The perceived correlation between junk food marketing and unhealthy dietary practices of Irish children is currently under the spotlight of the Children’s Commercial Communications Code.
The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) is currently reviewing submissions of concern from the public and professional bodies, with a mandate to consider imposing advertising restrictions on the promotion of dietary products judged to be harmful to children’s health.
The prevailing perception is that foods high in fat, sugar and salt (HFSS) are the chief culprits, with their ubiquitous presence in popular dietary choices underlying the current national health crisis.
The Slane Study (2007) described our current obesity epidemic in terms of 23% of the population being obese and 39% overweight. These figures represent children and adults who are likely to be pre-diabetic, and on the road to a future of chronic ill health and likely disability.
The popular belief that HFSS foods harbour the potential for chronic ill health has been so widely promoted, that it has become a politically correct slogan for public health spokespersons.
The “ HEALTH STATEMENT”, a special report in the Irish Times ( Oct, 11, 2011), reflects the collective opinions of several spokespersons in the health industry, who repeatedly and consistently vilify “high fat” foods as the cause of our national health crisis and call for a low fat dietary intake.
Paula Mee promotes low fat milk with breakfast cereal, and Maureen Mulvihill, health promotion manager with the Irish Heart Foundation, wants children to be protected from the advertising of foods “high in fats, sugar and salt”.
Dietary excesses of sugar containing products are significant contributers to diabetes and obesity, while a recent study in Rotterdam shows that moderate intake of salt has a negative impact on health in respect of blood pressure or heart disease, and that salt depletion may be harmful in some cases.
Ms. Mulvihill states that the marketing of unhealthy food to Irish children ““undermines the national health eating guidelines and the food pyramid”
Her support for the Food Pyramid is lamentable. The Food Pyramid, a product of the USA Dept. of Agriculture, with its unhealthy promotion of excess carbohydrates, has left a legacy of chronic obesity and morbidity wherever it has been applied, and has finally, and rightfully, been relegated to antiquity.
The traditional food pyramid was a disaster and should no longer serve as a recommended guideline for daily dietary choices.
The Food Pyramid was replaced on 31 Jan, 2011 by revised dietary guidelines, which includes seafoods, whole grains, fruits and vegetables, without the previously weighted requirements for dietary carbohydrates.
The preference in the revised guidelines of drinking water to fizzy drinks is welcome, but does not go far enough to identify the widely consumed carbonated beverages that contain unhealthy levels of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) which represents a hidden risk for diabetes, obesity and several chronic disorders, and as yet overlooked as a major threat to human health.
ANTI-FAT DOGMA:
A major weakness of the revised guidelines is their adherence to the anti-fat dogma, which reflects policy statements of the American Heart Association and The Irish Heart Foundation, based on the false belief that saturated fats are a risk for heart disease because they “raise cholesterol levels”.
These perceptions are repeatedly vocalized in public health messages.
Saturated fats do raise total cholesterol levels, but that is because they raise the very important HDL levels, the so called “good cholesterol” which is heart healthy. But they also lower lipoprotein (a), the substance that increases the risk for heart disease.
The heart actually draws on the fat reserves containing stearic acid and palmitic acid in times of stress, and these are saturated fats.
Furthermore, saturated fats are essential for the maintenance of healthy cell membranes, for bone protection, for immune enhancement, and have important anti-bacterial properties which protect us from possible gut infections.
Some saturated fats have a lower caloric value (medium chain) and are an efficient source of energy for the immediate use by the organs and muscles, and are thus not stored as fat. Thus they do not cause weight gain !
Why would we want to eliminate these vitally important fats from our diets ?
Without these dietary fats children would not be able to absorb the vitally important vitamins A, D, K & E, all fat soluble vitamins, and essential to good health.
Maeve Cormody, a senior HSE dietician condemns the use of butter and cheese because they “are high in cholesterol” and “increase the risk of heart attack”.
This is an unwarranted fear and not supported by scientific studies.
Trevor White , in his OPINION ( Irish Times Oct, 10) falls into the same trap by implicating dietary saturated fats in the escalation of obesity and diabetes, and refers to the Danish introduction of a tax on foods high in saturated fats.
