Eggs are Good or Bad for Health?

Date: Mon, 4 May 2009 08:33:20 +1000
Subject: Fwd: Egg Yolk Is Good For You

Letter via e-mail from Ir. Cheong C Kwong, Pinkpink devil and Ms Josephine Wong to Dr. JB Lim asking on an article below:

Egg Yolk is Good for You

Here's some advice for all the misguided people who've been throwing away egg yolk.

And affirmation for all the wise people who've been making delicious
pineapple tarts.

And fulsome praise for all those who eat four half-boiled eggs every morning.

Egg yolks are good for you. A lot of lay people do not understand the truth about egg yolks. Many people throw away the egg yolk because they think that's where all the nasty fat and cholesterol is. This is a perfect example of how confused most people are about nutrition. In a world full of misinformation, somehow most people now mistakenly think that the egg yolk is the worst part of the egg, when in fact, the YOLK IS THE
HEALTHIEST PART OF THE EGG! By throwing out the yolk and only eating egg whites, you're essentially throwing out the most nutrient dense, antioxidant-rich, vitamin and mineral loaded portion of the egg. The yolks contain so many B-vitamins, trace minerals, vitamin A, folate, choline, lutein, and other powerful nutrients... it's not even worth trying to list them all.

In fact, the egg whites are almost devoid of nutrition compared to the yolk. Even the protein in egg whites isn't as powerful without the yolks to balance out the amino acid profile and make the protein more bio-available. Not to even mention that the egg yolks from free range chickens are loaded with omega-3 fatty acids. Yolks contain more than 90% of the calcium, iron, phosphorus, zinc, thiamin, B6, folate, and B12, and panthothenic acid of the egg. In addition, the yolks contain all of the fat soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K in the egg, as well as all of the essential fatty acids.

And now the common objection I get all the time when I say that the yolks are the most nutritious part of the egg...'But I heard that whole eggs will skyrocket my cholesterol through the roof.' No, this is FALSE! First of all, when you eat a food that contains a high amount of dietary cholesterol such as eggs, your body down-regulates its internal production of cholesterol to balance things out. On the other hand, if you don't eat enough cholesterol, your body simply produces more since cholesterol has tons of important functions in the body.


And here's where it gets even more interesting...There are indications that eating whole eggs actually raises your good HDL cholesterol to a higher degree than LDL cholesterol, thereby improving your overall cholesterol ratio and blood chemistry.

And 3rd, high cholesterol is NOT a disease! Heart disease is a disease...but high cholesterol is NOT. You can read the following article about why trying to attack cholesterol is a mistake, and what the REAL deadly risk factors actually are...

http://www.truthaboutabs.com/cholesterol-myths.html

So I hope we've established that whole eggs are not some evil food that will wreck your body... instead whole eggs are FAR superior to egg whites!!

Also, your normal supermarket eggs coming from mass factory farming just don't compare nutritionally with organic free range eggs from healthy chickens that are allowed to roam freely and eat a more natural diet. (Like Kampong chicken!).

I recently compared eggs I bought at the grocery store with a batch of eggs I got at a farm stand where the chickens were free roaming and healthy. Most people don't realize that there's a major difference because they've never bought real eggs from healthy chickens...The eggs from the grocery store had pale yellow yolks. On the other hand, the healthier free range eggs had deep orange colored yolks indicating much higher nutrition levels and carotenoids.

So next time a health or fitness professional tells you that egg whites are superior, you can quietly ignore their advice knowing that you understand the REAL deal about egg yolks.

One more thing about eggs... I read a study recently that compared groups of people that ate egg breakfast vs. groups of people that ate cereal or bagel based breakfasts. The results of the study showed that the egg eaters lost or maintained a healthier bodyweight, while the cereal / bagel eaters gained weight.

It was hypothesized that the egg eaters actually ate less calories during the remainder of the day because their appetite was more satisfied compared to the cereal / bagel eaters who would have been more prone to wild blood sugar swings and food cravings.

Reply and comments by Dr Lim Ju Boo to the above article:

Dear Miss Josephine Wong and others,

Thank you for seeking my advice about eggs. Someone has sent me this same article about eggs many months ago, and he has asked me the same question you asked here. They too have requested me to comment on it. Many thanks for your information about the misnomer that egg yolk is nutritionally bad for health. Below is a summary of my assurance.

I powerfully support the above article sent to me for review. A lot of half-cooked ‘nutritionist’ and health freaks need to undergo a proper and qualified 4 year bachelor degree course in nutrition and food science in a properly recognized university before they talk and spread absolute rubbish that egg yolk is bad for health because they contain cholesterol.

Let me straight away tell you that although eggs are high in cholesterol this has no impact in raising blood cholesterol. An average hen’s egg is about 50 gm. and has about 140 mg cholesterol 3.7 gm fat. This means even if I eat 10 eggs everyday, the amount of cholesterol intake daily is 140 x 10 = 1400 mg (1.4 gm).

Blood volume:

The blood volume of an adult male weighing 70 kg is about 5 liters (5000 dl). This is the amount of blood circulating round the body outside the tissues, and does not include the cerebrospinal fluid nor the amount of intracellular fluid found inside every cell of an average human body, estimated to be around 100 million, million (100 trillion) of them. The total amount of water in a man of average weight (70 kilograms) is approximately 40 liters, averaging 57 percent of his total body weight.

Biological fluids distributions elsewhere:

Lean muscle tissue contains about 75% water by weight. Blood contains almost 70% water, body fat contains 10% water and bone has 22% water. Skin also contains much water. The human body is about 60% water in adult males and 55% in adult females.

Cholesterol not only found in the blood:

Let us assume that all the cholesterol in the body is found only in the blood. This is of course not true since many other organs like the brain and liver contain much more cholesterol than in the blood. But let us assume that this is true just for the sake of simple arithmetical calculation.

