US FDA Moves To Ban Trans Fat

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US FDA Moves To Ban Trans Fat

Posted by timothy on Thursday November 7, 2013 @08:25AM from the for-your-own-good-ad-infinitum dept.

UnknowingFool writes "Citing growing health concerns about trans fat, the FDA today proposed measures to eliminate it from the U.S. food supply. While trans fat can still be used, the new measures now place the burden on food processors to justify the inclusion of it in a food product as experts have maintained that there is no safe level of consumption and no health benefits. Since 2006, the amount of trans fat eaten by the average American has declined from 4.5g per serving to less than 1g as restaurants and the food industry have reduced their use of it. There will be a 60-day public comment period for the new proposal."

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Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by intermodal · 2013-11-07 08:30 · Score: 5, Informative

TFA is more specific than the brief above describes.

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1. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by clarkkent09 · 2013-11-07 09:20 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Per TFA the levels of trans fatty acids in the USA population has declined by 58% in 9 years (2009 data, probably lower still now) and per this article the use of trans fats by the food industry has declined by 73%. Just about all restaurant chains and most packaged food producers have already removed trans fats from their products.
  Sounds like an emergency situation that requires an immediate government ban. Or perhaps, the bureaucrats at the FDA were bored and the dart landed on trans fats as the thing to ban today?
  
  --
  Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
2. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by h4rr4r · 2013-11-07 09:26 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Most people choose to consume those. Very few people consciously choose to consume transfat. That stuff is purely used to save the producer money.
3. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by jedidiah · 2013-11-07 09:29 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Yes. It's "government to the rescue" after the free market has already sorted things out already. Just enforce sane and useful labeling but otherwise butt the f*ck out.
  
  --
  A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
4. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by buswolley · 2013-11-07 09:39 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  Small amounts of transfats can cause a large amount of health risk. Current rules allow food makers to say there is 0.0 grams of transfat per serving if there is less than .5 g transfat preserving. Unfortunately, a diet of 1 or 2 grams transfat daily is associated with all sorts of bad things, and you can easily rack it up by eating a couple servings of foods labeled 0.0 grams transfat. Transfat should be labeled in mg, not g, and reported with at least a precision of 0.1 g.
  
  --
  A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
5. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by buswolley · 2013-11-07 09:41 · Score: 2
  
  Mabe not ban it, but at least accurately report the amount in the food on the label. e.g. http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Diet/trans-fat-information-food-labels-deceptive-researcher/story?id=12515022
  
  --
  A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
6. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by Bacon+Bits · 2013-11-07 10:07 · Score: 2
  
  I agree, foods with trans fats should be sold 6am to 2am Monday through Saturday only to those persons who can prove they are 21 years of age or older. It should be a crime punishable by a fine to the store and the individual employee responsible for the sale, and stores should be required to purchase licenses in order to be able to sell trans fats.
  
  --
  The road to tyranny has always been paved with claims of necessity.
7. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by micahraleigh · 2013-11-07 10:22 · Score: 2
  
  And if it costs more money to produce it, the consumers don't get charged higher prices?
8. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by drinkypoo · 2013-11-07 11:10 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Most people choose to consume those. Very few people consciously choose to consume transfat. That stuff is purely used to save the producer money.
  Almost. It's also used to make the producer of the transfat money, not just save money for the restaurant or prepared food processor who uses it. Most of that stuff is soy or canola, both of which are GMO (specifically Monsanto) and massively subsidized. But they produce so much as a result that they have trouble finding places for all of it to go. One place for the excess soy to go in particular is into oil, but as a high-acid oil it doesn't keep very well. Hydrogenating it makes it keep much longer.
  This is also why we have so many products made out of milk these days, like recaldent gum. Hormones (again, produced by Monsanto, what a coincidence!) increase milk production; anyone who doesn't use them is left behind by the competition. But the demand for milk has not kept up with the production, so in order to stay in business milk processors have found new markets for milk and milk-derived products. Meanwhile, this reduces the quality of milk consumed by the average customer; rBGH/rBST has been proven to lead to reduced quality of milk.
  Both of these are examples of corporate subsidies where a substantial portion of the profits flow to Monsanto, which has under Obama has secured itself a truly staggering number of important posts in our government... Not that it wasn't going on before him.
  
