December 19th, 2013
More Walking and More Fiber: Good for the Heart
Larry Husten, PHD
It probably won’t come as a surprise, but walking more and eating more fiber are probably good for your heart. That’s the conclusion of two new studies, but because the studies relied on observational data it should be emphasized that they are incapable of demonstrating cause and effect. And it’s by no means clear that most […]
November 20th, 2013
Consumption of Nuts Linked to Mortality Benefit
Larry Husten, PHD
Nut consumption has long been linked to healthy lifestyles. Now, a study in the New England Journal of Medicine extends the finding and demonstrates a strong association with improved mortality. Ying Bao and colleagues examined data from nearly 120,000 people enrolled in the Nurses’ Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study to assess the relationship of […]
November 7th, 2013
FDA Seeks to Eliminate Trans Fat from Food in the U.S.
Larry Husten, PHD
The FDA said today that it would begin to take efforts to remove trans fat from food in the U.S. The agency has made the “preliminary determination that partially hydrogenated oils (PHOs), the primary dietary source of artificial trans fat in processed foods, are not ‘generally recognized as safe’ for use in food.” If the FDA’s preliminary determination is made final then manufacturers […]
November 4th, 2013
Healthy Diet in Middle Age Leads to Healthier Old Age
Larry Husten, PHD
New results from a long-running study offer fresh evidence that a “healthy” diet is actually good for you. The study shows that women who followed a healthy diet while in middle age had a much better chance of reaching age 70 without any of the major illnesses or impairments usually associated with old age. In a […]
February 5th, 2013
Back To The Future: Resurrected Data From 1960s Trial Might Impact Contemporary Dietary Fat Debate
Larry Husten, PHD
In an exceedingly strange turn of events, data from a clinical trial dating from the 1960s, long thought to be lost, has now been resurrected and may contribute important new information to the very contemporary controversy over recommendations about dietary fat composition. The American Heart Association has long urged people to increase their consumption of polyunsaturated […]
September 13th, 2012
A Manhattan Project to End the Obesity Epidemic
Larry Husten, PHD
A newly launched nonprofit organization, the Nutrition Science Initiative, will try to find an answer to the question, “What should we eat to be healthy?” Called NuSI (pronounced “new see”) for short, the organization is nothing if not ambitious: its goal is to seek “the end of fad diets and high obesity rates.” NuSI’s founders are Gary Taubes and Peter Attia. Taubes is the […]
June 5th, 2012
Subway Meals Get American Heart Association Endorsement
Larry Husten, PHD
The American Heart Association (AHA) announced yesterday that it had initiated a new program to help people choose healthy meals at restaurants. The Subway restaurant chain will be the first to display the Heart-Check Meal Certification logo next to certain selected meals. In a press release the AHA’s president, Gordon Tomaselli said the program would make “it easy […]