Cholesterol intake:

A person of about 68 kg (150 pounds), typical total body cholesterol synthesis is about 1 g (1,000 mg) per day, and total body content is about 35 g. A typical daily additional dietary intake in Malaysia and societies with similar dietary patterns is 200–300 mg. The body compensates for cholesterol intake by reducing the amount synthesized. Cholesterol is recycled. It is excreted by the liver via the bile into the digestive tract. Typically about 50% of the excreted cholesterol is reabsorbed by the small bowel back into the blood stream.

How much:

This means that even if we are able to eat 10 eggs a day, the total cholesterol intake from 10 eggs (exogenous source) would only raise the cholesterol in the blood by only 10 x 140 mg ÷ 5000 dl x 100 = 28 mg /dl. The normal desirable total blood cholesterol level is < 200 mg /dl. Most people have a blood cholesterol level of 185 mg /dl. So this means even if we are able to eat 10 eggs a day. This will raise the cholesterol level by just 185 + 28 = 213 mg /dl. But that is not all. We are only assuming that the body does nothing about it.

But the body does not just keep quiet and let the cholesterol just accumulate like dirt daily into the body. The body will throw out all the excess cholesterol it does not want through the bile. But some of them are also reabsorbed.

Biochemistry:

Cholesterol is oxidized by the liver into a variety of bile acids. These in turn are conjugated with glycine, taurine, glucuronic acid, or sulphate. A mixture of conjugated and non-conjugated bile acids along with cholesterol itself is excreted from the liver into the bile. Approximately 95% of the bile acids are reabsorbed from the intestines and the remainder lost in the feces. The excretion and reabsorption of bile acids forms the basis of the enterohepatic circulation which is essential for the digestion and absorption of dietary fats.

Under certain circumstances, when more concentrated, as in the gallbladder, cholesterol crystallizes and is the major constituent of most gallstones, although lecithin and bilirubin gallstones also occur less frequently.

Endogenous and exogenous balance:

Notwithstanding this, the body is able to establish a balance between endogenous and exogenous sources of cholesterol and establish a homeostatic balance in he blood. If this mechanism is not operative, then we will start to accumulate more and more cholesterol into the blood for every spoonful of cholesterol rich foods we take everyday. Even if we take absolutely no cholesterol at all, the liver will still be able to synthesize 10 times more cholesterol than all the cholesterol we can eat in a day. How much eggs, brain or liver can you eat in a day? One thousand eggs, 100 kg of liver or 100 kg of brain?

Out of date belief:

Some 60 years ago it was thought that cholesterol rich foods raised blood cholesterol. This effect is very temporary as the body adjusts itself to sudden influx of ingested cholesterol. But this belief is now completely out-molded and it is now no more fashionable to say that cholesterol rich foods like eggs is unhealthy to consume as it can cause heart disease. This is great grandfather’s theory which is now thrown into the dustbin by modern nutrition scientists. Milk and eggs are world’s most nutritious and health-protective foods

Biological Value:

The biological value and chemical score of protein in a whole egg depends mainly on the egg yolk rather than the albumin in the white of egg. The protein in it has very high nutritive value. In fact the nutritive value of the entire egg rests mainly on the yolk and not the white of egg.

The protein of an egg or whole milk has a score of 100 and this score is taken as the reference score of protein. It is this value around which all other proteins from all other sources of food have to be compared.

The entire un-hatched chick depends on it:

Just remember this – the entire chick from embryo until it is hatched and becomes nutritionally independent has to depend entirely on what is provided from the entire egg (yolk and white) as much as a baby has to depend entirely on her mother’s milk for growth and development till the age of at least 6 months. Both milk and whole egg is the best food in the world – complete in their entire spectrum of nutrients. No other food can beat them in health and growth promoting properties.

Timely to block unqualified health freaks by an Act of Parliament:

If I don’t give out this message and support what you sent me, we will get half-boiled health freaks and ‘nutritionist’ lurking around passing the message round that milk is also bad for health because it contains saturated milk fats and cholesterol.

But you reecho what we already knew only now in 2009 which is also very timely because there are a lot of so-called ‘health experts’ out there, who not only confuse themselves, but confuse others also.

Because of these people, I personally saw, on so many occasions people just threw away the egg yolk and ate only the egg white which is largely albumin - 64 % ovalbumin which actually blocks the action of digestive enzymes while the 12 % ovotransferrin binds with the iron and make it biologically unavailable to the body, and the 11 % ovomucoid has the same action as the ovalbumin that also blocks the digestive enzymes in the gastrointestinal guts.

The Practice of Nutrition to be Legalized:

See this imminent Act of Parliament (website below) to register All Professionally Qualified Nutritionists and the Practice of Nutrition as a Legalized Profession in Malaysia to safeguard the Public against quack nutritionists in Direct Selling, Beauty Saloons, Health Clinics and health clubs, executive clubs, etc

http://www.nutriweb.org.my/article.php?sid=147

Reverse Nutrition by Freaks & Extremists:

These health freaks are doing the opposite thing – all because they listen to another of their equally blind health extremists’ friends chit-chatting in the coffee shop instead of going to a proper university to undergo a proper intensive course in human clinical nutrition.

Just to let you know, I know of many people who eat a minimum of two fried eggs a day ever since they were in their 20s, and now at over 80 years, their blood cholesterol levels is just 4.5 mmol /dl which is well below normal. They do not suffer from any heart disease as far as their yearly medical examination showed.

Yes, I support the article sent to me for advice and comment. I hope this will assure everyone that a whole egg is one of the best and most nutritious foods available on this planet.

Regards

Lim Ju Boo
Formerly
Research Nutritionist
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) &
Institute for Medical Research, Malaysia