  --
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9. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by cob666 · 2013-11-07 11:46 · Score: 2
  
  And one of the biggest problems with that is that if a food has .6 g transfat per 6 oz service, the package is modified to state the serving size is now 4 oz. The transfat is now .4 g per serving so they get to put 0 g transfat per serving on the package.
  
  I agree that the nutritional information should require transfat be declared in tenth of a gram precision to close up that loophole.
  
  --
  Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law - Aleister Crowley
10. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by benhattman · 2013-11-07 12:14 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Sounds like a reasonable situation to ban a toxin that the majority of producers have proven is unnecessary to provide their goods and services.
  Lead paint is still banned, even though essentially nobody last year used it to paint their home. And, that's a good thing.
11. Re:Artificial trans fat, not just trans fat. by Miamicanes · 2013-11-07 13:23 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  As much as I hate to admit it, you're probably right. It's like food manufacturers have been taking lessons from Linksys and Netgear (release a kick-ass product with top-notch components, rack up 5-star reviews, then quietly replace it with an inferior and crippled second version so you can rake in the sales for a few months before people catch on and start neutralizing the early 5-star reviews with angry 1-star reviews).
  Example: ConAgra replacing HFCS with sugar in Hunt's ketchup, advertising it heavily for a few months, then quietly eliminating the proclamation from the label, ceasing the ads, coasting for another year and a half, then quietly replacing the sugar with HFCS & hoping nobody will notice. http://consumerist.com/2013/01/30/hunts-manages-to-sneak-high-fructose-corn-syrup-back-into-its-ketchup-after-2-years-without/
Is it working? by stewsters · 2013-11-07 08:30 · Score: 2

Since 2006, the amount of trans far eaten by the average American has declined from 4.5g per serving to less than 1g
Are we thinner yet?
1. Re:Is it working? by iONiUM · 2013-11-07 08:33 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  That's not the point of removing trans fats. Rather (from the wikipedia article) "In humans, consumption of trans fats increases the risk of coronary heart disease[2][3] by raising levels of the protein LDL (so-called "bad cholesterol") and lowering levels of the protein HDL ("good cholesterol")."
  Should we not ban something that is directly linked to an increased risk in heart disease? I suppose smoking is also directly linked, but not banned, so I leave that debate up to everyone who isn't me.
2. Re:Is it working? by CanHasDIY · 2013-11-07 08:41 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Should we not ban something that is directly linked to an increased risk in heart disease?
  In a supposedly free country? No, of course we shouldn't ban it.
  Mandate that any product containing trans fat be labeled as such, and with appropriate health warnings (like they do on tobacco products), but outright bans of things we can only use to harm ourselves is anathema to liberty.
  
  --
  An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
3. Re:Is it working? by Anonymous Coward · 2013-11-07 08:41 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Trans fat is about heart disease.
  If you want to attack obesity aim for sugar. If you want to loose weight just take whatever sugar intake you are doing and cut it to 1/3rd.
  This does affect some of the snack foods we eat today. Including movie theater popcorn, and microwave popcorn. Because of the high shelf life. Many have already moved away from trans fat with the last size reduction.
  The real affect will be food with a shorter shelf life and per dollar higher cost.
4. Re:Is it working? by iONiUM · 2013-11-07 08:45 · Score: 2
  
  While I agree with liberty first and foremost, transfats are an artificial creation used to save money regardless of health risks. No consumer, if properly educated, would ever choose to eat transfats because they "taste better", or something like this. They don't. There's no advantage, to the consumer to eat them.
  So, attempting to bring in liberty to this argument I think is an overreaction, which is why I didn't really want to relate smoking to it (as smoking does "have" a reason why people do it: they enjoy it), and it also isn't in a lot of foods as a "hidden" ingredient that is simply there to replace something else that is not dangerous in order to save the manufacturer money.
5. Re:Is it working? by TechyImmigrant · 2013-11-07 08:47 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  The Wiki article and TFA are wrong.
  LDL is not the 'cause' of heart disease. It never was. Damage to cells is the cause. Trans fats damage cell which mistake them for saturated fats. Oxidative stress is another mechanism.
  LDL raises because it is being generated to transport materials to the sites of damage for repair. Persistent raised LDL is a sign of persistent damage, from things like oxidation, glycation and excess exposure to Miley Cyrus. LDL raising is a response to cellular damage, not a cause. This is why LDL suppressing statins have failed spectacularly to improve human health even while it reduces LDL.
  
