Researchers at Harvard University found that consuming large amounts of unsaturated fats, which are found in vegetable oils, is associated with a low probability of early death. At the same time, a diet high in animal fats, on the contrary, contributes to poor health. Article published in JAMA Internal Medicine.
According to scientists, their work is by far the most complete and thorough test of how fats in food affect the state of the body. Nutritionists have found that replacing the saturated fats found in butter, lard, and red meat with the unsaturated fats from olive, rapeseed, and soybean oils can help prevent serious health problems.
Nutritionists studied data from 126 thousand people who took part in two long-term studies: Nurses' Health Study and Health Professionals Follow-Up Study. For 32 years, volunteers periodically, every two to four years, filled out questionnaires, answering questions about diet, diet, lifestyle and health. During the entire study, 33 thousand people died. Scientists have tested whether there is a link between nutrition and deaths due to cardiovascular disease, cancer, neurodegenerative disorders and respiratory system damage.
It turned out that different types of fats affected the state of the body in different ways. Trans fats (found in meat and dairy products) turned out to be the most harmful: if you increase their consumption by two percent, then the risk of premature death will increase by 16 percent. A five percent increase in saturated fat intake is associated with an additional eight percent of deaths. But unsaturated fats have the exact opposite effect. A diet enriched with them reduced the likelihood of death by 11-19 percent. Replacing saturated fat with carbohydrates only marginally improves health.
Unsaturated fat contains omega-6 and omega-3 unsaturated fatty acids. The first is found in most vegetable oils, and the second is found in fish, as well as in soybean and rapeseed oils.