Accusation #15: AtkinsFacts.org Makes "Misleading" Assertion About Saturated Fat
Atkins Corporation Mislabels and Misleads
Your website claims "saturated fats aren't bad."[1127] According to Colette Heimowitz, M.S., the Atkins Director of Education and Research, saturated fat has a "heart-healthy role." "In fact," she writes, "some large epidemiological trials, including the well-known Framingham Nurses' Study, have shown no correlation between saturated fat and heart disease, stroke or breast cancer. In fact, the more saturated fat and cholesterol participants consumed, the lower their risk of heart disease."[1128]
There is no such thing as the "well-known Framingham Nurse's Study." Ms. Heimowitz must be thinking of either the Framingham Heart Study or the Harvard Nurses' Health Study. In either case, she is mistaken.
The Atkins director presumably wasn't talking about the Harvard Nurses' Study, as it showed specifically that the saturated fat found in Atkins favorites like beef, pork, lamb, cheese, butter, and lard[1129] was associated with greater risk of coronary heart disease.[1130] She must have been referring to the Framingham Heart study.
In a section of the Atkins website entitled "Debunking the Myths" you "debunk" the "fallacy" that "a liberal intake of high-fat meats... will raise cholesterol levels, ultimately leading to heart disease." The "fact," you claim, is that according to the famous Framingham Heart Study, consuming less fat and cholesterol leads to higher blood cholesterol.[1131]
In its 56-year history[1132] the Framingham Heart Study produced over 1,000 scientific papers.[1133] So as to not misrepresent any part of this important study, let us defer to Dr. William Castelli, who directed the Framingham Heart Study for over 26 years and is currently the Director of the Framingham Cardiovascular Center.[1134]
Dr. Castelli was asked to directly respond to these claims. This is what he said: "That quote is correct but its' interpretation by Atkins and Sugar Busters and others is wrong. The data are diet history data. Very weak science!!!... Better science, where I lock you up in a metabolic ward has taught us that lowering the saturated fat, the cholesterol in the diet lowers cholesterol. Even better, over a dozen diet trials in the history of medicine which took people off the high fat diet lowered their cholesterols and 4-5 years out they lowered their heart attack rate. Has Atkins or Sugar-busters shown that they lower the heart attack rate?"[1135]
Dr. Castelli feels Americans have been "brainwashed to eat meat," but that the meat is killing us. "If Americans adopted a vegetarian diet," Castelli says of the heart disease epidemic, "the whole thing would disappear,"[1136] "When you see the golden arches," he once said, "you're probably on the road to the pearly gates."[1137]
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