Discussion of dietary cholesterol and cardiovascular disease

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #61

Actually, the American Heart Association started promoting “vegetable” oils after a large donation from Crisco Oil made them into the powerful organisation they are today. They’ve felt beholden to Procter and Gamble ever since.

(Jenna Ericson) #62

Apparently the causal link between LDL and ASCVD comes from Mendelian randomizations where genetic abnormalities affecting LDL levels were correlated with higher risk:

#63

As lard comes from pork, of course the animals aren’t grass fed :slight_smile: But yes, they may have a not so great diet, it depends from the source. Thankfully my body isn’t too choosy but I hopefully will be able to get enough farm pork in the future.
My main added fat is lard I render from fatty pork but I use barely any. My protein sources are fatty enough (or too fatty).
Butter is lovely, I use that too sometimes. Nothing can replace it :slight_smile:

(Chuck) #64

I grew up on the farm in the late 1940s and 1950s back then our pigs were roaming the pastures and eating lots of grass. Now days most pigs never get off a concrete floor. Another reason I get my meat, dairy and other produce from the small local farmers so I can see how they take care of their animals and produce.

#65

The pig farm nearby have cute places with a pen in the middle for every group of pigs… They love digging in the mud but of course, they are pigs. They even eat some mud, minerals and whatnot. Pigs are wonderful, I love them very much, not just to eat. Even if I eat supermarket pork as I can’t avoid that without making my diet very bad and I am selfish.

I used to buy eggs of hens nearby at some point. A neighbour bought old hens who didn’t produce enough eggs anymore in the factory. They were running below trees, digging, picking, of course hen eat up the greens very quickly but they got veggie scraps every day. Once I got mad at some caterpillars and fed them to the hens. I usually saw how the hens were kept where we got our eggs from, not anymore but at least I still avoid eating eggs from hen kept in cages, it’s something.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #66

However, they are relying on some rather weak papers to come to their conclusions, and they are making assumptions that may not be warranted.

(Jenna Ericson) #67

Only conclusion to be made: people with genetic abnormalities causing high LDL should just take advantage of it and go on a ketogenic diet. They’d probably be hyper-responders in no time!

I assume that keto mitigates the effects of high LDL. Without high insulin I bet the prevalence of ASCVD would much lower even if a person had high LDL.

(Joey) #68

Sorry, I find “causality” claim in this paper to be wholly bogus. Of course there is a strong association. That’s been shown repeatedly. No news here…

But there is no mechanism offered upon which to claim causality. On the contrary:

Serum LDL is understood by most modern researchers to be like the “fire trucks” pressed into service to squelch tissue inflammation … not the cause of it. So of course there is a strong association. (Otherwise, one’s protective metabolic system would no longer be functioning.)

And the higher levels of ASCVD-inducing inflammation that is active in the arteries, the greater number of metabolic “fire trucks” are called into service.

To claim - as this paper does - that LDL causes inflammation (that leads to CVD, T2D, neurotransmitter disease, et al) reflects a leap of logic without any any scientific support.

It’s like claiming that puss causes infection.

Eating a cholesterol-rich diet does not cause higher serum LDL. But, if you couple that with eating lots of carbs throughout the day, you invite the sustained repeated insulin spikes that produce higher levels of the inflammation that causes damage. LDL is then called to the rescue.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #69

It depends on what you consider the effects of high LDL to be.

If you think that LDL causes cardiovascular disease, a well-formulated ketogenic diet will definitely lower your risk of cardiovascular disease, regardless of its effect on your LDL. Fortunately, a high LDL level has been shown to correlate weakly, if at all, with cardiovascular risk. A ketogenic diet will definitely lower your triglycerides and raise your HDL, and a low ratio of triglycerides to HDL has been shown to correlate very strongly with reduced cardiovascular risk.

Given the known role of cholesterol in the immune system, and that higher LDL associates with lower cancer rates and lower all-cause mortality, it’s probably a good thing that a ketogenic diet can also facilitate those effects.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #70

Or that sutures cause knife wounds and other gashes in the skin, lol! :grin:

(Jenna Ericson) #71

In most cases high LDL is probably a downstream effect of some preceding metabolic dysfunction. However, in implicating LDL as a causal agent in cardiovascular disease they used “evidence from inherited disorders of lipid metabolism”. This means that they controlled for other factors that might lead to metabolic dysfunction. The article gives the example of Familial hypercholesterolaemia which is a disorder resulting in the loss of function of the receptor that would allow LDL into cells. This means people with the disorder have higher circulating LDL. This disease is specifically “characterized by markedly elevated levels of LDL-C and premature atherosclerosis, particularly coronary artery disease.”

