Olive Oil Boosts Heart Health
FDA Announces: Olive Oil May Boost Heart Health November 8, 2004 Food containing olive oil can carry labels saying they may reduce the risk of coronary heart disease, the government says, citing limited evidence from a dozen scientific studies about the benefits of monounsaturated fats.
As long as people don’t increase the number of calories they consume daily, the Food and Drug Administration confirmed a reduction in the risk of coronary heart disease when people replace foods high in saturated fat with the monounsaturated fat in olive oil.
That means a change as simple as sauteing food in two tablespoons of olive oil instead of butter may be healthier for your heart.
“”Since CHD is the No. 1 killer of both men and women in the United States, it is a public health priority to make sure that consumers have accurate and useful information on reducing their risk,”" Lester M. Crawford, acting FDA commissioner, said in a prepared statement.
“”It’s good news for consumers,”" said Bob Bauer, president of the North American Olive Oil Association, which sought the qualified health claim on Aug. 28, 2003. “”Olive oil is a healthy product to help them fight heart disease.”"
Recent research has underscored the heart benefits from so-called Mediterranean diets high in unsaturated fats from vegetable oil, nuts and such fish as salmon and tuna. Mortality rates dropped by more than 50 percent among elderly Europeans who stuck to such diets and led healthy lifestyles, according to research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in September.
The North American Olive Oil Association included 88 publications to back its claim for the heart-healthy benefits of olive oil. The group wanted to make the claim for monounsaturated fats contained in just one tablespoon of olive oil per day.
Olive oil and certain food containing olive oil can now indicate that “”limited and not conclusive scientific evidence suggests that eating about two tablespoons (23 grams) of olive oil daily may reduce the risk of coronary heart disease due to the monounsaturated fat in olive oil,”" the FDA concluded.
“”I think FDA just took a more conservative view,”" Bauer said. Manufacturers waited for the FDA’s precise wording before revising labels. “”I expect, over time, most every container of olive oil will have this,”" he said.
Already, American restaurants and consumers drive $450 million in olive oil sales per year. Supermarket sales in 2003 accounted for 132 million pounds of olive oil, up by nearly one-third over the past six years. Bauer said he expects the label change to spur a larger uptick in sales.
According to the American Heart Association, coronary heart disease caused 502,189 deaths — or one in five deaths — in 2001, the most current statistic available. Another 13.2 million Americans that year survived the heart attacks, chest pains and other ailments caused by coronary heart disease.
Along with lowering cholesterol, cutting out cigarettes and exercising, the group says Americans can boost heart health by eating foods low in saturated fat, cholesterol and sodium. An American Heart Association spokeswoman declined comment on the FDA’s action until it reviews the health claim.
The FDA discounted most of the submitted studies because the methodology made it difficult to tease out the effect of the monounsaturated fats in olive oil. Of a dozen studies that survived the cut, four were the most persuasive.
Thirty-three healthy young American men ate diets high in saturated fats from butter or cocoa butter, olive oil’s monounsaturated fats or polyunsaturated fats from soybean oil. The soybean and olive oil groups significantly lowered total and bad LDL cholesterol.
In another trial involving 21 middle-aged Spanish women, those with diets in which olive oil replaced 8 percent of total daily calories from saturated fats lowered their total and bad cholesterol while significantly boosting good HDL cholesterol.
Forty-one young Spanish men lowered total and bad LDL cholesterol with an olive oil diet. Levels of good cholesterol did not drop in the olive oil group, as they did for youthful peers who replaced calories from saturated fats with carbohydrates.
And 22 healthy, middle-aged Spanish men with slightly elevated cholesterol counts were put on a four-week diet high in saturated fat. Those who switched to diets high in olive oil and those who replaced calories from saturated fats with carbohydrates lowered total and bad LDL cholesterol levels.
It’s the third time the FDA granted a qualified health claim for conventional food. In March, the agency said “”supportive but not conclusive research”" shows eating 1.5 ounces of walnuts per day may reduce coronary heart disease risk. In September, it issued a similar qualified claim for the heart-healthy benefits of omega-3 fatty acids.
