studies that challenge the Lipid Hypothesis", and on the second page of the link it lists the "Benefits of Saturated Fats" and benefits of cholesterol in "What about cholesterol?" It explains why hydrogenated oils are toxic to humans under "Hydrogenation."

Link 3 explains the results of a study widely known as the American Paradox. If you want more information on it just search "american paradox."

Link 1 supports the lipid explanation; I don;t see that there is any reason to believe link 2 (I don't even care what they are claiming, they don't point to any objective facts); Link 3 is clearly from one of those New Age quack med sites and again provides no evidence, just empty claims.

Link 1 goes into detail about hydrogenation.

I suggest doing a search of your own on the topics if you don't like the links I provided.

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Link 1 shows several studies under the heading "Studies that challenge the Lipid Hypothesis", and on the second page of the link it lists the "Benefits of Saturated Fats" and benefits of cholesterol in "What about cholesterol?" It explains why hydrogenated oils are toxic to humans under "Hydrogenation."
You need to find an alternative, openly available source of your information, in order to show that there is experimental evidence.

Anyhow, my point is that you start from an irrational, emotional premise that mainstream science is usually wrong. You have given no real evidence to support your assertion, and the burden is on you to prove your ridiculous claim about processing food. Since you reject science, I wondered how you planned to prove that. Apparently by saying "If you don't believe me, go do your own search to prove it to yourself". Okay, I did that; and I've concluded that you're wrong.

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Apparently by saying "If you don't believe me, go do your own search to prove it to yourself". Okay, I did that; and I've concluded that you're wrong.

Where's your proof that saturated fat and cholesterol is unhealthy? Where is your proof that processed foods such as white flour, refined sugar, hydrogenated oils are safe?

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Your reasoning would suggest that the most "heart-smart" way to eat wheat is to eat the whole stalk, most of which is not digestible; next best would be whole unhulled seed; next the uncracked seed; as a last resort, raw whole-wheat flour.

Indeed, some among the community that question the Lipid Hypothesis go that far. They think processing -- as in, man manipulating food in some way -- is what destroys the nutritive value of food. I agree with your reductio ad absurdum -- the intervention of mankind isn't what makes certain foods bad.

However, when the more cogent of the dissenters talk about "processed foods," they mean just what progressiveman1 mentioned: refined sugar, hydrogenated oils, white flour. These food products (and similar items like high-fructose corn syrup and texturized vegetable protein) are the evils to the skeptics. They could keep repeating the long list of food items every time they wanted to talk about them, or they could use a neologism or a compound word. They stick to "processed foods," and what they mean is just this short list of foods -- not all products that have ever been manipulated by a human. The complaint isn't about processing; it's about the effect that these specific foods have on men.

Mainstream opinion is fairly well settled; the skeptics, however, are a diverse bunch. Most skeptics (as well as most non-skeptics) are irrational people. The people that rally around Weston A Price focus on the nutritive value of the foods they eat; the cholesterol skeptics have a wide range of different hypotheses, ranging from homocysteine to excess carbohydrate intake; and there are a handful of independent personalities, like Mercola, that have a grab-bag of complaints.

So where's the science?

The Anti-Coronary Club Trial was started in the late 1950s. By November 1966, 26 of the "Club members" had died, eight from heart attacks, compared to 6 deaths (none from heart attacks) in the control group.

Seymour Dayton reported in 1969 on a study of 850 veterans. The study group saw their cholesterol droop 13% lower than the controls, and 30 fewer members died from heart disease. Hurrah, right? Significantly more of the study group died from cancer. When autopsied, there was no difference in the amount of atherosclerosis between the two groups. Statin trials have shown similar results: lowering your serum cholesterol indeed lowers your risk of death from heart disease -- you'll just die from cancer, or stroke, or something else, instead. The statin proponents don't like talking about mortality.

The four-and-a-half year Minnesota Coronary Study included more than 9000 men and women; half served a low-cholesterol, low-saturated fat, and high-polyunsaturated fat diet, while the other half received a "typical American diet." The cholesterol-lowering diet was associated with an increased rate of heart disease. 269 on the diet died, compared to 206 eating the normal fare.

A 1957 study on 5400 male employees at Western Electric looked at (among other things) the 15% of the men that ate the most fatty food and the 15% that ate the least. After four years, 14 new cases of heart disease showed up in the high-fat group and 16 in the low-fat group. After two decades, the study was revisited: "the amount of saturated fatty acids in the diet was not significantly associated with the risk of death from [CHD]".

