From Nutra Ingredients:The science has spoken. Low-fat diets don’t work: Forget the carrots and broccoli sprouts, I can now have my cake and eat it, and put extra cream on top.
Ask the average person in the street if a low-fat diet is good for them they would instinctively say ‘yes'. Ask them why and they'll almost certainly tell you it's better for your heart, and protects against other diseases they may not even be able to name.
But now, if you believe the headlines, there's no benefit in low-fat. If it didn't reduce the risk of certain cancers and heart disease for 25,000 women in a medical trial, what are the chances of it helping others?
Published in the hugely respected Journal of the American Medical Association, the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) Dietary Modification Trial involved 48,835 post-menopausal women, eight years of follow-up and cost a staggering $415 million dollars of taxpayers' money.
Scientists from such esteemed institutions as Harvard Medical School, UCLA, Ohio State, Brown and Northwestern Universities carried out the research.
The end results created headlines that declared a low-fat, fruit-‘n'-veg-rich diet does not change your risk of colorectal or breast cancer of cardiovascular disease (CVD).
The trial set out to compare women eating a normal diet with women eating a diet low in fat and high in fruit, vegetables and whole grains.
Nice idea, so what went wrong?
The design of the study was flawed from the start, which is undoubtedly why there was opposition when the study was first proposed. Leading nutritional and medical researchers said it wasn't worth doing, while the National Institute of Health initially rejected calls for funding.
Strategic lobbying and then a run through congress eventually got the necessary approval and the WHI was off.
The diet aimed to cut down fat intake for the intervention group to less than 20 per cent, eat five servings of fruit and veg, and six portions of grains per day. The studies claim they succeeded in reducing fat intake by 8.2 g, but by year six the average fat intake was still 29 per cent. The normal diet group was eating 35 per cent fat.
The intake of vegetables and fruit did go up as well, but only by about one serving per day.
The researchers themselves admit that very few of the women in the intervention group actually met the targets.
Excuse me for being so bold, but does this not mean that $415 million were spent on an intervention study that didn't really intervene?
Does this not immediately put a massive question mark on any claims?
Apparently, no – at least if you believe the headlines. Many national and local newspapers have picked up on these reports and run with stories taking the conclusions to the consumer.
Right on! I think the news media jumped on the band wagon without even reading the study. This study is going to push us a few decades in the wrong direction, for sure.
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