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  I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
6. Re:Is it working? by jythie · 2013-11-07 08:48 · Score: 2
  
  One rather specific reason the two are different is industry has any number of drop-in replacements for trans fat, while smoking is a rather unique experience. Artificial trans fats are really more of a manufacturing process then anything else, a way to produce cheap fats for adding to processed foods. They could just as easily add other fat sources and produce something nearly identical in terms of taste and texture but at a marginally higher cost.
7. Re:Is it working? by realityimpaired · 2013-11-07 08:50 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  The original theory, as promoted by the same health nuts that are trying to get it banned now, is that because your body can't digest it, it was better than consuming actual fat. It came out of the "fat = bad, carbs = good" mentality from the 70's, 80's, and 90's. That mantra was repeated so much that today it's heresy to even suggest that fat is actually good for you, even though carbs, and the associated insulin response, have been linked with increased risk of heart disease.
8. Re:Is it working? by jythie · 2013-11-07 08:52 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  They have a somewhat longer shelf life, but other then that, no, they are simply cheap to manufacture with.
  
  On the more general topic of 'but we are a free country', while the future is difficult to predict, a trans fat ban could very well result in greater consumer choice rather then less. Right now there is an industry race to the bottom, everyone uses trans fats because any company that does not will have marginally higher prices which would hurt the company. As long as ANY company is using them, they all have to in order to be competitive. Consumers do not want the stuff, they just want a slightly lower cost the the box sitting next to whatever it is.
  
  Part of the problem is that right now consumer demand is not the dominant factor in choosing which fat source to use. By removing one option that puts the power back on consumers to demand any particular source they want, or no particular source. For the moment, we have surprisingly little choice. And half the equation in freedom is having choices in the first place.
9. Re:Is it working? by Charliemopps · 2013-11-07 09:20 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  Uh... Transfats cause Heart disease. Not that I like government regulation, but all they are doing here is making a distinction that man made transfats are NOT food, they are an additive. Which is a fact.
10. Re:Is it working? by Atzanteol · 2013-11-07 09:27 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  So then I would take it that you are in favor of making marijuana (and other drugs) legal?
  Marijuana, which is no more a drug than anything in my spice rack, yes.
  Actual drugs, aka meth, coke, pharmaceuticals... yes, but in a highly regulated environment.
  Why not "just label them?" If it's good enough for trans fats why not others? FREEDOM and all...
  
  --
  "Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
  
  - Charles Darwin
11. Re:Is it working? by niado · 2013-11-07 10:11 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  In a supposedly free country? No, of course we shouldn't ban it.
  Mandate that any product containing trans fat be labeled as such, and with appropriate health warnings (like they do on tobacco products), but outright bans of things we can only use to harm ourselves is anathema to liberty.
  Why do people flip out about these basic tenets of modern civilization? Sorry, most people don't want poison to be sold as food. Go ahead and sell transfats all you want, but don't tell people it's food when it is most certainly not food.
  
  At this point, transfats seem to be harmful food adulterants. Food companies are already banned from putting terrible shit into our food. If you're calling it food, it better be composed primarily of food, not poison. This is not some huge encroachment on the liberty of Americans.
  
  How about we go ahead and ban the transfats (like other things that seem like they might be poison) from the general food supply so nobody accidentally eats it, and then everyone who wants to eat the stuff can get some and put it into their food themselves. I feel this latter group would be a significant minority of the population.
  
  Similar to rat poison, which food producers are not allowed to include in food, but you can buy from the store yourself and put into your own food if you like. This is comparable to the current situation with tobacco products.
12. Re:Is it working? by losfromla · 2013-11-07 10:12 · Score: 2
  
  My mom can't read the labels, the writing is too small. She also doesn't remember to check labels and sometimes buys things like "Orange Juice drink" not realizing it wasn't orange juice. Garlic that comes from China, because the "from China" label is written in a tiny font. Bans would be good, otherwise a bold message in the front stating that the product contains unnatural additives known to cause heart disease etc. The messages should have the largest font of the package with a non-obscuring background, the font should be no smaller than the largest writing on the package including logos.
  
  --
  Only I can judge you.
13. Re:Is it working? by realityimpaired · 2013-11-07 10:15 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  You don't get to call others "nuts" when you promote LCHF diets which are unproven to be safe and totally unnatural.
  I can suggest a few documentaries for you if you like... to begin with, Fat Head... it was still on Netflix last time I checked it, and most of the actual medical sources I could cite are in his bibliography.
  
