Cholesterol

Aim for a total fat intake of not more than 30 per cent of calories, as recommended by the nutritional guidelines.

If you need to reduce fat intake, do so primarily by cutting back on saturated and transfats.

The major sources of transfat in our diet are the readymade and fried foods.

These are not labelled, so the consumer does not know how much transfat he consumes.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) recommends that transfat should not be consumed at all.

From September 1, 2007, the use of transfats will have to be listed on food labels of all products manufactured in India.

Cardiovascular risk It is estimated that three years after the effective date, transfat labelling will prevent between 600 and 1200 cases of Coronary Heart Disease (CHD) and 250 to 500 deaths a year.

It takes about three years for lower Low Density Lipoprotein to result in lower CHD risk.

According to nutritional guidelines, transfat is not essential and provide no known benefit to human health.

The primary health risk from transfat consumption is an elevated risk of cardiovascular disease.

The consumption of transfatty acids raises levels of LDL, reduces levels of High Density Lipoprotein (HDL) i.e.

increases bad Read more...