Is Fat "Good" or "Bad" and Can It Help You Lose Weight?

The introduction to Dr Mark Hyman’s book “Eat Fat Get Thin” starts like this:

What is the single best thing you can do for your health and longevity? Eat more fat! That’s right. Eat more fat to lose weight; feel good; prevent heart disease, diabetes, dementia, and cancer; and live longer”. He goes on to say that “It is true that the fat on our bodies is making us sick and causing us to die too soon. But the seemingly logical leap that the fat we eat creates the fat on our bodies and clogs our arteries is wrong”. He finishes up with “This book dispassionately reviews the evidence and uproots the conventional wisdom about fat – both the fat on our bodies and the fat we eat".

If you remember in the eighties and nineties being told we should eat margarine instead of butter and that eating fat was going to make us fat and ill, I am sure you will be as interested as me to read Dr Hyman’s book. I used to have very dry, flaky skin, until I was advised to eat more “good” fat by a health practitioner. Up to that point I had been consciously or subconsciously avoiding most fats, as much as possible. I think I had been very influenced by the media at the time and felt it was helping me to stay healthy and avoid gaining weight. I had been avoiding cheese, hardly ever ate nuts, olive oil, butter, avocados and I thought eating seeds was just for birds, oblivious as to how nutritious they were. I did not even know that coconut oil existed and would probably have avoided it if I had.

It has taken me a long time to savour the peppery, fruity delights of a cold pressed extra virgin olive oil on my salads and steamed vegetables guilt-free, knowing it is nourishing my body with its medicinal qualities instead of increasing my waistline. I make a point of eating nuts, seeds, avocados, eggs and coconut milk regularly. My dry, flaky skin is a thing of the past and my waistline has not expanded! The coconut and avocado oils I use for slow roasting root vegetables, making kale chips and frying onions in is equally nourishing and hugely beneficial for me. Sadly many people still think that these are dangerous saturated fats or high in calories and to be avoided at all costs.

Are you sometimes confused about just which fats are “good” and which are “bad” or whether there is there even such a separation?

I hope that I can help to demystify the facts and debunk some of the myths around this subject here today.

The Basics.

Fats are also called lipids, fatty acids and some are even called essential fatty acids because our bodies cannot synthesize them. There are different types of fats namely; monounsaturated, polyunsaturated and saturated.

Monounsaturated Fatty Acids (MUFAs) – examples are: nuts, seeds, avocados, vegetable oil. Liquid at room temperature, these are said to reduce the risk of chronic disease, taste delicious and help us feel full for longer.

Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids (PUFAs) – Also liquid at room temperature, within this group of fats are omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids. These are considered essential to our diet because our bodies cannot synthesize them.

There are 3 main types of Omega 3:

· EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid)

· DHA (docosahexaenoic acid)

· ALA (alpha-linolenic acid)

Omega 3s help reduce inflammation, support heart health, can reduce symptoms of depression and the risk of cancer.

Omega 3 EPAs and DHAs – examples are: salmon, mackerel, tuna, anchovies.

Omega 3 ALAs – examples are: chia seeds, walnuts, chickens eggs (from chickens who have had an omega 3 rich diet), edamame beans, avocados and oatmeal.

Omega 6 – examples are: soy, corn, safflower and sunflower oil, nuts and seeds. meat, poultry, fish and eggs.

Western diets are said to be too high in omega 6 and too low in omega 3 and this promotes inflammation and chronic disease.

Saturated Fats – examples are: fatty meat, lard, dairy, palm, coconut and cocoa oils (tropical oils).

These are normally solid at room temperature. Too much saturated fat is generally associated with obesity and heart disease, whatever kind of diet you are on. It is generally recommended that our diet is made up of about 10% saturated fat.

Coconut oil stands out in this category as a plant-based saturated fat that is a great source of lauric acid, unlike its animal-based counterparts. This has beneficial antibacterial, antifungal and some cholesterol-lowering properties. It also contains MCTs (multi chain triglycerides) and studies now show that these can increase the number of calories your body burns. However, the MCTs in coconut oil only make up 14% of it and the studies were only on the MCTs and not coconut oil as a whole. In fact there is no concrete evidence to indicate that coconut oil will increase the amount of energy you expend. However, despite being high in calories, it is widely considered to be a healthy saturated fat to consume in moderation.

