Have you ever found yourself eating an entire box of Oreos at midnight? Enjoy eating peanut butter out of the jar with a spoon? Are you a Burger King junkie, or a sucker for the Wendy's Dollar Menu?
Before indulging in a 1,000-calorie snack, consider the trans fats you're ingesting.
Unfortunately, along with a gross amount of calories and grams of fat, most of our favorite foods contain substantial quantities of trans fats. Used under the pretense of increasing the shelf life of products, trans fats save companies money but also pose some major health risks for consumers.
Most commonly found in products like Oreo cookies and peanut butter, trans fats are linked with heart disease, as well as cardiovascular disease, according to Atif Awad, a professor in the department of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences.
According to Awad, trans fats are created through a process called Hydrogenation.
"Hydrogenation is when hydrogen is put into vegetable oil to make the oil solid at room temperature," Awad said.
Awad's research deduces that trans fats are linked to cardiovascular disease because they increase the amount of "bad" cholesterol in the blood-LDL cholesterol. As LDL cholesterol increases, so does the risk of a heart attack.
"Good" cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, is also manipulated by the consumption of trans fats. HDL cholesterol in the blood reduces the risk of heart disease, according to Awad.
While conducting his research, Awad faced extreme pressure from the food industry. When his findings were submitted to other researchers in his field for review, there was extreme opposition to the link between trans fats and cardiovascular disease.
"The industry paid people with Ph.D.s to try to disprove research against the harm of trans fatty acids," Awad said. "These Ph.D.s went after me so that my research seemed questionable."
The government has passed a law requiring all food manufacturers to include the trans fat content on their nutrition labels.
National chains such as McDonald's and Burger King now have nutritional calculators where customers can tabulate the content of their meals. For example, a person could select a Big Mac, small french fries and a large Sprite and the calculator will add up the nutrition content of each individual item. Likewise, chains are now listing the nutritional value, including trans fat content, of their products online.
"All of our stores in the Buffalo area will be changing to a different oil that contains no trans fat by April," said Steve Alex, a district manager of the KFC franchises in Buffalo. "This will make our food healthier for our costumers."
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
