5 false myths about fats in the diet

Do you think that all fats are unhealthy and try to remove them as much as possible from your diet? To break down mistakes and falsehoods, we review five popular myths about fats that you should stop believing.

Around food there are numerous myths anchored almost perpetually in the popular imagination. Sugar, chocolate, breakfast, dairy, bread, eggs, oil and even water are some of the examples. Or have you never heard that you do not have to drink water during meals, that taking an egg a day is very bad for your health or that drinking juice is the same as eating fruit?

Something similar happens with fats, since until a few years ago they were demonized in the wrong way, since they must be part of a healthy diet. To tear down myths and clear up misunderstandings that prevent you from following a healthy diet, we review five false beliefs about fats.

5 false myths about fats you should know

  • Eating any amount of fat will make you gain weight: Obviously, consuming many high-fat foods on a daily basis will have an effect on the scale, but if you eat a normal amount - the one recommended by the WHO, for example - you should not perceive weight gain . It is important to note that fats must be between one fifth and one third of the daily energy, or what is the same, represent at least 20% of your daily intake. From the WHO say that caloric intake should be balanced with caloric expenditure, and to avoid an unhealthy weight gain, fats should not exceed 30% of total caloric intake.
  • Consuming fats in your diet has no purpose: This myth is about an aberration, since you need adequate amounts of fat in your diet to perform normal functions of the brain and body. Among many other things, your body needs fats for the production of hormones, cell signaling and the regulation of body temperature. They are also key to maintaining healthy hair, skin and nails, says Cording. AND
  • Fat is bad for your body: As with carbohydrates - it is not the same to take simple as complex - there are high quality fats and low quality fats. The latter are the saturated, common in processed foods and whose intake should represent less than 10% of total daily calories, while the intake of trans fats, extremely harmful to the body, should be less than 1%. Some of the foods rich in healthy fats are salmon and other blue fish, nuts and flax seeds, avocados or olive oil, so typical of our healthy Mediterranean diet.
  • All foods high in fat will increase your cholesterol: While saturated fats are linked to an increase in cholesterol, other types of healthy fats, such as polyunsaturated fatty acids such as Omega 3-present in pumpkin seeds, sesame and sunflower, salmon , tuna, avocado and nuts have been shown to significantly reduce cholesterol levels.
  • There is only one type of fat: It is a myth to put all the fats in the same drawer, but in reality there are several different types, with very different consequences for the organism. On the one hand, polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats are healthy for the heart and the body burns them easily, while saturated fats and trans fats are more easily stored as body fat. Saturated fats reside in coconut and palm oils, in butter and in the fats of beef, pork and chicken. Trans fats are found mainly in partially hydrogenated vegetable oils, in processed foods and in animal fats.