  Carbs are the energy we use, don't blame others if you eat more than you use up.
  Hoo-boy... not that I really wanted to get pulled into this particular argument, but I may as well ---
  1 - Carbs are *not* the energy we use... at least, not carbs as presented in foods. Yes, glucose, which is what we actually use, is a complex carbohydrate, but most of the carbs you eat are in a different form. At its most basic, sucrose, but the majority of the carbs you consume are actually fibres and starches. Your body has to expend energy to convert these to the glucose your muscles and organs can actually use, which is the same thing it does to proteins and fats. The difference is that carbs have a much higher glycemic index, meaning that it takes less energy to be converted to glucose, and it happens faster than it does with fats or proteins.
  2 - Consuming something with a high glycemic index triggers a sudden increase in blood glucose levels, which triggers insulin. Insulin regulates the glucose level by causing fat cells to start storing energy.
  3 - Fats have amino acids and other nutrients in them that carbs don't, and which your body needs to survive.. The reason they tend to be "worse" is because they tend to be much more calorie dense than carbs, but that's not always the case. In short, you can consume more volume of carbs than you can fats in order to get the same number of calories.
  4 - Overeating and lack of exercise is the main reason people are overweight, but it's not as simple as a calculation between calories in and calories out. If you take the straight calories in/calories out calculation, you'll find that almost nobody loses weight as quickly as the numbers say they're supposed to, because of many different factors, including the body tricking itself into starvation mode. Sometimes, you will actually lose weight faster by increasing your calorie input, and increasing the amount of exercise you get.
  5 - BMI is a bullshit calculation. It was originally intended to track population trends among French farmers, 200 years ago. In the intervening years, nutrition has improved significantly, and with that, peoples' general average weight has gone up. Quite aside from that, something intended to track population trends should *never* be used as a measure of an individual's health. It's possible to be in the "ideal" bracket according to BMI and be extremely unhealthy, and it's possible to be in the "obese" bracket according to BMI, and be in perfect health.
  6 - Low carb-high fat was the prevailing wisdom in the 70's, before the US FDA's food guide came out. The above-linked documentary has a very good discussion of how the food guide we know today came about, but in brief, it was a fad diet promoted by a doctor in the 50's. In the 70's when the food guide came out, it was mostly a political decision, and the fad diet was used as justification for a food guide that was mostly intended to promote American grain and corn farmers, who were a very major lobbying body. It's worth noting that fat has certain amino acids in it that don't exist in carbs which the brain requires to function properly, and the doctor who came up with the fad diet in question ended up committing suicide due to depression. That aside, however, the committee in the 70's that came up with the food guide went through hundreds of doctors before they came up with one who would say what they wanted them to say -- most of the doctors at the time thought high carb/low fat was an idiotic idea.
  7 - Perhaps the most damning, the current obesity epidemic started just a couple of years after they changed the
14. Re:Is it working? by slew · 2013-11-07 10:29 · Score: 2
  
  Substitutions for trans-fat in the commercial food industry isn't really a cost of materials issue. The change in the cost of materials is likely to be marginal. The primarly reason trans-fat is used is to increase shelf-life of products (polyunsaturated oils in food go rancid really quick) which means most change-outs will affect the distribution chain and the cost of distribution.
  Say if a snack product is delivered weekly to market now, it might have to be delivered twice a week in smaller batches. Packaging sizes might also need to go down (as products will go rancid more quickly than before). These infrastructure and distribution changes are much higher and more distruptive and costly than simply the price of the ingredients.
  It also isn't clear that the drop-in substitutes are significantly better. For example, using naturally saturated fats (e.g. palm oil) or animal fats would likely result in similar cardiovascular disease profile and more product variance. The new industrial processes to avoid trans-fat (e.g., modified hydrogenation, interesterification) may just be rolling the dice because in the end, they may be just as bad as trans-fat. Of course, many are not fans of the GMO seeds that are engineered to not produce polyunsaturated oils. On top of that, none yet have the shelf-life as long as the trans-fat versions.
  What most large companies are doing now is to fractionate and blend various vegetable oils to create zero-polyunsaturated products that happen to work reasonably well for a specific cooking process. That isn't a cheap development, and it isn't a drop-in replacement that can be used industry wide (which is why only the mega-corps are doing this now).
What about natural trans fat? by TechyImmigrant · 2013-11-07 08:34 · Score: 3, Informative

Trans fats appear naturally in small amounts in things like cream.
Cream, being mostly saturated, zero carb and choc full of fat soluble vitamins is a very healthy food.
There is plenty of reasonable hypothesis that the small amount of trans fats in milkfat has a hormetic effect. It is the bulk trans fats in engineered foods that is toxic.

