Saturated Fats May Actually Be Healthy For People, Study Claims

Saturated fat has always been known as the "bad fat" because of its effects on the heart's health. However, a new study claims that consuming saturated fat in the diet may be good for people. This challenged the long-belief that dietary fat is unhealthy for most people.

According to EurekAlert, a new Norwegian diet intervention study (FATFUNC), conducted by researchers at the KG Jebsen Center for Diabetes Research at the University of Bergen, raises questions about the validity of a diet hypothesis that has been around for more than half a century -- that dietary fat and particularly saturated fat is unhealthy for most people.

The researchers of the study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, found a number of striking similar health effects of diets based on either slowly processed carbohydrates or fats. In the randomized controlled trial, 38 men with abdominal obesity followed a dietary pattern that is high in either carbohydrates or fat, which is about half was saturated.

Fat mass in the abdominal region, liver and heart was measured with accurate analyses, along with a number of key risk factors for cardiovascular disease. "The very high intake of total and saturated fat did not increase the calculated risk of cardiovascular diseases," said Professor Ottar Nygard.

"Participants on the very-high-fat diet also had substantial improvements in several important cardiometabolic risk factors, such as ectopic fat storage, blood pressure, blood lipids (triglycerides), insulin and blood sugar," Prof. Nygard added.

In other reports, it was said that both groups had similar consumption of energy, proteins and polyunsaturated fatty acids. Food types were also the same and varied mainly in quantity, and intake of added sugar was minimized.

"We here looked at effects of total and saturated fat in the context of a healthy diet rich in fresh, slowly processed and nutritious foods, including high amounts of vegetables and rice instead of flour-based products," said Ph.D. candidate Vivian Veum.

"The fat sources were also slowly processed, mainly butter, cream and cold-pressed oils," said Veum. The researchers also found that the total energy intake was within the normal range. Even the participants with increased energy intake during the study showed considerable reductions in fat stores and disease risk, Indian Express reported.

Meanwhile, Ph.D. candidate Johnny Laupsa-Borge explained that their findings showed that the overriding principle of a healthy diet is not the amount of fat or carbohydrates consumed but the quality of foods people eat.

The "good" cholesterol increased only on the very-high-fat diet. "These results indicate that most healthy people probably tolerate a high intake of saturated fat well, as long as the fat quality is good and total energy intake is not too high. It may even be healthy," said Prof. Nygard.

"Future studies should examine which people or patients may need to limit their intake of saturated fat," said Assistant Professor Simon Nitter Dankel, who co-led the study.