Diet Debate

Hi Heretic,

Some people use statistics like a drunk uses a lamppost; for support, not for illumination.

Please be aware that all the people in this study are on some version of the SAD.

However, it is curious why these results appear to contradict the Framingham results, and many other studies.

For those of us who are working diligently to improve their health through a mostly whole plant based diet, there is not much to be concerned about, in this study.

Best regards, EngineerGuy

That study simply falsifies the cholesterol-heart disease hypothesis for populations consuming a standard Western European diet!
I posted this study to remind people that cholesterol is not the risk factor on that diet! SAD has nothing to do with it! The original cholesterol hypothesis was postulated based on the flawed statistical analysis of the people eating the standard Western diet and that study consists of statistical compilation of multiple studies, also using standard Western diet. The fact that the original papers by Dr. Ancel Keys contradict this one study as well as most of the other later cholesterol studies is simply illustrating that the original Keys statistical analysis was simply wrong! It is the simplest explanation! It was just one person mistake - Ancel Keys' bad idea!

It has spread like cholera only because Key was also a high ranking official with the US government, had plenty of cash to his disposal and was able to skew the research by giving grants to those who kowtowed to him while freezing out those (mostly British and Germans) who didn't.

I can't see any benefit or a good rationale for inventing some complex explanations reconciling Keys' hypothesis with the new statistical studies, while a simple explanation that Keys was just wrong - suffices!

You and many vegans seem to be hanging onto Keys like onto a religious icon defending it against "blasphemy" at all cost. It simply does not make a sense! Both Keys and his "cholesterol" are dead! It's over!

Heretic

the number 5 is the European way of measuring cholesterol which is 200 here. 6 is about 240 and the numbers in the chart go to 7 which I am guessing is close to 300. Men in the study look like they do worse the higher their cholesterol but not the women. (Possibly something to do with estrogen?) Did I miss charts of the mortality rates of those with cholesterol under 150 which Esselstyn and others claim is protective against heart disease?

Dolores

This is similar with other studies. They are all basically consistent with each other, except with the Ancel Keys' original study!

For example Framingham study showed that high cholesterol correlates with cardiovascular only for men aged 30-50, not for women of all ages and not for older men. J-LIT study (look it up, there is now followup published!) confirmed this basically. In addition it found that subgroups with low cholesterol had a higher cardiac risk as well as those with too high. The lowest risk was at around 200mg/dl (=5mmol/L). Esselstyne data may be correct too - the reson is that cholesterol is not causing anything, it is just a secondary marker. For example it is conceivaable that vegatrians with TC=150mg/dl may have a have low risk while SAD eaters with 150 may have higher risk. It is conceivable that people on a high fat low carb diet have a very low risk of CVD regardless whether their TC is high or low.

The probably real causative factor is insulin! Those vegetarians who maintain low glycemic eating pattern (and no wheat!), have low insulin AND also at the same time have low fasting insulin level! The same low risk and low insulin as those who consume a high fat paleolythic diet or Atkins! It is all science and logic.

The SAD eaters who also happen to have low fasting insulin may also have low CVD risk!

Mystery solved (probably)! No more paradoxes! No need to break Occam razor invoking mystery genes etc.

Heretic