1/x This is going to be a bit of a different thread. I want to talk about health for once rather than investment related matters.

2/x Someone should write a book focusing in on 1976, because that is the year the obesity problem really manifested itself in America and then went on to manifest itself in many other parts of the developed world that had increasingly become culturally Americanised.

3/x Before we talk about what happened in 1976, let's briefly talk a little about the years prior starting with 1958. That year a gentleman called Ancel Keys that came up with, amongst others, the "Diet-Heart Hypothethis".

4/x He analysed the data from some 7 countries and directly showed a high linear correlation between high fat consumption and heart disease. He showed that countries that ate more fat had a higher rate of heart attacks.

5/x His justification behind the statement that "if you eat more fat you get fat" was that you see an increase of cholesterol when fat is consumed and that results in the arteries clogging up which in turn leads to a heart attack.

6/x The American Health Organisation along with the USDA and several others came to accept this as scientific fact.

However, there is but one caviat to his "scientific" study... He had based it on 7 countries out of 22 *raises eyebrow*

7/x Well, it turns out that if you try to plot it the same way on the other countries, with or without the original subset 7 nations included... The data gave a whole different result. No meaningful correlation was shown anymore. No straight line at all.

8/x His recommendations was nevertheless put into place swiftly in spite of researchers such as Dr. George Mann disproving the "Diet-Heart Hypothesis" noting that "dietary fat is not the determinent of either high cholesterol or coronary heart disease".

9/x The USDA, American Health Organisation etc. still stood by this faulty hypothesis (remember that a hypothesis is something not proven) even though the study that the hypothesis based itself on had been outright debunked as nothing more than selection bias.

10/x From an evolutionary standpoint as we evolved our brains required more energy and our stomachs shrunk to save energy, but there is one caviat to this. This meant that our stomachs became less effective at accomodating all of the fibrous food we would need to fuel our bodies.

11/x Therefore, we had to rely on more energy and nutrient dense foods and here fat enters the picture. Fat is the most calorie dense nutrient providing us with the most energy – some 9 calories per gram. So, historically fat has been important for us and a key part of our diet.

12/x The common misconception many people have because they have been so mentally conditioned by the American Health Organisation et al. is the idea that fat and cholesterol builds up at the walls of the arteries. That is not how it works.

13/x It does build up indeed, but it does so underneath the walls of the arteries and only in damaged sections of the walls. It happens because our bodies naturally wants to fix that section and therefore sends out cholesterol, calcium etc. in an attempt to seal it.

14/x Do not blame the cholesterol for clogging up your arteries from within the damaged section of your arterial walls. Instead think of what caused the whole situation to begin with, the underlying cause, i.e. the inflammation.

15/x You got high cholesterol? Well, according to the "Lyon Diet Heart Study" by Dr. Johnny Bowden in the 80s – 90s it does not really matter. The study showed two groups with high cholesterol. One group cut down on unsaturated fats & cholesterol intake and the other one did not.

16/x The mortality rate because of heart failure and all causes in the group that did cut their unsaturated fat intake and cholesterol intake was significantly higher than the group that did not.

17/x Moreover, the study also showed that the group that did not cut down their intake... Well, their cholesterol did not increase. It just would not budge lending much credence to Dr. George Mann's conclusions that was briefly noted earlier in this thread.

18/x So, going by the results of Dr. Johnny Bowden's study it seems that cholesterol has, unjustly so, gained a bad reputation, because Dr. Johnny Bowden's study shows that cholesterol appears to be innocent.

19/x Now historically people have talked about so called good (HDL) and bad (LDL) cholesterols. What if I told you that is the thinking of the past? A gentlemen called Peter Attia through a studious seminar noted that the "fact" that high levels of LDL causes heart issues...

20/x ... appears to be outright false and he cites a study with some 136 000 patients admitted to the hospital for a coronary heart event. Nearly half of them had a low LDL level.

See: https://peterattiamd.com/the-straight-dope-on-cholesterol-part-i/

21/x Now the one thing you DO want to watch out for when it comes to fatty acids is having too high levels of triglycerides in your bloodstream being carried by your lipoproteins as they can cause inflammation or harden the arterial walls thus increasing risk for heart attack.

22/x With that noted about triglycorides... Let's go on the attack. Peter Attia has been kind enough to find numerous studies showing that a consumption of processed carbohydrates and sugar leads to an increase of triglyceride concentration in your bloodstream.

23/x In order to reduce the triglyceride concentration the solution was quite simple: High fat and low carb diet and make sure the carbs you do get are not processed but rather whole carbs.

24/x In 1958 going forward corporations quickly joined the low fat and high carb train and began marketing dietary products high on carbs as a healthier alternative to high fat products bolstered by the anti-fat & anti-cholesterol movevement.

25/x Therefore, increasing the risk of heart disease amongst people in America, in particular amongst the more health conscious portion of their populace. All because of one man, Ancel Keys, and his faulty hypothesis that the American Health Association et al. decided to support.