While in most cases there would be an underlying issue causing higher LDL, the article also says “The key events in the initiation of ASCVD are the retention and accumulation of cholesterol-rich apoB-containing lipoproteins within the arterial intima at sites of predilection for plaque formation. Notably, LDL and other apoB-containing lipoproteins <70 nm in diameter (including VLDL, their remnants, IDL, and Lp(a)) efficiently enter and exit the arterial intima.”

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #72

That sounds to me like a reference to familial hypercholesterolaemia. Research on people with FH over the past sixty years has shown that half of that population never develops cardiovascular disease and dies at a perfectly normal age from normal conditions. And this, despite having the same level of LDL as their family members who do develop cardiovascular disease. The people with FH who develop cardiovascular disease all have variants of fibrinogen and clotting factor VIII that make their blood readier to clot. The people with FH who do not develop cardiovascular disease do not have these variant clotting factors. In fact, one study of the non-CVD group of people with FH showed that in their seventies, they actually had a higher life-expectancy than other people their age. Go figure.

However, if you find this study compelling, who am I to argue?

#73

I fear I may not make that deadline!

:confused::slightly_frowning_face:

#74

This…just for clarity (I don’t think taurine, omega 3 or autophagy are quite going to get me over the line for that :smile:

(Jenna Ericson) #75

Just wait, we might all make that deadline! I love Rhonda Patrick, but this video is a little creepy :upside_down_face:

#76

That’s funny, because a life insurance company randomly phoned me up today offering me a new deal.

They knew everything, they just wanted me to confirm health stats, but they already knew how much and how many years left on my mortgage, income, other insurances…you get the gist.
They could offer a better deal. I told them to get lost when the questions got a bit too personal.
I don’t mind broadcasting on here my blood markers…I’m proud of those markers!

But they got too personal. Cheeky c*nts. I never asked them to phone me. Weird, huh?
How did they know so much about me? They probably know more now fs. This shouldn’t be allowed.

But anyway, they wanted to offer an extended life insurance deal way past that I need it for.
They said that that only 1% of UK people make it past the age of 99, so it would be a high chance of paying out to my family whom survived me.
I said yeah, and my only direct family, Carly, will be long dead…so whom am I setting up a trust fund for? I already have everything needed through work and Unions anyway.

I was near going for it. Then they got too personal. (UK, I think they were Manchester based. Be careful, they may be actually be legit…that doesn’t mean they can’t screw ya.)

(Robin) #77

Yeah, red flags for sure. These people can get pretty sneaky and know way too much about us.

#78

I don’t want to sound wacko, but they all have to be sharing info.

Nothing sacred anymore :frowning_face:

They knew everything to screw me out of money, and now they know more (medical).
Life insurance, see? Personal questions, and I don’t mean like on here…I mean, your GP practice, med history, really stuff even HR wouldn’t dare snoop into.
I think I will look into it.

I was on the phone for at least 45 minutes before I wised up and told them to fk aff in a polite way i.e. ‘I have a meeting now, bye.’.

#79

They speak too fast with shtty (British) accents that you can’t remember the name of the company, even though you ask them to repeat it. When I say British, yeah, English. Name of Thomas and Jack. Bastrds.

Then they start rhyming off some spiel about complying with the FCA (financial conduct authority) at a million words a minute, telling you that everythings being recorded for training purposes etc.

You are sweet talked for a while, then handed over to another ‘expert’.
These are bad practises. Thomas handing over to ‘Jack, whom asks you medical questions’

I’m disgusted at myself for not telling them to eff off quicker, but I don’t think they got anything useful. I still feel like sh*t and angry as fk though, I was about to be ripped off.

As soon as I said I wasn’t comfortable they closed down quickly.

Apologies…this is going off topic. I’m just relaying what happened to me around midday today at work in a random phone call from a so called life insurance broker who said it was a good idea to take his policy because only 1% of Brits make it past 99 years old.

Truth, whether you believe that or not I really don’t care…it’s the truth :man_shrugging:

(Jenna Ericson) #80

Yeah, I hadn’t thought about the implications. Life insurance companies are going to have to branch out :smiling_imp: Maybe they’ll become life assurance companies haha. Not really sure how that would work.