Such a taxation of foods, which are essential to good health, is a retrogressive step, and should be applied instead to harmful dietary fats such as trans fats, and interesterified fats, which are an insidious intrusion into the processed food industry, as a replacement for the unpopular trans-fats!
The scaremongering approach to fats has deprived our nation of healthy fats, and offered false hopes of health gains by promoting unhealthy alternatives to healthy butter, whole milk and cheese, since they are devoid of supportive nutrients, unless fortified.
The promotion of skim milk and low fat alternatives serve only to deprive consumers of essential nutrients such as palmitoleic acid, which protects against insulin resistance and diabetes, and conjugated linoleic acid, a vital cancer protective nutrient which can reduce the risk of bowel cancer by as much as 41%.
Full fat dairy products have been shown in a study to reduce weight by 30% and also to offer protection against heart disease.
While physical exercise is vital to good health, our reliance on activity programmes will count for naught if we ignore the role of diet and habitual daily nutrient intake.
Dr. Muireann Cullen of the Nutrition & Health Foundation suggests that “exercise offers our best hope of reversing rising obesity” and calls for expanded recreational facilities. ( Opinion, Aug 15).
This approach is not without merit, but ignores the core issues which underlie the explosive epidemic of global and national obesity
Low fat diets are not heart healthy foods, and invariably contain high levels of carbohydrates or polyunsaturated fats. Consider that your large tub of “low fat” yogurt actually contains 13 times more carbohydrate than fat, and that carbohydrates in excess stimulate insulin production and weight gain, and are a potential risk for diabetes
The anti-fat and anti-cholesterol campaign, promoted by the food industry, and insidiously supported by sections of the health industry, has opened the doors for the widespread consumption of carbohydrates, predominantly in the form of refined grains, and products high in fructose corn syrup, contributing factors for diabetes and obesity.
The conventional dietary advice which equates “heart healthy” with low fat products, is misguided and contrary to scientific evidence, and has consequently spawned a lucrative industry of “low fat” foods which are not only high in carbohydrates, but also high in vegetable oils and polyunsaturated fats, creating a dangerous imbalance between inflammatory omega 6 fats and healthy omega 3 fats.
This imbalance invariably leads to deprivation of the essential omega 3 (fish oils) which are essential to the health of children and adults alike.
The low fat campaign has failed the test of time.
The food and health industry should abolish their unscientific propaganda about dietary fats and salt restriction, and acknowledge the findings of critical science with respect to the health benefits of nutrient dense dietary fats.
Dr. Neville Wilson.
Family Physician & Sports Nutritionist.
The Leinster Clinic,
Kilcock Road.
Maynooth.
Phone:01-5052135.
There is I think more to this debate than you have covered. You are right of course the cholesterol debate has nearly run its course. I await the next debate about the uselessness of statins (in most cases). This of course has to start, and finish within the medical community.
First the milk itself. Our much maligned farmers have got too efficient. The fat content of the milk on our supermarket shelves is anything from 25% to 50 % higher than the milk out parents, or grandparents drank. All due to more effecient/intensive farming practices. More importantly as the fat content has gone up, the healthy fats,
-beneficial fatty acid content has gone down. Fats like conjugated linoleic acid (CLA9) are way lower in todays milk
The same applies with naturally occuring anti-oxidants.
If you believe milk is a healthy option, or if like most of us you use in in breakfast cereal, and tea and coffee. and you want a health benefit with your milk, then buy organic. Overall fat content 40% less than your supermarket milk, and a way higher content in beneficial fatty acids and anti-oxidants. And you live in the best country in the world for this because grass fed organic milk is by all accounts the most beneficial of all. (plenty of good science here)
The problem here is that you have’nt mentioned the calcium debate. The argument here is that excessive calcium intake is a major cause of atherosclerosis. The evidence in support of this theory, to my reading has gathered much support. This was kicked off a few years ago by a Dr Stephen Seely of the University of Manchester, who now argues for drastic reductions in milk consumption. There is considerable documentation/publication around this. People who support this theory, by and large propose a no dairy diet
There is a down side in modern society to nearly every mass produced food, and milk is no exception. The future debate around milk, butter et al, i think will not be the cholesterol debate.
Personally, milk for breakfast cereal, and tea only. Organic of course.
Thank you Brian.
You raise several issues which are important, and largely ignored (or misunderstood ) by the conventional spokespersons for the health industry.
