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Sugar industry influenced researchers and blamed fat for CVD (2016)
- LastTrain 9mo agoBig sugar exaggerated the skinny on fat?
- jsmailes 9mo agoFor those like myself who didn't know, CVD = cardiovascular disease.
- delichon 9mo agoThis meme is very healthy among MAHA, and Secretary Kennedy is overseeing an overhaul of the Dietary Guidelines, recasting saturated fat as a health food. There is a lot of speculation that we will soon see a new food pyramid that is an inverted version of the last one. https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/10/08/nx-s1-5564026/dietary-guidelines-rfk-saturated-fat-2025 https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/10/08/nx... I wonder if it will keep flipping as administrations change. Edit: The new guidelines are expected to be released today. https://www.wfla.com/news/national/kennedy-wants-to-end-war-on-saturated-fats-with-new-dietary-guidelines/ https://www.wfla.com/news/national/kennedy-wants-to-end-war-...
- alphazard 9mo ago> There is a lot of speculation that we will soon see a new food pyramid that is inverted. Pretty much everyone I know understands that the food pyramid is the product of various lobbies coming together and does not represent a legitimate theory of diet or nutrition. That is independent of their politics or opinions about RFK. I don't think a change to the food pyramid would change anyone's actions, people haven't taken it seriously for decades.
- julkali 9mo agoSource?
- mullingitover 9mo agoThe food pyramid went away over twenty years ago. It was discontinued in 2005, and the current guidelines are at https://www.fns.usda.gov/cnpp/myplate https://www.fns.usda.gov/cnpp/myplate which launched in 2011.
- DetectDefect 9mo agoWhich are crafted by individuals with strong financial ties to the meat, dairy, or egg industries, thus should be disregarded by any reasonable person.
- giantg2 9mo agoThen I would think the meat, dairy, and egg industry didn't get their money's worth. The My Plate guidelines have protein as less than 25% of the plate, and nothing says it has to be animal based.
- DetectDefect 9mo agoThe Court has actually ruled that the USDA violated federal law by hiding conflicts of interest in the Dietary Guidelines. It is beyond insane that these are the official guidelines on what Americans should eat. Why would anyone defend them?
- giantg2 9mo agoWhat do you find disagreeable about the My Plate that was linked?
- DetectDefect 9mo agoI just told you: it's made by food industry interests and is ultimately divorced from actual nutrition science.
- giantg2 9mo ago
- _heimdall 9mo agoDon't public school lunches have to follow the food guide recommendations? Assuming that hasn't changed since I was in school, a recommendation based on something other than industry lobbying could help quite a bit with children's health and long term outlooks. That said, I obviously don't know what this administration would propose as a new recommendation so I'm not implying it will be better. We'd have to see what they put out, if anything, to get an idea about that.
- lostphilosopher 9mo agoFood pyramid was taught when I was in school, but that was before 2011 (as mentioned by another commenter) my own children are in school now and their school lunches align with more modern ideas (veggies and proteins). Certainly could still be improved but I recognize the cost, scale, delivery constraints, plus allergy considerations makes this non-trivial.
- _heimdall 9mo agoSame, I was just assuming the MyPlate recommendations were similarly expected for public schools to follow.
- Mountain_Skies 9mo agoWhen people say that SNAP (food stamps) should "only be able to buy healthy foods", they have to be reminded what the government considers to be healthy and just importantly, what the government considers to be unhealthy. Since SNAP is a government program, it almost certainly would use government guidelines on what is healthy.
- _heimdall 9mo agoI often hear that argument raised in response to the idea of SNAP covering things like sugary drinks and foods. I'm not sure how SNAP could follow guidelines and also pay for sugary drinks or candy (if those claims are accurate).
- giantg2 9mo ago"Pretty much everyone I know understands that the food pyramid is the product of various lobbies" Maybe adults, but probably not the people who were taught the food pyramid - children. Edit: changed the tense to acknowledge this was in the past. Thought that was obvious since the food pyramid was a thing of the past.
- napkinartist 9mo agoWho is being taught the food pyramid? Its been 20 years since it was discontinued. I don't know any children being taught it.
- shermantanktop 9mo agoI've seen this over and over - adults assuming that what happens in schools today is the same their childhood experience in the classroom, frozen in time. Parents of school-age children ranting and raving about how the school needs to stop doing X, when it hasn't been that way forever; and they cannot hear it, cannot absorb it, cannot stop talking about it. Something something childhood trauma.
- NiloCK 9mo agoNit: Children haven't been taught the food pyramid in something like a couple of decades I think. Current model is something like the DailyPlate visual - a plate filled proportionally with various things.
- alphazard 9mo agoDefinitely agree with the concern here, but this is not a problem unique to the food pyramid. Children will be taught all kinds of propaganda if they attend a public school. It's part of the cost, just not the part that is taken from tax dollars.
- smileysteve 9mo agoAnecdotally, only the "health focused" people around me understand that the food pyramid was for a different time and based on other interests. And I don't think adults on a grand scale question it, or process nutrition labels. Boomers in particular (who engrained Gen x and millennial diets) are most likely to follow grains (and margarine) diets.
