Natural trans fats vs unnatural trans fats

You’ve probably heard of the term trans fats. Trans fats are known to be bad for your health. They stimulate the development of heart disease and give a higher cholesterol. What many people don’t know is that trans fats are not only made by an industrial process, they also can be found in natural products. Do these natural trans fats have the same effect on our health as the unnatural ones?

What are unnatural trans fats?

Trans fats are fatty acids which arise in hydrogenation of vegetable oils. These hydrogenated fats are much cheaper than, for example, butter, and the products with these fats are processed for a longer shelf life. Trans fats are known to be bad for your health. They stimulate the development of heart disease, they lower the good cholesterol and increase the bad cholesterol.

What products contain unnatural trans fats?

You can find trans fats in cake, candy, margarine, snacks, microwave meals, bánh bao, milk powder, pizzas and everything in which margarine or hydrogenated vegetable oil is processed. It’s difficult to determine if there are trans fats in a particular product, because the producer is not required to state if there are trans fats in the product.

What are natural trans fats?

In the stomach of a cow a hardening process takes place too. The bacteria in the rumen help the cow to digest the grass, but they also release oils from grass or forage in trans fat. Natural trans fats are found in milk, cheese, butter and meat. The question is what effect this type of fat has on our health.

The difference between natural and unnatural trans fats

In this study can you find the effects of natural and unnatural trans fats. The results are tested on people.

Natural trans fats in men

• No increase in LDL (bad) cholesterol
• No increase in HDL (good) cholesterol
• The natural trans fats don’t have an effect on men

Unnatural trans fats in men

• Increase in LDL (bad) cholesterol
• Reduction of HDL (good) cholesterol
• Unnatural trans fats have a double negative impact on men

Natural trans fats in women

• Increase in LDL (bad) cholesterol
• Increase in HDL (good) cholesterol
• Natural trans fats give an HDL and LDL increase in women

Unnatural trans fats in women

• Increase in LDL (bad) cholesterol
• Reduction of HDL (good) cholesterol
• Unnatural trans fats have also a double negative impact on women

An increase in LDL cholesterol is not significant. LDL cholesterol is also called ‘bad’ cholesterol because a high concentration of LDL is a marker for the risk of a heart attack (there are many more markers for heart disease outside of a high LDL).

LDL separated in two categories

LDL is, based on the type, often separated into two categories: the small dense LDL (pattern B) and the large buoyant LDL (pattern A). Small dense LDL (sdLDL) is known to be associated with an increased risk of developing cardiovascular disease.

When do you have risks of heart disease?

Small dense LDL is bad. When we look at the data from the survey, we see that the natural trans fats only affected the large buoyant LDL. Of large buoyant LDL no adverse effects are known to be related to heart disease.

The combination of small dense LDL, low HDL levels and elevated triglycerides. This is exactly what the unnatural trans fats do: they raise triglycerides (all fats do that), they increase small dense LDL and they lower the HDL. The natural trans fats won’t do this.

Sources: www.todio.nl