Been reading about polyunsaturated fats: going to start supplementing omega 3.

[Murph]

My main health-science interest is ME/CFS obviously but i've recently been reading more about obesity. There's an intriguing possible connection.

Obesity has risen at the same time people have been eating more polyunsatured fats via seed oils (e.g. sunflower oil and canola oil and all the things in fried and processed foods), as this chart shows:

Seed oils are high in omega 6. Science is pretty sure that the ratio of omega 3 to omega 6 in your body is very important.

"Excessive amounts of omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) and a very high omega-6/omega-3 ratio, as is found in today's Western diets, promote the pathogenesis of many diseases, including cardiovascular disease, cancer, and inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, whereas increased levels of omega-3 PUFA (a low omega-6/omega-3 ratio) exert suppressive effects." source; https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12442909/

There's an interesting effect of high omega 6: it makes you fat and tired and in certain animals it can even trigger hibernation. Bears eat loads of omega-6 rich nuts and when they eat enough, their body can start to hibernate. Same is true of other animals that do torpor (short term) and hibernation (long term).

Source: https://faseb.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1096/fasebj.2019.33.1_supplement.lb304

People are not known to hibernate. Nor are we known to enter torpor. However the skill is found in all branches of the animal tree, including mammals and even one or two primates (they call this "evolutionarily conserved"). So it's possible we have some parts of the biolgical machinery in there and we're mostly not using it when we are healthy. (nb many of us attest to a time of year effect!)

Body temperatures have fallen over the last 100 years - as the next picture shows - as seed oil intake has risen. Could some people be in a pseudo-torpor? Could mecfs be partly affected by propensity to torpor ? are all the omega 6 polyunsatured fats on our bodies part of what's making the overall population sicker and us acutely sick?

One weird little clue that I sometimes turn over in my mind is that Norway and Britain are the two epicentres of mecfs (as shown below via google trends). What is it about the geography of the region that might explain it? I've though about sunlight and vasodilation usually. But one answer may be that these regions are historically fishy, eating cold water fish. [i'm stretching the idea now, no argument!] fish are high in omega 3. Is it possible that northern europeans need even more omega 3 than they are getting from a modern diet, and are more prone to torpor if they have high omega-6 to omega 3 ratios (and especially if they then get whacked by a virus?)

Certainly omega-3 supplementation is a very very safe idea. well tested. I'm also going to radically reduce omega-6 just to see if I notice anything different! maybe i just lose a bit of fat, that would be welcome too!

 

[LINE]

Good post. You can see significant changes in disease patterns starting in the 1950s to today. Increases in metabolic diseases, heart disease, cancers, auto-immunity, neuro-psychiatric etc.
\
There are distinctive suspects for this, but I think primarily from the advent of chemical farming and industrial food processing that started in the 1950s. The human has not evolved well enough to take the onslaught of unnatural ingredients. My brother was a researcher and taught at Harvard Medical School who assured me that many modern diseases were simply the result of epigenetic changes. Those changes are created by environmental toxins. His words, not mine. The environmental toxins would likely be pesticides, herbicides, fluoridated compounds, fire-retardants etc.

These alterations in chemistry begin to downstream into the cell responses which causes mis-firing in systems such as the immune response and a whole host of other important responses.

. What bothers me is the silence of the media (no surprise) and the blindness of the 'health professionals'. Caveat emptor (buyer beware) seems appropriate.

Take a look at people in the 1950s versus today if you can.

 

[LINE]

I was looking for the story about McDonalds french fries which used to be cooked in lard, someone persuaded them to change to vegetable oil which is likely cheap oils such as soybean etc. He believed that lard was causing coronary disease due to the high saturated fat - but from what I read, coronary disease increased after the higher use of vegetable oils. (Open for correction).

Healthy fats are necessary for cellular functioning.

 

[Murph]

I was looking for the story about McDonalds french fries which used to be cooked in lard, someone persuaded them to change to vegetable oil which is likely cheap oils such as soybean etc. He believed that lard was causing coronary disease due to the high saturated fat - but from what I read, coronary disease increased after the higher use of vegetable oils. (Open for correction).

Healthy fats are necessary for cellular functioning.

There does seem to be a cardio-protective effect of unsaturated omega 6 vegetable fats. IN hibernation the bear's hearts need to keep working even as their body temperatures fall - building cell walls out of vegetable fats seems to help that happen (vegetable fats are liquid at cool temps, whereas animal fats are solid). A hibernating bear doesn't want their heart to get all stiff and rigid when the temperature goes below zero!

I think that omega-6s possibly do help human hearts compared to solid saturated fats. The questions that remain are: at what cost to every other system; and have we got more than enough?

edit to add: omega-3s are very liquid fats too - they come from cold water fish who can't afford to freeze up when they're swimming through icy streams and ocean currents!