- harrall 9mo agoI think the real problem is that a food pyramid is an oversimplification. No matter what you do, “fruits” isn’t really a goal — it’s macronutrients and micronutrients like vitamins, fiber, etc. So with or without lobbying, any food pyramid will always be wrong. A food pyramid exists because it is far more relatable than comparing nutrient labels and tabulating.
- GuB-42 9mo agoI consider the traditional food pyramid, with grain at the base, to make a lot of economic sense. The question is not "what's best for you", but "how to keep as many people as possible well fed and reasonably healthy". And an important part of it is that everyone gets enough calories, even the poor, and even during hard times. Grain is an efficient source of calories, and grain products tend to have a good shelf life and don't need refrigeration. And ideal baseline for keeping people from starving. But grain is good for calories, but not enough to keep people healthy, you also need vitamins, fiber, etc... So you introduce the second food group: fruits and vegetables. A bit more expensive and more involved than grain, but it provides most of the things grain don't. Now, we are at a vegan diet, and experience has shown that it can be perfectly healthy, but in order for it to be, you need to do a significant amount of bookkeeping, and you may need some slightly exotic food to avoid deficiencies. So, not enough for the general population, so you introduce animal products. Even more expensive, but now you have everything you need, with good margins. The top of the pyramid is for the products for which the needs are covered more efficiently by the lower layers.
- aziaziazi 9mo ago> a significant amount of bookkeeping [...] for the general population True, but not really more or less than a diet including animal products: in both cases they'll be good by varying the sources of macronutrients. In fact most long-term, healthy vegans don't bother bookkeeping what they eat. Some athletes and weight-loss seeker does but it's not particular to plant-based diet. Vegan bookeeping is a common fallacy. A while ago I had an odd conversation with a doctor that went like that: - It's complicated, you'll need to count everything ! - Is it different with animal products ? - Oh yes no count I advise 1-2 serve of red meat every 2 weeks, 2-4 serve of fish per week, 1 serve of seafood once in a while 2 serves of chicken per week, adjusted if you workout. Also 2 diary product per day but avoid salty cheeses too often or in large quantity. - I count 1 pill of b12 per day.
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- biophysboy 9mo agoWhat annoys me the most is that sat fat is a huge way that sugary products are made more palatable to people. People love butter. It is every chef's 2nd favorite tool, just after salt.
- bluGill 9mo agoButter is only a favorite because Lard has been some demonized that no chef would ever use it anymore.
- biophysboy 9mo agoChefs use animal fats all the time. They think about cooking temperature, flavor, etc to make decisions.
- gilrain 9mo agoThat, and the only readily available form of lard stinks of rancid hog. Approximately nobody has access to high quality leaf lard like the food blogs champion.
- bregma 9mo agoEver spread lard on toast? Do you prefer croissants made with lard? Is everyone's favourite dish these days lard chicken (I mean the Indian dish, not the Soul Food dish, which is of course popular in some locales). Nope. Butter is favoured because it tastes unctuous. Nothing to do with Big Cow or any special interest lobby local to certain valleys in the USA. Except maybe Big Bacon Drippings, because if there's one thing better for a grill cheese than butter it's bacon grease (thick-sliced sourdough bread, sharp Cheddar cheese, a shmear of chili crisp) Now, suet has been demonized to the point that nobody makes suet pudding any more. A shame, really.
- aziaziazi 9mo ago> Butter is favoured because it tastes unctuous Oily stuff tastes unctuous. Butter is favored because most people had it in their youth. Some regions loves Nato and Chicken feet, others cheese and oysters. What's the most delicious? It depends of your own history. I spread olive oil on my toast and prefer the croissants made with that as well. My favorite dish is fried tempeh.
- lostlogin 9mo agoIf you do the opposite of whatever Kennedy recommends, you probably wouldn’t be too far off doing the right thing.
- sieabahlpark 9mo ago[dead]
- al_borland 9mo agoEating nothing but processed foods, sugar, and heavily processed grains? That sounds like the opposite of what Kennedy recommends, which is a recipe for obesity and type 2 diabetes. He’s got his problems, many of them, but eating real food without a bunch of processing seems like a fairly common sense thing.
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- lostlogin 9mo agoIs this with or without the increase in saturated fat he recommends? Or more red meat? Health policy decisions would ideally be based on some sort of evidence, not the quackery he spouts. Yes, some of his changes are an improvement. Most aren’t. https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/5675784-kennedy-saturated-fat-guidelines/ https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/5675784-kennedy-satura... https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/rfk-jr-upsets-food-pyramid-urging-americans-to-eat-more-meat/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/rfk-jr-upsets-foo...
- stuffn 9mo ago[flagged]
- lostlogin 9mo ago> Since you present no actual evidence. It’s his food pyramid and his departments advice. https://cdn.realfood.gov/DGA.pdf https://cdn.realfood.gov/DGA.pdf As for him being a quack, that’s earned through his refusal to follow scientific guidance, and sacking the guidance available. You’re presumably aware of his views on fluoride and vaccines.
