Olive oil may reduce coronary heart disease risk: FDA

Food containing olive oil may reduce the risk of coronary heart disease, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) says, citing limited evidence from a dozen scientific studies about the benefits of monounsaturated fats.
As long as people don't increase the number of calories they consume daily, the FDA confirmed a reduction in the risk of coronary heart disease when people replace foods high in saturated fat with the monounsaturated fat in olive oil.
That means a change as simple as sautéing food in two tablespoons of olive oil instead of butter may be healthier for your heart.
"Olive oil is a healthy product to help them fight heart disease," said Bob Bauer, president of the North American Olive Oil Association.
Recent research has underscored the heart benefits from so-called Mediterranean diets high in unsaturated fats from vegetable oil, nuts and such fish as salmon and tuna.
Mortality rates dropped by more than 50 percent among elderly Europeans who stuck to such diets and led healthy lifestyles, according to research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Olive oil and certain food containing olive oil can now indicate that "limited and not conclusive scientific evidence suggests that eating about two tablespoons (23 grams) of olive oil daily may reduce the risk of coronary heart disease due to the monounsaturated fat in olive oil," the FDA concluded.
"I think FDA just took a more conservative view," Bauer said. Manufacturers waited for the FDA's precise wording before revising labels. "I expect, over time, most every container of olive oil will have this," he said.
According to the American Heart Association, coronary heart disease caused 502,189 deaths or one in five deaths in 2001, the most current statistic available.
Another 13.2 million Americans that year survived the heart attacks, chest pains and other ailments caused by coronary heart disease.
Along with lowering cholesterol, cutting out cigarettes and exercising, the group says Americans can boost heart health by eating foods low in saturated fat, cholesterol and sodium.
Thirty-three healthy young American men ate diets high in saturated fats from butter or cocoa butter olive oil's monounsaturated fats or polyunsaturated fats from soyabean oil. The soyabean and olive oil groups significantly lowered total and bad LDL cholesterol.
In another trial involving 21 middle-aged Spanish women, those with diets in which olive oil replaced eight percent of total daily calories from saturated fats lowered their total and bad cholesterol while significantly boosting good HDL cholesterol. Forty-one young Spanish men lowered total and bad LDL cholesterol with an olive oil diet.