Introduction

Youve been told that cholesterol is something to be feared. That cholesterol is the enemy. That when you eat it, it will build up in your arteries and eventually cause heart disease, heart attacks, and early death.

Youve been bombarded on television and in popular magazines by ads which encourage you to ask your doctor to prescribe the latest cholesterol lowering drug, and given the message that the lower the level of cholesterol in your blood, the less likely you will be to have a heart attack, stroke, or other circulation disaster.

Youve been told by the advertising media to avoid eggs, eat Egg Beaters. Youve been told to avoid butter and lard, and to use various types of margarine, Crisco, and other fake fats. All of this to avoid the devious, sneaky enemy, CHOLESTEROL!

Perhaps youre taking one of the expensive cholesterol lowering drugs known as statins, and returning to your doctor periodically for blood tests to see if your liver, kidneys, or muscles have been damaged by the drug. Or perhaps you are experiencing confusion, memory problems, weakness, excessive fatigue, or muscle pain, (increasingly common side effects of the statin drugs) and beginning to wonder if it all makes sense.

The truth about cholesterol!

My mission is to teach you the truth about cholesterol and its alleged relationship to heart disease. You will learn that cholesterol is not the enemy, that it is not the cause of heart attacks. You will learn the many very important roles that cholesterol plays in your body. You will learn that the real dangerous fats are the ones that you have been brain-washed into eating if you have been following the advice of the food industry, the medical establishment, and the popular media.

You will learn that the early research designed to prove the diet/cholesterol/heart disease connection actually proved that there was no connection between dietary cholesterol and heart disease, and that voluminous research since then has also verified that the cholesterol that you eat has no causative role in heart disease.

You will learn that the animal foods that your grandparents ate on the farm a few generations ago, when combined with lots of vegetables and fruits, provide the healthy fats and other important nutrients that you and your arteries need to keep you functioning to a ripe old age. You will also learn about other important good fats that will actually prevent and treat many of the common ailments that plague us through the aging process.

And we will explore the fact that the low-fat food propaganda from the processed food industry over the last thirty years has been a major contributor to our current epidemic of obesity and adult-onset diabetes. Now teenagers and even preteens are developing adult-onset diabetes.

You will learn of the serious dangers inherent in taking the commonly over-prescribed statin drugs. And you will learn of the science that exposes the real causes of heart disease. And, most importantly, you will learn what you need to know to avoid heart attacks, and live a long healthy life.

Have you been lied to? Lied to by the medical establishment? Lied to by the food industry? Lied to by the media?

In this book I will help you sort out the truth from the commercially motivated lies. I will provide you with numerous sources to check so that you can verify the facts which I present. I will direct you to the foods and nutritional supplements that will help you achieve optimal health. And, should you need a doctor or a nutritionist, I will help you find health practitioners who utilize healthy alternative methods of preventing and treating heart disease and other diseases of aging. The rest will be up to you.

My hope is that you will realize that often the truth is something that you must search for. In this most important area of heart health I aim to help you find the truth.

Yes, you can stop worrying about cholesterol, avoid heart attacks, and live a long healthy life!


Part I
Cholesterol! Does It Matter?


Chapter One
The Lipid Hypothesis

Four important questions:
Does the animal fat and cholesterol you eat cause elevation of your blood cholesterol level?
Does the animal fat and cholesterol you eat cause heart disease?
Does the cholesterol in your blood cause heart disease?
Does lowering your cholesterol prevent you from having heart attacks?

The idea that fat and cholesterol consumption is the reason for our current epidemic of heart disease originated early in the twentieth century when it was observed that the plaques in the arteries of heart attack victims contained fat and cholesterol. The Framingham study, which began in 1948 and continued for many years, was designed to prove the lipid hypothesis. The lipid hypothesis is simply the theory that there is a direct relationship between the amount of saturated fat (animal fat) and cholesterol in the diet, and the incidence of coronary heart disease (heart attacks).

The Framingham Study is used by those who endorse the lipid hypothesis, as proof of the validity of the lipid hypothesis. In this study approximately 5000 people were followed and studied every five years. There were two groups. Those who consumed large amounts of animal fat and cholesterol were compared with those who consumed very little. Forty years after the start of this study, its director, Dr. William Castelli, reluctantly admitted, In Framingham, Massachusetts the more saturated fat one ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the lower the persons serum cholesterol. We found that the people who ate the most cholesterol, ate the most saturated fat, and ate the most calories, weighed the least and were the most active. Yes, those who ate the most cholesterol and fat gained the least amount of weight. Although the study did find an association between high levels of blood cholesterol and increased likelihood of future heart attacks, the elevated cholesterol was only one of over 240 risk factors that were associated with increased risk of heart attacks.