Eggs And Cholesterol?

[Julian]

I wonder if anyone can tell me the truth: Do eggs affect cholesterol? Or is this just a myth?

[worins net]

Hello. Ist is just a myth! Chicken eggs are high in cholesterol but the effect of egg consumption on blood cholesterol is minimal. Most people can eat up to 10 eggs and there is no increase of their risk of heart disease. But if you like eggs and don't want the extra cholesterol you can eat only the egg whites. They contain no cholesterol.

Edited February 8, 2016 by worins net

[Guest]

It's a healthy type of cholesterol that your body needs.

[Simon Zackrisson]

Hey man.

I feel somewhat qualified to speak out on this, since I've read quite some about it.

In short - Egg consumption is NOT dangerous for your health, even in large quantities.

It is probable that it's actually the opposite.

 

Elaboration:

I will begin by a disclaimer that my understanding may be inaccurate, so even though I'm pretty sure of this, it may of course still be faulty.

 

Alright, so lets explore cholesterol. 

To start to understand this, we need to first pierce one bubble of ignorance. 

A lot of people think that there is only one form of cholesterol. 

And, that having a high cholesterol is bad. 

 

How this narrative has been spread is profoundly dishonest. What this oversimplification has brought is lucrative business models both within the medical field (For example, a medicine called statins), as well as in other industries. Such as those who wish to not have their products exposed as the health-declining actors they are. (Think of like basically every product with sugar in it, or carbohydrates, like pasta and bread)

The truth is, in a somewhat simplified model, that there are three types of cholesterol:
 

• VLDL Very Low Density Lipoprotein
• LDL Low Density Lipoprotein
• HDL High Density Lipoprotein

(Don't think of the names for these too much, it's enough to remember the acronyms.)

 

What now? Different types of cholesterol..? Ah..  tad annoying, I thought it only were one ....

Don't worry, it's rather easy to understand. 

VLDL is just cholesterol that becomes LDL, don't think about this guy more.

 

LDL is the generally thought of as "the bad cholesterol"* 

HDL is in general the good one.

 

Ok. So high amounts of LDL causes heart-disease and high amounts of HDL lower it. How do we get more of the good HDL then?

BY EATING SATURATED FAT. Such as eggs. 

 

A diet of saturated fat increases the amount of positive HDL cholesterol. 

A diet of carbohydrates increases the amount of negative LDL cholesterol. 

 

Wait, so then why has there been all this talk about this one cholesterol, and that having high of it is bad?

Because, what they've done there is added all these three types together, forming one single set of number. 

And since we now know that they have different properties (HDL is good and LDL bad), the result displayed by this method is close to completely irrelevant. 

 

There it is. 

Any questions, send them away.

 

(*Clarification: Even though it's often deemed that LDL is the "bad guy", your body is unable to sustain life without a small amount of these guys around.)

Edited February 8, 2016 by Simon Zackrisson

[Makkatya]

To put it simple, it's a myth.

Trans fats are the big no-no.

[Amy]

Eggs do contain about 55 percent of your cholesterol intake in a day, however studies suggest that a person's cholesterol level is affected by heredity.  Exercise and whole grain oats can help lower ldl levels and increase hdl levels.

[JevinR]

Eat the damn yolk http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=827408

[rikkefriismose]

Cholesterol is not dangerous! Cholesterol is a molecule your body needs.

Your blood cholesterol tells you if something is wrong in your body. Like fever does it. An infection causes fever, the fever cannot cause the infection. It is the same case with the cholesterol. Certain diseases can cause a high amount of cholesterol in your blood, but the cholesterol cannot cause any diseases.

If you do not serve your body with enough cholesterol, it will try to produce it on its own. It is not really good at it and can only reach a production to cover 10% of your daily need. Cholesterol is, for instance, used for the production of sex hormones and represents 75% of the weight of your brain. A lack of cholesterol will, therefore, cause a imbalance in your hormons and an insufficient maintenance of your brain, which for instance increases your risk to develop Alzheimer's Disease. 

In Denmark, the system recommends your blood cholesterol to be lesser than 5,0 millimol per liter, which corresponds to 200 on the American rate list. The actual fact is that a blood cholesterol lower than 5,1 shows that you have the highest risk for diseases. The normal range is in-between 5,6-7,2 (220-280). The range from 7,7-12,8 (300-500) shows a imbalance in your body, and the range from 15,4-26,6 (600-1.000) indicates a disease in your body.

My source is Robby Curdorf and the knowledge I have from studying medicine.