The LCHF/banting trend that’s taken hold makes some people nervous – after all, so much fat just can’t be good for you, right? But where did we get the idea that fat was bad for people in the first place, and is it true? Let’s take a look.
It started decades ago when a Dr Key examined heart risk based on how people live and what they ate. He found that in the countries where people ate more saturated fat there were more cases of heart disease, and he concluded that the fat was the cause. But the study didn’t take sugar or starch into consideration.
Moving on to present-day research: sure, less saturated fat in your diet lowers cholesterol, but it mostly lowers fluffy, light cholesterol that does no harm. On the other hand, when people drop fat, they tend to eat more sugar or starch, and this actually increases their levels of small, dense cholesterol that causes heart attacks.