By Richard Tardif
Today’s obesity epidemic began in the 1950s when we were told to avoid eating fat, after it was hypothesized by Dr. Ancel Keys that dietary saturated fat is linked to the climbing rates of heart disease and should be avoided, and we should increase our carbohydrates instead, if we were to win the war on heart disease.
The hypothesis proved futile and should have been shelved as misleading but Keys persuaded governments and health agencies to prop up the hypothesis as fact and warned us to eat less fat. Doctors began recommending that we swap out saturated fats in foods like butter and eggs for polyunsaturated fat mainly found in packaged products. We did eat less fat.
Fat consumption in the early 1960s was estimated to be about 40 percent of total calories when Canadians were encouraged to reduce its consumption to prevent the rates of heart disease. By 2004, fat consumption accounted for 31 percent of total daily calories, and we were ready to declare victory in the war on heart disease.
In the meantime, “fake” food companies had just about everyone hooked on a low-fat, low-source, little-fat, reduced-fat, fat-free, no-fat, zero-fat, unloved fat bandwagon. The message was, “go ahead and carb it up” and “fat is the Bogeyman”. The quality of what we turned to for our health was less than optimal and mainly refined sugar, gushing insulin from our overworked pancreas, leading to an array of chronic health issues, including insulin resistance, a condition leading to type 2 Diabetes. Even Canada’s Food Pyramid in 1982 was recommending three to five servings of refined foods a day (bread and cereals).
The result? Obesity rates in Canada have doubled for adults and tripled for children over this timeframe, and while researchers, diet gurus and six-pack know-it-all trainers go on debating, the increase in rates of obesity and type 2 diabetes continues.
Not to be too harsh, but Canadians were getting fatter, not thinner, based on the less-fat, more-carbs theory and heart disease is on the rise. One can surmise, the obesity problem began to develop after the introduction of nutritional guidelines recommending eating higher levels of carbs in the 50s, while eating lower levels of fat – and they’d be right. Today, 60 percent of Canadians are overweight or obese, and nine out of 10 Canadians have at least one risk factor for heart disease.
Is butter back? Eat more bacon? Eat fewer carbs now? Has the Bogeyman left the building? Yes, and no! Embrace this!
Obesity is a complicated issue, one that can’t be dealt with by chugging shakes and scarfing supplements, or only eating dietary fat while shunning anything carbohydrate; nor is running half-marathons every weekend believing it will lead to fat loss, and soothing the inevitable injuries with marketed superfoods or medicines the answer to our obesity epidemic.
Nor is the body a simple mathematical model fixed to calories in, calories out assumptions, nor is a calorie is a calorie, is a calorie model: dare you to compare the quality calorie content of an apple to, let’s say, a deep-fried Twinkie (37 ingredients, six different names for sugar, trans fat, and artificial flavourings) and then burn it all off at the local gym, because exercise without quality nutrition does not matter when it comes to fat loss.
We need quality foods. You can’t have your cake and eat it, too.
Richard Tardif is one of those know-it-all personal fitness trainers, life coach, an award-winning health journalist and author writing about health and wellness for over 20 years. Stop the Denial: A Case for Embracing the Truth about Fitness, published by Smiling Eye Press, is his debut book. Email at richard@richardtardif.com
This information is solely for informational purposes. IT IS NOT INTENDED TO PROVIDE MEDICAL ADVICE. Neither the author or Smiling Eye Press take responsibility for any possible consequences from any treatment, procedure, exercise, dietary modification, action or application of medication which results from reading or following the information contained in this information. The publication of this information does not constitute the practice of medicine, nor any exercise described in this article taken without a personal trainer involved constitutes responsibility for injury, and this information does not replace the advice of your physician or other healthcare providers. Before undertaking any course of treatment or training, the reader must seek the advice of their physician or another healthcare provider.