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- bluGill 9mo agoAnd most likely we will move too far in that direction in the near future. Too many people have their identity, religion, reputation, or paycheck invested in something about how they eat and so are unwilling to take an objective look at things. Instead they find studies that seem to fit their narrative and amplify them. They often will setup their experiments and data to get the results they want. And then we get into the reproducibility problem that science publications often have.
- ericmcer 9mo agoIt's a "meme" that sugar is worse for you than fat?
- delichon 9mo agomeme, noun. Any unit of cultural information, such as a practice or idea, that is transmitted verbally or by repeated action from one mind to another -- Wordnik
- 1121redblackgo 9mo agoYes and also a true meme.
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- bell-cot 9mo agoMaybe I read too much history - but hasn't Big Sugar been known for "nothing that a slave trader wouldn't do" ethics for the past 300+ years?
- vintermann 9mo agoSure, but do you trust Big Butcher?
- Avshalom 9mo agoAnd of course big sugar is these days just big corn which is happy selling to CAFOs.
- bell-cot 9mo agoBased on the history of the past 1-ish century, I trust Big Meat & Dairy to have less capability for and competence at evil than Big Sugar. Because otherwise we'd have been hearing far more "Fat is Fine, Carbs are Crap" messages.
- vintermann 9mo agoI feel like I hear that a lot.
- zdragnar 9mo agoWell, there's the whole atkins and keto fads...
- Avshalom 9mo agoAnd Atkins really started picking up in the 90s which was https://web.archive.org/web/20120629041358/http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/eib-economic-information-bulletin/eib43.aspx https://web.archive.org/web/20120629041358/http://www.ers.us... Oh hey right after beef CAFOs started dominating the industry.
- DetectDefect 9mo ago
- bpavuk 9mo ago[flagged]
- begueradj 9mo ago>Sugar Papers Reveal Industry Role in Shifting National Heart Disease Focus to Saturated Fat But sugar-sweetened foods contain saturated fat ... so ?
- DetectDefect 9mo agoNeeds (2016) in the title - and all big industry plays these games with "science".
- agumonkey 9mo agoto the point that sadly, science = f(economy)
- rendaw 9mo agoWhen this news first came out it was mind blowing, but at the same time I don't entirely get it. So the money quote seems to be: > The literature review heavily criticized studies linking sucrose to heart disease, while ignoring limitations of studies investigating dietary fats. They paid a total of 2 people $50,000 (edit: in 2016 dollars). That doesn't seem like enough to entirely shape worldwide discourse around nutrition and sugar. And the research was out there! Does everybody only read this single Harvard literature review? Does nobody read journals, or other meta studies, or anything? Did the researchers from other institutions whose research was criticized not make any fuss? I guess the thing that I most don't get is it's now been 10 years since then, and I haven't seen any news about the link between sugar and CVD. > There is now a considerable body of evidence linking added sugars to hypertension and cardiovascular disease Okay, where is it? What are the conclusions? Is sugar actually contributing more than fat for CVD in most patients? Edit: Or, is the truth that fat really is the most significant, and sugar plays some role but it's strictly less?
- apples_oranges 9mo agoPR can be a lot of bang for your buck. https://paulgraham.com/submarine.html https://paulgraham.com/submarine.html
- uniqueuid 9mo agoIt's really good to ask these questions. I'm not a medial researcher, but my impression is that many fields find it difficult to produce the robust high-level risk comparisons that you ask about. I.e. if you're looking at blood fats, even there you'll find many complicated contextual factors (age, sex, ethnicity, type of lipids i.e. LDL or lp(a) or ...?). The same might be the case for sugar. So it's not really easy/cheap to combine detailed state-of-the-art measurements of different causes into one randomized controlled trial. As for the effects of sugar, I think there's some evidence that's not too hard to find, e.g. some meta analyses showing something around 10% increase in dose-dependent risk (RR ~ 1.10) [1,2]. A lot of the literature seems to be focused on beverages, e.g. this comparative cross-national study [3]. [1] https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/1819573 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullar... [2] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S089990072300062X https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S08999... [3] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-024-03345-4 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-024-03345-4
- yieldcrv 9mo ago"the only people that would care about a funding a study, funded the study! see! that's proof!" no conflict == no interest I agree about the need for more transparency and more peer review actually being done
- eth0up 9mo agoAs a teen I was fooled for a short time, confused about fats, types, etc. But I was a feral child and as ignorant as any animal. It didn't take long to figure things out after I learned to read. I expect more of government though, and while I see the vague rationale behind hamfisted soda regulations, I remain deeply irked by the Fat Tax that Denmark once imposed. I offer no benefit of doubt and view that thankfully now bygone usurpation of the family table as unforgivable and implemented in full awareness of its flaws. If one chooses to blame this on corporate influence and ignorance, then either way it exemplifies how easily fundamental aspects of our personal lives can be controlled based on deception. Ain't sure about anyone else, but I certainly wonder how many other similar delusions we're subject to under such influence and "research'. I know of more than a few. For me it begs the question of how and why we've allowed such centralized frameworks to persevere. Independent groups do exist, but then there's SEO, mainstream-media and all the other factors that make them practically invisible. And with abandonment of the Internet in favor of corporate friendly LLMs, I expect it to get worse.
