Ice cream is delicious, sweet, but it is full of fat and sugar. So how do some people consider this frozen dessert to be good for your health?
Recently, in an article b AtlanticDavid Merritt Jones, a historian of public health in the United States, reveals how decades of research have uncovered the mysterious health benefits of ice cream. On the other hand, scientists admit that they have no idea how this happened.
Jones’s Ice Cream investigation began in 1999. In 2018, the Harvard Ph.D. A student published a study on ice cream and diabetics.
According to this study, half a cup (64 grams) of ice cream daily may reduce the risk of heart disease in diabetics.
Upon further investigation, Jones found that the study data was more than 20 years old and that he was an observer himself. In other words, the study could not prove that eating ice cream by itself was in any way responsible for reducing the risk of heart disease in patients with type 2 diabetes.
In another article from 2014, researchers examined dozens of years of dietary tracking data. But they found that other dairy products did not.
But according to Tufts University’s Dariush Mozafarian and co-author of that paper, “the conclusion was not properly written. No foods were linked – ice cream was linked.”
“There is this perception that ice cream is not healthy, but it has fat, it has protein, it has vitamins. It’s better for you than bread,” said Mozaffarian, as quoted in Atlantic. “Given how terrible the American diet is, if one eats ice cream and eats less starch… it can actually prevent diabetes.”
“Can the idea that ice cream is a metabolic protector be true? It would be pretty bonkers. However, there are at least a few points in its favor,” John wrote, noting that the glycemic index of ice cream is lower and lower than that of brown rice. Benefits of other dairy products.
Along with sugar and fat, there is calcium
Not everyone was receptive to these findings.
“As an academic public health doctor, I’m not in a rush to eat a lot of ice cream based on this study,” said John Forte, a professor of public health at Queen Mary University of London. The guard.
“There are many other explanations – perhaps people are more likely to reach for ice cream to cool down after a walk or some exercise, or people are more likely to choose ice cream as a dessert rather than a high. Chocolate cake calories can replace other high-fat foods.” can
Duane Mellor, lecturer and nutritionist at Aston Medical School, said: “The problem is that we end up trying to associate the health effects or benefits of a single food when we eat different foods. , The guard He reported.
However, Mellor acknowledged the point that ice cream “may contain some beneficial nutrients,” particularly calcium and its low glycemic index. However, this is also something that can be weighed down by sugar and calories. “So in general we should not consider ice cream as a health food, but in small quantities as part of an overall healthy diet.
“I think ice cream is still a reverse factor,” Mozaffarian said Atlantic. “But I’m not sure, and I’m very angry about it,” he concluded, adding that if ice cream were a patent medicine, a company would “do $30 million in random inspections to make sure ice cream is banned.” diabetes.”