Ray Peat, PhD, is an influential health writer who claims that there is no such thing as essential fatty acid (EFA) deficiency. According to Peat, the body can make its own EFAs; furthermore, he claims that EFAs in the body become rancid and therefore cause cancer.
Unfortunately, Peat does not understand the use of EFA by the human body. He is trained in hormone therapy and his training in fats and oils has been limited to misinformation as far as the polyunsaturated fats and oils are concerned.
Research on EFAs is voluminous and consistent: EFAs are types of fatty acids that the body cannot make, but must obtain from food. We do not make them because they exist in virtually all foods, and the body needs them only in small amounts. The body does make saturated and monounsaturated fatty acids because it needs these in large amounts and cannot count on getting all it needs from food.
There are two types of EFAs, those of the omega-6 family and those of the omega-3 family. The basic omega-6 fatty acid is called linoleic acid and it contains two double bonds. It is found in virtually all foods, but especially in nuts and seeds. The basic omega-3 fatty acid is called linolenic acid and it contains three double bonds. It is found in some grains (such as wheat) and nuts (such as walnuts) as well as in eggs, organ meats and fish if these animals are raised naturally, and in green vegetables if the plants are raised organically.
Essential fatty acids have two principal roles. The first is as a constituent of the cell membrane. Each cell in the body is surrounded by a membrane composed of billions of fatty acids. About half of these fatty acids are saturated or monounsaturated to provide stability to the membrane. The other half are polyunsaturated, mostly EFAs , which provide flexibility and participate in a number of biochemical processes. The other vital role for EFAs is as a precursor for prostaglandins or local tissue hormones, which control different physiological functions including inflammation and blood clotting.
Scientists have induced EFA deficiency in animals by feeding them fully hydrogenated coconut oil as their only fat. (Full hydrogenation gets rid of all the EFAs; coconut oil is used because it is the only fat that can be fully hydrogenated and still be soft enough to eat.) The animals developed dry coats and skin and slowly declined in health, dying prematurely. (Interestingly, representatives of the vegetable oil industry blame the health problems on coconut oil, not on fatty acid deficiency!)
In a situation of fatty acid deficiency, the body tries to compensate by producing a fatty acid called Mead acid out of the monounsaturated oleic acid. It is a 20-carbon fatty acid with three double bonds named after James Mead, a lipids researcher at the University of California at Los Angeles who first identified it. An elevated level of Mead acid in the body is a marker of EFA deficiency.
According to Peat, elevated levels of Mead acid constitute proof that your body can make EFAs. However, the Mead acid acts as a “filler” fatty acid that cannot serve the functions that the original EFA are needed for. Peat claims that Mead acid has a full spectrum of protective anti-inflammatory effects; however, the body cannot convert Mead acid into the elongated fatty acids that the body needs for making the various anti-inflammatory prostaglandins.
Peat also asserts that polyunsaturated fatty acids become rancid in our bodies. This is not true; the polyunsaturated fatty acids in our cell membranes go through different stages of controlled oxidation. To say that these fatty acids become “rancid” is misleading. Of course, EFAs can become rancid through high temperature processing and it is not healthy to consume these types of fats. But the EFAs that we take in through fresh, unprocessed food are not rancid and do not become rancid in the body. In small amounts, they are essential for good health. In large amounts, they can pose health problems which is why we need to avoid all the commercial vegetable oils containing high levels of polyunsaturates.
Peat’s reasoning has led him to claim that cod liver oil causes cancer because cod liver oil contains polyunsaturated fatty acids. Actually, the main fatty acid in cod liver oil is a monounsaturated fatty acid. The two main polyunsaturated fatty acids in cod liver oil are the elongated omega-3 fatty acids called EPA and DHA, which play many vital roles in the body and actually can help protect against cancer. Furthermore, cod liver oil is our best dietary source of vitamins A and D, which also protect us against cancer.
Actually, Peat’s argument that polyunsaturated fatty acids become harmful in the body and hence cause cancer simply does not make sense. It is impossible to avoid polyunsaturated fatty acids because they are in all foods.
