How state nutrition guidelines have made Americans too complete
Nina Teicholz, author of the New York Times bestselling book Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat, and Cheese are Healthy Diet, is convinced that the US government made a big mistake in recommending proper nutrition for Americans, leading to a nationwide disaster.
“Given the list they still offer, it is indeed possible to draw a plausible conclusion that they caused more harm than good,” - quoted Teicholz Reason.com.
Consuming meat, butter, eggs, and cheese was once promoted as part of a healthy diet for the American family. Then, in the 1950s, Minnesota-based doctor Ansel Keys put forward his hypothesis about a diet for heart health. He argued that saturated fat raises cholesterol levels and triggers heart attacks.
Case conducted field studies of the relationship between diet and heart disease, which fundamentally changed the science of nutrition. The doctor has become a powerful figure in the scientific community. Contemporaries, who publicly questioned the validity of his conclusions, risked losing the funding of their research or becoming rejected.
When the US adopted dietary recommendations in 1980, Case's hypotheses were entrenched in a national food policy.
“We based our policy on the dubious science of epidemiology, which shows the association but not the cause,” Teicholz explains. "We find ourselves in a situation where we simply cannot abandon this policy, which was originally based on really weak evidence."
The flaws in Case study are one of the reasons why Americans have grown fat over the decades and become an increasingly less healthy nation. Despite significant advances in treatment, heart disease continues to be the leading cause of death for men and women in the United States and worldwide.
Keyes' hypothesis quickly spread throughout the world. Life hacker... The first organization to support it was the AHA (American Heart Association), which was engaged in research on cardiovascular diseases. Later, large publications such as The Times joined in, and almost everyone in the United States already knew that saturated fat is the main enemy of humanity.
The US government began pushing this idea into the food industry. Vegetable oils have become the main analogue of animal fats. However, in order to use them in food, a hydrogenation process had to be carried out. As a result, another product was obtained - trans fats.
They began to be used everywhere, and this could not but affect people's health. A 1994 study by Joseph Judd showed the impact trans fats have on us. Two groups of people were taken. The first one consisted of food with a high content of olive oil, the second one consisted of a high trans fat content. Studies have shown that a diet high in trans fats significantly increased cholesterol levels.
The study immediately went public, and now food manufacturers had to come up with a replacement, but this time, trans fats. And this replacement is still bad for our health.
"The prevailing view is that dietary advice is good ... and the reason America gets fat and sick is because America was wrong to follow that advice," Teicholz says. "And when you start looking at the data, it turns out that literally for every food category we obediently followed the recommendations."
Today, the science behind Case's dietary discoveries is being tested again. Teicholz launched the Nutrition Coalition, which aims to inform food policy, backing data with rigorous scientific findings.
“Our goal is to educate people about how dietary recommendations have not been successful, and to convey this alternative perspective to policymakers on this issue,” Teicholz emphasizes. "More and more experts are ready to talk about science, and I think this will drive change."
Solution
The most useful oils are unprocessed vegetable oils. However, choosing a diet, you should pay attention not to the amount of fat, but to the amount of carbohydrates. Do not blindly hate saturated fats, they are also important for our health. But the two basic rules that need to be followed in the diet are:
- A small amount of carbohydrates.
- Adequate intake of proper fat.
And remember that the advertised products with a "low fat content" are often full of sugar, which is much more harmful.
