Finally, scientists have good news about the fats in our food. Contrary to what is feared, the majority of food producers and restaurants not only changed an ingredient harmful to health by another when they pulled out of their products the trans fats, which is dangerous because it clogs arteries and affects the heart.
Even the French fries have long been considered a scourge in the diet, are now made with healthier ingredients. But there is still room for improvement, especially for some items for sale in supermarkets, in which trans fat is replaced with his unhealthy cousin, saturated fat.
A researcher from Harvard University and a group of consumer advocacy examined 83 foods in which ingredients has been reformulated since 2006. In that year the federal government began to require that on labels have to be placed the amount of trans fats in the packaged products, and the city of New York became the first of several cities in withdrawing it from restaurants.
Trans fats are created when hydrogen is added to liquid oils to harden them so they are used in baking or to extend the products duration on the shelves. Once these fats were targeted by government regulators, food manufacturers and restaurants, they started to experiment with different cooking oils and fat substitutes, trying not to compromise the taste and texture of the food they offer. But how healthy fats are used now?
Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, a researcher at the University of Harvard, and the Center for Science in the Public Interest checked edible products and restaurant menus to measure their fat content. The articles studied included margarine, junk food, confectionery and five popular fast food chains.
The results were published on Thursday in a letter included in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Almost all the food samples were free of trans fats, or with low quantity. And many companies and restaurants did not increase their content of saturated fats after cutting trans fats: 65% of products in supermarkets and 90% of the dishes in restaurants contain saturated fat, which levels were lower or unchanged to the previously measured amounts, or only slightly higher.
However, despite the improvement detected, there were some voices of caution. The fact that trans fats are gone, doesn’t mean that fattening foods are healthy, said Dr. David Heber, who is head of the Center for Human Nutrition at the University of California at Los Angeles.
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