EFAs are, however, harmful in large amounts and the many research papers cited by Peat showing immune problems, increased cancer and premature aging from feeding of polyunsaturates simply corroborate this fact. But Peat has taken studies indicating that large amounts of EFAs are bad for us (a now well-established fact) and used them to argue that we don’t need any at all.
Finally, it should be stressed that certain components of the diet actually reduce (but do not eliminate) our requirements for EFAs. The main one is saturated fatty acids which help us conserve EFAs and put them in the tissues where they belong. Some studies indicate that vitamin B6 can ameliorate the problems caused by EFA deficiency, possibly by helping us use them more efficiently.
This article appeared in Wise Traditions in Food, Farming and the Healing Arts, the quarterly magazine of the Weston A. Price Foundation, Spring 2005.
🖨️ Print post
Mary Enig,
Your statements appear to make quite a bit of sense. In my early experience of experimentation with diet and eating EFA’s, along with involving a serious weight training regimen, I noticed some astounding results. My initial oil of choice was olive oil. I cooked with it, used in salads, etc. in an attempt to eat healthier. My diet consisted of protein, vegetables, and olive oil. Always. I saw great results in my health. My body fat percentage was very low, muscles astoundingly lean and massive as a result. Though, my health eventually to a massive turn for the worse. I begin to smell a acidic sent from my body. My skin begin to change as if my pores were clogged. I begin losing muscle mass dramatically, developed a stomach ulcer and could barely digest anything. My body would wilt(for a lack of a better word) immediately after ingesting anything. It was as if my blood and energy was being drawn to my stomach. My fingers, arms, legs, whole body would just shrink right after swallowing my first bites of food. The most plausible thing I could assert it to was my insistent ingestion of olive oil. The high amount of MUFA and the very little amount of PUFA in my diet seemed to be the culprit. I learned that high amounts of MUFA could restrict blood flow, that it would develop from the MUFA clogging up the arteries much like cholesterol. I’d been previously ingesting high amounts of MUFA for months. I first thought it was diabetes. I tried to do the diabetic home test kit and pricking my finger to check my blood, only for it to result in me not being able to bleed a drop. I pricked other fingers and still couldn’t draw any blood. Then I tried taking fish oil for a day. Almost an immediate response within an hour. My hands and body seemed to swell back to normal, some. I later tried pricking my finger and I drew blood this time. It seemed the PUFA
Mary Enig,
Your statements appear to make quite a bit of sense. In my early experience of experimentation with diet and eating EFA’s, along with involving a serious weight training regimen, I noticed some astounding results. My initial oil of choice was olive oil. I cooked with it, used in salads, etc. in an attempt to eat healthier. My diet consisted of protein, vegetables, and olive oil. Always. I saw great results in my health. My body fat percentage was very low, muscles astoundingly lean and massive as a result. Though, my health eventually to a massive turn for the worse. I begin to smell a acidic sent from my body. My skin begin to change as if my pores were clogged. I begin losing muscle mass dramatically, developed a stomach ulcer and could barely digest anything. My body would wilt(for a lack of a better word) immediately after ingesting anything. It was as if my blood and energy was being drawn to my stomach. My fingers, arms, legs, whole body would just shrink right after swallowing my first bites of food. The most plausible thing I could assert it to was my insistent ingestion of olive oil. The high amount of MUFA and the very little amount of PUFA in my diet seemed to be the culprit. Thyroid issues developed as well. I learned that high amounts of MUFA could restrict blood flow, that it would develop from it clogging up the arteries much like cholesterol. I’d been previously ingesting high amounts of MUFA for months. I first thought it was diabetes. I tried to do the diabetic home test kit and pricking my finger to check my blood, only for it to result in me not being able to bleed a drop. I pricked other fingers and still couldn’t draw any blood. Then I tried taking fish oil for a day. Almost an immediate response within an hour. My hands and body seemed to almost swell back to normal. I later tried pricking my finger and I drew blood this time. It seemed the PUFA created more blood flow.
