Siguel, Edward. Material presented in part at the AOCS95 meeting.
More than 25% of adult Americans have biochemical evidence of Essential Fatty Acid (EFA) Insufficiency. People eating low calorie (< 1,500), low fat diets do not meet their body's needs for EFAs (about 15-40 grams/day/adult). We need to design EFA-rich foods to supplement EFA deficient diets or correct EFA abnormalities. Surveys indicate that fat is the # 1 food concern among consumers.
Current nutritional recommendations and advertisements have shifted consumers' food buying preferences towards very low fat foods deprived of EFAs. People are told to replace calories from fat with calories from carbohydrates. However, these consumers are not eating fewer total calories, as shown by an increase in the number of overweight people. Excess calories from carbohydrates are converted to saturated (SFA) and monounsaturated (MUFA) fatty acids.
Under current trends, individuals might slowly deplete their stores of EFAs and replace them with SFAs and MUFAs. The result would be reduced tissue levels of PUFAs relative to other fatty acids. Recent research has shown that a diet low in EFAs is probably the most significant factor in cardiovascular disease, and low levels of PUFAs are associated with elevated TC/HDLC and heart disease.
Besides the increased risk for heart disease caused by a diet low in EFAs, low EFA diets increase the risk of a wide range of health problems, including decreased mental function, increased kidney disease and diabetes, high blood pressure, etc. After a period of several years on low fat diets, we anticipate a decrease in the population's plasma and adipose tissue levels of PUFAs, which must be corrected.
Elderly individuals and those who exercise little and therefore must follow low calorie diets cannot obtain enough EFAs to meet cell needs using naturally occurring foods. These individuals must eat EFA-rich food supplements for the rest of their lives. Adults with significant EFA deficiencies must eat EFA supplements until their deficiencies are corrected. Growing children and pregnant women, who need to form a huge number of cell membranes, must eat EFA supplements to compensate for diets rich in SFAs and carbohydrates. EFA-rich supplements must also be designed for individuals with gastrointestinal disease, and those who cannot convert EFAs to EFA derivatives, either due to old age, disease, metabolic or genetic variability, or unknown disease.
Fat is the # 1 food concern among consumers. The federal government stated that the type of fat we eat is one of the most significant factors in health and disease. Consumers are urged to eat foods low in or devoid of fats. Food and nutrition journals, news and consumer magazines, newsletters, TV and radio programs, and most health practitioners urge people to eat foods low in fat. The federal government has issued guidelines indicating that foods high in fat are hazardous to people's health. The National Institute of Health (NIH), the USDA, the FDA, and the American Heart Association (AHA) are among several of the public health groups urging people to eat foods low in fat.
People must select their foods in light of this barrage of recommendations to avoid dietary fat. Unfortunately, neither the federal government, food labels, nor public health organizations warn consumers that eating diets deprived of essential fatty acids may cause disease.
The result is that consumers often eat a diet deficient in EFAs. See Siguel's research for letters published in the Am. J. of Clinical Nutrition.
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© 1998 Edward Siguel. All rights reserved |
modified 9/14/98 |