- almosthere 9mo agoSugar and fat are the same thing. Converts
- amanaplanacanal 9mo agoThere are processes that convert, but it's typically only small amounts. They aren't interchangable in effect.
- almosthere 9mo agodepends on how fat you already are - if you are, 100% of it converts. For anyone that is addicted to sugar they are pretty much a fat person. The sugar industry is blaming themselves.
- StopDisinfo910 9mo agoA casual look at where people live the oldest, what they eat, and what's recommended tell you all you need to know about food recommendations then and now. It's a field where actual long term controlled experiments are impossible, confounding variables are everywhere, and multiple lobbies have vested interests in the outcomes. I take everything with a grain of salt apart from studies of harm when sources are credible and numerous and even then, I'm not fully confident. The only current advice I follow is avoiding industrially processed food. That sounds like a sound one as this kind of food is basically terra incognita. It's just applying the precaution principle.
- Maxion 9mo ago> The only current advice I follow is avoiding industrially processed food. It is also surprisingly hard in practice. There are so many foods that on the label are supposed to be whole foods or low processed but then when you read the ingredients do you realize you've been bamboozeld.
- m4rc3lv 9mo agoFor me avoiding processed foods is not that hard, I only eat whole foods like vegetables and fruits (where I live there are no labels on these whole foods). I know that this is not doable for most of you, but it can be done if you want. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant-based_diet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant-based_diet
- lithocarpus 9mo agoI think avoiding industrially processed food is wise, but it eliminates 99% of restaurant food and 90% of prepared food in almost any setting, only exception being about half the stuff at a salad bar. Almost everything that isn't a single ingredient whole plant or animal food contains industrially processed oil or sweetener/starch. Still worth doing imho but I understand why it's not easy for most people.
- StopDisinfo910 9mo ago
- hombre_fatal 9mo agoThis is on HNs homepage because it confirms what we want to believe about our favorite foods: saturated fat = bad is just a sugar industry psy-op! But notice how "Sugar industry blames [saturated] fat for CVD" doesn't mean it's good for you. Their motive is to sell you sugar. Just like finding evidence of the meat/dairy industry sowing FUD on saturated fat doesn't mean it's bad for you. Their motive is to sell you saturated fat. We should instead look at our best converging contemporary evidence on how saturated fat impacts human heath outcomes, not wank off to blog posts like this.
- __0x01 9mo agoMy understanding was that atherosclerotic plaques are comprised of cholesterol or fatty deposits [1] and that these can lead to CVD. The fat mechanism I understand, but what is the mechanism for sugar in CVD? [1] https://www.heart.org/en/health-topics/cholesterol/about-cholesterol/atherosclerosis https://www.heart.org/en/health-topics/cholesterol/about-cho...
- giacomoforte 9mo agoPretty much every health authority will tell you that high blood sugar damages blood vessels, thereby enabling the formation of said plagues.
- loeg 9mo agoHealthy adults consuming some dietary sugar doesn't cause persistent high blood sugar, though. That's diabetes.
- Alex2037 9mo agoit's not just sugar. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glycemic_index#Grouping https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glycemic_index#Grouping all simple carbs are the devil, but we can't possibly feed billions of people actually healthy food - organic vegetables, nuts, and animal products, so come drink your corn syrup.
- loeg 9mo agoThe sugar industry (topic of this article) can only be blamed for sugar, though -- not all high-GI foods. And you can replace "sugar" in what I said earlier with "high-GI foods" and it doesn't change a thing. Persistent high blood sugar is diabetes; it isn't dietary.
- Alex2037 9mo ago>Persistent high blood sugar is diabetes; it isn't dietary. how is it not dietary if consuming most carbs spikes your blood sugar for hours, which, with three meals + snacks + starbucks slurry, means elevated blood sugar 20+ hours a day?
- giacomoforte 9mo agoAren't both sugar and saturated fat problemtic, and complementary in contributing to CVD?
- kortex 9mo agoYes. Sugar (and all of its downstream phenomena - diabetes, insulin resistance, the ease in which sugar adds calories without satiation signals) is well established to contribute to CVD. Long-chain (animal based) sat fat and trans fat is also well established to contribute to CVD. The high calorie density of fatty foods plays a big role, as does the overall palatability and "eatability" of low fiber, high fat, high sugar, delicious foods, making portion control challenging. That should be uncontroversial at this point. The jury is unclear on: - How the chain length of sat fats impact things (medium-chain triglycerides seem to be protective, but the boundary between medium and long is fuzzy) - How the ratio of the various omega-N (3/6/9) unsat fats impacts health, particularly inflammation - The whole "seed oil" thing is probably MAHA/conspiracy style false signal at the end of the day, but it hasn't been fully debunked and there are almost certainly facets of truth to it (seed oils are a form of ultra-processed food, and all UPFs are problematic) Confounders, confounders everywhere. This whole field is just extremely challenging and noisy.
