A new study from Tufts University found that participants with the highest levels of dairy fat in their blood had a 46 percent lower risk of developing diabetes than did those with lower levels of dairy fat.
Julie Child once said “Fat gives things flavor.” However, culinary advice not withstanding, nutrition experts have long recommended low-fat dairy products to improve health and reduce obesity. A new study from Tufts University has turned the tables on this long-standing wisdom, finding that people who eat full-fat dairy products are less likely to develop diabetes or become obese.
The study, led by Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, looked at 15 years of data for 3,333 adults who participated in the Nurses’ Health Study and Health Professionals Follow-up Study. They discovered that participants who had the highest levels of dairy fat in their blood had the lowest risks of developing diabetes during the 15 years of the study. Those with the lowest levels of dairy fats in their blood had up to 46 percent higher risk.
The surprises did not stop there. When Mozaffarian and his team adjusted their calculations to include weight gain and loss, they found that the connection between a lower-risk of diabetes and eating full-fat dairy products still held.
A Swedish study 3 years ago indicated that middle-aged men who consumed high-fat dairy products were less likely to become obese over a 12-year period when compared with men who rarely or never ate high-fat dairy. Some experts believe this may be because high-fat foods keep you feeling full longer, so you may eat fewer sugary calories overall during a day.
It is not yet clear just how whole fat is helping to lower diabetes risk, but the researchers say it may be that it is helping to regulate glucose and insulin. It also might be that dairy fats act directly on cells, working with muscles and the liver to improve their ability to break down the sugar from food. There is also a question of whether the microbes in certain high fat dairy foods, such as cheese, might be working to improve insulin response and lower diabetes risk.
Although Mozaffarian says the results of the study are preliminary and should not yet be taken as dietary advice, he told Time magazine that “I think these findings together with those from other studies do call for a change in the policy of recommending only low-fat dairy products. There is no prospective human evidence that people who eat low-fat dairy do better than people who eat whole-fat dairy.”
The study was published in the journal Circulation.
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