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349 points zdw | 2 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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taeric ◴[] No.45662518[source]
I'm very curious what the method they used to attribute this to the advice? I ask as I swear I saw something around that timeline talking about "trans fats" and how they were a possible culprit in a ton of nutrition related woes. Notably, in 2015 was when it was removed from the "safe" list and it was on the way out during this time.

It sucks, as I can't find whatever paper I thought I read that implicated trans fats in allergies. Searching "trans fats allergies" shows several. I'm assuming it was one of the main results.

So my question is largely, why would it be more likely that the advice is why allergies reduced? Seems if there was evidence that trans fats were leading to increased allergies, that removing them would be by far the bigger driver?

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hinkley ◴[] No.45664945[source]
I have a vague but possibly false recollection that someone noticed that mothers who ate peanuts while breastfeeding had lower incidence of peanut allergies in the child. And they started pulling on that thread.
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taeric ◴[] No.45669154[source]
I should be clear that I expect exposure to something will build up some resilience to it. You see very similar with milk, if I'm not mistaken.

So, I wouldn't expect that this would have no impact. I just question any improvements in the 2008-2015 timeline that doesn't acknowledge how much progress we got from removing trans fats.

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hinkley ◴[] No.45672715[source]
Trans fats are as bad or worse than saturated fats, but I’d be very surprised if they had anything to do with childhood food allergies. Some ethnic food uses raw peanut oil but it’s mostly disappeared from processed food. I remember that being discussed when I was a child, but cannot recall if it was peanut oil or hydrogenated peanut oil. Hydrogenated vegetable oil is unsaturated fat that we saturated via hydrogen ions. It can sub in for butter and lard in some recipes and we have vats of highly processed corn and soy owned by people who pay food “scientists” to invent needs for their surplus of product. Have been since practically the end of WWII. There are now two snack aisles at my grocery store. That’s changed in the last twenty years, and so has obesity. 80% of that is highly, highly processed, hyperpalatable food. But it turned out that margarine is objectively worse for you than butter. But cheap butter can have its own food allergy problems. IIRC Holstein cow milk has more allergens in it than older milk cow breeds and those are everywhere.
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taeric ◴[] No.45673209{3}[source]
No, trans fats are flat out worse. They are not safe. Pretty much period.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6... is an older study that supports this pretty directly. Is a big part of why they were removed from the "safe" category in 2015.

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1. hinkley ◴[] No.45673431{4}[source]
And that has nothing at all to do with food allergies.
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2. taeric ◴[] No.45673864[source]
Google isn't making it easy to find the direct studies, but their silly AI summary at the top is pretty direct. "Yes, evidence suggests that trans fats can contribute to food allergies by activating mast cells, altering the gut microbiome, and promoting an inflammatory response."

You can argue that this is only in a mouse model. And fair, but evidence is still there that they can directly lead to food allergies.

Do we have direct causal links to children food allergies? No, but nor do we have direct causal evidence for early exposure. My prior is still that people are better at managing their dietary intake when the problem ingredient is literally removed from the ecosystem than when they are just advised to do better.