Foods to lower cholesterol

Eating foods to lower cholesterol were the commandment of healthy eating for the past decades. Touted as a way to lose weight and prevent heart disease millions of people followed this advice (or rather, tried to follow). Seeing the tremendous marketing opportunities food companies have modified thousands of products to reduce their content of fat or total degreasing. Such a diet low in fat in the diet may have a value to a random person, but across the nation that did not help control weight and become healthier. In the 1960s, fats and oils supplied about 45 percent calories of Americans, about 13 percent were obese and less than 1 percent has second type diabetes. Today, Americans eat less fat, gaining about 33 percent of calories from fats and oils, but 34 percent are obese, and 8 percent have diabetes, the majority with second type diabetes.

Benefits of foods to lower cholesterol

Why is the exclusion of fats from the diet has not brought the expected results? A detailed study, much of which was done at Harvard, shows that the total amount of fat in the diet is not really associated with weight or disease. What really matters is the type of fat in the diet. Bad fats are trans fats and saturated fats increase the risk of certain diseases. Under the good fats imply monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, which do just the opposite. They are good for the heart and most other parts of the body.

What about the cholesterol in food? For most people a mixture of fats in the diet affects blood cholesterol levels far more than does the cholesterol in food.