- andor 9mo agoSugar doesn't cause insulin resistance or (type 2) diabetes. Both are a result of being overweight. Of course, you can get overweight by eating too much sugar, but it's really about not eating too many calories long-term, regardless of the source. And of course, refined sugar isn't healthy at all and consumption should be kept to a minimum, outside of exercise.
- tsimionescu 9mo agoThere are many people with type 2 diabetes that are not overweight; and also many people with overweight and even obesity who do not develop type 2 diabetes. The estimate is that around 537 million people have diabetes worldwide, while overweight and obesity is estimated to affect 1.1 billion people.
- slicktux 9mo agoI feel like the same thing is happening now… processed foods have less sodium and I feel are more sugary. I don’t live a sedentary lifestyle…I need salt for hydration and muscle contraction. I find the new nutrition guidelines for sodium lacking.
- jorblumesea 9mo agoCVD and links to saturated fats is a long, long established phenomenon and has a lot of science behind it. A single study or even studies should not invalidate or discount it. Before people misinterpret what this is saying. Sugar may also contribute some to CVD but most cardiologists still think fats are the main driver of CVD.
- giacomoforte 9mo ago? Every health authority mentions both cholesterol/saturated fat and blood sugar as contributing factors.
- jorblumesea 9mo agonot sure where people have been for the last year but MAHA and rfk have been on the "fat is good train" and seem to completely ignore entire decades of science.
- kypro 9mo agoFat is good if you eat the right kinds of fats and your consumption of unhealthy fat is limited. The issue is more that people eat too much fatty food, a specifically unhealthy fats. On the other hand sugar is probably never good for you and you should aim to reduce it as much as possible.
- aldarion 9mo agoThose studies however generally put beef and sausages into the same "red meat" category. So yeah... that science is, from what I've seen, basically worthless.
- jjk166 9mo agoWhy would beef and sausages not be in the same category? A large percentage of sausage literally is beef.
- 9mo ago
- stephenhuey 9mo agoHere’s a gift link to a NYT article that was posted a few minutes ago: Kennedy Flips Food Pyramid to Emphasize Red Meat and Whole Milk https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/07/well/rfk-jr-food-pyramid-nutrition-guidelines-protein.html?unlocked_article_code=1.ClA.Jvv1.C1A5XEMqjubb&smid=nytcore-ios-share https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/07/well/rfk-jr-food-pyramid-...
- DetectDefect 9mo agoThese evil people want us sick and hospitalized with chronic disease from eating this crap. Now that it's political, hopefully people will see it for the bullshit it really is.
- ThinkBeat 9mo agoAt the top of the pyramid there are also vegetables. For some reason that is left out in some of the media converge. Kennedy said to avoid the sugary, processed foods that he labels as poisonous to health. (Does any sane person disagree with this?) “My message is clear: Eat real food,” Mr. Kennedy said (Does any sane person disagree with this?)
- octaane 9mo ago[flagged]
- youarentrightjr 9mo ago> He's an absolute goddamn nutjob > He is a vaccine-denier > Anything he says has no validity Huh? Yeah, he's wrong about many things. But hurling epithets and constructing an argument via ad hominem isn't necessary. You can defeat his claims directly. And FWIW, the claim that eating unprocessed "whole" foods is healthy is almost certainly true.
- kiernanmcgowan 9mo ago[flagged]
- vegetable 9mo agoWhat does "industry" mean. Which firms were involved? Were all firms involved?
- aeternum 9mo agoIt seems one should not always "trust the science"
- Alex2037 9mo ago[flagged]
- Covzire 9mo agoScience isn't always "science". If it's not clear by now it never will be that there is a massive amount of fraud in the "scientific" community as a whole.
- kypro 9mo agoYou shouldn't trust the messengers of "the science", however the science speaks for it's self. I got really into reading about nutritional science a few years ago and there's a surprising amount of stuff which people don't think is bad for them which probably is. Eating 3 meals a day with snacking between meals is probably a significant contributor to diabetes and CVD, for example. Yet a lot of people believe it's unhealthy or strange to only eat once a day. Similarly fruit drinks are bad when a lot of people think they are good, and we probably over empathise problems with "red meat" these days – the main risks with there are more specifically with processed red meats like sausages and also how the meat is cooked. If people care about their health they should be curious enough to ask questions and read scientific papers themselves.
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- siliconc0w 9mo agoThis isn't really a correct narrative. Diets high in saturated fat are correlated with CVD. Sugar is also correlated with poor metabolic health which is also correlated with CVD. Both are bad. Best data is still Mediterranean- nuts, fruits vegetables, olive or avocado oil, and lean protein.
- nephihaha 9mo agoFruit and veg can be contaminated with sprays as well unfortunately. The vegetarian aisle used to be healthier but now it's been invaded by ultraprocessed food too. I find a meat heavy diet works with keeping weight off. The opposite of what we've been told.
- aldarion 9mo agoMediterranean diet is basically a lie, though. If you look at the healthiest Mediterranean populations, they eat a lot of saturated fat. Diets high in saturated fat are correlated with high standard of living. High standard of living is correlated with high consumption of processed foods. So... yeah.