I agree that the cholesterol debate will finally end with the acknowledgement (grudgingly !) that chasing cholesterol numbers has been an utter waste of time, energy and valuable resources, which should rather have put to better use elsewhere.
I have argued elsewhere that the “diet-heart-hypothesis” is untenable, and that the risks to health of unnecessarily lowering cholesterol numbers has not been fully appreciated in conventional medical practice.
As you suggest, there are fats, and there are fats, and conventional medical protocols repeatedly fail to acknowledge this fact, and continue to vilify saturated fats, ignoring the evidence that they are either atherogenically neutral, or negative, and do NOT contribute to heart disease via cholesterol raising.
Full fat milk (saturated fat) is healthier than the insipid “low fat” alternative, which does not confer cardiac benefits, and may in fact be strongly linked to prostate cancer in males, and ovarian cancer in females.
The health benefits, by contrast, of full fat milk, were shown in a study, by measuring the actual levels of 2 milk fats (pentadecanoic acid and heptadecanoic acid) in the blood of subjects who subsequently demonstrated reductions in their risk of heart attack.
As you indicate, the conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) content of milk is vital for health. Evidence suggests that CLA reduces tumour growth in animals, and in a Finnish study, CLA levels correlated with a 60% reduction in female breast cancer.
(For those readers who may not be familiar with CLA, it is a collective term which designates a group of fats (isomers) derived from linoleic acid, but with varying positions of double bonds, rendering it a mix of cis-fats and trans-fats. The trans- fats, unlike the commercially produced trans-fats, are natural and health promoting.)
CLA has been shown to reduce body fat mass (BFM) in animals, and researchers in a Norwegian study found similar benefits in human subjects.
CLA isomers have also been shown to inhibit carcinogens in animal models. (Progress in lipid Research, vol 40, issue 4, July 2001, p 283-298).
Certainly, the supermarkets have a hand in the final consumer supplied product, and promote a low fat product for economic purposes. Fat is removed in the creameries from the original 4% milk fat, and the residual milk blended according to the fat content required, which may be 0.1% fat (skimmed ), or 1% (very low fat), or the 1.5% to 1.8% (low fat) variety.
Milk fat will also vary between winter and summer, depending on animal feeds, and in Ireland the majority of farmers use fertilisers, and not organic manure. So, is the Irish product fully organic ? Obviously, organic products are more desirable for good health.
The CALCIUM debate is another story, and I need to address that more fully in a separate article.
You are correct in stating that calcium scoring is a valuable tool for estimating the risk for cardiovascular disease, but whether dietary calcium leads to blood calcium and than to plaque calcium is a subject for further discussion !
Cholesterol in the diet does NOT raise cholesterol in the blood (contrary to what many people are taught !) which does NOT in turn contribute to cholesterol in plaque.(myth!).
And calcium levels in the blood do not correlate with calcium stones in the kidney, so why should it cause calcium deposits in the artery ?
I shall return to this interesting topic elsewhere.
You have raised some interesting and important questions. Thank you !
The proposals in some quarters to reduce dietary dairy products, because of the calcium content, ignores the findings of critical science, that dairy products ( full fat milk, butter, cheese, eggs ) have many health supporting properties, since they contain important minerals and vitamins, such as vitamins A,D,E K2, Butyric acid and omega 3 fatty acids, and of course, CLA !
Neville.
It has been encouraging to note a reversal on “fat policy”, within the Health Industry over the past 2 years, with growing recognition, in many quarters, that previous dietary directives were not supported by science, or by the totality of critical evidence, over the past 30-40 years.
It is a slow, but welcome, turn about by opinion-makers in the food and health industry, who for too long have been misguided about “heart healthy” dietary choices, through their evangelical promotion of “low fat” and “low cholesterol” products.
The popular myth, promoted by influential spoke-persons in the health industry, that saturated fats are detrimental to heart health, and pose an increased risk for death or stroke, has never been based on credible science.
It is to be hoped now that the fearsome warnings of the past, regarding dietary saturated fats, will be replaced by an acknowledgement that the real culprits are an excess of refined carbohydrates and omega 6 rich poly-unsaturated fats, as well as the harmful ubiquitous trans fats present in processed supermarket products.
Dr Nev.