4 JANUARY 1998. THE SUNDAY TIMES

Low-fat diet may pile on weight by Lois Rogers Medical ,Correspondent

LOW-FAT foods can make you fatter, scientists, now believe. Slimmers who eat processed diet foods may find they put on more weight than those who eat natural, unprocessed oils, according to controversial new research.

The findings will be a blow to the food industry, which has spent millions of pounds developing and promoting low-fat desserts, cheeses and ready-made meals.

Udo Erasmus, a leading biochemist and diet expert at the University of British Columbia In Vancouver, Canada, has established that it is much more important for weight-conscious people, to consume oily fish, nuts, olive oil, sesame oil and other vegetable oils than processed low-fat products.

Natural oils and fats, which have already been found to reduce the risk of heart disease, contain chemicals that raise the body "thermostat" and cause it to burn more, energy. People who fall to consume a minimum amount have a slower metabolism and a tendency to gain weight.

The natural fats and oils contain essential fatty acids (EFAs). Some of these help convert food into instant energy - rather than stored fat - by transporting fat-burning oxygen to the body's tissues.

Manufacturers remove EFAs from processed foods because they quickly go rancid, reducing the product's shelf life.

Processed foods such as cakes, biscuits and pastry - even those with reduced fat - therefore push foods containing beneficial EFAs out of the diet.

Toby Aysslinger, a spokesman for Erasmus said: "There Is ample evidence of the benefits 'and lots of people here are trying to increase their intake of EFAs as a result"

The findings, the result of a 17-year research project, an particularly important in Britain, where almost half the total adult population is overweight.

Many of those who have tried low-fat products claim they have just got fatter. Ursula Van Leeuwen-Hill, 30, a long. term slimmer from St Neots, Cambridgeshire, said: "I used to buy low-fat everything because I was under the Impression that would make me lose weight, but I was still more than 14st. It's not just to do with calories." She has switched to a fresh food diet to keep her weight at about 10st.

Obesity researchers in Britain have also begun to investigate EFAS. Susan Jebb, head of obesity studies at the Dunn Nutrition Centre in Cambridge, said: "If I had to put my money on an area which Is going to throw up some exciting information about obesity, it would be the role of fatty acids."

Concentrated high-calorie foods rich in sugar and fat with low quantities of fibre and water are more likely to cause obesity. It is believed the brain's switch mechanism, which tells us to stop eating when we are full of bulky foods, does not respond to fat In the same way.

Eating the wrong fats may damage your health in other ways, possibly causing cancer, heart disease and arthritis.

Research in Scotland has found that the 20% of the population with the lowest intake of EFAs has a risk of heart disease three times higher than those who eat a healthier diet.
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