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1. Re:What about natural trans fat? by 0racle · 2013-11-07 08:38 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  You could at least read the first line of the FA.
  
  --
  "I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
2. Re:What about natural trans fat? by SJHillman · 2013-11-07 08:38 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  "The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday proposed measures that would all but eliminate artificial trans fats, the artery clogging substance that is a major contributor to heart disease in the United States, from the food supply."
  Keyword: artificial. But because that wasn't enough, the article goes on to say:
  "Some trans fats occur naturally. The F.D.A. proposal only applies to those that are added to foods."
3. Re:What about natural trans fat? by sjames · 2013-11-07 09:34 · Score: 2
  
  What is actually being banned is partially hydrogenated vegetable oil, the source of artificial trans fats.
  For that matter, it's not an outright ban (though it likely amounts to one), just stripping it of it's status of Generally Recognized As Safe (since it is nothing of the sort).
HFC would be a better start by sputnikid · 2013-11-07 08:36 · Score: 4, Insightful

Why not targeting high fructose corn syrup instead?
It is far more harmful and sugar is a better (albeit pricier) replacement.
1. Re:HFC would be a better start by EmperorArthur · 2013-11-07 08:43 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Why not targeting high fructose corn syrup instead?
  It is far more harmful and sugar is a better (albeit pricier) replacement.
  The reason is right in the name. Corn is a major part of the US agriculture industry. Do you know how much lobbying power they have?
  
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2. Re:HFC would be a better start by SJHillman · 2013-11-07 08:47 · Score: 2
  
  Every anti-HFCS study I've ever seen just concludes that too much of it is bad, but it's generally no worse than too much sugar. The only difference is HFCS is used more, so it's more likely to be the cause of obesity or other sugar-related maladies.
  Bad car analogy: Toyotas cause more crashes than Bugattis. It doesn't necessarily mean that Bugattis are safer, it just means there's more Toyotas to cause crashes. (It actually means zilch in the argument over which is safer).
3. Re:HFC would be a better start by rubycodez · 2013-11-07 09:03 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17441692.2012.736257?journalCode=rgph20#.Unv_7406LCQ
  There is a reason other countries outright ban or have quotas for that vile dangerous sweetener
4. Re:HFC would be a better start by NoImNotNineVolt · 2013-11-07 09:05 · Score: 2
  
  Sugar used to be cheap. It hasn't been for quite some time. Why?
  
  Because we insist on holding a grudge against the Cuban people.
  
  --
  Chuuch. Preach. Tabernacle.
5. Re:HFC would be a better start by Obfuscant · 2013-11-07 10:09 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Once sucrose is cleaved in to fructose and glucose a few ms after hitting the stomach,
  Wrong.
  
  there is no chemical difference between HFCS and Sucrose.
  Wrong again. HFCS is high-fructose corn syrup. The ratio of fructose to glucose is higher in HFCS than in sucrose. That's why it is called "high fructose".
  The problem with HFCS is that it first bypasses the metabolic pathway that sucrose must go through, thereby creating a rush as the simple sugars are directly absorbed by the blood. Second, it puts a stress on the liver where fructose is metabolized, which causes more fructose to be converted to storage forms since there is more available at one time than can be used. The rush of glucose also stresses the glucose regulatory systems and can lead to diabetes and near-diabetes.
  Gary Taubes has dealt with the "HFCS is just sugar" myth in his books. He points out that the common factor in aboriginal peoples who adopt a western diet and earn an obesity epidemic with it is the use of HFCS and other processed carbs. They eat fats and sugars in their natural diet and do fine. It's when they pick up the HFCS and white bread that they start to bulk up.
  This stuff about HFCS being just like sugar is marketing hype by the people who make HFCS products, aimed at people who are ignorant of the metabolism of sugars. "HFCS is just like sugar" is about as true as saying "drinking from a firehose is the same as sipping a glass of water through a straw."
6. Re:HFC would be a better start by demonlapin · 2013-11-07 11:34 · Score: 2
  
  HFCS is no worse than sucrose. But sucrose isn't harmless.
7. Re:HFC would be a better start by Obfuscant · 2013-11-07 11:59 · Score: 2
  
  The cleaving happens in the brush border. The brush border is on the inside of your stomach.
  
