Fats

bobrobert said:

It is worth a read. An open mind is needed and as to the amount of fats then "moderation" is wise. The Inuit people didn't know what "moderation" was and they thrived on it. Most now live in the cities deprived of their meat, riddled with modern diseases such as drugs, diabetes, heart problems, overweight etc etc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inuit_diet

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A very interesting read indeed.
(I'm not entirely sure why you quoted it though)

serenity648 said:

as a newly diagnosed, the feel i have got for the forum is that, no matter what some people say, another will come along and argue against it, often in a defensive and/or confrontational way, and leave confusion and unpleasantness in their wake. I have some straightforward questions about fats:

do humans, or do they not, need saturated fats in their diet?

what is being defined as saturated fat?

what are the alternative safe fats I can eat?

thanks @peterhanna1 for starting this thread : )

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Well from the about link, it appears the inuits thrived a diet split roughly
'50% of their calories from fat, 30-35% from protein and 15-20% of their calories from carbohydrates'

It moves on to suggest that the western diet is worse, as the inuits was mainly monounsaturated fat.

'It has been suggested that because the fats of the Inuit's wild-caught game are largely monounsaturated and rich in omega-3 fatty acids, the diet does not pose the same health risks as a typical Western high-fat diet'

But then it goes on to disagree with any evidence fats are healthy.

'However, actual evidence has shown that Inuit have a similar prevalence of coronary artery disease as non-Inuit populations and they have excessive mortality due to cerebrovascular strokes, with twice the risk to that of the North American population.[28][29] Indeed the cardiovascular risk of this diet is so severe that the addition of a more standard American diet has reduced the incidence of mortality in Inuit population.[30] Furthermore, fish oil supplement studies have failed to support claims of preventing heart attacks or strokes'

So make of that what you will with regard to fats, and types of fats.

The british heart foundation has a guide to fats

https://www.bhf.org.uk/heart-health/preventing-heart-disease/healthy-eating/fats-explained

To answer the question, do you need saturated fats though, I have never seen any study that shows saturated fats were necessary for life. A vegan diet is normally very low in saturated fat, which seems to bear out humans do not need saturated fats.

None of that will really make a great difference to my point of view though, I'm not vegan, and I'm certainly not inuit.
I'm just one person that like to keep my cholesterol where I like it to be, and I do that by eating food that works for me. Saturated fat doesn't for some, (myself included) whereas the alternatives appear to.

SunnyExpat said:

A very interesting read indeed.
(I'm not entirely sure why you quoted it though)



Well from the about link, it appears the inuits thrived a diet split roughly
'50% of their calories from fat, 30-35% from protein and 15-20% of their calories from carbohydrates'

It moves on to suggest that the western diet is worse, as the inuits was mainly monounsaturated fat.

'It has been suggested that because the fats of the Inuit's wild-caught game are largely monounsaturated and rich in omega-3 fatty acids, the diet does not pose the same health risks as a typical Western high-fat diet'

But then it goes on to disagree with any evidence fats are healthy.

'However, actual evidence has shown that Inuit have a similar prevalence of coronary artery disease as non-Inuit populations and they have excessive mortality due to cerebrovascular strokes, with twice the risk to that of the North American population.[28][29] Indeed the cardiovascular risk of this diet is so severe that the addition of a more standard American diet has reduced the incidence of mortality in Inuit population.[30] Furthermore, fish oil supplement studies have failed to support claims of preventing heart attacks or strokes'

So make of that what you will with regard to fats, and types of fats.

The british heart foundation has a guide to fats

https://www.bhf.org.uk/heart-health/preventing-heart-disease/healthy-eating/fats-explained

To answer the question, do you need saturated fats though, I have never seen any study that shows saturated fats were necessary for life. A vegan diet is normally very low in saturated fat, which seems to bear out humans do not need saturated fats.

None of that will really make a great difference to my point of view though, I'm not vegan, and I'm certainly not inuit.
I'm just one person that like to keep my cholesterol where I like it to be, and I do that by eating food that works for me. Saturated fat doesn't for some, (myself included) whereas the alternatives appear to.

