Thread by @chrisboettcher9

You’ve heard that fat and cholesterol are bad for you. That eating eggs, butter, and red meat will clog your arteries.

But what if I told you this belief was built on one man's manipulated data and bad science?

Here's the truth:

Much of this fear can be traced back to Ancel Keys, a scientist obsessed with heart disease.

He was determined to prove that saturated fat and cholesterol were to blame, even when the evidence didn’t fully support it.

In the 1950s, heart disease was skyrocketing, and scientists were searching for answers.

Keys introduced the Diet-Heart Hypothesis. The idea that saturated fat raises cholesterol, which then causes heart disease.

To support his theory, Keys conducted the Seven Countries Study, claiming it showed a direct link between fat intake and heart disease.

But there was a problem, he cherry-picked data and ignored countries that didn’t fit his narrative.

For example:

France and Germany had high saturated fat intake but low heart disease, yet they were excluded.

Meanwhile, countries with high heart disease but also high sugar and smoking rates were included—blaming fat instead of other factors.

Despite these flaws, Keys’ influence was massive.

He landed on the cover of Time magazine in 1961, advising Americans to cut saturated fat and cholesterol.

Soon, government guidelines followed, pushing low-fat diets.

This led to one of the biggest nutritional disasters of all time:

• Natural saturated fats (butter, animal fats) were demonized
• Food companies replaced them with polyunsaturated fats
• Seed oils like soybean, canola, and corn oil flooded the market

The shift from saturated fats to seed oils was disastrous. These oils are:

• Highly processed & oxidize easily
• High in omega-6 fatty acids, driving chronic inflammation
• Linked to obesity, diabetes, and metabolic disorders

Meanwhile, later research disproved the Diet-Heart Hypothesis:

• Saturated fat doesn’t directly cause heart disease
• Dietary cholesterol has little impact on blood cholesterol
• Sugar, processed foods, and inflammation are the real culprits

But the damage was done. The food industry had embraced cheap, low-fat, high-carb products, loaded with seed oils and sugar.

And with the billions in profits, they're able to continue to manipulate data today in an effort to convince you this garbage is somehow healthy.

Today, we’re still undoing this false narrative while people are sicker than ever before.

Real foods like eggs, butter, and red meat aren’t the enemy, ultra-processed junk and seed oils are.

Thanks for reading!

If you learned something, follow me @chrisboettcher9 for more and retweet the tweet below to share this with others:

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