Dieters, beware! If you're trying to shed pounds simply by cutting fat, you're risking cancer, heart disease and other health problems if you don't balance your diet to include crucial nutrients found in other foods.
Women, who tend to watch their waistlines more than men, more often fall into the low-fat trap, particularly if they're cutting fat grams by munching on reduced-fat goodies rather than carrot sticks, nutrition experts say."They'll eat these snack foods, where they ought to be eating (fresh vegetables and fruit rich in) vitamins and minerals," says Paul A. Lachance, professor of food science and executive director of the Nutraceuticals Institute at Rutgers University.
Cutting fat and cholesterol reduces risk of heart disease and diabetes. But the catch is that nutrient-poor diets also are associated with heart disease and diabetes, along with osteoporosis; cancers of the digestive tract, colon and other organs; and birth defects.
"Simply reducing fat intake does not achieve what I would call a healthful diet," said Eileen Kennedy, deputy undersecretary for research, education and economics with the U.S. Department of Agriculture. "It's not just what you don't eat, it's what you do eat."
Despite "the national obsession with lowering fat intakes," most people do not meet government-recommended dietary guidelines, the department reported after its most recent survey on Americans' eating habits.
The guidelines center on the Food Guide Pyramid - the agency's recommendation to limit fats, oils and sweets while eating five to nine daily servings of fruits and vegetables. But survey after survey shows few people follow its suggestions.
"The National Cancer Institute says to eat five as a minimum," Lachance says. "We're not even getting 80 percent of people to do that."
The one message the public has heard is about fat - that less than 30 percent of daily calories come from fat and less than 10 percent from saturated fats. USDA surveys show the average American got 42 percent of calories from fat in 1965, dropping to about 32 percent by 1995.
The problem is in how people cut fat.
If they switch to leaner meats, skim milk and whole grains, and snack on fruits and raw vegetables instead of junk food, they should improve their overall health.
But many people load up on reduced-fat cookies, potato chips and cakes, mistakenly believing "they have a license to eat as much as they want," says registered dietitian Cindy Moore, a spokeswoman for the American Dietetic Association. They end up with too many calories and too few vitamins and minerals.
Some surveys have found 90 percent of women are missing important nutrients.