VERY LOW FAT DIETS HARMFUL?
Report #7274
What are you supposed to think when you believe that respected researchers interpret their own data incorrectly?
An article in the most prestigious medical journal in the world, The Journal of the American Medical Association concludes that a moderately restricted low-fat diet lowers cholesterol, while a more severely restricted low-fat diet is harmful because it lowers the good HDL cholesterol that prevents heart attacks and raises blood triglyceride levels very high.
A LOW-FAT DIET LOWERS CHOLESTEROL EFFECTIVELY ONLY WHEN IT GETS YOU TO TAKE IN FEWER CALORIES. I led my medical school class in cholesterol. When I first went on a low-fat diet, I restricted meat, chicken, diary products, oils and fats and I loaded up on spaghetti, macaroni, breads, bagels, crackers and white rice. My triglycerides shot up toward the sky and my good HDL cholesterol dropped through the floor. The only way that you can go on a low-fat diet and reduce your intake of calories is to avoid flour. Bakery products do not make you feel full. Can you eat only a small cup of pasta, or one bagel, or one slice of bread? I couldn't and the odds are that you can't either. Restricting calories on a low-fat diet requires eating lots of whole grains and avoiding food products made from flour.
However, if you avoid foods made from flour and add a cup of whole grains to every meal, it fills you up so you eat less. Whole grains draw up to 5 times their weight in water, swell up and distend your intestines to suppress appetite. So you eat less. The authors should have told their patients to severely restrict meat, chicken, whole milk diary products, fats, oils and all bakery products and load up on fruits, vegetables, whole grains and beans. All my readers have known this for years.
By Gabe Mirkin, M.D., for CBS Radio News