by Andrea Culver

Created on: February 28, 2007   Last Updated: April 02, 2007

Trans Fat Free?

Like many Americans, I was blissfully unaware of the effects of my buddy, Trans Fat. It made food taste good, and supposedly helped the purveyors of foods make them cheaper with a longer shelf life. A win-win situation, right?

Wrong.

Also like many Americans, I have high blood pressure and high cholesterol. But unlike most Americans with these problems, I happen to be under the age of 30. I didn't understand why I was having problems- I had quit smoking, was watching my fat and calorie intake daily, and exercising at least four times a week. Unfortunately, every single time I had those numbers rechecked, I had the same results. The culprit? Trans fats.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not blaming the entire cholesterol OR blood pressure problem on trans fats. I've already admitted to you that I was, at one point in my life, a smoker. And the body weight? Giselle Bundchen, I ain't. However, because of a labeling glitch allowed by the FDA in the United States, I was consuming more trans fat than I really knew.

Trans fats are man made fats that are concocted by mixing hydrogen with certain types of vegetable oils. It's a process called hydrogenation, which allows these vegetable oils to stay solid at room temperature, and also keeps food from spoiling sooner. There is even a certain little amount of trans fat that seems to be a natural by-product of some animal and vegetable foods. So far, it sounds good. But the problem with trans fats is that they are extremely bad for you. They are so bad for you, in fact, that the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) doesn't even have a recommend daily allowance for it listed on packaging, and if you consult their website (www.usda.gov) regarding recommended daily allowance, they say as little as possible. Now, this whole as little as possible' thing being said, most dieticians, doctors, and scientists agree that two to two and a half grams would be an okay daily amount, depending upon your personal weight and daily caloric intake. This would amount to about 1% of your entire day's food allowances. However, by even a 2% increase in trans fats consumed daily, you would increase your risk for heart disease by 23%. Top nutritionists at Harvard believe that banning trans fats would prevent at least 30,000 premature deaths a year, but believe that epidemiologic evidence would actually put this number closer to 100,000 premature deaths a year. That's a pretty scary statistic. Another scary statistic is that heart disease

• 1
• 2
• 3
• Next Page >>