Trans Fats – examples are: processed baked goods, margarine, fried foods, frozen foods.

It is now well documented that trans fats cause inflammation in the body and should be avoided where possible. These are banned in Austria, Denmark, Switzerland and some States in the US; namely New York and California. Currently in the UK there is no such ruling. The Government prefer to allow food companies to reduce their trans fat content on a voluntary basis.

What is the deal on fat? How can we eat fat, thrive, nourish ourselves, prevent chronic disease and even lose weight?

You can see that some fats can be enjoyed in moderation or even abundance, while others can do a lot of harm, even in relatively small amounts. It is also important to note that some fats, such as extra virgin olive oil, change state when cooked at high temperatures and can give off toxic fumes which are harmful if breathed in. Coconut and avocado oils both have higher smoking points than most oils, making them excellent and healthy for shallow frying and roasting. As a rule of thumb, any oils that are pale yellow and industrially produced will be high in omega 6 and therefore are likely to cause inflammation. High oleic sunflower oil is thought to provide some benefits for heart health. However, sunflower oil has been shown to release toxic compounds when heated to higher temperatures over time. Some varieties are also high in omega-6 and may contribute to inflammation in the body when consumed in excess. Oils such as cold-pressed extra virgin olive oils, cold-pressed rapeseed oils, walnut oils are all wonderful for drizzling on vegetables and salads and all have great health benefits.

What about fat helping us lose weight though?

The first thing to understand is that sugar is generally the thing that is making most of us fat through insulin resistance. Low-fat diets often don’t make you feel full or satisfied and tend make you eat more starch and sugar. This leads to an increase in the type of cholesterol that causes heart attacks. Contrary to what you may believe, saturated fat is not bad for us. There is in fact no correlation between saturated fat and heart disease. It is however important to eat good quality saturated fat, such as grass-fed, organic beef, or coconut oil, as opposed to the type you get in fast food or bacon and sausages.

Yes, some fats are “bad” or unhealthy, such as trans fats and inflammatory vegetable oils. We should keep consumption of those to a minimum to avoid weight gain and disease. However, we can all benefit from eating more omega 3 fats such as, wild, sustainably caught fish, more omega 3 eggs, chia seeds and walnuts.

Eating “good” quality fats will help your body to build healthy cell walls that metabolise insulin better. This leads to better blood sugar regulation which in turn helps to curb hunger, increase fat burning and decrease fat storage. Therefore, eating the right fats helps you lose or sustain a health weight while eating too much sugar and the wrong type of fats will make you gain weight.

Our brains are made up of about 60% fat and the biggest portion of that is made up of the omega 3 fat called DHA (docosahexaenoic acid, noted above). They need DHA to spark communication between the cells and apparently high quality, fat boosts cognition, happiness, learning and memory. Studies even link depression, bipolar disorder, anxiety and schizophrenia to a deficiency in omega 3 fats.

Our amazing bodies give us signs as to whether or not we are getting enough good quality fat because, as previously mentioned, the body uses the fat you eat to build cell walls. The following conditions could be a sign for you: dry, itchy, scaling or flaking skin, soft, cracked or brittle nails, hard earwax, tiny bumps on the backs of your arms or torso and achy, stiff joints.

It’s a win-win!

If you eat the right “good” fats then you can improve your mood, skin, hair and nails as well as protect yourself against type 2 diabetes, dementia and cancer.

For optimum health, wellness and to fight against chronic diseases, make sure you try and include the following foods regularly in your diet:

Avocados, nuts, including walnuts, pecans, almonds, macadamia, (but not peanuts*), pumpkin, chia, hemp, sesame seeds, fatty fish such as mackerel, herring, sardines and wild salmon, extra virgin olive oil, grass fed and sustainably raised animal products and extra virgin coconut butter and oil.

*Peanuts contain more omega 6 fats than any other nuts and they also tend to be colonised by a mould called aspergillus which can cause cancer.

Sources: “Eat Fat Get Thin”, Dr Mark Hyman, www.drmarkhyman.com, www.healthline.com, https://www.euractiv.com/section/agriculture-food/news/eu-curbs-trans-fats-from-2021-to-boost-heart-health/