Nexus - 0601 - New Times Magazine-pages

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deposits in their skin and other tissues—and in their arteries. By In 1957, Dr Norman Jolliffe, Director of the Nutrition Bureau showing that polyunsaturated oils from vegetable sources lowered of the New York Health Department, initiated the Anti-Coronary serum cholesterol at least temporarily in humans, Kritchevsky Club in which selected businessmen, ranging in age from 40 to 59 appeared to show that the findings from the animal trials were rel- years, were placed on the Prudent Diet. Club members used corn evant to the CHD problem, that the lipid hypothesis was a valid oil and margarine instead of butter; cold breakfast cereals instead explanation for the new epidemic, and that, by reducing animal of eggs and chicken; and fish instead of beef. Anti-Coronary products in their diets, Americans could avoid heart disease. Club members were to be compared with a 'matched' group of the In the years that followed, a number of population studies same age who ate eggs for breakfast and had meat three times a demonstrated that the animal model—especially one derived from day. Dr Jolliffe, an overweight diabetic confined to a wheelchair, vegetarian animals—was not a valid approach for the problem of was confident that the Prudent Diet would save lives, including heart disease in human omnivores. his own. A 1955 report on artery plaques in soldiers killed during the In the same year, the food industry initiated advertising cam- Korean War showed little difference in the number and severity of __ paigns that touted the health benefits of their products: "Low in plaques between American soldiers and those of Japanese fat" or "Made with vegetable oils". A typical ad read, "Wheaties natives—75 per cent versus 65 per cent—even though the may help you live longer". Wesson recommended its cooking oil Japanese diet at the time was lower in animal products and fat.* A "for your heart's sake". An ad in the Journal of the American 1957 study of the largely vegetarian Bantu found that they had as Medical Association (JAMA) described Wesson oil as a "choles- much atheroma—occlusions or plaque build-up in the arteries—as terol depressant". Mazola advertisements ed the public that other races from South Africa who ate more meat.’ A 1959 report "science finds corn oil important to your health". Medical journal noted that Jamaican Blacks showed a degree of atherosclerosis ads recommended Fleishmann's unsalted margarine for patients comparable to that found in the United States, although they suf- with high blood pressure. fered from lower rates of heart disease.° A 1960 report noted that In his syndicated column, Dr Frederick Stare, head of Harvard the severity of atherosclerotic lesions in Japan approached that of | University's Nutrition Department, encouraged the consumption the United States.” The 1968 International Atherosclerosis of corn oil—up to one cup a day. In a promotional piece specifi- Project, in which over 22,000 corpses in 14 nations were cut open cally for Procter & Gamble's Puritan oil, he cited two experiments and examined for plaques in the arteries, showed the same degree _and one clinical trial as showing that high blood cholesterol is of atheroma in all parts of the associated with CHD. However, both world—in populations that suffered . . toe experiments had nothing to do with from a great deal of heart disease, and The American Medical Association CHD, and the clinical trial did not in populations that had very little or Fi find that reducing blood cholesterol none at all.* (AMA) at first opposed the had any effect on CHD events. Later, All of these studies pointed to the commercialisation of the lipid Dr William Castelli, director of the fact that the thickening of the arterial hypothesis and warned that "the Framingham Study, was one of sever- walls is a natural, unavoidable al specialists to endorse Puritan. Dr process. The lipid hypothesis did not anti-fat, anti-cholesterol fad is Antonio Gotto, Jr, former AHA presi- hold up to these population studies, . . . dent, sent practising physicians a let- nor did it explain the tendency toward not just foolish and futile... ter promoting Puritan oil_printed on fatal clots that caused myocardial it also carries some risk". Baylor College of Medicine, The De infarction. Bakey Heart Center letterhead.’ The irony of Gotto's letter is that n 1956, an American Heart De Bakey, the famous heart surgeon, | eee (AHA) fund-raiser was aired on all three major co-authored a 1964 study involving 1,700 patients, which also networks. The Master of Ceremonies interviewed, among oth- showed no definite correlation between serum cholesterol levels ers, Irving Page and Jeremiah Stamler of the AHA and researcher _and the nature and extent of coronary artery disease.” In other Ancel Keys. Panellists presented the lipid hypothesis as the cause words, those with low cholesterol levels were just as likely to of the heart disease epidemic and launched the Prudent Diet, one have blocked arteries as those with high cholesterol levels. in which corn oil, margarine, chicken and cold cereal replaced But while studies like DeBakey's mouldered in the basements butter, lard, beef and eggs. of university libraries, the vegetable oil campaign took on The television campaign was not an unqualified success increased bravado and audacity. because one of the panellists, Dr Dudley White, disputed his col- The American Medical Association (AMA) at first opposed the leagues at the AHA. Dr White noted that heart disease in the commercialisation of the lipid hypothesis and warned that "the form of myocardial infarction was non-existent in 1900 when egg anti-fat, anti-cholesterol fad is not just foolish and futile...it also consumption was three times what it was in 1956 and when corn _ carries some risk". oil was unavailable. When pressed to support the Prudent Diet, The American Heart Association, however, was committed. In Dr White replied: "See here, I began my practice as a cardiologist 1961, the AHA published its first dietary guidelines aimed at the in 1921 and I never saw an MI patent until 1928. Back in the MI- public. The authors—Irving Page, Ancel Keys, Jeremiah Stamler free days before 1920, the fats were butter and lard, and I think —_ and Frederick Stare—called for the substitution of polyunsatu- that we would all benefit from the kind of diet that we had ata _ rates for saturated fat, even though Keys, Stare and Page had all time when no one had ever heard the word corn oil." previously noted in published papers that the increase in CHD But the lipid hypothesis had already gained enough momentum __ was paralleled by increasing consumption of vegetable oils. In to keep it rolling, in spite of Dr White's nationally televised plea fact, in a 1956 paper, Keys had suggested that the increasing use for common sense in matters of diet and in spite of the contradic- of hydrogenated vegetable oils might be the underlying cause of tory studies that were showing up in the scientific literature. the CHD epidemic." (AMA) at first opposed the commercialisation of the lipid hypothesis and warned that "the anti-fat, anti-cholesterol fad is not just foolish and futile... it also carries some risk". 20 - NEXUS DECEMBER 1998 - JANUARY 1999