Dairy puts your heart at risk

Dairy and other animal fats have been shown to put you at risk of heart disease and stroke

Dairy products contain varying amounts of fat but a considerable portion of it is always saturated fat. This study investigated the link between dairy fat intake and the incidence of heart disease and stroke among 220,000 people whose diets and health were followed for decades.

When compared to sugary diets, dairy fat intake did not pose a higher risk for heart disease and stroke but comparing one unhealthy diet to another doesn’t really make much sense. The authors used all the data to look at the effect of replacing dairy fat with other types of fat and found that replacing it with polyunsaturated fats (from various food sources) reduced the risk by 24 per cent, whilst replacing it with vegetable fat cut the risk by 10 per cent. On the other hand, replacing dairy fat with other animal fats only increased the heart disease and stroke risk.

And what’s truly worth highlighting – replacing dairy fat with healthful carbohydrates from wholegrains was associated with an amazing 28 per cent lower risk of heart disease and stroke!

_{Chen M et al., 2016. Dairy fat and risk of cardiovascular disease in 3 cohorts of US adults. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. 104 (5): 1209-1217.}