I see it that not eating PUFA is almost impossible. It’s in pretty much everything as you explained. How can you really avoid it? Though, I believe any oil that’s at a high temperature, being ingested can be trouble. I experienced an adverse reaction to taking fish oil from a warm bottle that should’ve been refrigerated. It was extremely rancid and my skin Irrupted with acne which I hadn’t had in 20yrs. The was sign of toxicity or me. Nonetheless, I eat more mackeroand other fish more often. PUFA flat out being toxic makes no sense, because it’s in almost all foods I know of. Fish being one of the most prominent I know. So what…are we not to eat fish? At all? Should we just barely eat anything that’s even considered healthy? Ray Peat seems to not have offered much of a real solution to eating, as a result of a strong focus on why we shouldn’t eat PUFA’s. I didn’t see where there was ANY acception of it. His explanation says PUFA s flat out poison. Then why the positive effects on brain function, and blood flow? Heck, Jesus taught fishers how be ‘REAL’ fishers! It’s had to be poisonous since the beginning of time, then, really causing all kinds of deformities and mutations in humankind by now. We should just be born toxic.
This is not correct. Any oil that is liquid 100% of the time in all temperatures is a rancid, unstable and clearly highly chemically processed hydrogenated oil. Olive oil is derived from a fruit not a seed so safe when not cooked.
So a clean saturated fat is best to cook with. Safe.
Butter, ghee, coconut oil, beef suet, pork lard, duck fat.
but even if you right , there is cultures naturaly have very low level of EFA in their diet.i mean diets with no nuts or seeds.like massai and also i saw vilages that ppl eat nuts very rarly and the only intake of fat is from ruminant animal milk or body fat which is very low on pufa!
Rio, you are on the right track. I live in the tropics, in Southeast Asia, and our traditional diet do not consist of taking so called EFAs, which consist of fish oils and certain seed oils not found here. While fish is a staple in coastal areas, they are eaten cooked, and cooking oxidizes the oil in the fish. Still, there are mountain tribes that don’t even eat much fish. That people in the tropics have thrived without EFAs for centuries can only mean omega-3s and 6s should be renamed appropriately as PUFAs (polyunsaturated) instead of the misleading EFAs.
Michael, I would be interested in knowing how healthy or unhealthy the people on the coast are, in general, since you say they are the only people who eat fish. Although I respect Ray Peat and have read many of his articles and I frequent the forum that bears his name I tend not to believe that eating fish is unhealthy. I experimented for a short while with the carnivore diet and during that time I read alot about it. Arctic explorer Wilhjalmur Steffansson wrote books about living with Eskimos. I read some excerpts. What I remember is that at least one tribe or group that he lived with ate almost exclusively one kind of fish. They would sometimes boil it but mostly ate it raw ( Ray Peat says that polyunsaturated oils become rancid even in our bodies because of our body temperature). These people were extremely healthy and vibrant. One visual I have is that they all slept naked on the floor, in what kind of structure I can’t recall but it was whole large families or maybe even the whole tribe. Strange I know. I also don’t know what their lifespan typically was or is. Does anyone have information about the health of people who eat fish regularly whether whole cultures or people who have been on a pescatarian diet for a long time?
Where are your studies and sources for this? All the arguments you purport are easily refutable and Peat has refuted them thoroughly with studies and physiology.
You say? Because PUFA are everywhere in small amount.
The way EPAs are marketed and even their name suggests we could live in them exclusively.
On a scale of what is essential Oxygen and water would have to be right up there. The line as stated above by the author that we only need small amounts of PUFA and that they are present in virtually all foods tends to support Peats argument that supplementation of them and also excess consumption is unnecessary.
Mary Enig wrote this in 2005. She’s since passed away in 2014 so can’t reply to these comments.
