linoleic acid vs sat fat -- how about fish oil?

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With all the discussion about linoleic, makes me wonder what the (3) eq's tell us about fish PUFA's?

Regards.

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From: citpeks

Sent: Friday, February 04, 2005 11:34 PM

Subject: [ ] Re: New file uploaded to

I thought that the phrase "They [FAO/WHO] specifically recommendconsumption of linoleic acid at the 10% level when total intake ofsaturated fatty acids is high" was in accordance with the numbers thatwe have been calculating with the Hegsted equation: one part ofsafflower oil (or grapeseed or sunflower) counteracts the effect oftwo parts of lard, as far as cholesterol is concerned.Here are some more numbers to calculate how to meet LA requirements:A 2000-calorie Zone diet (30% fat) requires 600 calories from fat. Ifwe want to have 10% of the calories from LA, that is 200 calories or22 grams of LA. Let us say that we want to eat a whole food, likesunflower seeds, to satisfy this requirement. What amount ofsunflower seeds do we need to eat, and how many calories will theyhave? (because besides the LA there will be other fatty acids andprotein).Sunflower seeds have ~50% oil of which ~68% is LA. This means that34% of the weight of sunflower seeds consists of LA. So to get 22grams of LA, you need to eat 65 grams of sunflower seeds (about 1/2cup). From the Nutrition Facts we know that 33g of seeds have 190calories. Therefore, 65g of seeds have 374 total calories of which292 are from fat, which is slightly less than half of the total dailycalories for fat. The 65g of seeds also contain about 16 grams ofprotein.Depending on your caloric intake, 1/4 to 1/2 cup of sunflower seedswould provide the LA requirement.Tony====Message 17422From: "Rodney" <perspect1111@y...>Date: Fri Feb 4, 2005 5:20 pmSubject: Re: New file uploaded to The safflower oil issue is an interesting one. How much linoleic issufficient to get the lion's share of the benefits to be had, beforediminishing returns (and increasing calories) set in?I just checked broccoli. 100 grams contains 35 calories and 51 mg oflinoleic. Am I right that that is about 1% of what may bedesirable? Are there better vegetable sources of linoleic that donot contain the types of fats we do not need, or want? Avocado hasmore, but it also contains other fats, that we do not need, to gowith it. Or is a small amount of safflower oil the best bet - themost linoleic for the smallest number of calories? Five grams a day,perhaps? Not a huge amount."Requirements for EFAsLinoleic acid: a minimum of 1 to 3+% of calories. Only small amountsof linoleic acid (an n-6 acid) are required. An RDA/RDI has not beenformally adopted; however linoleic acid at 1-2% of calories willprevent deficiency. NRC [1989] recommends a minimum intake oflinoleic acid, for adults, of 3-6 g/day. The comments of Jumpsen andClandinin [1995, p. 29] are appropriate here:...ecause competition exists among the fatty acids fordesaturating enzymes (Brenner, 1981), a level of at least 3% ofenergy should be met by n-6 fatty acids (FAO, 1977)...Uauy et al. (1989) recently suggested that the recommendation of 3.0%of total energy is adequate to prevent clinical signs of deficiencybut may be insufficient to ensure functional and biochemical normalcy.FAO [1995], a joint publication with the United Nations World HealthOrganization (WHO), recommends linoleic acid consumption in the rangeof 4-10% of total energy. They specifically recommend consumption oflinoleic acid at the 10% level when total intake of saturated fattyacids is high. Note that the FAO/WHO-recommended consumption level ishigher than the suggested minimums."http://www.beyondveg.com/billings-t/comp-anat/comp-anat-7h.shtml(probably *not* an unimpeachable source)Rodney.