Scientists Begin to Question Benefit of 'Good' Cholesterol

NY Times ^ | March 15, 2004 | Gina Kolata

[codyjacksmom]

BUMP to read later

[Uncle Hal]

If you wait long enough what is good for you will eventually be bad for you and vice versa.

[shield]

Want to kill yourself trying to AVOID HEART DISEASE?

Then just obey the Food Police and eat a VERY LOW-FAT DIET.

I've been cautioning my readers about this for years and now I'm even hearing agreement from the Chairman of the Nutrition Committee of the American Heart Association. Even he now admits that a very low-fat diet can be harmful to many people! So unless you've actually been tested and found to have a very specific condition called "pattern B LDL," be careful to get enough animal fat in your diet.

At this point patients often ask me,"But how can I keep my cholesterol down?" Well, maybe you should be more concerned about getting it higher. Because...

LOW CHOLESTEROL can be much deadlier than high cholesterol

Here too, even the American Heart Association is now admitting... LOW CHOLESTEROL CAN TRIGGER THE DEADLIEST KIND OF STROKE. It's called a "massive stroke," and it happens when blood vessels in your brain are so weak, they burst open. EVEN MODERATELY LOW CHOLESTEROL LEVELS can raise your risk of these strokes. By this, I mean under 200. Yet many doctors routinely prescribe cholesterol-lowering drugs if it's over 200!

No wonder the British Medical Journal recently announced:

"CHOLESTEROL SCREENING IS NOT WORTHWHILE!"

When they actually looked at the figures, guess what? Folks with lower cholesterol were just about as likely to develop heart disease as those with higher levels. It simply doesn't matter. So what's the real cause of heart disease? Well, for one thing:

Too little RED MEAT in your diet

See how pleasant real health can be? Your friends might say "YOU'RE NUTS," but the actual biochemistry behind my EAT LIKE A HUMAN diet is now endorsed by just about every serious heart researcher.

You see, of all the different substances they can measure in your blood, the deadliest risk factor for heart disease is not cholesterol, but a chemical called HOMOCYSTEINE. Because...

Cholesterol doesn't do diddly unless it "catches" on a ridge or a pit in your artery walls. And the secret cause of these "cholesterol traps" is homocysteine. Too much homocysteine and your arteries corrode like a rusty pipe.

But it's so easy to cut down your homocysteine levels! Three vitamins do the trick quickly, including vitamins B6 and B12. And by far the richest source of these vitamins is... You got it. Red meat. Per Dr. Douglass

[GalaxieFiveHundred]

So, good is bad and bad is bad? Say it ain' so...

[Smartass]

"And they don't even get into homocystene."

Or into Sugar. The issue is not being properly addressed. One of the biggest culprits to heart disease and obesity is sugar. It appears the medical community has remove sugar from their vocabulary. Just read the label. The food processing industry jams packaged foods with tons of sugar. The average person consumes 180 pounds of sugar a year. The low carb craze is about the cause and effect of carbohydrates turning into sugar. An obese America can look forward to millions and millions of new cases of diabetes, along with high health care costs.

[Ditter]

I'll have you know that "pure gobs of animal fat" have made me the oustanding person I am today. Thank you very much! ;9)

[mhking]

Just damn.

If you want on the list, FReepmail me. This IS a high-volume PING list...

[aruanan]

For years, doctors have been saying that to prevent heart disease, patients should pay attention to both the so-called bad cholesterol, or L.D.L., and the good cholesterol, or H.D.L. The good, they said, can counteract the bad.

First of all, there is no good or bad cholesterol. There is just cholesterol. There are, though, a variety of different lipoproteins which provide the name for and the description of various particles that contain cholesterol. These different particles represent different phases or parts of the system for maintaining cholesterol homeostasis. Relative differences in proportions between these lipoproteins (and in conjunction with various types of fat) have been associated with different disease states. The association is strong enough and the mechanisms are well-understood enough that generally one should aim to lower one's LDL (through diet and exercise first) and seek to elevate one's HDL (through diet and exercise). There could, though, be pathogenic reasons for low LDL or a high HDL levels: you could have a home incapable of being blown down by a tornado because it's already been burned down by lightning. In this case, its degree of imperviousness to wind damage is nothing to be happy about.

[Iron Matron]

Oh! I am just SO suprised! :O

Wonder what this is leading up to?

What food or activity will they "ban" now?

[international american]

Krispy Grease!!

[gura]

It looks like you're referring to leptin, which is something else entirely from the macronutrient protein, and doesn't work in humans the way it does in rats.

A good primer on leptin is:

http://www.avantlabs.com/magmain.php?issueID=3&pageID=51

http://www.avantlabs.com/magmain.php?issueID=4&pageID=58

[arielb]

Remember, if you want to look young and healthy like this guy:

then i have the perfect diet for you!

[q_an_a]

yes my comment was about leptin. it is possible that the research done here is producing a result which is different from the study you point to in your post.

i'm not a doctor and don't play one on TV either,so I'll just say that more tomatoes and more chicken, turkey and beef may give me something to lower many of the artificial killers of old people. time will tell. Thanks for your comment.

[Springman]

Bump for later, got to heat up some turkey burger.

[gura]

I'm not a doctor, just an advocate of the "mom" diet, the diet my mom used to feed me. Every meal had a protein source, 1-3 types of veggies, and maybe some bread. Want a snack? Step away from the cookies and eat some fruit. Eat things that come in boxes or cartons rarely and in moderation.

[fortunecookie]

Thank you. Saving this. My sister and I have this discussion all the time. She eats a lot of super refined carbs, no meat and almost no fat (her doctor ordered her to eat more). And while my eating habits were bad a decade or so ago, I'm doing much better, but I add the some 'healthy' fats and nuts and meat. My b-i-l has the high cholestrol and their kids are more anemic than I am (dr also told her "feed them meat!", she does now) and I think this is definitely contributing to the dilemma. We jokingly refer to her as 'the food police' or the 'food nazi'.

[scholar]

So much to worry about...

Who told us that we could live forever? I love the line that goes "Eat healthy, stay fit--die anyway!

[Calamari]

Yes! The trick is deciding what to ignore and what really needs to be "worried" about. Better to resolve real issues important to you that you have control over and not spend time worrying about that which is unlikely to affect you and over which you have no real control.

The "Other Things to Worry About List" was started on Feb. 23, 2004 and is from articles posted on FR. It is growing like a well watered weed. Most of it is junk science or agendized enviromental propaganda such as "global warming may cause the next ice age".

With a little effort, a fax machine and a catchy name; I might be able get some one to write an article declaring that beer is a new food group and counter acts the free radicals in you body more effectively than colloidal silver.