  Wrong. From the link I provided: "Hydrolytic cleavage of sucrose, like that of of maltose, occurs in the brush border at the surface of the intestinal epithelial cells." The intestinal epithelial cells are not in the stomach. Not "ms" in the stomach.
  
  Taubes rightly points to examples of peoples (like the Pima) who's health turned to shit after they were displaced and were given grains in place of a hunter gatherer lifestyle. HFCS didn't even exist back then.
  That's why I said "the use of HFCS and other processed carbs." White bread.
  
  No one has produced evidence that the 4-5% different in ratio makes any difference in the metabolic response.
  If you read the link I already provided, you'll see the evidence. "Both sugars are then taken up by specific transport: Glucose by the SGLT1 transporter, and fructose by the GLUT5 transporter, which is named after glucose but in fact is more active on fructose than on glucose." Different uptake mechanisms. "Fructose degradation , sometimes called fructolysis, is carried out in the liver." Different metabolic processing. "Fructose and sucrose appear to promote obesity more strongly than equivalent amounts of starch or glucose;". Different result.
Debate over by Anonymous Coward · 2013-11-07 08:38 · Score: 5, Insightful

Smoking = tax money
Trans fats = no tax money
Debate over.
1. Re:Debate over by h4rr4r · 2013-11-07 09:11 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Smoking = conscious choice
  trans fats = hidden in all kinds of stuff, even products that claim 0 trans fat* then in very small text "per serving". Restaurant food is even worse in that you never know if it contains it or not.
2. Re:Debate over by h4rr4r · 2013-11-07 09:33 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  She would not know, she did not make it.
  I am not a vegetarian, but I have days where I do not eat meat. I have ordered items that I was assured were vegetarian and turned out not to be. If the waitress did not notice the ground beef in the 3 bean soup what are the odds she knows if trans fat is in the fries?
Vegans need it by Anonymous Coward · 2013-11-07 08:43 · Score: 5, Interesting

Vegans have diets that are so low in the LDL (bad) cholesterol that they can be too low. It turns out that you need some LDL cholesterol, or you bleed to death. It is only "bad" when you have too much of it.
Humans can produce their own LDL, but for some people that is not enough and they need dietary LDL. Partially-hydrogenated oils provide that need without requiring a vegan to eat any animal products.
Vegetarians who eat milk, eggs, or fish don't have this problem. But vegans do.
Of course, it is also true that a lot MORE people are dying of heart disease because of too much LDL than are dying of anything because of too little, so I think this battle is up a very steep hill.
1. Re:Vegans need it by ShanghaiBill · 2013-11-07 09:22 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Partially-hydrogenated oils provide that need
  PHVO is NOT cholesterol, and contains no cholesterol. It may cause your body to retain cholesterol, but if your body is unable to make cholesterol, then there is nothing to retain. I am very skeptical of your claim that anybody, including vegans, needs trans-fat. Can you provide a reference to a source? If I google for "vegan" plus "cholesterol", all I see are articles saying that vegans can still have high cholesterol despite their diet.
  Even if there are a few rare people that are both vegans and unable to make enough of their own cholesterol, that is hardly a justification to allow this synthetically produced artery-clogging gunk into our normal food supply.
2. Re:Vegans need it by intermodal · 2013-11-07 09:45 · Score: 2
  
  TFA describes the potential classification as similar to caffeine and salt, so I'm not too worried about that. Most of the vegans I know do most of their own cooking, and considering you can buy salt in gigantic bags or large boxes/cardboard cans, I think they'll be fine. The implication of the article seemed to be that it would mostly affect restaurants and processed/prepared food products, though it never actually stated this explicitly.
  
