10 Nutrition Myths

And what health experts want you to know instead

-  Sophie Egan

MYTH 1: Fresh fruits and vegetables are always healthier than canned, frozen or dried varieties

 Despite the enduring belief that “fresh is best,” research has found that frozen, canned and dried fruits and vegetables can be just as nutritious as fresh.

“They can also be a money saver and an easy way to make sure there are always fruits and vegetables available at home,” says Sara Bleich, a professor of public health policy at Harvard University.

One caveat: some canned, frozen and dried varieties contain added sugars, saturated fats and sodium, so be sure to read nutrition labels, especially on prepared foods. Choose the ones that keep those ingredients to a minimum.

MYTH 2: All fat is bad

 When studies published in the late 1940s found correlations between high-fat diets and high levels of cholesterol, experts reasoned that if you reduced the amount of total fats in your diet, your risk for heart disease would go down. The assumption was that a low-fat diet could benefit everyone, even though there was no solid evidence that doing so would prevent heart disease, obesity and other health issues.

As a result, says Vijaya Surampudi, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, Centre for Human Nutrition, many people—and food manufacturers—replaced calories from fat with calories from refined carbohydrates such as white flour and added sugar.

“Instead of this helping us stay slim, rates of overweight and obese people went up significantly,” she says.