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- Panoramix 9mo agoI've been to the Mediterranean several times. They eat a ton of (delicious) super oily food, sausages, meats, eggs, fish (often fried or deep fried), salty cheeses, greasy stuff, tons of white bread, lots of wine. Fat chance to find someone eating avocados, kale, or quinoa, and proteins are not at all minimized. The Mediterranean diet is like a Californian wellness type of person's idea of what the actual Mediterranean diet is.
- deleted 9mo ago[deleted]
- jamesgill 9mo agoA good book that explains it all is The Case Against Sugar by Gary Taubes, which came out the same year as this article. Like many truths, it's actually well-known and frequently discussed in public, but hard to hear amongst all the noise of corporate messaging and decades of bad dietary 'advice' from both public and private institutions. To paraphrase the Oracle in the Matrix: What's really going to bake your noodle later on is--saturated fat isn't the culprit in CVD either. And that's equally well-supported yet drowned out for the same reasons ('nonfat all the things!').
- aldarion 9mo agoYep. And thanks for the recommendation. I am currently reading The Big Fat Surprise by Nina Teicholz.
- rsync 9mo ago“… but hard to hear amongst all the noise …” A well placed warning label makes it a little easier to hear: https://kozubik.com/items/ThisisCandy/ https://kozubik.com/items/ThisisCandy/
- SoftTalker 9mo ago> hard to hear amongst all the noise of corporate messaging The one I like are the sodas that tout "made with real sugar" as if that's better for you than HF syrup.
- hinkley 9mo ago
- ChrisArchitect 9mo ago(2016) Some other discussions: 2024 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41962750 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41962750 2022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32978590 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32978590 2021 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26126183 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26126183 and on and on... 2016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12480733 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12480733
- 10xDev 9mo ago[flagged]
- platevoltage 9mo agoI thought that BMI did the opposite. I'm a naturally thin person who has also been vegan for over 20 years, so I usually have to pay attention to whether I'm eating enough. I recently did a BMI test and was surprised how average my score was. I've known people who appear healthy and active that inch into the "overweight" category. It really is a bad measurement system given the whole muscle mass factor.
- game_the0ry 9mo agoThat industry can lobby for and basically "purchase" scientific outcomes that affect health standards should be a defcon 1 red alert. People should be lose their careers over this, at the very least imo. And the fact that people do not care is just as, if not more, concerning. This is how you get MAHA, which I support bc of this, craziness included.
- Alex2037 9mo ago>That industry can lobby for and basically "purchase" scientific outcomes that affect health standards should be a defcon 1 red alert. why? the state does not need you to live past your retirement age. in fact, it's preferable if you don't.
- kenferry 9mo agoEr, how does putting your faith in literally vibes (MAHA) follow. Just complete rejection of expertise and science.
- morshu9001 9mo agoYeah, I completely reject nutritional science. Even without bribes involved, there are just too many complexities for them to draw useful conclusions. Ignored the food pyramid too.
- boston_clone 9mo agoYou should try the carnivore diet and completely eliminate Vitamin C intake to prove them scientists wrong! Scurvy is just a complex myth, after all. Just like rickets, or blindness from Vitamin A deficiency.
- game_the0ry 9mo agoBc that "expertise" was bought and paid for which is why we have a food pyramid that does more harm good.
- 9mo ago
- rsync 9mo agoOne very minor side (art?) project I am doing: https://kozubik.com/items/ThisisCandy/ https://kozubik.com/items/ThisisCandy/ … is a pushback of sorts on the sugar industry.
- elektronika 9mo agoIf I were to design a warning label I would take inspiration from the Australian tobacco warning labels, quite gruesome medical imagery of rotted teeth. Restricting the form of advertisement would be a start, like USA tobacco regulations.
- ChrisArchitect 9mo agoRelated (reason why OP submitted this today?): Eat Real Food – Introducing the New Pyramid https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46529237 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46529237
- jqpabc123 9mo agoWhich will make you fatter? A) Eating a pound/kg of fat B) Eating a pound/kg of refined sugar Correct answer: B Sugar enters your blood stream almost immediately --- starting in your mouth. Unless you're doing heavy exercise and burning lots of calories, your body has to store most of this excess energy --- as fat. The only way to get consumed fat into your bloodstream is to first convert it into sugar --- which itself burns some energy.
- timerol 9mo agoNote that a kg of fat contains about 9000 calories, while a kg of sugar contains about 4000 calories, so this is really a startling claim, if true
- brodouevencode 9mo agoIt's not given the ratios OP should have said for calorie-adjusted intake sugar is more fattening.
- jqpabc123 9mo agoIt is about more than just the calorie content of the food. Unless your digestive system is hyperactive, a lot of this huge glob of fat will likely just pass right through without being absorbed into your bloodstrean. The refined sugar is virtually guaranteed to fully hit your bloodstream and right now. It's enough to send some people into a life threatening diabetic coma. After eating a pound of fat, you may want a nap but dying from it is extremely unlikely.
