Is The Message Scrambled

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Eggs

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By Chuck Ring (GadaboutBlogalot ©2009 – 2010)

Quote Freely From The Article – Leave The Pseudonym Alone

In, Egg on Their Faces, Steven Malanga writing for City Journal breaks the yolk of the government’s nutrition studies and the recommendations made as a result of those studies.  It is enough to cause one to slather a hamburger patty or a marbled steak all over his or her pudgy body.

Mr. Malanga’s revelations, or assertions pokes a carving knife in the government’s attack on meat  or other potentially fat protein.  Since I like food of any derivation (so far in my limited experience, at least) let’s see what Malanga has to say:

Every five years, the federal Department of Agriculture and Department of Health and Human Services revise their Dietary Guidelines for Americans, a publication that sets the direction for federal nutrition-education programs. In an age when aggressive government agencies in places like New York City seek a greater hand in shaping Americans’ diets, the next set of guidelines, published later this year, could prove more controversial than usual because increasing scientific evidence suggests that some current federal recommendations have simply been wrong. Will a public-health establishment that has been slow to admit its mistakes over the years acknowledge the new research and shift direction? Or will it stubbornly stick to its obsolete guidelines?

In his introduction above, Malanga asserts, informs and in the last sentence, asks a question most of us can answer if we look to the government’s record in dealing with such matters.  They will stick to their guns and disregard any study which disagrees with their own work … whether real work or just “make work.”  Habits in government are difficult to break and for the past three decades or more, Americans have been asked to take a detour from the greasy road of burgers, chops and other such.  But let’s see what else surfaces in Malanga’s article:

As a recent review of the latest research in Scientific American pointed out, ever since the first set of federal guidelines appeared in 1980, Americans heard that they had to reduce their intake of saturated fat by cutting back on meat and dairy products and replacing them with carbohydrates. Americans dutifully complied. Since then, obesity has increased sharply, and the progress that the country has made against heart disease has largely come from medical breakthroughs like statin drugs, which lower cholesterol, and more effective medications to control blood pressure.

It is plain (maybe) there is a small disconnect in the paragraph above.  The government never counted on “super-size me” and other such personal, some might say, “selfish indulgence” as a new American eating experience, but the experience did develop and probably had much to do with our floppy bellies and fallen arches visited upon up from the sheer weight of our dining experiences.  Anyhow, according to Mr. Malanga, harder questions are being asked by researchers:

…In an analysis of the daily food intake of some 350,000 people published in the March issue of The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, researchers at the Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute found no link between the amount of saturated fat that a person consumed and the risk of heart disease. One reason, the researchers speculate, is that saturated fat raises levels of so-called good, or HDL, cholesterol, which may offset an accompanying rise in general cholesterol. A few weeks later, researchers at Harvard released their own analysis of data from 20 studies around the world, concluding that those who eat four ounces of fresh (not processed) red meat every day face no increased risk of heart disease.

More findings or report on findings can be found in the rest of Mr. Malanga’s article.  So read the other several paragraphs and learn neither meats nor carbohydrates  are necessarily poison to our long-term health, but it is important as to type and tailoring to meet our needs.  We leave you with the last paragraph of the article:

As increasingly sophisticated medicine focuses on tailoring therapies to individual needs, sweeping public pronouncements on health have become outdated at best and dangerous at worst. The best advice that government can give citizens is to develop their own diet and exercise regimes, adapted to their own physical circumstances after consultation with their doctors.

Click on this link for more of the article and don’t forget the supplemental links provided below.  Thanks and a flap of the cap to Mr. Malanga.

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