Physiology Of Fat. Part 4

What an extraordinary contrast these two sample menus present in fat content and calories! On the one hand, the total calorie content of a typical American daily diet is about 2800 calories, of which almost 50 per cent is fat. The low-fat diet provides approximately 1800 calories (1000 calories less), which is the normal healthy amount for the average adult housewife or light worker. Here the fat content is about 15 per cent of the total dietary calorie content and is the amount found in the diets of millions of non-Americans who are virtually free of atherosclerosis or heart attacks and strokes. What a clear-cut and simple choice is given us for better health and longer life! The question may still arise, "Isn't fat necessary for normal health and nutrition?" As mentioned previously, the need for fat in humans has never been proven, although certain essential fatty acids contained in some vegetable oils are very valuable for keeping the blood fats lowered. In some people, fat seems to be necessary. The Hottentots are an example. These South African tribes, related to the Australian bushmen aborigines, are unique amongst humans in that their women have enormously developed buttocks, due to extraordinary deposits of fat!

At one time these huge posteriors were thought to be an interesting example of attractive, secondary sex charactertistics in women. But anthropologists later found that the excessive fat deposits had been developed through the ages by Mother Nature to protect these women from the continuous famines and droughts from which these tribes suffered. Nature gave these women and their tribes survival by developing in them fat storage depots or warehouses. In times of starvations or drought, these storage warehouses were called on to supply food and energy, enabling the women and their young children to survive the famine and to perpetuate the species. Nature had found that the ideal location for these storage banks of fat was on the buttocks and hips. Some of this hereditary tendency is still seen in African descendants who now live in the United States; their ancestors had been brought over in slave ships only one or two hundred years ago to this country. Curiously enough, this primitive trend seems to be becoming popular in some "quarters," particularly in the world of entertainment, such as the motion pictures!

Another interesting demonstration of the importance of body fat in a society was the old custom among Turks and Arab peoples of measuring beauty in their women by the amount of avoirdupois! Many a rich man among them proudly regarded his wealth by the number of fat wives and women in his home or harem. In times of food scarcities and daily uncertainties of living, an ample supply of food as shown by obesity was the best visible sign of affluence and prosperity. The husband's success then carried over into standards of feminine beauty as evidenced by his ability to pad and fatten his women. This concept was very popular in the "gay nineties" of our own country. The comic "beef trust" troupes in theatrical vaudeville and burlesque occasioned both fun and admiration for so much concentrated female pulchritude in a chorus-line of 200 to 300 pounders!

Take a lesson from the pig. Finally, let us look at the startling new discoveries made in swine. The hog or pig has always been associated in every mind as the epitome of fatness. The expression "to be fat as a pig" or as a hog is one of the most common expressions in our language. Fat and food from swine is one of the most frequent sources of nourishment used by humans, i.e. ham, bacon, pork, lard and so on. Yet only very recently has it been discovered that pigs are virtually the only animals subject to the natural or spontaneous development of atherosclerosis. Several teams of researchers have published numerous convincing photographs of the development of atherosclerosis in many vital arteries of swine. This startling news was provided by Doctors J. H. Bragdon, J. H. Zeller, and J. W. Stevenson of the National Heart Institute of Bethesda, Maryland, who confirmed the original findings made in this research by a team of Wisconsin scientists headed by Doctors H. Gottlieb and J. J. Lalich. The amazing facts were that about 50 per cent of the swine examined carefully showed the natural development of atherosclerosis in the main arteries of the body. This disease in the arteries was virtually the same as atherosclerosis seen in humans!

In addition, still other investigators such as Doctors Irving Page and Lena Lewis of the Cleveland Clinic found that hogs had unusually high levels of blood cholesterol and fats. There was a special increase in the swine studied of the atherogenic portion of the lipoproteins, so important in the development of atherosclerotic heart disease in humans. It has always been thought that fat on the hog was natural and did not harm the animal, but just those humans who made "hogs" of themselves. Now all these extraordinary discoveries show us that even the pig is victim to fatty deposits in the arteries; to eat high on the hog even damages the hog. Let us "eat to live, not live to eat." By following the instructions contained in the following pages on what to eat and what to weigh, you can learn to enjoy your food, and most important, enjoy better health and increased vitality and reap a harvest of added years to your life.