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I note that the BHF also recommend 'plenty of starchy carbs' as part of your diet so I'm not sure they are experts in healthy foods

Daibell said:

I note that the BHF also recommend 'plenty of starchy carbs' as part of your diet so I'm not sure they are experts in healthy foods

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Exactly, you beat me to it.

Daibell said:

I note that the BHF also recommend 'plenty of starchy carbs' as part of your diet so I'm not sure they are experts in healthy foods

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I have noticed that at times.
One any established health care organisation makes one statement we disagree with, it does seem to be a blanket reason why the opposite view to everything they say has to be taken.
I prefer to keep an open mind, and see which statements seem to make sense, and work, and which ones I choose to disagree with based on fact and observation.
Each to his own though.

You can't whack a 'sat'

It sort of seems like no-one actually knows anything, from the trials and proven point of view, so I have to find out for myself by seeing how my own body reacts to fats.. However, if I try doing the eating saturated fats thing, then have a heart attack or stroke, its too late. I will have damaged myself even more.

serenity648 said:

It sort of seems like no-one actually knows anything, from the trials and proven point of view, so I have to find out for myself by seeing how my own body reacts to fats.. However, if I try doing the eating saturated fats thing, then have a heart attack or stroke, its too late. I will have damaged myself even more.

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So why not try gradually adding sat fats to your diet? You don't need to change very much at all at first, just switch one thing and see what happens in your next set of blood tests. If you just maybe switch from low fat spread to butter or skimmed milk to whole milk the effects won't be too great. You can always change back again if your blood results start to go in the wrong direction. I think I am at an advantage as compared to you in that I have been given so much bad advice from NHS doctors that going against NHS advice is very easy for me. If what you've been told has always worked for you then it must be more difficult.

Have you seen this book? - Eat Fat by Dr Trudi Deakin. ?

SunnyExpat said:

A very interesting read indeed.
(I'm not entirely sure why you quoted it though)




'However, actual evidence has shown that Inuit have a similar prevalence of coronary artery disease as non-Inuit populations and they have excessive mortality due to cerebrovascular strokes, with twice the risk to that of the North American population.[28][29] Indeed the cardiovascular risk of this diet is so severe that the addition of a more standard American diet has reduced the incidence of mortality in Inuit population.[30] Furthermore, fish oil supplement studies have failed to support claims of preventing heart attacks or strokes'

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However, the link to that quote states that the study was flawed:

"Alexander Ströhle, Maike Wolters and Andreas Hahn, with the Department of Food Science at the University of Hanover, rely on Bjerregaard et al. (2003)[10] to argue that hunters like the Inuit, who traditionally obtain most of their dietary energy from wild animals and therefore eat a low-carbohydrate diet, seem to have a high mortality from coronary heart disease, but the study did not control for carbohydrate consumption or smoking, which is significant, considering it was a "westernized" Inuit population of which 79% were current smokers and more than likely ate a non-traditional diet.[11] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-carbohydrate_diet#Resistant_Starch

so it wasnt studying an actually traditional inuit diet-eating population.

zand said:

So why not try gradually adding sat fats to your diet? You don't need to change very much at all at first, just switch one thing and see what happens in your next set of blood tests. If you just maybe switch from low fat spread to butter or skimmed milk to whole milk the effects won't be too great. You can always change back again if your blood results start to go in the wrong direction. I think I am at an advantage as compared to you in that I have been given so much bad advice from NHS doctors that going against NHS advice is very easy for me. If what you've been told has always worked for you then it must be more difficult.

Have you seen this book? - Eat Fat by Dr Trudi Deakin. ?

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I havent seen that book and will look it up. I use butter already and will switch to full fat milk, and see what happens at my next HbA1c in 2 months time. Thank you.

As you say, no one knows anything reliably.

I would assume you're not low fat if you are on this forum.
Eat non saturated fat. Get your blood tests and check up.
Try saturated fats, Get you bloods and check up again.

Decide what works for you.
If it happens to be what you've been told that has always worked for you, don't feel you need to change it just because.

However, I would suggest you do your research beforehand. I decided what I wanted my bloods, (BG, Cholesterol, fastings, liver function etc), and ate to achieve those figures.
I didn't want to choose my diet, get my results, then research the internet for studies that agreed my results were correct.

