Coconut Oil: Diet Friend or Foe?
Tropical Oils’ Bad Reputation and Startling Health Benefits
Despite the fears of our parents' generation, health experts are now suggesting coconut as one of the healthiest oils: good for the heart, thyroid, cholesterol and more.
Occasionally, medical science gets it wrong. The blacklisting of coconut and other tropical oils by American health and nutrition experts stands as a perfect example. Thirty years of health advice by the FDA and other experts has promoted trans fat margarine or corn, soy, safflower and canola oil over coconut oil, but the joke is on us. It turns out that coconut oil may be beneficial to the immune system, the thyroid, the heart, improves cholesterol, and unlike most fats, coconut oil does not go rancid even when cooked at high temperatures.
The Benefits of Coconut Oil:
Immune Support
- Coconut oil is rich in medium chain fatty acids and monoglycerides which have immune-boosting and antioxidant activity and are antimicrobial, according to Dr. Jon J. Kabara (2001)
- Lauric acid (which makes up about 50% of coconut oil), and its derivative monolaurin, support the immune system and may dampen or prevent toxic/allergic reactions - as well as playing a role in destroying pathogens like HIV, herpes, and the flu (Dr. Mary G. Enig, 2001)
Metabolism and Thyroid
- Coconut oil may boost the metabolism and improves thyroid health (unlike soy or canola, which can suppress the thyroid). Animals fed on “cheap coconut oil for fattening” in the 1940s became more active and were leaner, as opposed to animals fed on corn and soybeans. Corn and soy feed were used to replace thyroid-suppressant drugs that were given to animals to make them sluggish and heavier (Dr. Ray Peat, 2001)
Blood Sugar
- Coconut oil appears to stabilize blood sugar levels and prevent symptoms of hypoglycemia (Peat, 2001)
Cholesterol
- Coconut oil, unlike most fats, has been noted in two 1995 and 1988 studies as a “neutral fat,” having no negative impact on cholesterol or the health of the arteries (Enig, 2001). A 1989 study showed that men who were accustomed to coconut oil in their diet demonstrated undesirable changes in their HDL-LDL cholesterol ratio when corn oil was substituted instead of coconut in the diet
- Coconut oil feeding resulted in lower serum cholesterol than olive oil in a cholesterol study in 1997, and a 1994 study showed similar results when comparing coconut to olive and corn oils.
No Rancidity
- Unsaturated oils oxidize at high temperatures and go rancid - outside and inside the body. Unlike other cooking fats - including olive oil - coconut oil is not damaged at high heat, nor does it contain any (“partially hydrogenated”) trans fats which have been linked to heart disease, cancer, diabetes, high LDL (“bad”) cholesterol, and obesity (Dr. Mary Enig, 2000)
Raw Food Diets
- Raw coconuts and coconut oil are widely recommended in raw food diets, some of the healthiest diets for weight loss and cleansing
Coconut’s Undeserved Bad Reputation: Where did it come from?
According to Dr. Mary G. Enig (2001), “The coconut industry has suffered more than three decades of abusive rhetoric from the consumer activist group Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), from the American Soybean Association (ASA) and other members of the edible oil industry, and from those who learned their misinformation from groups like CSPI and ASA.”
It all began in the late 1950s with the misinterpretation of several studies showing the health impact of polyunsaturated and saturated fats (Enig, 2001). These studies were used by various groups, including the CSPI and the FDA, to make a case that partially hydrogenated (trans) oils were the healthy ones, while coconut and palm oil were called “cheaper artery-clogging oils from Malaysia and Indonesia.”
In the 1960s, 70s and 80s, several American health boards (some of which had originally been in favor of the more stable saturated fats over unstable unsaturated and trans fat) began to use the same misinformation to promote domestic corn, soy, and other oils over foreign coconut, palm and palm kernel oils, under the guise of sage health advice.
For more details, see Dr. Enig’s article, Coconut: In Support of Good Health in the 21st Century.
