Saturated fats have long been blamed to be the villain when it comes to atherosclerosis and heart disease.
However, there is also a growing body of evidence suggesting that saturated fats don’t increase those risks, but can actually reduce them.
This is why the topic is one of the most controversial in modern medicine and nutrition.
Is saturated fat that bad for you? Are all saturated fats the same? Read this article to find out!
Saturated fat Q&A
What is saturated fat?
Dietary fatty acids are carbon chains with an even number of atoms. They can be short-chain (2-4), medium-chain (6-12), and long-chain (14-24).
A much more common classification is whether those chains have double bonds or only single bonds, linking the carbons.
If all links are saturated with hydrogen, there are only single bonds. This is a saturated fatty acid. Otherwise, there are one or more double bonds and we have an unsaturated one.
Saturated fat examples are stearic, palmitic, myristic, capric, lauric, arachidic, caprylic, caproic, and more.
What foods contain saturated fats?
Almost every fatty food out there contains a mixture of both saturated and unsaturated fatty acids in various ratios.
Mostly saturated are the majority of animal fat products and certain plant-based ones – coconut, palm kernel, and palm oil.
You can recognize them easily as they are solid at room temperature.
On the other hand, mostly unsaturated are the fats in fish, nuts, seeds, vegetable oils, etc.
What is the importance of saturated fats?
The body uses saturated fats mainly for energy storage and supply. It can also produce them from other fats.
Saturated fats also benefit the levels of your hormones, especially in men – it boosts testosterone.
A study published in the Journal of Applied Physiology showed that a diet higher in saturated fats resulted in higher levels of testosterone amongst participants when compared to lower fat intake (1).
Should I eat them or not?
You can’t avoid saturated fats completely, because almost every food containing fats, contains some portion of it as well. And you don’t have to!
If there are fats to avoid, they are the industrialised vegetable oils and the trans fatty acids, which are artificially made unsaturated fatty acids that are solid at room temperature.
Such are the hydrogenated vegetable oils that industry uses to produce margarine, various confectionery, and other processed foods.
Evidence has proven, again and again, that they reduce HDL, increase LDL, and raise the risk of diabetes and heart diseases (2).
Learn more about cholesterol and its effects on cardiovascular risk, by reading the article on keto and cholesterol.
Why do people think saturated fat is harmful?
The debate about whether saturated fats are good or bad has been going on for some time.
And it doesn’t look like there will be an agreement on the topic anytime soon.
One of the first studies to vilify the saturated fats was the ‘seven countries study’, directed by Ancel Keys.
It started in 1956 and was first published in 1978. It attempted to show a link between elevated levels of total cholesterol and increased risk of heart attack and stroke.
And saturated fat took the blame for that. In 1956 the American Heart Association advised the people to adopt a low-fat diet.
However, the study was later criticized by many researchers on a few important points:
- It did not account for the consumption of trans fats (now proven as most harmful) which peaked during the 60s.
- It excluded countries like France, Denmark and Norway which have high-fat consumption but low death rates from coronary disease and stroke.
- Sugar over-consumtion was not taken into consideration, while nowadays it is well-known to raise triglycerides, blood pressure, and risk of heart disease.
- The prevalence of smoking was not taken into consideration.
We know that weight loss is not about the type of fat you consume, but the total amount of calories.
In fact, you can lose a ton of weight on a keto diet while eating plenty of saturated fats.
Find out what other foods you can eat on keto here [link to Keto Foods – What to Eat & Avoid]
What if it was the reduced caloric intake that ultimately led to lower body weight, improved blood cholesterol, and reduced cardiovascular risk?
How do different saturated fats affect my health?
Did you know that there are different types of saturated fats with totally different functions in our bodies?
As previously mentioned, we have short-chain (2-4), medium-chain (6-12), and long-chain (14-24) fatty acids.
Long-chain (LCFAs) – stearic, palmitic, myristic, arachidic
The most common saturated fatty acid in the modern western diet is palmitic acid (16 carbon atoms). This is usually the main contributor to a raise in the levels of LDL.