SunnyExpat said:

However, I would suggest you do your research beforehand. I decided what I wanted my bloods, (BG, Cholesterol, fastings, liver function etc), and ate to achieve those figures.
I didn't want to choose my diet, get my results, then research the internet for studies that agreed my results were correct.

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I did as I was told by my GP, thinking that if the NHS and BHF said it then it had to be right. I got really bad test results for all of those you mention above and then decided I had to research it myself to get better results.

serenity648 said:

However, the link to that quote states that the study was flawed:

"Alexander Ströhle, Maike Wolters and Andreas Hahn, with the Department of Food Science at the University of Hanover, rely on Bjerregaard et al. (2003)[10] to argue that hunters like the Inuit, who traditionally obtain most of their dietary energy from wild animals and therefore eat a low-carbohydrate diet, seem to have a high mortality from coronary heart disease, but the study did not control for carbohydrate consumption or smoking, which is significant, considering it was a "westernized" Inuit population of which 79% were current smokers and more than likely ate a non-traditional diet.[11] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-carbohydrate_diet#Resistant_Starch

so it wasnt studying an actually traditional inuit diet-eating population.

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I can't find the link in that quote?
That does tend to agree that a diet high in non saturated fats is beneficial then.
And the standard traditional inuit diet was allegedly 15 to 20% carbs.

zand said:

I did as I was told by my GP, thinking that if the NHS and BHF said it then it had to be right. I got really bad test results for all of those you mention above and then decided I had to research it myself to get better results.

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I don't believe the GP and BHF prescribed a low carb, high non saturated fat diet?
Imagine what your figures would be like if they had.
Made a difference for me.

serenity648 said:

However, the link to that quote states that the study was flawed:

"Alexander Ströhle, Maike Wolters and Andreas Hahn, with the Department of Food Science at the University of Hanover, rely on Bjerregaard et al. (2003)[10] to argue that hunters like the Inuit, who traditionally obtain most of their dietary energy from wild animals and therefore eat a low-carbohydrate diet, seem to have a high mortality from coronary heart disease, but the study did not control for carbohydrate consumption or smoking, which is significant, considering it was a "westernized" Inuit population of which 79% were current smokers and more than likely ate a non-traditional diet.[11] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-carbohydrate_diet#Resistant_Starch

so it wasnt studying an actually traditional inuit diet-eating population.

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Forgive me quoting you twice, it was a very interesting link.
The resistant starch was something I knew about, but this is new to me.

'Working together with the Oxford University team, they found that the energy stored in the heart was reduced by an average of 16% among those who followed a high-fat, low-carbohydrate diet[12] '

I haven't found the original study, 2005 apparently, but I shall be looking.

SunnyExpat said:

I don't believe the GP and BHF prescribed a low carb, high non saturated fat diet?
Imagine what your figures would be like if they had.
Made a difference for me.

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lol no they didn't! Pretty much the same as my own results I would think but I reckon that diet would have been unsustainable for me personally as I don't like very many unsaturated fats.

zand said:

lol no they didn't! Pretty much the same as my own results I would think but I reckon that diet would have been unsustainable for me personally as I don't like very many unsaturated fats.

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That's the way it goes. I used to like pies, and hated veg.
It's funny how things have to change.