The FDA press release: http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/news/2004/NEW01129.html
Science Begins to Add Weight to CLA
The flurry of activity in CLA applications is being backed by a growing body of research to support the ingredient, particularly for its effects on weight loss. A review published in this month’s Journal of Nutrition supports conjugated linoleic acid’s action on weight management, concluding that it is at least in part due to regulation of glucose and fatty acid uptake and metabolism.
Conjugated linoleic acid is the common name of a group of fatty acids found in dairy products and meat. CLA isomers have been studied for their action on an impressive range of diseases, including cancer, atherosclerosis, obesity, and immune function. However as scientists begin to reveal their effects on reduction of body fat, food makers are increasingly looking at the ingredient for the valuable slimming market.
In Canada, where many of the patents for CLA are held, the dairy industry has long been studying the production of high-CLA milk. In Europe, a research centre in Ireland is studying the compound which could add significant value to its dairy industry, while in Italy, Techno Foods introduced a strawberry flavoured yoghurt naturally rich in CLA (conjugated linoleic acid) and omega-3 fatty acids this summer.
Specific CLA isomers have been shown to prevent the development of obesity in certain rodent and pig models and this has been attributed mainly to trans-10, cis-12 CLA, both in vivo and in vitro, write the University of North Carolina researchers in the review. However, CLA’s ability to modulate human obesity remains controversial because data from clinical trials using mixed isomers are conflicting.
In vitro studies by the team demonstrated that while trans-10, cis-12 CLA prevents triglyceride accumulation in human cells, cis-9, trans-11 CLA increases triglyceride content. The team concluded that the isomers’ regulation of glucose and metabolism must partly explain its mechanism on human fat.
The news is also good for supplement marketers who recently learned of research carried out by Cognis backing the long-term safety of its Tonalin CLA.
Acetyl L-Carntine vs. L-Carnitine
The Essential Difference Between the Carnitines
Do you lack energy, or feel tired and physically or mentally unprepared to take on the tasks of the day? This is not unusual, especially as we age, and today’s topic may help explain some of the reasons for this energy deficit.
Two natural compounds produced by our tissues, L-carnitine and acetyl-L-carnitine (ALC), are similar in that both have identical chemical core structures. However, one (ALC) contains an extra component, an acetic acid bound to the core molecule (in what is known as an ester linkage). It turns out that this extra chemical piece makes a significant difference in how this molecule behaves in our body relative to its non-acetylated cousin, L-carnitine. These differences are described below, but first a brief summary of how these molecules normally function in our body.
L-carnitine functions as a vehicle to ferry fat constituents (fatty acids) across a membrane barrier into the cell’s energy-producing machine, the mitochondria, where the fat is converted to energy. Equally important, L-carnitine works in the reverse direction, too. It ferries toxic products produced during fat metabolism out of the mitochondria. This latter step helps maintain the mitochondria as clean-burning, energy-efficient machines.
We are all aware of the fact that as we age, our energy level diminishes. This decrease in energy parallels a decrease in the plasma level of L-carnitine. L-carnitine also decreases under conditions of stress, both psychological and physical. Consequently, it is described as a conditionally essential nutrient. This simply means that when our bodies cannot produce enough of it to meet demand, we need to increase the intake of this nutrient.
Acetyl-L-carnitine is just as active as L-carnitine in transporting fatty acids into the mitochondria. However, as described below, that extra acetyl group confers additional properties to this form of L-carnitine, which make it superior to its non-acetylated cousin. Both compounds increase energy Acetyl L-Carnitine or ALC Physical Energy Fat Metabolism Brain Protection Neurotransmission
Experiments with rats show a dramatic decrease (between 50-70%) in the activity level of old rats as compared to the young animal. Old rats, too, get tired with age! This decrease, as mentioned above, parallels a decrease in the amount of L-carnitine present in the animal’s tissues and blood.
This observation led researchers to investigate whether the old energy-deficient animals could be transformed into more energetic, youthful animals by feeding them a diet enriched with L-carnitine. Supplying L-carnitine to the diet increased the ambulatory activity of the old rats almost two-fold. The experiment was repeated with ALC, and it too increased the animals’ activity level to about an equal degree. So both compounds worked equally well in improving the old rats’ energy levels. ALC protects the brain
One of the two cousins, ALC, stands out with respect to its effects on the brain and nervous system. First, ALC is more effectively transported into the central nervous system. It more readily traverses the blood-brain barrier