Studies published in the American Journal of clinical nutrition have found that it raises LDL without affecting HDL (6).
The richest dietary source is palm oil. This is why we recommend restricting your usage of palm oil and palm oil containing processed foods.
On the other hand, there is the stearic acid (14 carbon atoms) – the second most common dietary saturated fat. It doesn’t affect HDL and slightly reduces LDL, which improves your total/HDL ratio and actually lowers cardiovascular risk (7, 8)! The most common sources are animal fats.
Another long-chain saturated fat is myristic acid. It is unhealthy as it significantly increases LDL, while not affecting HDL (9). Fortunately, it is rather rare amongst foods.
Just as most foods contain a mixture of saturated and unsaturated fats, there is always a combination of different saturated fatty acids in them.
This is why even if a type of fat contains some amounts of palmitic acid or myristic acids, stearic, lauric or other MCFAs balance their effects out.
Medium-chain (MCFAs) – lauric, capric, caprylic, caproic
Lauric acid – is another common saturated fat. It raises total cholesterol significantly.
However, it is due to a raise in HDL and improving the total-to-HDL ratio, which significantly decreases cardiovascular risk (10).
This is the main type of fat in palm kernel oil (47%) and coconut oil (42%).
Other MCFAs do not affect any cholesterol levels.
Coconut oil is a wonderful addition to your diet.
A meta-analysis of multiple RCTs, published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, revealed that these saturated fatty acids are also good for weight loss, which again leads to a reduction in cardiovascular risk (11).
Furthermore, studies done by the Boston University School of Medicine showed an improvement in insulin sensitivity related to their consumption (12).
Short-chain (SCFAs)
These saturated fats are not consumed with our diet, but produced by the healthy gut bacteria in the colon during fermentation of dietary fibre. These molecules play a role as prebiotics, cell signalling mediators, in the production of vitamins, etc. which makes them crucial for optimal gastrointestinal health (13, 14).
This is yet another reason to consume enough foods rich in fibre, such as green leafy vegetables.
Make sure you eat plenty of those alkalizing foods in your keto diet by checking out [call to action – reg keto alkaline 5dc]!
Does saturated fat cause heart disease? What do the researchers say?
So why don’t we consider, that overeating on a combination of highly processed fats and carbohydrates (mostly refined) is what’s actually harmful to us?
To further prove that saturated fats are not the villain, we can look at multiple meta-analyses and systematic reviews.
A meta-analysis by de Souza et al. compared many observational studies and made multiple comparisons with 90 501-339 090 participants in each (15).
It didn’t find an association between saturated fats and mortality, heart diseases or diabetes. On the other hand, there was a strong association between these diseases and trans-fat consumption.
Another meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies, by Oakland Research Institute, targeting 347,747 subjects showed no significant evidence that saturated fats increase the risk of heart disease (16).
Furthermore, a meta-analysis of 49 observational studies (556,246 participants) and 27 randomized, controlled trials (103,052 participants) showed similar results (17).
Unrelated to saturated fat consumption, omega-3 (polyunsaturated) fatty acids had protective effects.
A systematic review of 607 articles revealed once again that saturated fat consumption is not related to increased risk of heart diseases (18).
Increasing healthy types of polyunsaturated fatty acid consumption did improve LDL cholesterol while replacing fat with carb worsened it.
There was also a meta-analysis showing that replacing saturated fat with omega-6 (another polyunsaturated) fatty acids didn’t improve cardiovascular risk (19).
And finally, there is the latest meta-analysis of cohort studies that showed that neither of the fatty acids, whether saturated or not, did show a link to heart risk (20).
Only trans fats showed a dose-response risk. Have we convinced you?!
In conclusion – is saturated fat good or bad?
Indeed, there are few types of saturated fats, such as palm oil which should be used sparingly.
However, different types of saturated fats are always in combination and balance themselves out, just like saturated and unsaturated fats also need to be in a proper ratio.
Considering also the substantial amount of evidence there is, consuming saturated fats can be a healthy option, in combination with other essential nutrients and optimal body weight.