How did inflammation become a problem?

There are good studies and then there are … well…

Skyrocketing rates of heart disease during the 1950’s led to studies aimed at understanding the role of various nutrients: fats, sugars, phytosterols, too many calories, too few calories, proteins… By the 1960s, there were two prominent camps:

• John Yudkin believed added sugars increased serum triglyceride levels and heart attack rates;
• Ancel Keys theorized that total fat, saturated fat, and dietary cholesterol caused the problem.

In 1965, the Sugar Research Foundation (SRF) published its review of these studies. They subsequently spent $600 000 ($5.3 million in 2016 dollars) to teach “people who had never had a course in biochemistry… that sugar is what keeps every human being alive and with energy to face our daily problems.”

The war on fat begins: Project 226
A Literature Review on Sugars, Fats, and Heart Disease

In 1965, the Sugar Research Foundation (SRF) secretly funded a review in the New England Journal of Medicine that discounted evidence linking sugar consumption to blood lipid levels and hence coronary heart disease (CHD). The SRF paid two Harvard researchers $6500 ($48,900 in 2016 dollars) for “a review article of the several papers which find some special metabolic peril in sucrose and, in particular, fructose.”

In 1967, McGandy, Hegsted, and Stare published “Dietary Fats, Carbohydrates and Atherosclerotic Disease,” in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). This biased review was directed by the SRF and discounted well-done studies by John Yudkin, Alfredo Lopez, Robert Hodges, and Willard Krehl that showed:

• a positive association between high sucrose (table sugar) consumption and CHD
• sugar caused serum cholesterol and serum triglyceride levels to rise in healthy individuals
• sugar caused serum triglyceride levels to rise in those with hypertriglyceridemia.
• sucrose affected serum cholesterol levels primarily through changes to the intestinal microbiome, and
• fructose, a component of sucrose, affected serum triglyceride levels by increasing fat production in the liver, adipose (fat) tissues, and other organs.

The review article promoted one single randomized controlled trial, conducted by Hegsted, that concluded that reducing dietary cholesterol and substituting polyunsaturated fat for saturated fat substantially improved serum cholesterol levels. Unfortunately, it was a poorly designed study.

Equally unfortunately, the SRF succeeded in burying the truth until Kearns, Schmidt & Glantz analyzed internal industry documents in 2016.

The war on fat continues: Project 259
Burying the animal studies linking sugar to high triglycerides, altered gut health, and heart disease

Between 1967 to 1971 the SRF funded research by W.F.R. Pover that found:

• serum triglycerides went up in rats fed a high sugar diet compared with high starch feed (that’s right, sugar is worse than other starch)
• the sugar diet elevated levels of beta-glucuronidase, an enzyme previously associated with bladder cancer in humans
• risk of coronary heart disease is greater in a high sugar diet compared with the high starch diet
• changes to the gut microbiota may explain the different effects of sucrose and starch on blood lipids

What happened to this research? The sugar industry buried it. All all evidence of harm, including how sugar might cause cancer, was lost to science until Kearns and team blew the whistle just last year.

Industry has a habit of manipulating or burying data that goes against it’s theories and that could lead to unfavorable (to their profits) regulations. While most people are aware of industry wars denying links between cigarette smoking and cancer, psychiatric medications and suicide, pharmaceutical drugs and death or birth defects, we’re still under the belief that sugar is a healthy treat and we need it to fuel our cells, especially our brain.

By 1977, the Dietary Guidelines for America committee made it official: Get the fat out of food.

Since “everyone knows” fat is bad—food labels prominently in BIG BOLD FONT mark items “low-fat,” “reduced fat” or “fat-free.”

The problems?

• fat helps you feel satisfied with your meal—low fat and no fat are not as filling, so you want (and eat) more calories
• low fat doesn’t taste as good as the full-fat versions
• the sugar industry happily added sugar to these otherwise bland foods
• sugar industry profits soar, pharmaceutical company profits soar, insurance premiums and health issues skyrocket

The Bottom Line: Fat has been unscientifically demonized and replaced with sugar. Despite the known dangers of added sugar, it is everywhere.