The Framingham Heart Study was launched in 1950 and followed 5100 residents, re-examining them every two years. The risk for heart disease among the men with high cholesterol was five times the risk of men with cholesterol levels under 200 - but this correlation disappeared with age, was substantially lower for women, and was completely absent for women over 50. The study director said, "the more saturated fat one ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the lower people's serum cholesterol...." I've seen the Framingham study cited as proof that high serum cholesterol causes heart disease, but that isn't what that study demonstrated at all. It demonstrated correlation, not causation, and most importantly only among a subset of the population.

There's Mann's research into the Masai, who consumed solely animal products yet had low cholesterol and no heart disease until they moved into neighboring Nairobi and started eating traditional Western diets. Studies of native populations in Alaska and the Yukon showed similar results.

Here are a handful of other studies showing no link between dietary fat and heart disease:

Navajo Indians: Page et al 1956

Irish immigrants in Boston: Trulson et al 1964.

Swiss alpine farmers: Gsell and Mayer 1962.

Benedictine and Trappist Monks: Groen et al 1962.

Samburu: Shaper 1962.

The Helsinki Mental Hospital Study ran from 1959 to 1971, and their cholesterol-lowering diet seemed to reduce heart-disease deaths by half. This study is frequently cited by those supporting the Lipid Hypothesis. What about all of these other studies? You can't pick and choose your evidence.

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You have given no real evidence to support your assertion, and the burden is on you to prove your ridiculous claim about processing food.

The burden is on those that make claims. The Lipid Hypothesis is a claim. Where is the evidence for it? We don't have to disprove it.

As I mentioned above, I think this thread about processing food is misguided. I think you two are talking past each other. Progressiveman, I suggest you make it clear that you're not talking about "human manipulation" as a primary causal agent.

Gary Taubes in Good Calories, Bad Calories does a great job of pulling together the reasons why the Lipid Hypothesis is the current mainstream belief. Maybe getting to a bookstore is difficult for you, I don't know. I suggest stopping by a bookstore or library and reading the first chapter or two. He's done much more research than I have. I can't really recommend too many websites because, you know, they're websites. People put them up in their spare time. The best two are westonaprice.org and thincs.org. The latter is a spare-time kinda thing, but the posters are all professional scientists, researchers, or practitioners. The Weston A Price foundation is a non-profit and moderately funded, and many of the articles are of professional quality.

I've seen a lot of Objectivists say "go read Rand, she's expressed this much more eloquently and covered it in much more depth than I can." I'm saying the same here. I suggest reading Taubes first.

Edited by Heresiarch
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On the issue of health, diet and obesity, Fumento's "Fat of the Land" is a good starter book for a layman, because he breifly reviews a whole range of surveys. It's like a top-level map, from where one can then choose to delve down into specific areas.

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I didn't mean for this to be a weight loss thread. My topic is that a high saturated fat and cholesterol diet is better than one with a low amount. And also that the main cause of heart disease and diabetes is from eating processed foods(white flour, hydrogenated oils, refined sugar, etc), not from eating saturated fat and cholesterol.

Neither did I want to talk about weight loss. I only mentioned this as a side note, i.e. it's possible to lose weight even when you don't count calories. I'm at a loss at figuring out why you took that as a main point in my post.

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You started this thread. You go first.

Gary Taubes' book, Good Calories, Bad Calories seems to have put together a lot of the information I have seen in his book. Dr. Atkins wrote a book called The New Diet Revolution, which covers the benefits of saturated fats and explains the dangers of high insulin production(the processed foods I listed previously cause that). Dr. Atkins lists probably 100 studies. Insulin is the major problem with these foods, so I suggest reading some books on that topic.

Also, the other reason why I don't believe saturated fats and cholesterol are harmful is because of the lack of proof. Like Heresiarch said, the Lipid Hypothesis is the claim. If you support the claim, I would like to know why.

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Insulin is the major problem with these foods, so I suggest reading some books on that topic.

Also, the other reason why I don't believe saturated fats and cholesterol are harmful is because of the lack of proof.

You claimed in post 3 that a high saturated fat and cholesterol diet is better than one with a low amount, and in post 6 you claimed that you have experimental evidence to support that claim. You have yet to actually provide any experimental evidence. In the first post you also claimed that we all know how often mainstream scientists and organizations are wrong. Putting the two together, I want to know what method you would use to scientifically prove your assertion that a high saturated fat and cholesterol diet is better than a low saturated fat and cholesterol diet. If you know of a method other than science to prove the claim, you can explain the method.

You also made the claim that heart disease is caused by eating foods that are "processed" by man, but you have yet to provide that "processing" food has a proven effect on cardiac health. So you've made two positive assertions, and I am still not seeing any scientific evidnce to support the claim. Since you seem to have access to a lot of studies that actually do experimentally test these assertions, it ought to be trivial for you to locate one of those studies, and summarize the methods and results in a short paragraph. I'll then get a copy of the relevant medical journal and read that study, and we can argue over whether those results should be accepted of rejected. I've read the books and studies, and I conclude that you are simply wrong: how in the world do you defend your position?