It's certainly possible that we can have more flexible membranes (e.g. less stiff red blood cells) if we dial in the fats we eat.

 

[LINE]

@Murph likely certain other fats that are toxic? example soybean oil, cottonseed oil etc. while sunflower, sesame are better?

 

[junkcrap50]

This site might be interesting to you. Discusses this topic. https://fireinabottle.net/

 

[Rufous McKinney]

I just do not want to participate in the Fish Scene. There may be vegan sources of Omega 3, but I"m not convinced they are comparable to Eat Some Fish.

I have tried to avoid seed oils for decades now. Many many decades. I have all the metabolic disorders gifted from my parents. And I am not overweight.

 

[Murph]

This site might be interesting to you. Discusses this topic. https://fireinabottle.net/

yep, that's a place some of my ideas have come from!
He's very convincing, but almost too much so, crossing over into guru-that-makes-the-evidence-say-whatever-he-wants areas. I need to read a few more rebuttals I think before I feel i've weighed it all up properly.

 

[Murph]

@Murph likely certain other fats that are toxic? example soybean oil, cottonseed oil etc. while sunflower, sesame are better?

My understanding is the omega6: omega3 ratio is what you need to worry about. soybean is the worst I think?

flaxseed better but none of them are great and so eating solid saturated fats is smarter(coconut oil, butter, meat fats).

A really good diet probably focuses on omega 3s, starch and fibre. salmon with rice and veg!

 

[Murph]

Here's some results from a recent very big study from the UK finding you probably want an omega 6 to omega 3 ratio around 8. above that you get a growing risk of your heart failing

Very high levels of omega 6 relative to omega 3 seem dangerous; there's also a group who can maybe benefit (modestly) from eating more omega 6! I'd love to see if the scientists could zoom in on he characteristics of the people at the extreme left of the charts.

 

[Murph]

I dived in a bit further. The results certainly don't suggest cutting out omega-6 fatty acids!

The healthiest people seem to be the ones in the top quintile for both. i.e. the trick seems to be eating a lot of omega 3 and omega 6. These people have a hazard ratio (chance of dying) of less than half of the people with low omega 3 and low omega 6. (highlighted in blue in table below)!!

I might revise my plan to cut out all omega 6s! I will still cut out the industrial seed oils though.

 

[junkcrap50]

Here's some results from a recent very big study from the UK finding you probably want an omega 3 to omega 6 ratio around 8. above that you get a growing risk of your heart failing

From what I can recall, I believe you want some optimum ratio (I don't know what that is, or if it's known). The problem is the modern diet and food we now eat is very omega-6 dominant. So, in order to compensate for that, you have to make a conscious effort to focus only on omega-3's.

You can measure you omega3mega6 ratio with a test. I've seen it several places and think I had it done on some nutritional/vitamin test kit. Also, on the Fireinabottle or some other place online (plasminogen doctor/site), there's some blood test mentioned where you can get your saturated & polyunsaturated fats measured. People have tried tracking/tracked their increase of saturated fats as a result of their diet.

 

[LINE]

@Murph -Great post, thanks for doing that.

Just expanding on this - I read the posts from people about seed oils which they lump into one category which is don't consume these. On the other hand, I read abouit the benefits of quality 6 oils such as sesame.

 

[Murph]

This data from hanson's metabolite study shows patients were lower than controls in DHA, an omega-3.

data is from my webapp that allows you to see levels of any metabolite from that study. It's a great studty because it measures the metabolite four times, before and after two bouts of exercise.
https://jasemurphy.shinyapps.io/Germainetal2022/

 

[Mary]

@Murph - I've seen lots of references to abnormal omega 3 levels or omega 3 utilization and ME/CFS. Have you seen this? https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Omega_3_fatty_acid_hypothesis

It says, among other things:

A study of twenty-two patients (defined using the CDC criteria) and twelve controls found that CFS patients have significantly lower EPA/AA and Omega3/Omega 6 (ω3/ω6) ratios owing to substantially increased levels of Omega 6 fatty acids (but not lower Omega 3s).

A naturopathic type person (not a doctor really) urged me to take omega 3's and also my regular MD of all people had done testing (nothing out of the ordinary) which showed low omega 3 levels, so I added in a fish oil, and I think it helps me some with sleep, but I can't take past noon. Though nothing has extended my energy envelope . . .

 

[LINE]

As a FYI, I find wheat germ oil to be helpful. Also experimenting with Pro Resolving Mediators which is a modified fish oil.

(Wheat germ oil in capsules - my belief is that capsules prevent rancidity which is not good).