Жирное сало это тоже не здорово. Такое несбалансированное питание может привести к нарушению обмена веществ, что приведет к ожирению. А ожирение это тоже болезнь, которая кроме того влечет за собой и другие опасности для здоровья.
Thu, August, 25, 2011 Reuters News
Obesity to worsen, weigh heavily on healthcare costs
* Obesity most widespread in Britain, U.S. among OECD countries
* Epidemic to weigh heavily on healthcare costs everywhere
* Governments must take lead in interventions
By Tan Ee Lyn
Obesity is most widespread in Britain and the United States among the world's leading economies and if present trends continue, about half of both men and women in the United States will be obese by 2030, health experts warned on Friday.
Obesity is fast replacing tobacco as the single, most important preventable cause of chronic non-communicable diseases, and will add an extra 7.8 million cases of diabetes, 6.8 million cases of heart disease and stroke, and 539,000 cases of cancer in the United States by 2030.
Some 32 percent of men and 35 percent of women are now obese in the United States, according to a research team led by Claire Wang at the Mailman School of Public Health in Columbia University in New York. They published their findings in a special series of four papers on obesity in The Lancet.
In Britain, obesity rates will balloon to between 41-48 percent for men and 35-43 percent for women by 2030 from what is now 26 percent for both sexes, they warned.
"An extra 668,000 cases of diabetes, 461,000 of heart disease and 130,000 cancer cases would result ," they wrote.
Due to overeating and insufficient exercise, obesity is now a growing problem everywhere and experts are warning about its ripple effects on health and healthcare spending.
Obesity raises the risk of heart disease, stroke, diabetes, various cancers, hypertension, high cholesterol, among others.
Because of obesity, the United States can expect to spend an extra 2.6 percent on its overall healthcare bill, or $66 billion per year, while Britain's bill grow by 2 percent, or £2 billion per year, Wang and colleagues warned.
OBESITY BOMB TICKING EVERYWHERE ELSE TOO
In Japan and China, 1 in 20 women is obese, compared with 1 in 10 in the Netherlands, 1 in 4 in Australia and 7 in 10 in Tonga, according to another paper led by Boyd Swinburn and Gary Sacks of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Obesity Prevention at Deakin University in Melbourne, Australia.
Worldwide, around 1.5 billion adults are overweight and a further 0.5 billion are obese, with 170 million children classified as overweight or obese. Obesity takes up between 2 to 6 percent of healthcare costs in many countries.
"Increased supply of cheap, tasty, energy-dense food, improved food distribution and marketing, and the strong economic forces driving consumption and growth are the key drivers of the obesity epidemic," Swinburn and Sacks wrote.
The health experts urged governments to lead the fight in reversing the obesity epidemic.
"These include taxes on unhealthy food and drink (such as sugar sweetened beverages) and restrictions on food and beverage TV advertising to children," wrote a team led by Steven Gortmaker at the Harvard School of Public Health, which published the fourth paper in the series.
(Reporting by Tan Ee Lyn)
(c) 2011 Reuters Limited
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Wed, August, 24, 2011 The Wall Street Journal Online
Study: Foods To Lower Cholesterol
Eating more plant-based fat and protein lowered cholesterol more than eating a diet low in saturated fat, according to a study published Tuesday.
The report offers further evidence that low-fat diets aren't the most effective way to improve heart health.
Participants in the large, randomized trial were instructed either to eat a diet low in saturated fat, or to add to their diet largely plant-based foods, primarily nuts, soy, plant-based margarine spreads and "sticky" fibers like barley and oats.
The latter group lowered their low-density lipoprotein, or LDL-the "bad" type of cholesterol associated with heart disease-by some 13% more than the group eating the low saturated-fat diet. The study was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The trial "may underline the importance of food quality over total fat quantity," said Iris Shai, a researcher in clinical intervention trials of diet and chronic diseases at Ben-Gurion University in Israel, who wasn't involved in the study.
Further research is needed to determine the effects of specific food components on other disease risk factors, Dr. Shai said in an email. "Nevertheless, this study reminds us again that diet is extremely effective in reducing cardiovascular risk."
That diet can help reduce cholesterol and the risk of heart disease is well known, but theories about exactly which foods and nutrients are responsible have evolved over the years.
Experts have been moving away from the notion that simply cutting dietary fat is most effective. Instead, evidence has grown that replacing sources of saturated fat, such as red meat and dairy products, with sources of healthy fats like nuts and soy products has greater benefits than replacing them with carbohydrates, according to Walter Willett, chairman of the nutrition department at the Harvard School of Public Health, who wasn't involved in the study.
Previous studies have examined individuals' regular food intake and correlated it with their health-a design that makes it difficult to isolate which foods actually bring about health improvements.
The goal of the current study was to examine systematically whether foods considered by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to lower cholesterol could be incorporated successfully into individuals' diets and actually improve cholesterol levels. Researchers compared the effects of these foods with those of a low saturated-fat diet, said David Jenkins, a study author and professor of medicine and nutritional sciences at the University of Toronto.
Over six months, 351 adults with high cholesterol were told at doctor visits to follow either a vegetarian diet, or a low-fat diet focused on low-fat dairy, whole grain cereals, fruit and vegetables. Both groups increased fiber and cut back on saturated fat. Those who ate largely plant-based foods had significantly greater reductions in LDL.
"That's why we think it was the nature of the foods" that was responsible for the cholesterol-lowering effect, said Dr. Jenkins, who also is director of the risk factor modification center at St. Michael's Hospital, in Toronto.
The LDL benefit might be even greater for people with poor diets to start with, Dr. Jenkins said. Specific suggestions may help individuals who find it hard to incorporate new foods, he said. For instance, swap veggie burgers for hamburgers, or soy milk for dairy milk.
"We're saying, 'Why not just try it?' " Dr. Jenkins says.
Write to Shirley S. Wang at
shirley.wang@wsj.com
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