Of course, what I ultimately want to understand is how you can maintain the contradiction that science should be rejected (if it reaches a conclusion that you don't like) but should be accepted (if it reaches a conclusion that you do like). But I'm not expecting much: all I want to see is some actual evidence to support your two assertions.

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These are just a few studies that Dr. Atkins lists in his book, "New Diet Revolution."

Dr. Atkins summarizes this study: "In the crucial sixty-year time span between 1910 and 1970, when coronary heart disease escalated from a yet-to-be-recognized problem to the killer of more than half the population, this is what happened the America's diet: The intake of animal fat and butter actually dropped a little, while the intake of cholesterol was not changed. Meanwhile, the intake of refined carbohydrates(mainly sugar, corn syrup, and white flour) escalated by sixty percent."

-Enns, C.W. "Trends in Food and Nutrient Intakes by Adults:NFCS 1977-78, CSFII 1989-91 and CSFII 1994-95," Family Economics and Nutrition Review, 10(4), 1997.

Dr. Atkins: "Only a few decades ago, the Frenchman with his butter, cheese, and goose-liver diet had a heart disease rate sixty percent lower than his American peers. The Frenchwoman did even better- she had the lowest heart disease in the western world. The French also have far lower rates of obesity than Americans do, despite the fact that thier diet is higher in fat. They eat comparable amounts of meat and fish, four times the butter and twice as much cheese as Americans. What does it all mean? Could it by any chance have anything to do with the fact that the per capita consumption of sugar in the U.S. was five times that of France?"

-Dolnick, E. "Le Paradoxe Francais," Hippocrates. May/June 1990.

Dr. Atkins: "High insulin levels have been shown to correlate with high levels of triglycerides and low levels of 'good' HDL cholesterol."

-Parks, E. and Hellerstein, M. "Carbohydrate-Induced Hypertriacyl-glycerolemia: Historical Perspective and Review of Biological Mechanisms," American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 7, 2000.

-McLaughlin, T. "Carbohydrate-Induced Hypertriglyceridemia: An Insight into the Link Between Plasma Insulin and Triglyceride Concentrations," Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, 85(9), 2000.

Dr. Atkins: "Using data from several epidemiological studies, Dr. B. Balkau found links between high glucose levels and mortality in thousands of men whose medical histories had been followed for two decades."

-Balkau, B. "High Blood Glucose Concentration is a risk Factor for Mortality in Middle-aged Non-Diabetic Men: 20 Year Follow-up in the Whitehall Study, the Paris Prospective Study, and the Helsinki Policeman Study," Diabetes Care, 3, 1998.

Dr. Atkins: "Even in childhood, a high insulin level corresponded to higher triglyceride levels and higher VLDL("bad") cholesterol."

-Jiang, X. "Association of Fasting Insulin Level with Serum Lipid and Lipoprotein Levels in Children, Adolescents, and Young Adults: The Bogalusa Heart Study," Archives of Internal Medicine, 155, 1995.

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-Enns, C.W. "Trends in Food and Nutrient Intakes by Adults:NFCS 1977-78, CSFII 1989-91 and CSFII 1994-95," Family Economics and Nutrition Review, 10(4), 1997.
Which hypothesis do you think this study supports? I just want to make sure I understand your logic. Which study proves that a high saturated fat / cholesterol diet is better that a low saturated fat / cholesterol diet?

[ed: added a point]

Also, relate this to cardiac health, not diabetes (review your initial claim).

Edited by DavidOdden
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Which hypothesis do you think this study supports? I just want to make sure I understand your logic. Which study proves that a high saturated fat / cholesterol diet is better that a low saturated fat / cholesterol diet?

[ed: added a point]

Also, relate this to cardiac health, not diabetes (review your initial claim).

The first study suggests that those specific refined carbohydrates are the cause of heart disease. None of those studies show that a high saturated fat/cholesterol diet is better than a low one. I'll post those today and tomorrow. What the ones I've already posted show is that high amounts of saturated fat/cholesterol aren't the cause of heart disease in the past.

I'm linking refined carbohydrates to diabetes because that is one of my other claims.

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These studies are all from this site: http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/cholesterol_myth_2.html

All the graphs on the website.

1. Framingham Heart Study: they measured cholesterol intake and compared it with blood cholesterol. As Table I shows, although subjects consumed cholesterol over a wide range, there was little or no difference in the levels of cholesterol in their blood and, thus, no relationship between the amount of cholesterol eaten and levels of blood cholesterol was found. (Although it is interesting that women who had the highest levels of cholesterol in their blood were ones who had eaten the least cholesterol.) Next, the scientists studied intakes of saturated fats but again they could find no relation. There was still no relation when they studied total calorie intake. They then considered the possibility that something was masking the effects of diet, but no other factor made the slightest difference.