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  In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
3. Re:Vegans need it by Anonymous Coward · 2013-11-07 10:01 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  LDL is not found in the diet. LDL particles are carriers for fat and cholesterol in the blood. They are made in the liver as a way to transport fat and, especially, cholesterol to the rest of the body. HDL particles (considered the "good cholesterol") are synthesized in the peripheral tissues to carry cholesterol back to the liver. Again, neither LDL nor HDL (nor VLDL, for that matter) come from the diet. They are all synthesized by our organs.
  Cholesterol does come from the diet, but a large amount, about 75% according to the googles, is made in the liver. In fact, decreasing dietary cholesterol intake leads to an increase in production by the liver.
  There is no known minimally required level of LDL for health. People who carry mutations in both copies of the PCSK9 gene contain no detectable levels of serum LDL and are healthy with very low levels of heart disease.
  Partially-hydrogenated fatty acids are completely different molecules from cholesterol. No one needs to eat any partially-hydrogenated oils, vegan or not. Cholesterol, on the other hand, is required by the body, but since the liver can make as much as you need, I doubt that there is any requirement for dietary cholesterol.
  tl;dr: Vegans don't need it.
4. Re:Vegans need it by TechyImmigrant · 2013-11-07 11:30 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  >There is no known minimally required level of LDL for health. People who carry mutations in both copies of the PCSK9 gene contain no detectable levels of serum LDL and are healthy with very low levels of heart disease.
  Where did you get that from? People with no LDL are dead.
  People who have the type of mutation on PCSK9 to enhance LDL receptor activity on cell surfaces enjoy greatly reduced rates of heart disease because there's less LDL running around in the blood (it's being more efficiently taken up by cells) and so less serum LDL => less LDL oxidation => less bad stuff. But the notion that there is none is flat out wrong. The same amount of LDL is reaching the cells, it's just taking less time to get there.
  The numbers are given in the second entry in a google search for PCSK9 mutations. 35% difference in takeup. Not 100% as your wrong statement implies.
  
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  I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
5. Re:Vegans need it by bfandreas · 2013-11-07 21:16 · Score: 2
  
  While I too am not a fan of government bans I have to say that relying on consumer choice for them to get something as basic nutrition right is beyond naive. While vegans truly must come from another star system the mainstream is not any better.
  
  To my European taste the US food is not edible. Everything is far, far too sweet. Setting aside the madness that is HFCS most of the processed foods are frankly disgusting. Why there needs to be so much sweetener in bread, ketchup, peanutbutter, stuff that doesn't need to be sweet is beyond me. And the sweets are so sweet you feel like your mouth is being pickled with sugar.
  
  This, too, is a problem in Europe. But in the US you can detect it with a minimum of functional taste buds.
  
  I think the story you can take away from TFA is that you shouldn't buy processed food. Anywhere. Problem is, it tends to be dirt cheap.
  
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  20 minutes into the future
Re:Further down that slippery slope... by epyT-R · 2013-11-07 09:15 · Score: 2

Well informing is not the same as banning. I don't mind the former, but the latter encourages a nasty anti-liberty path. There's a huge list of foods and foodstuffs the leftists would love to ban and/or ultratax. I don't want these soccer mom associations deciding limits on my freedom. As long as the packages are clearly marked, I can make my own decisions.
Re:Further down that slippery slope... by WaffleMonster · 2013-11-07 09:19 · Score: 3, Insightful

.5/g per serving of Trans-fats will not hurt you. Silly point.
There is no basis for such conclusions without first knowing how many "servings" would normally be consumed.
Serving size is completely arbitrary some have been intentionally reduced to avoid having to put a number other than 0 in the trans fat column.
This has the effect of the consumer being lied to about the nutrition of the shit their eating.
Re:Trans Fat Pudding by jandrese · 2013-11-07 09:21 · Score: 2

Ironically, Transfats were originally developed as a healthier alternative to saturated fats like Butter, Lard, Tallow, etc...

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I read the internet for the articles.
Re:Why not just tax it instead? by chill · 2013-11-07 09:43 · Score: 2

Tobacco products are something used directly by consumers, they aren't an ingredient. People buy cigarettes, etc. specifically.
Artificial trans-fat is not something consumers purchase and use. It is an ingredient in other food items where it is frequently hidden.
Thus, it is not necessarily an informed choice, like tobacco products.

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Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Re:Trans Fat Pudding by FlyHelicopters · 2013-11-07 09:46 · Score: 2

Yes, but what we've learned since then is that butter is actually better for you than margarine is...
Butter is a real food, margarine is just a manufactured food.
Frankly, most of the frankenfoods that the food industry makes today are crap, go back to eating real food and get healthy.
The only issue with butter is the amount you eat. Just keep it within a reasonable level and it is fine. Reminds me of when eggs were "evil" about 20 years ago, and egg whites became all the rage.
My wife eats 3 eggs a day, every day, she is 40 years old and recently had her cholesterol checked (for a life insurance policy), her levels were well below average because as a rule, she doesn't eat crap in a box, she eats real food.