It has recently come to light in the scientific community that eggs have a chemical in them the prohibits the uptake of "bad" cholesterol. So for years they have been saying that eggs are bad for you and one shouldn't eat them or to only eat a couple a week. However, the English, who eat eggs with almost every meal, have not had the same cholesterol problem as those in the U.S. When the thing about butter being bad for you came about, I could not manage to bring myself to eat oleomargarine, the taste was reason enough, but I couldn't help but think that I trust cows more than chemists. Then a few years ago they found that the trans-fatty acids in oleomargarine was worse for you than butter. Has anyone but me noticed that when we are told a natural food is bad because...the statement gets recalled? How long until raw milk gets the credit it deserves?

-- Tana Cothran (tana@getgoin.net), November 09, 2001

Answers

Do you know where this study was published?

-- paul (primrose@centex.net), November 09, 2001.

it isnt the milk, its unpasturized milk,, and alot of "scientists" are saying milk is THE best source or calcium,,, but skim milk is what to drink. I also dont think any of it matters much,, as long as they arent living a sedantary lifestyle

-- stan (sopal@net-port.com), November 09, 2001.

Tana, you are not the only one who has noticed these "retractions". I have also noticed the same kind of "retractions" for many things that the government tells us is okay or good and then later retracts such as how much x-ray exposure is safe, how saccharine/nutrasweet is safe to take and we all know the list goes on forever. My conclusion a long time ago is to ignore what the government says is good or not good for us. Make my own choice on my own experience and my own common sense. All of these government recommendations are driven by money and money also funds the studies for the company that is trying to push their product. So I don't believe studies either. We are a country that lets others tell us what is best for us instead of deciding what to do ourselves. A good example of this is that poor postal worker that is in the news lately who died from anthrax. He suspected that he had been exposed to anthrax but he let his employer (the government) tell him whether or not to pursue getting treated for anthrax even though he was suspicisous that he had been exposed. I would not have waited for my employer to tell me whether or not I had been exposed, I would have made my own decision regardless of what they were telling me. He would probably have been alive today had he done so. I'm not trying to pick on this poor man, he is dead, but I am using it as an illustration of how much the American public are sheep. They wait for some "authority" to tell them what to do. I work in Washington, DC and when the Pentagon was hit by the plane, I told my boss I was leaving and heading home. I didn't ask for permission. I stated a fact. I was leaving. I didn't wait until they told me I could go, or that we were closing the office, or whatever, I made the decision that for my safety, I needed to be out of the city. Since I am the one who has to live (or die) of the consequence, I am not going to leave life or death decisions in the hands of others. I have the same philosophy about my health and what I eat and what medications I will take, etc. I make my own choices.

-- Colleen (pyramidgreatdanes@erols.com), November 09, 2001.

My nutrition teacher told me that about the eggs, way back in 1976. I thiink he said the chemical was lecithin. I don't remember, but I think he said the lecithin broke down the cholesterol into more usable foods or something. Anyway, he said that eggs were called the "perfect food" at that time.

JOJ

-- joj (jump@off.c), November 09, 2001.

Hey thanks for the post, gee, it's funny to me how it seems in the end, "common sense" wins out, I'm not a religious fanatic or anything but it's a good feeling to me to know that God provides us with everything we need, and you ain't gotta spend a whole bunch of money. My chickens are darn near self sufficient and provide wonderful eggs! Joy

-- Joy (Boogerwoods@msn.com), November 09, 2001.

If folks are looking for the absolute last word on what is or is not good to eat I'm afraid you'll wait a long time because it ain't going to come.

Science can tell you what it knows at any given time but understanding changes over time with increased experience and a heightened perception of risk. There's plenty of good old fashioned ways of doing things that'll cut your lifespan nice and short for you if you don't understand the damage they can do. There's also plenty of new fangled ways of doing things that can do the same thing if we haven't collected enough experience with them yet to know any better.

We could lower that risk I suppose if we were willing to just wait longer before we used those new fangled methods but for how long are you willing to wait? Some things simply take years, decades even, and a huge number of people doing them before their particular not so obvious risks become apparent.

Eat moderately from a wide variety of foods and MOST of you will do OK with this for the length of your life. A few of you won't and a very rare individual will eat something they're deathly allergic too and die. There is a huge variation of physiology in the human species and for this reason there can be no absolute correct advice on virtually anything that will impact the human body.

I think it's a combination of the sheer volume of human knowledge there is now so that it's very difficult to keep even moderately abreast across a wide field of human endeavors and the fact that many people just won't learn how the scientific process works is why we have so muddled an understanding of human nutrition, medicine and all the rest.

For myself, I keep hens and have never had a problem with eating eggs even when everyone was so down on them but then again I didn't eat huge numbers of them. If I could get it from a source I could *trust* I'd have no problem with raw milk either. Too much of either in my diet is just plain bad though.

={(Oak)-

-- Live Oak (oneliveoak@yahoo.com), November 09, 2001.