After twenty-two years of research, the researchers concluded:

"There is, in short, no suggestion of any relation between diet and the subsequent development of CHD in the study group."

On Christmas Eve, 1997, after a further twenty-seven years, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) carried a follow-up report that showed that dietary saturated fat reduced strokes. As these tend to affect older men than CHD, they wondered if a fatty diet was causing those in the trial to die of CHD before they had a stroke. But the researchers discount this, saying:

"This hypothesis, however, depends on the presence of a strong direct association of fat intake with coronary heart disease. Since we found no such association, competing mortality from coronary heart disease is very unlikely to explain our results."

In other words, after forty-nine years of research, they are still saying that they can find no relation between a fatty diet and heart disease.

Here's the site explaining the details of the Framingham Heart Study: http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/about/framingham/

2. Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial: Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial

One of the largest and most demanding medical studies ever performed on humans, The Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial (known in the medical world, by its initials, as MR. FIT) involved 28 medical centres and 250 researchers and cost $115,000,000. The researchers screened 361,662 men and deliberately chose subjects who were at very high risk to ensure that they achieved a statistically significant result. They cut cholesterol consumption by forty-two percent, saturated fat consumption by twenty-eight percent and total calories by twenty-one percent. Yet even then they didn't succeed. Blood cholesterol levels did fall, but by only a modest amount and, more importantly, coronary heart disease was unaffected. Its originators refer to the results as "disappointing" and say in their conclusions:

"The overall results do not show a beneficial effect on Coronary Heart Disease or total mortality from this multifactor intervention."

Here's the site explaining the details of the trial: http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/resources/deca/de...tions/mrfit.htm

3. The Tecumseh Study attempted to correlate blood cholesterol levels measured one day with the amounts of fats eaten the previous day - but found none. Interestingly, Table II demonstrates that the people who ate the least cholesterol had the highest levels of blood cholesterol. Although not looking for it, this study also found that blood cholesterol levels were quite independent of whether the dietary fats were saturated or unsaturated. Thus another 'diet-heart' hypothesis, that only saturated fats are to blame, was invalidated.

More details: http://www.thincs.org/Malcolm.choltheory.htm

4. WHO European Coronary Prevention Study

The results of the World Health Organisation's European Coronary Prevention Study were called "depressing" because once again no correlation between fats and heart disease was found. They had cut saturated fats down to only eight percent of calorie intake daily, yet in the UK section there were more deaths in the intervention group than in the control group.

5. The North Karelia Project: North Karelia, which had Finland's highest rates of heart disease, was compared with neighbouring Kuopio in The North Karelia Project. In North Karelia, risk factors were cut by seventeen percent over the period of the study. As Table III shows, in North Karelia there was a reduction in both CHD mortality and total mortality. Table III also shows, however, that in Kuopio, the control group, where there were no restrictions, there was an even bigger decline in both CHD and total mortality. These figures suggest that adopting a 'healthy' lifestyle may actually have inhibited the decline in heart disease. They certainly give it no support.

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The first study suggests that those specific refined carbohydrates are the cause of heart disease.
Now let's see what the study actually says. It is a re-packaging of data on food-intake trends from a USDA survey from 1994-6, which contains no medical assessment of the relationship between food consumed and health effect. This is unsurprising given that the USDA is not a medical research organization. These results are entirely compatible with the claim that the highest incidence of heart disease was in the sample with the lowest intake of unrefined carbohydrates. Note, in fact, that the words "heart", "coronary" or "cardiac" do not even appear in the article. There is also no control over the distinction "refined" and "unrefined", so the reported increase in consumption of grain products could be entirely in fluffy white bread. Similarly the rates for consumption of sugars does not distinguish molasses and raw sugar from table and powdered sugar. So you study give no evidence for even being concerned with the refined / unrefined distinction (a meaningless one, which is why they would not have bothered), and your study does not show that there were any correlations between patterns of consumption of carhohydrates and cardiac health.

Thus we can dispose of the "refined foods cause heart disease" hypothesis; I'll wait until tomorrow to see what study you think establishes that high cholesterol and saturtated fat is medically beneficial.

I'm linking refined carbohydrates to diabetes because that is one of my other claims.
I just want you to focus on the heart-related claims that you started with, before drifting off to some other topic. Let's keep the issues separate.
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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?c...t_uids=16467234

This is a study that took place over 8 years with one group on a low-fat diet and the other not. In the end, it was concluded that heart disease wasn't effected by the low-fat vs. high fat consumption.

If that first one doesn't convince you, here's another study showing that more saturated fat resulted in less progression of heart disease.

http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/abstract/8...&view=short

Say uncle.

Edited by progressiveman1
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