Three healthy fats – raw organic extra virgin coconut oil, all-natural bacon and grass-fed pasture raised organic butter.
The tide of public health policy concerning guidelines for a healthy diet have finally started to shift towards advice based on facts and scientific studies. Sweden has become the first country to officially reject recommendations to eat a diet low in fats and particularly low in saturated fats. Sweden is now advising a diet low in carbohydrates, especially highly refined carbohydrates and sugars, and much higher in fats, with no special restrictions on saturated fats.
Sweden’s government is basing this switch in dietary policy squarely upon scientific evidence, much of which was produced in the US. After reviewing 16,000 studies over two years, an independent group of doctors and scientists decided that evidence directly implicated carbohydrates, and specifically sugars and highly refined carbohydrates such as white flour and white rice, as the culprits and underlying cause of metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular disease and diabetes. The review group found no evidence of any connection between a diet high in overall and/or saturated fats and any of the chronic diseases.
Eat complex, whole food carbohydrates like fresh greens, mushrooms and vegetables instead of manufactured, highly processed carbohydrates like white flour, white rice or sugar.
The findings actually showed that a higher fat/lower carbohydrate diet resulted in much better regulation of blood sugar and insulin levels, resulting in greatly reduced occurrence of metabolic syndrome and diabetes. A higher fat/lower carbohydrate diet also lowered overall systemic inflammation and triglycerides, leading to lessened cardiovascular disease rates. More calories from saturated fats directly correlated to lowered rates of inflammation and cardiovascular disease.
The US will almost certainly not follow Sweden’s lead in this matter. Industrial food and big pharma write most government policy and regulations concerning themselves and have too much invested in the status quo to allow a major change in dietary advice. If everyone followed the Swedish government’s recommendations on what to eat, it would go a long way towards eliminating obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Fast food restaurants and processed food manufacturers would lose billions of dollars to fresh produce and meat sales. Big pharma would lose billions of dollars on prescription and generic drug sales for the treatment of preventable diseases.
High quality sources of protein such as pasture raised eggs, wild caught fish and all-natural pork also supply healthy fats and fat-soluble vitamins.
It will be very interesting to follow this story and see which other countries value the lives, and quality of life, of their citizens more than the profits of private corporations. The US will be one of the last to acknowledge dietary reality and will do so only when faced with absolute outrage by both doctors and ordinary citizens, and certainly only after the food and drug industries have been able to put a “plan B” in place to profit from the change.
Resources:
http://thinkeatbehealthy.com/2013/08/16/the-importance-of-fats-in-our-diet/
http://healthimpactnews.com/2013/why-low-fat-diets-make-you-fat/