GREAT POST, Colleen! I've noticed that if I drink "store" milk, I get very, very sleepy for awhile - but if I drink the raw milk I get from a neighbor, I'm fine.

-- Bonnie (chilton@stateline-isp.com), November 09, 2001.

It is difficult to overcome the irrational people who simply believe whatever they want. But perhaps the strongest recommendation is a weak statement by the AHA..., the American Heart Association admitted not long ago that eating eggs in moderation has no adverse affect on cardiovascular health. That was a weak statement at best. Eggs used to be known as the perfect food because they contain every amino acid (building blocks of protein) and the yolks are rich in vitamins and minerals. The egg white is water and protein. The yolk is where the fats are, but the yolk also contains half the protein in of the egg. Also, the vitamins and minerals are in the yolk.

Regarding butter..... natural is always better (that is true of all foods, but too many 'health food nazis' abound). ALL margarins have hydrogenated vegetable oils. Hydrogenated vegetable oils are more harmful to your health than anything in natural butter. No cholesterol? That's just a technicality ... hydrogenated vegetable oil becomes cholesterol as soon as it hits your stomach acid.

You're always better off with natural food. It tastes better (natural butter tastes much better than margarine ... naturally produced eggs (from free-ranging hens on pasture) always taste better than confinement eggs) and your body assimilates it more readily.

-- Egg Farmer (not@home.com), November 09, 2001.

It's not difficult to know what foods are good for us. Eat foods which are as close to their natural form as possible. The more processed/changed/mutilated they are by humans, the more unhealthy they are. Same goes for animal products that were RAISED unnaturally, like ruminants fattened on grains instead of grass. Changes the whole structure of the fats, from a healthy, dis-ease preventing food (grass-fed) to an unhealthy, dis-ease causing one (grain-fed).

Nature knows best; we should watch, listen and learn, doncha think?

-- Earthmama (earthmama48@yahoo.com), November 09, 2001.

If man makes it, don't eat it. Simple. LOL LQ

-- Little Quacker (carouselxing@juno.com), November 09, 2001.

My wifes great grandma lived to be 100 years old. Every morning she had to have either her bacon and eggs, or ham and eggs. She would not hardly eat anything else for breakfast. Also that breakfast kept her going till supper time. She never ate a mid-day lunch.

I know from my experience that if I eat bacon and eggs for breakfast that I am not really that hungry when lunch comes around.(although I eat anyway) But if I eat cold or hot cereal I will be starving two hours later.

-- r.h. in okla. (rhays@sstelco.com), November 09, 2001.

People have "food superstitions" and they aren't rational. Such as chicken is lowerfat than beef, so use ground chicken in your recipes instead of ground beef to cut fat in the diet. Except that ground beef is regulated by law the amount of fat it can contain and ground poulty isn't. Ground poulty can be as mush as 65 % fat whereas ground beef can be nore more than 30%. But every time you challenge someone's folk superstition they will ignore you or dismiss you. Frustrating, eh?

-- Mitzi Giles (Egiles2@prodigy.net), November 11, 2001.

Blame the so-called cholesterol problem on the tv and 'puter games. If folks would get off their behinds, they also wouldn't get osteoporosis.

-- ~Rogo (rogo2020@yahoo.com), November 11, 2001.

Eggs are STILL an almost perfect food. They have everything except vitamin C and roughage and are also easy to digest. When anyone asks me about the cholesterol in eggs I get on my soapbox and tell them more than they wanted to know!

I recently got a publication from PETA & they claim eggs are a major source of salmonella (not true) & that eating a lot of eggs makes women more at risk of breast cancer! Now where did they get THAT! I am writing a letter of protest even tho I know it won't do any good.

-- Bonnie (stichart@plix.com), November 12, 2001.

Actually, the chemical's called "Lecithin", here's some info. on it;

So I say where are the steak and eggs for breakfast??? :} LECITHIN Contains Choline & Inositol which are essential for the breakdown of fats and cholesterol. It helps prevent arterial congestion, helps distribute bodyweight, increases immunity to virus infections, cleans the liver and purifies the kidneys.

"GIVE YOUR MEMORY A BOOST WITH LECITHIN SUPPLEMENTS

'Where did I leave my keys?' 'Oops, I forgot that my brother's birthday was yesterday.' Does your memory seem to be slipping as you get older? Over the years, scientists have suggested that lecithin may enable certain nerves to better transmit signals. And because lecithin is an important building block in nerve membranes, it might help maintain nerve structure as a person ages. All this leads to the most recent studies which suggest that taking granular lecithin supplements may improve those frustrating, minor memory lapses. ........

........The richest food sources of lecithin are eggs, red meat and nuts. Some experts note that people with well-intentioned efforts to cut back on fatty or high cholesterol foods may inadvertently be decreasing lecithin intake to suboptimal levels. Eliminating an egg from the daily diet, for example, results in one-third less total lecithin for the day, on average."

-- Carla Walls (wtnf18@hotmail.com), November 19, 2001.