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793

It's a miracle these tapes could still be read after all that time.

Re-evaluation of the traditional diet-heart hypothesis: analysis of recovered data from Minnesota Coronary Experiment (1968-73) https://www.bmj.com/content/353/bmj.i1246

In 1968, researchers ran the largest randomised trial ever done on saturated fat.

Over 9,000 people in Minnesota state hospitals were split between animal fat and corn oil for years.

The corn oil group’s cholesterol dropped hard.

The full results never got published.

The raw data sat on magnetic tapes in a basement for over forty years.

A researcher named Christopher Ramsden tracked those tapes down in 2013 and ran the numbers the original team never released.

For every 30 point drop in cholesterol, death risk rose 22 percent.

The lower the cholesterol fell, the faster people died.

In the over 65s, each drop of roughly half a point on the cholesterol scale carried a 35 percent higher death risk within two years.

The trial is real.

It was double blind.

It was the gold standard design.

And it found the exact opposite of what dietary guidelines were about to be built on.

It sat unpublished for over forty years while the low fat, high vegetable oil advice became national policy.

This was not a small study lost in the noise.

It was the largest of its kind.

And the finding that mattered most never reached a single doctor’s desk for four decades.

It's a miracle these tapes could still be read after all that time. Re-evaluation of the traditional diet-heart hypothesis: analysis of recovered data from Minnesota Coronary Experiment (1968-73) https://www.bmj.com/content/353/bmj.i1246 >In 1968, researchers ran the largest randomised trial ever done on saturated fat. > Over 9,000 people in Minnesota state hospitals were split between animal fat and corn oil for years. > The corn oil group’s cholesterol dropped hard. > The full results never got published. > The raw data sat on magnetic tapes in a basement for over forty years. > A researcher named Christopher Ramsden tracked those tapes down in 2013 and ran the numbers the original team never released. > For every 30 point drop in cholesterol, death risk rose 22 percent. > The lower the cholesterol fell, the faster people died. > In the over 65s, each drop of roughly half a point on the cholesterol scale carried a 35 percent higher death risk within two years. > The trial is real. > It was double blind. > It was the gold standard design. > And it found the exact opposite of what dietary guidelines were about to be built on. > It sat unpublished for over forty years while the low fat, high vegetable oil advice became national policy. > This was not a small study lost in the noise. > It was the largest of its kind. > And the finding that mattered most never reached a single doctor’s desk for four decades.
[–] • 1 pt

It’s interesting is that the corn oil group’s cholesterol went down. That might be because they used the bad cholesterol test that measures only one type of cholesterol and estimates the other type based on that instead of measuring it directly. I forget which one it measures, but it might measure HDL (the good kind) and estimate LDL (the bad kind). Under that test the corn oil group could have had low HDL and high LDL and still registered as low in cholesterol.

This data finally saw the light of day around 2008. That’s around the time I first learned about the saturated fat / cholesterol scam. This might be the reason why.

[–] • 1 pt

Well yeah. (((They))) didn't want that data published. So it was hidden. This happens too often.