A new study suggests consuming healthy fats not only extends life but could prevent millions of deaths and heart diseases cases annually. Reducing saturated fat from one’s diet has been on the forefront of improving health as of late, but researchers suggest not only is it important to reduce unhealthy fat from your diet but also increase good fat as well.
Senior study author, Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, said, “Our findings highlight the importance of ending America’s fear of all fat. We estimate that nearly 50,000 Americans die of heart disease each year due to low intake of vegetable oils.”
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To achieve their results the research team analyzed data from 186 countries where they looked at research from previous studies which examined people over long periods of time and looked at their diets and rates of heart disease.
Based on the collected data the researchers estimated that 700,000 deaths worldwide and annually are associated with heart disease linked with consuming too little of good fats and too much of bad fats.
Consuming too much saturated fat was associated with four percent of heart disease deaths and eight percent of heart disease deaths were associated with high consumption of trans fat.
Canada and the U.S. still remained in the top four nations for heart disease even though consumption of saturated and trans fat is on the decline. Russia, Germany and Egypt consumed the leased amount of healthy fat and the Philippines, Malaysia and other tropical countries consumed high levels of saturated fat.
The take home message here is it’s not only good enough to reduce unhealthy fats but we must supplement by increasing our intake of healthy fat in order to prevent heart disease.
The findings were published in Journal of the American Heart Association.
Mohan Garikiparithi got his degree in medicine from Osmania University (University of Health Sciences). He practiced clinical medicine for over a decade before he shifted his focus to the field of health communications. During his active practice he served as the head of the Dept. of Microbiology in a diagnostic centre in India. On a three-year communications program in Germany, Mohan developed a keen interest in German Medicine (Homoeopathy), and other alternative systems of medicine. He now advocates treating different medical conditions without the use of traditional drugs. An ardent squash player, Mohan believes in the importance of fitness and wellness.