I eat saturated fats and lots of them. I would rather eat natural fats than the vegetable oils etc than have been pushed on us as healthy since they tend to be less stable to heat so not great for cooking and have too much omega 6 compared to the healthier omega 3's (or so my research tells me) . Personally I now use coconut oil (pure virgin coconut oil) which is a medium chain saturated fat and seems to have many health benefits.
i have been eating butter, cream with berries daily and cooking with coconut oil and eating streaky bacon etc as well as avocados ,olives etc (and if you are scared of animal fats then adding avocado and nuts and olives is a good start in increasing healthy fats).
I avoid things like rapeseed oil (too many chemicals needed to preocess this into edible form since it's basically a poison). My cholesterol levels have improved, Trigs down and HDL up while LDL is down. Total is about the same but in much healthier proportions. Eating low carb has helped of course but if you eat low carb you need to increase your fats to avoid feeling hungry and the main thing is they do not have a detrimental effect - not on me or on most people I have come across who eat similarly (of course there may well be exceptions).
All the recent research appears to support the view that saturated fat is not detrimental to health so whether you eat it or not is up to the individual to decide but the old view of it being unhealthy seems to have been discredited. Much of the information on the BHF and other medical sites appear to be not up to date with current medical research (maybe because many are sponsored by manufacturers of cereal, bread or margerines so difficult for them to change their tune).
Going back in time before Ancel Keys and his now discredited 7 nations study (even he backtracked but he wasn't allowed to publish his review of his own ideas) diets for diabetics were low carb and high in fats like butter and full fat milk. The NHS diets seem designed to keep the drug manufacturers in business.
Happy Eating!
Edited to add that since adding all these saturated fats to my diet not only has lipid profile (cholesterol) improved but I have effortlessly lost over a stone in weight and my HBA1c is now 35.
Edited to add that I try not to think in terms of saturated or unsaturated but as healthy fats so the list to eat includes both but excludes any transfats (in processed food and some margerines etc (those hydrogenated vegetable oils - avoid like the plague) and unnatural products like the vegetable oils that are chemically processed (so no sunflower or rapeseed etc). So oily fish, avocados, nuts, seeds, full fat dairy (as low fat anything always has sugar added to make it palatable) olive oil, nut oils, with butter or coconut oil for cooking. These are all healthy unprocessed or minimally processed fats.
The BHF says there is not enough evidence to change their guidelines (although it admits there may be cause to but not ready to actually say it - hmmm see their sponsor list)....but there are many people on here and on dietdoctor.com who can testify to the benefits. It depends whether you need possibly flawed scientific evidence to make your decision or are prepared to trust the actual experiences of actual people.

My body just could not tolerate fat or meat. It couldn't digest it...and causes humongous problems with my bowel.
Yet avocado and olive oils etc it coped with far better.
Now it can't digest anything unless its blended. The avocados are alot tastier in smoothies that trying to blend pork crackling!!
I used to love pork crackling!! Only occasionally but belly rashers were my favourite Sunday dinner with veg.
However, when people ask for facts ref saturated fats or poly/mono etc the only fact that really needs to be established is how your individual body reacts.
It doesn't really matter what happens to everybody else unless you're in a research programme.

I do think there should be wider research programmes. I have to keep a detailed diary each day of my foods and nutrition and bowel habits/sickness/nausea etc not just carbs but also fibre and protein...
I think there would be enough people in this world that could give good diaries and details for 9 weeks for researchers to be able to establish what is best.

Its okay the NHS advocating their eatwell plate but where have they got their facts from really??

Just googled nutritional research studies in UK.
Got hubbies agreement to sign up for them as he's healthy.
There's more studies going on than I expected.

Not one says "researching the eatwell plate" though!!

Evidence was asked for earlier in the thread. One trial is not the body of evidence which is what has to be evaluated by those organisations giving official dietary advice .
Wiki has a good summary of systematic reviews up to 2014 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturated_fat_and_cardiovascular_disease_controversy
There are more recent ones including an update of the Cochrane review
http://www.cochrane.org/CD011737/VA...rated-fat-we-eat-on-our-risk-of-heart-disease
and a review from Dec 2015 that includes the predimed (recent med diet trial) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26561617 (and no doubt I will have missed something and there are also many many more with reference to the various fats and other diseases)
There was a very recent review paper from Dariush Mozaffarian on dietary patterns and CVD, diabetes and obesity which includes a discussion on the various fats in the diet http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/133/2/187.full

Lots of not so light bedtime reading

Inuits aren't really relevant to us since their lifestyle is entirely different Their diet was also very high in omega3 an essential but non saturated fat; no saturated fats are classified as essential though we do need some fat in the diet and in any case very often foods contain a mixture of different types of fat . Many Inuits also have a least one specific genetic mutation that makes their fat metabolism differ from most of us. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/22/s...to-omega-3-fatty-acids-health-story.html?_r=0 and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketosis (section on Inuits)
....and too much omega 3 can in fact cause blood to become too thin as one earlier British Researcher found in his N=1 seal meat eating study (not so good if when pruning roses, your wellingtons fill with blood)
http://savingoxfordmedicine.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/hugh-sinclair-collector.html