Loren wrote:

>I agree to disagree with Mary and Sally on the role of dietary
>saturated fat and coronary heart disease.

>The type of foods (milk, cheese, butter, cream, salt, fatty meats, whole
>grains etc) which Mary and Sally recommend as healthful are all foods
>which are recent additions to the human dietary experience and which
>were only incorporated as staple foods in the past 10,000 years as
>humans made the transition from hunter-gather to farmer.

Mary and Sally wrote:

>If the consumption of saturated fat within the context of the "average
American >diet" is "deadly", why was heart desease so rare among Americans at
the turn of >the century, who consumed large amonts of saturated fat from
dairy products, >lard, tallows and coconut oil?

I feel this is a good question.  During a recent lecture, Robert Atkins, MD
also cited this evidence.  He mentioned that all the great anatomists of the
19th Century rarely reported on seeing any atheroscerlosis in the many
autopsies performed.  Atkins says that it was not until around 1912 that
atheroscerlotic plaques began to be observed upon autopsy.  This was approx.
20-30 years after "altered foodstuffs" (flour, cereals, refined sugars, trans
fats, etc.) began to be common components of the American diet (this
coorelates to Cleave's "Law of 20's").

Also, the 10/21/97 issue of Circulation contained an article called: "Fasting
Triglycerides (TG) and HDL and Risk for Myocardial Infarction".  This Harvard
study concluded that the ratio of TG:HDL was the most significant risk factor
in developing CHD.  The TG:HDL ratio was a better predictor than total
cholesterol (TC), better than TC:HDL ratio, and better than LDL:HDL ratio.

Reducing carbohydrates, particularly refined ones and other "altered
foodstuffs", is the best way to reduce TG levels.  Maybe this is one
explaination for why 19th Century Americans and primitive cultures that
consumed some dairy products and  whole grains were remarkably clear of
atherscelosis and CHD.

Comments?

Ed Campbell, DC, CSCS