- cyberax 9mo ago> The only way to get consumed fat into your bloodstream is to first convert it into sugar --- which itself burns some energy. Fat does not get converted into glucose in normal conditions in appreciable quantities. It's used as-is, most of the body can directly utilize fatty acids as a fuel source. Also, body has a lot of mechanisms to deal with sugar. It is normally stored in the liver and then released slowly.
- 9mo ago
- brodouevencode 9mo agoThe new dietary guidelines are much more sensible IMO, compared to the food pyramid or MyPlate. https://cdn.realfood.gov/DGA.pdf https://cdn.realfood.gov/DGA.pdf
- munchler 9mo ago> To Make America Healthy Again, we must return to the basics. Who knows, these guidelines might indeed be sensible, but anything labeled “Make America Healthy Again” has no scientific credibility.
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- zamadatix 9mo agoThe dumb marketing label lowers the credibility that I'll expect to find good science in it. It in no way defines what the actual scientific credibility should be though.
- deinonychus 9mo ago> Protein serving goals: 1.2–1.6 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day, adjusting as needed based on your individual caloric requirements. it's crazy the us gov put this out and is still using kilograms for this formula
- deinonychus 9mo agoanyway, i don't find anything here that stands out or is obviously against the consensus, other than recommending tallow as a cooking fat. i don't see any signs of seed oil extremism or sat fat trutherism otherwise. there's even this line about limiting sat fat: > In general, saturated fat consumption should not exceed 10% of total daily calories. Significantly limiting highly processed foods will help meet this goal. More high-quality research is needed to determine which types of dietary fats best support long-term health.
- caycep 9mo agoI'm used to CAD as the acronym for this thing, but I'm just being pedantic
- WheatMillington 9mo agoIt would be cool if researchers weren't so easily bought. I thought the sciences attracted people of strong moral character but it would appear not.
- alliao 9mo agoI blame this book's incendiary title, was a fun read for sure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pure,_White_and_Deadly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pure,_White_and_Deadly
- maqp 9mo agoHFCS is another beast. Everyone needs to watch this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM
- indubioprorubik 9mo agoShould make flour from it: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667160325000067 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S266716032...
- xthe 9mo agoThe 2016 JAMA paper illustrates how funding sources can shape research focus, reinforcing the value of transparency and multiple lines of evidence in nutrition research.
- TuringNYC 9mo agoAs a child of the 1980s, I feel so cheated that we were told to eat "5 servings of grains a day" pointing to bread and pasta -- when so many breads have added sugar and so much pasta has added sugar in the sauce. How did no one speak up? Would people ever have spoken up if we didnt have social media?
- grvdrm 9mo agoI don't feel so violently on one side of this or another, but I agree with the spirit of your comment as a child of the 80s. I think I ate white bread or something very similar to it almost every day for lunch (in school). Cold cuts too. A shit-ton of pasta, but I'm my family is Italian, so that was a given no matter what. Tons of granola bars. Basically every processed baked packaged thing you can imagine. Your point about sauce hits home too. Sauce purists may disagree but I despise ANY sweetness in your basic red sauce.
- andor 9mo agoBread with sugar in it is problematic, but that doesn't mean all bread is bad. That would be like saying that boiled potatos are as unhealthy as french fries. Or rolled oats vs. sugary industrial cereals. Whole grains are actually really healthy. Bread and pasta are staples in France and Italy, and still they are much healthier than the US. In France, there's nothing wrong with a baguette from a bakery (or even from a supermarket). You'll also find industrially produced white bread if you really want to, but people aren't buying that as much, because of their food culture. On average, they have a better understanding of what's good and healthy. One of the key issues is understanding food as products rather than produce. By outsourcing your food to large companies, you are giving them an opportunity for cutting costs by reducing the quality of the production process (e.g. reduced fermentation time of the dough) or the ingredients (e.g. adding sugar for better browning or to make the product more addictive). It's a result of the financialization of everything and the need for growth. Rather than buying branded products and going to chain restaurants, buy from smaller places or cook your own food, from scratch.
- aldarion 9mo agoStaples, but eaten in very small quantity, at least in France. As for Italy, Italians actually have massive problems with obesity, especially in children, precisely due to their consumption of bread and pasta. Traditional Italian diet is massive on vegetables, fruit and meat (fish and pork in particular), with bread and pasta being basically side dishes. But that is not what Italians are eating now, and so they've gotten sick as well.
- BirAdam 9mo agoI mean, anecdotal but I suffered metabolic syndrome. Cut out all carbs, increased my fat intake. This led to a loss of 50 pounds, my blood fat and blood cholesterol dropped, liver enzymes in the blood dropped, insulin resistance reversed, blood pressure dropped, and according to my blood, everything is now normal.
- lubasara 9mo ago[dead]
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- oxag3n 9mo agoDo your own research, it's not that hard: * Select a subset of diets that might fit your lifestyle. * Make a list of categories you consume: refined sugars, all kinds of fats, gluten, dairy. * Look for published papers on diets and categories. I did a few dramatic changes throughout my life based on researches I did, not the hype. The first one was refined sugars for me and my kids - they didn't have a single cavity in baby and now permanent teeth. Pediatric dentist actually it's impressive, but little sugar here and there wouldn't harm with proper hygiene. One thing I learned about medical doctors is that they are not scientists, and unless they follow a protocol to diagnose and treat you, their opinion is often B.S. For adult, removing refined sugars reduced body fat percentage over time, but what's most important - lipid panel came to normal in about a year.
