Toxic Trans Fats
Improve Your Diet for Heart Disease, Diabetes, and Cancer
Trans fats are disguised in foods all around us. Learn why they are a cause of devastating and deadly chronic illnesses, and how you can avoid them.
You hear the words everyday - polyunsaturated fats, trans-fatty acids, saturated and unsaturated fats, mixed up with the words "avoid", and "okay". But what does it all mean, and which parts do you really need to understand? Well, in a word (or two), trans fats.
Trans Fats
The big monster in the mix is the trans fats, also called trans-fatty acids, or TFA’s. Trans fats are the byproducts of the hydrogenation process. Since the trans fats resulting from hydrogenation are an unnatural substance to the human body, the body is extremely inefficient at processing them. They accumulate far more rapidly than what the what the body can process, and steadily begin clogging up major arteries and organs. Except for the scrupulous, label-reading shopper, the many Americans who dine out, or consume packaged and canned food from their local grocery store, are unknowingly subjected to the debilitating, toxic effects of trans fats.
Hydrogenation
Hydrogenation is a chemical process commonly used with oils to increase their shelf life and/or improve the textures of food. It converts unsaturated fats into an unnatural version of saturated fats. Hydrogenated and partially-hydrogenated fats and oils are very popular with the commercial food industry because they give food products a much longer shelf life. They can also provide a specific desired texture in a product, such as crispness.
Fast Food, Prepackaged, and Canned Food
Since commercially processed food such as fast food, and prepackaged and canned grocery store products are popular and widely available, we tend to feel safe, believing that if these products for sale, and readily available, they must not be that bad, right? Wrong.
Toxic Effects
According to Walter Willet, an nutrition researcher from Harvard, trans fats from hydrogenated oils constitute “the most significant culprit in generating heart disease such as stroke and heart attack, cancer, and diabetes.” It is also known to raise LDL, or harmful cholesterol, and lower HDL, good cholesterol.
Abundance of Trans Fats
In 2006, the American Heart Association stated that trans fat intake should be limited to 1 percent of all calories consumed. That is approximately 2 to 2.5 grams of trans fats per day. It is very easy to go way beyond those guidelines. Consider some popular fast food options:
- Large fries from McDonald's, 8 grams of trans fat
- Apple pie from McDonald's, 4.5 grams of trans fat
- KFC's Chicken Pot Pie, 14 grams of trans fat
- Taco Bell's Nachos, 4 grams of trans fat
WHAT YOU CAN DO
- Enjoy healthy oils such as olive, grape seed, and virgin unrefined coconut oil.
- When dining out, know that fried and baked goods will have higher levels of trans fats.
- Very common sources are margarine and shortening. Switch to using real butter, and don't buy or use products made with margarine or shortening.
- Read labels. As of January 1, 2006, the FDA requires food manufacturers to list trans fats on the labels.
- Read food label's entire ingredients list. Food manufacturers are allowed to label their product as having zero trans fats if a serving has .5 grams or less. If a product lists margarine, hydrogenized, or partially hydrogenized oil as an ingredient, it has trans fats!
