Experts finally concede they have been wrong for the past 30 years.  The results of the study are published online March 23, 2010 in PLoS Medicine.  Lead investigator Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian (Harvard University, Boston, MA) summarized the importance of this meta-analysis study by saying “This is pretty important on a policy level,” said Mozaffarian. “It’s naturally assumed that lowering saturated fat is good for the heart, but that’s not what the evidence shows.”

The researchers note that people did in fact cut their saturated fat; but to continue to get their calories, they increased their intake of carbohydrates.  Which, by the way, is exactly what the food pyramid at the USDA recommended with a whopping 6-11 servings of carbohydrates per day.

 The team at Harvard does not exactly claim defeat though.  Here is how they spun their story…

#1 – We were wrong:  For 60 years Medical Nutritional “authorities” have claimed saturated fat is the cause of heart disease.  But now, research is indicating that is not the case.  In fact as people have cut saturated fat out of the diet over the past decades, heart disease has not decreased as a result.

#2 – It’s your fault not ours:  People did in fact cut saturated fat like we suggested but, the researcher claims, we did not explain what to eat instead of saturated fats, and people replaced saturated fats at meals with carbohydrates.  I need to correct this researcher, as the USDA and the American Heart Association recommended 60% dietary calories come from carbohydrates.

#3 – We all should have been replacing saturated fat with UN-saturated fats (PUFA’s).   This suggestion reeks of the kind that in 30 years will be followed by a Mea Culpa form Harvard researchers as they then acknowledge that they have dramatically raised cancer rates with their unsaturated fats recommendations.

Very simply – the days of hearing that “saturated fat is bad for your heart” should be over.  Let’s get the FatBack in the diet!