“The LCHF War Divides Sweden”
A low-carb and high-fat diet (LCHF) has become extremely popular in Sweden in recent years. But there’s still plenty of resistance. The old-fashioned fear of fat is not dead yet. And this week saw some of the biggest headlines and media frenzy in years!
It all started with an opinion piece by a few fat-fearing professors, in Swedens biggest newspaper, called “The popular fat diets are a threat to public health” (link to Google translation).
This exploded into massive headlines in every paper and became the main piece of news on TV (I was on a morning show briefly to discuss it).
The most bizarre thing is that the opinion piece suggests that there’s been an increase in risk of heart disease & stroke in Sweden – and they blame the popularity of LCHF. However, the risk of heart disease and stroke in Sweden is on the contrary going down, faster and faster, according to the latest statistics:
Risk of heart disease to the left, stroke to the right. Top line for men, bottom line for women. Bigger picture.
Another silly health scare
It’s absolutely bizarre how little evidence is needed to trash low-carb diets. What the professors were referring to was a subgroup of people: young women with a very short education. The risk of heart disease for this group has indeed increased – since 1995!
In other words, the increase in butter sales in the 2010s are being blamed for an increase in heart disease risk in the 1990s! I know there are some misconceptions about the danger of butter, but really, does anyone really believe that butter can travel through time?
Good advertising?
In Sweden it’s often said that “all advertising is good advertising”. And that may be true again. These silly Swedish health scares about LCHF always results in more daily visitors for my Swedish blog:
This week saw a new record: 58 000 visits in a single day. Pretty good in a small country.
Here’s what’s even better: More and more Swedes are seeing through the fat-phobic propaganda. More and more Swedes realize that there’s no sound scientific reason to fear good old-fashioned butter. The Swedish LCHF revolution keeps growing.
PS
Here’s comments on all the LCHF health scares (Google translated)
Earlier on the Swedish LCHF revolution