- spot5010 9mo agoHow strict was your elimination of sugar? Did you find a gradual trend of your lipid profile over the course of a year, or was it more sudden?
- oxag3n 9mo agoI had to cut it all at once - i.e. if added sugars is > 0 on the label, I avoided it. I still was consuming naturally occurring sugars from fruits and other produce. Hard to tell if it was gradual or not, I had one panel done 3 months later and it showed that all values are within acceptable range now, but very close to thresholds, and ~10 months later all values were just in the middle between min/max where applicable.
- NoPicklez 9mo agoIt's fairly basic nutrition education that cutting out or reducing refined sugar intake will reduce cavities and reduce body fat. It's all about the amount you consume them in amongst the rest of your diet. It's not new evidence, science or research that says you should reduce your refined sugar intake.
- oxag3n 9mo ago
- lfliosdjf 9mo agoHas any one successfully code with same focus after cutting sugar? Seems sugar is really important for focus. Whats your experience?
- united8932 9mo agoBeen coding while fasting on keto and it's absolutely amazing. Fasting is hard socially, being ketogenic puts a bit more stress on my kidneys, but for me (adhd) it's amazing. remember your brain can run on ketones which provides a more stable energy than glucose spikes. the brain is metabolically flexible, can run on glucose, ketones or lactate
- anthomtb 9mo agoI did keto for a few months a long time ago (2010/2011). This was early in my career and long coding and debug sessions were a normal part of my day-to-day. There was zero impact to my work focus, positive or negative, from cutting nearly all carbohydrates out for several months. I am curious were you heard or learned that "sugar is really important for focus". Just a vibe, perhaps?
- lfliosdjf 9mo agoPersonal experience. Then I found many well known programmers shared the same experience online. It feels deliberate work without sugar. ie. if coding = work + fun. without sugar its just coding = work. It does not get any better after 3 days or so too.
- GloamingNiblets 9mo agoIt might feel good but spiking your blood sugar isn't healthy for you, and the crashes afterwards will get worse over the years. Improving metabolic health might be a better long term solution; have you explored how endurance or high intensity exercise affects your focus?
- 331c8c71 9mo agoIf anything focus gets better without sugar and excessive carbs for me - but those work well for outdoors or workouty days I find.
- FlyingBears 9mo agoI avoid sugar pretty thoroughly, but my cholesterol is high because I can't walk past a breakfast sandwich. This an n=1 observation.
- maximgeorge 9mo ago[dead]
- VanshPatel99 9mo agoSorry to say but I see a lot of ill informed takes here on sugar, fats and their 'correlation' with CVD. To put it bluntly, jut eat maintenance calories with most of it coming from good protein sources and eat good amount of fibre. No, dietary cholesterol isn't gonna kill you, nor is sugar but obviously that doesn't mean you eat tons of them. And the most important is enough sleep and WORKOUTTTT. 240 min of cardio and resistant training combined. Is that a lot to do? Why do you need to optimize each and every aspect of each nutrition? "Oh, I don't eat meat because it is correlated to heart disease, so I consume dairy. Oh wait it isnt exactly digestible so I consume vegetables. Oh wait, I will have to eat like KGs and Kgs of veggies to meet the nutrient requirement. Oh wait, that means I am eating tons of carbs". How about you stop brushing your ego and just keep it simple by having a sense of number of calories you want and then eat enough protein from natural sources. Yeah, for sure if you have any beliefs which prevents you from eating something then by all means find alternatives and have processed food. Processed food is not necessarily bad. Whey protein is processed but it is very important for vegetarians. What grinds my gears is this push to find the ideal diet. Vegans hate carnivores. Carnivores make fun of vegans for eating veggies. Like bro, shut up.
- NoPicklez 9mo agoDoesn't both sugar and saturated fat contribute to CVD if consumed in excess?
- gowld 9mo agoAnoy other greybeards remember this one? https://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/07/magazine/what-if-it-s-all-been-a-big-fat-lie.html https://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/07/magazine/what-if-it-s-all... What if It's All Been a Big Fat Lie? By Gary Taubes July 7, 2002
- pcblues 9mo agoNot sure if this has been posted (I see stephenwoo has mentioned him further down), but it's a break-down of how sugary foods damage the body, particularly fructose. It's 16 years old about 30 years of previous research. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM
- p0w3n3d 9mo agoSugar got into all the meal we have, and because it is so addictive, we went for it. Fatty meals are more healthy, especially for me, but will get you sick in no time, unless you eat healthy fats (olive oil, olives especially). The trans fats are carcinogenic
- mediumsmart 9mo agoSo most of these fat people today are a result of the low fat doctrine forged in the 70’s?
- kudeyar 9mo agoMy workplace has a canteen where a hundred people eat together. it's obvious who is destined for medical misery.