The lipid hypothesis is a theory that directly relates saturated dietary fat with heart disease mortality. Saturated fats are coconut, butter, lard, tallow and palm oil. Nature’s nutrients lampooned as the culprit of modern day illness. The idea was that of Ancel Keys, a brilliant student of fish research, oceanography and eventually physiology. His initial studies in biochemistry, the foundation of sound nutritional science were aborted. He is known for his contribution to soldiers’ 3,200 calorie K-ration packs for war time efforts. His wonder lust and constant focus change in studies is well known. A brilliant mind filled with diverse interests and broad fortes. This is the man, propped up to launch modern medicine into a belief vortex that nailed nature’s stable, wholesome fats as causation for disease. The only problem is, none of it is true, or very little of it.
Cell Biology:
Every one of your twenty trillion cells in your body is surrounded by a membrane, or a wall. The cell wall is meant to keep the inside of the cell securely housed and semi-permeable to nutrients coming in and out. This is a highly controlled function and a foundation to a healthy body. The cell membrane is made from the fats you eat and it functions optimally when it is 50-60% saturated fat and cholesterol. The cell membrane loses saturated fat concentration when the diet has too much unsaturated fats like olive oil, canola, safflower, sunflower and soybean oil. Then the cells are forced to build their membranes from these very fluid, active, long-chain fats. This is directly linked to membranes that are overly permeable and less control over nutrients going inside and out of the cell. The end result is inefficient metabolism, increased inflammation and oxidation of fats causing rise of free radicals. Free radicals lead to the death and mutations of cells. Fundamentally, a low saturated fat diet and a highly concentrated diet in liquid oils can only contribute to disease.
10 Reasons Why we need to Eat Saturated Fats, Butter, Lard, Coconut, Palm and Tallow:
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- Enhances immunity
- Calcium assimilates best with saturated fat (Enig, 2009)
- Short and medium chain fats of coconut and butter are a quality source of clean energy
- All saturated fats are naturally stable without any artificial hydrogenation and chemical bonding
High heat cooking is tolerated by saturated fats
- Stearic acid, the 18chain saturated fat implicated in disease is reduced to an unsaturated fat within the first enzymatic step
- The heart uses 16carbon and 18carbon fats from saturates as the preferred fuel
- Vitamins A,D,E,K need saturated fats for assimilation
- Saturated fats are anti-microbial and keep the gut lining healthy
- Using saturated fats eliminates the need to use artificially made hydrogenated trans fat
“…As the science has advanced, we now know more and more that the way we used to simply group all fats into one category (saturated, monounsaturated,polyunsaturated), and equate them isn’t the way the biology works.” (Dale Bauman, Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor, Cornell University, Ithaca New York). Inform. Vol. 17(5), pg. 277