Open Veils · Answer
What are the health implications of seed oils?
The alternative record treats industrial seed oils as a novel, evolutionarily mismatched input whose pathology lies not in cholesterol numbers but in oxidative instability, omega-6/omega-3 ratio distortion, and toxic processing byproducts. A April 2026 Tandfonline review (per PubMed, Apr 2026) concludes concerns are 'without scientific foundation' — but critics note that review focuses narrowly on CVD endpoints and ignores oxidation chemistry, aldehydic breakdown products, and linoleic acid tissue accumulation data entirely. The institutional literature and the alternative record are asking different questions.
Evidence
- Gary Taubes and Nina Teicholz, in 'The Big Fat Surprise' and associated reporting, document how the replacement of animal fats with polyunsaturated vegetable oils was driven by Ancel Keys' disputed epidemiology and aggressive lobbying by the vegetable oil industry — not randomised mechanistic evidence.
- The processing criticism is specific: deodorisation of canola and soybean oil requires temperatures above 200°C, which the Weston A. Price Foundation and researcher Mary Enig documented as generating trans-fat isomers and oxidised sterols even before consumer use.
- Joseph Mercola and the Weston A. Price Foundation further flag that institutional studies validating LA use partially-hydrogenated controls or compare to trans fats, inflating apparent seed-oil benefit.
- Tucker Goodrich, a lay researcher cited approvingly by Saladino and Kruse, maps the rise of seed oil consumption against parallel curves for obesity, diabetes, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, arguing correlation is mechanistically supported by rodent studies showing LA-fed animals develop metabolic syndrome.
- Max Gerson's cancer therapy explicitly excluded all polyunsaturated industrial oils.