Think Twice

WRONG ADVICE:
It’s now OK to eat saturated fat.
THE TRUTH:
Saturated fat may still kill you.

fries
You’ve no doubt heard by now that fat is back. The fat love came from a mega study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine Journal, which never actually said saturated fat was good for you, just that it’s no worse than other foods when it comes to heart disease. Since then, separate studies have shown that saturated fat may cause insulin resistance, expression of genes related to obesity, harm to fetus stem cells and may contribute to breast and intestinal cancers.

WRONG ADVICE:
You need to do cardio or high intensity exercise to lose weight.
THE TRUTH:
The most effective exercise for losing weight is weights.

woman with weights
How often have you heard that the trick to losing weight with exercise is to get your heart rate up and get sweaty with everything from cardio to running? But a study of 10,000 men aged over 40 by the Harvard School of Public Health found that those who did weight training for 20 minutes a day gained less abdominal weight than men who increased the amount of time they spent doing aerobic exercise. Basically, more muscle mass means a higher (basal) metabolic rate.

WRONG ADVICE:
The Western diet is behind the obesity crisis and modern diseases.
THE TRUTH:
Lack of exercise is responsible for twice as many deaths as obesity.

exercise
We’ve become so used to blaming junk and processed food for everything, from obesity to cancer, that we are forgetting that a lack of physical activity may be a worse killer. A mega study of over 334,000 European men and women has found that twice as many deaths are attributable to inactivity, compared with the deaths largely due to obesity. The study found that a modest increase in physical activity could dramatically lower the death rate and deliver massive health benefits.

WRONG ADVICE:
Minimize carbs in your diet.
THE TRUTH:
Carbs are essential for good health.

pasta
The blanket condemnation of carbohydrates has accompanied the rise of fat. This horrifies not just professional nutritionists but sports and fitness coaches intimately acquainted with the benefits of carbs. Not only do carbs supply energy to the brain, but exercising muscles rely heavily on them as their main source of fuel and for protein synthesis. Experts say the main question should be what types of carbs are best, pointing out that the real problem is overconsumption of refined carbs.

WRONG ADVICE:
You must get eight hours of uninterrupted sleep a night.
THE TRUTH:
That’s only a recent thing. There are other natural types of sleep patterns.

Young woman standing outdoors, arms raised, smiling
With several studies showing that lack of sleep dramatically impacts on mental performance and health, the unrelenting advice is that you need eight hours a night of continuous sleep, i.e., a monophasic sleep schedule. But that ignores the fact that before the invention of electricity (and sleep-disrupting electric light), many slept in a biphasic pattern, i.e., in two 4-hour blocks, falling asleep soon after the sun went down and waking for a couple of hours before going back to sleep.

WRONG ADVICE:
Olive oil is dangerous when used for cooking.
THE TRUTH:
Pure olive oil is the safest to fry with. Olive oil also has massive anti-cancer properties.

olive oil

olive oil

One of the internet’s most dangerous myths is that olive oil is carcinogenic when used for cooking. But most oils produce toxic compounds when cooked at high enough temperatures. Rather, a recent German study found that pure olive oil (not virgin or extra virgin) is the most stable for deep-frying. And let’s not forget the countless studies indicating that various compounds in olive oil have anti-cancer properties.

WRONG ADVICE:
Antioxidants are essential.
THE TRUTH:
They may prevent you from getting fit.

group pushups
We’ve been hearing that antioxidants are essential for health forever. But two studies have shown that a diet rich in antioxidants actually undoes the cardiovascular benefits of exercise. Researchers from the University of Copenhagen and the Queens University in Canada found that resveratrol (an antioxidant) blunted the effects of exercise both in mice and human subjects. It seems some oxidant stress is needed for the body to repair itself correctly.

WRONG ADVICE:
You must do a certain diet to lose weight.
THE TRUTH:
It seems that eating more fiber is an easier way to lose weight.

Broccoli 4

Broccoli 4

Maybe we’ve all been barking up the wrong tree by dieting to lose weight. A US clinical trial has found that a higher intake of fiber-rich foods will help you lose weight nearly as much as a complicated diet requiring drastic calorie reduction. Study subjects who added fiber to their otherwise normal diet were able to lose weight and lower blood pressure and blood sugar levels — all without enduring the dieting pain of the other test group, who tried various common diets.

WRONG ADVICE:
Drink from BPA-free plastic bottles to avoid a variety of illnesses.
THE TRUTH:
Alternative plastics are just as bad.

water girl
This is the classic case of the “safe” replacement for a bad product turning out to be just as bad. We’ve all been told to avoid plastic drink containers containing the toxic chemical Bisphenol-A, or BPA, and to drink from bottles made with a safe alternative, Bisphenol-S, or BPS. But recent research found that even tiny doses of BPS cause developmental problems in fish embryos. It recommends that pregnant women minimize the use of plastic bottles and containers.

WRONG ADVICE:
Vitamins are a waste of time.
THE TRUTH:
They may fill nutritional gaps and improve health.

Drugs and vitamins

Drugs and vitamins

After the Annals of Internal Medicine wrote an editorial that vitamins were a waste of time, four nutrition experts from the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University hit back, saying that the journal and countless anti-vitamin advocates ignored decades of nutrition research that proved vitamins could fill nutritional gaps, improve general health and were cheap for all the potential health benefits they had.