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Fat gives us energy and is an important part of the daily diet—without it, fat soluble vitamins such as vitamin A cannot be absorbed. There are good fats, bad fats and really bad fats. However much of this information leads to confusion and is often misleading.

When talking about fats, fatty acids are the component parts that are important. They are required by the body for lots of functions other than providing energy.

In the past we’ve read about saturated fats being bad and polyunsaturated fats being good. Now we talk about omega-3 and omega-6, which are, incidentally, polyunsaturated fatty acids. You might see these written as n-3 and n-6 for omegas-3 and -6.

Omega-3 fatty acids can be found in oily fish and to a lesser extent white-and shell-fish, some nuts and seeds such as walnuts and pumpkin seeds, and human milk. Omega-6 is found in most vegetable oils such as safflower, sunflower, sesame, soybean and corn oil … there are others; this is not an exhaustive list.

The average western diet contains much more omega-6 than omega-3; although the amount of omega-6 is in line with current recommendations. Both provide independent health effects however. The problem is that we do not consume anywhere near enough omega-3, and herein lies the problem. It is increasingly being stated that the ratio between omega-3 and omega-6 is the important factor.

There are all sorts of health claims being hailed in the popular press – polyunsaturated oils protecting against heart disease, stroke, arthritis, alzheimer’s disease, cancers, etc. etc. but evidence is still accumulating for many of these claims. These will be discussed in further bulletins.

For the moment it appears we do need to eat more fish, particularly oily fish. This however, poses another current public health problem … that of obesity. If we increase our oily fish consumption without adjusting for the extra calories, then weight gain will result.

Talk about being between a rock and a hard place!
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Inflammation is a reaction to tissue damage. It’s a normal response and is there to defend against additional damage. In some situations however, if this response is heightened it results in long-lasting damage.

Quite a few conditions involve inflammation in some form or another:
- rheumatoid arthritis
- Crohn’s disease
- ulcerative colitis
- psoriasis
- lupus
- type-I diabetes
- cardiovascular disease
- some cancers
- adult asthma
and, it is thought, obesity

Some of these conditions such as arthritis and asthma may be helped through tweaking the daily diet. Researchers Backer and colleagues (2004) have found that populations that naturally consume large amounts of Omega-3 fish oils such as Inuit and Japanese, have low rates of these diseases. But surprisingly, researchers (Shoda, 1996) have also found that increased rates of Crohn’s disease in Japan were associated with increased amounts of Omega-6 in the diet.

It seems Omega-6 is converted to a compound that is thought to promote inflammation. This may sound very confusing and disappointing given that Omega-6 helps lower LDL (bad) cholesterol. However, we are back to the old argument about ratios. Omega-3 helps reduce inflammation - it is the ratio between Omega-3 and -6 that is important.

Quite simply, this means more Omega-3, particularly in the form of fatty fish, needs to be incorporated in our daily diet, and excessive amounts of Omega-6 which is in vegetable oils may lead to diseases that involve inflammatory elements.

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