The 1950s is when the era of "fat demonization" officially began. An American scientist named Dr. Ancel Keys published a paper that linked high saturated fat consumption to heart disease in men. Big Food celebrated with joy, as more Americans would lose faith in a diet that was keeping them healthy and assume that processed foods were less damaging. The problem was that Keys' findings were flawed and cherry-picked, yet corporate "junk science" food manufacturers still refer to them as the holy grail of research, since it supports their insidious profit-making schemes. Even eggs and coconut oil have been thrown under the bus as causing heart disease and weight gain, and now real science is proving the polar opposite.
Science is now proving that only small LDL particles, not large LDL particles, are associated with heart disease. Saturated fats increase the large LDL. Top that off with the fact that saturated fat increases high-density HDL (lipoprotein) cholesterol levels – that's the good kind! Bottom line? Saturated fat intake benefits cardiovascular health and can contribute to weight loss. Could this be the major reason that every other American is overweight and every third American is obese? Follow bad advice from Big Food and bad science and look where it gets you.
The only time saturated fat is your enemy is when combined with lots of carbohydrates and refined sugars. That's why paleo and ketogenic diets work – and real dietitians know this.
Plus, coconut oil can contribute to weight loss and brain health. In fact, a Brazilian study published in 2009 in the journal Lipids found that women who ate just 30 milliliters of coconut oil daily (raw or as a supplement) lost weight, including reducing abdominal fat. It's the concentrations of medium-chained triglycerides that serve as a form of saturated fat that's easy for our bodies to metabolize quickly. Bye-bye saturated fat myth!
Go ask a thousand Americans if saturated fat is bad for you and guess what answer you'll get from 990 of them? Americans have been brainwashed, incorrectly educated, misled and snookered into bad health through horrible advice that the mainstream media propagates. It's just like the food pyramid taught in every school since 1974.
It's time to realize that the world's not flat, the sun is a star, and saturated fat from real food is good for you, especially when combined with regular daily exercise. Still, the majority of "peer reviewed" science papers will claim otherwise, and that's mostly because they're skewed and funded by the Big Food companies that make processed, "ready-made" and nutrient-void foodstuffs.
Let's conclude with some great reasons you should not fear saturated fats. Saturated fats play key roles in immune health, helping white blood cells recognize and destroy pathogens, bacteria, viruses and fungi. A mother's breast milk is rich in these essential fats and acids. Saturated fats help protect the liver from the toxic damage caused by alcohol and prescription medications.
The main reason the mass media perpetuates the "saturated fats are bad" myth is to sell everybody more toxic, processed and GMO vegetable oils for cooking. From canola to soybean oil and on down to corn oil, pesticides and industrial toxins flood the market of vegetable oils, raising the risk of heart disease through the consumption of free radicals. Stick to raw, organic olive oil, coconut oil and sea salt (that's chock full of minerals) and never look back. A healthy heart and healthy brain are yours to enjoy. Don't let Big Food and Big Pharma run your health into the ground, literally.
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