By all account she seemed quite knowledgeable regarding dietary fats and was certainly a moderate when it came to saturated fats and cholesterol. That being said, Dr. Peat has been very thorough in his work and has written several fully referenced articles and books on the anti-metabolic impacts of polyunsaturated fats. His arguments are consistent enough to at least seriously question the narrative of the EFA. On top of that, the original experiments that showed the need for the essential fatty acids were replicated in the 40s and basically the apparent deficiency was solved by adding b vitamins (notably b6). It was a flawed idea from the start, and the agricultural industry (specifically the grains and seed oils producing companies) have consistently supported research which promoted their products at the expense of traditional saturated, animal products (and tropical fats like coconut oil, which is not a key product of the american industry)
I have no omega-3s in my diet and am very concerned about this. I have tried eating oils, about 14 kinds, at the level of a quarter tsp. every few days. They upset my gut terribly after a few tries each, and even when I used them topically. I believe this indicates salicylate sensitivity. Among the 14 are olive, walnut, coconut, several different fish oils and X-Factor. I only have 13 safe foods I can eat. Unable to use B vitamins because they are made from nutritional yeast and I am very yeast sensitive. Do you have any substitutes and non-yeast B I could try. Eggs and red meat are not one of the foods I can eat, no fruits, no fish. Believe me, I have tried many in each category.
Hi! Mary,
Firstly, I would be interested to see where your research on lipids is placed as I have high Cholesterol levels but apparently no hypothyroidism. I have just had a Triple Bypass surgery after 2 Heart attacks-I had severe Triple vessel disease and had been living with this for 17 years. I find Ray peat very interesting and all his articles are heavily referenced; this is a good sign in research. He even alludes to how scientific data is changed in conclusions. I knew a Czech scientist in vaccination who told me this 25 years ago. One has to know how to read scientific data and medical data is NOT scientific. Dr Malcolm Kendrick-a Cholesterol skeptic said that medical science is an oxymoron.
I am, however, concerned and not clear on your advocacy for PUFA’s as according to huge amounts of scientific data from Gerald Ling cell membranes do NOT exist-so if this is true- the PUFaA argument would be irrelevant. Lings work is backed up by other scientists, including work by Russian scientists. Dr Thomas Cowan ( one of your colleagues as a founder member of Weston Price originally sent the Ling information to me) is aware of Ling’s work in this field and Thomas is a proponent of the Structural water theory of Pollock. However, the structural water theory goes back to around 1933.
For example, I eat huge amounts of avocados, and now I am concerned to leave these alone. I know at Weston Price you advocate for saturated fats. However, some populations live longer because of where they live, not for what they eat. For every 1500 feet above sea level the rates of so-called degenerative ( might be a mis-nomer) diseases decreases by 10-15%. This data comes from Insurance companies. This is just like the global warming theory. Banks still lend money to people who want to build condiminians in florida-close to sea level. The banks know the sea-level is NOT going to rise as they would NOT lend the funds to Investors.
Your comments would be welcome. I am not criticizing you, just that there are so many conflicts of interest. Ray Peat seems to have no conflicts of interest. I am not saying you have.
It seems you have misunderstood much of Ray Peat’s work – he does not actually say that PUFA is not “essential” as such – simply that, if it IS essential, it is essential in tiny amounts, which the original studies on both omega 6 and omega 3 (found only through total parenteral nutrition) also suggest – and the actual official guidelines suggest that we need perhaps as little as 4 grams a day of PUFA, which falls directly in line with Ray’s suggestion that PUFA is unavoidable and we get what we “need” simply by eating butter, coconut oil, and animals fats
If PUFA’s are in most foods that we eat, why do we need to seek them out in the form of seed oils or fish oils? Why not just rely on the PUFA’s that we get from eating whole foods?
Greg, I think Mary Enig wrote this article for the benefit of those who try to follow Ray Peat’s advice to carefully avoid PUFAs. He would have people avoid fish, nuts, whole grains , seeds and legumes. He also believes most starches are a problem, grains and legumes fall into that category too. I find it very difficult to follow his principals and find myself arguing with him in my head all the time.