Currently browsing posts about: Eggs

The study: Health Functions of Egg Protein.  Ryosuke Matsuoka, Michihiro Sugano.  Foods 2022, 11, 2309. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods11152309.

Purpose: “In this review, we have summarized the available information regarding the health benefits of egg proteins based on human studies.”

Conclusion: “This review summarizes the health effects of egg proteins, especially EWP, as reported in human studies. Two major functions have been clearly identified: (1) they improve muscle mass and have muscle-strengthening and antifatigue effects when
consumed during exercise; (2) they can improve lipid metabolism by reducing visceral fat and lowering serum cholesterol levels. The intake of egg protein may, thus, contribute to the prevention of physical frailty and metabolic syndrome.”

Conflicts of Interest: M.S. declares no conflict of interest. R.M. is an employee of Kewpie Corporation. There are no other patents, products in development, or marketed products to declare.

Comment: M.S. declares no conflict but is Chair of the Japan Egg Science Society, Tokyo, respectively.  The purpose of this study was to examine the benefits of egg proteins, not to evaluate them in comparison to any other proteins or to assess the role of eggs in diets.  Studies that look for benefits invariably find them.  The Kewpie Corporation sells products using eggs.  It can now advertise them as health foods.

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Nutritional Viewpoints on Eggs and Cholesterol. by Michihiro Sugano and Ryosuke Matsuoka.  Foods 2021, 10(3), 494; https://doi.org/10.3390/foods10030494

Opinion:  This review says that although Japanese people eat more eggs than Americans, they may be protected against higher cholesterol levels due to the differences in everything else they eat (more seafood, for example?).

Conclusion: “Although randomized controlled trials with long-term follow-up are required to evaluate the association between consumption of eggs and human health, available information, at least from the nutritional viewpoint, suggests that egg is a healthy and cost-efficient food worldwide.”

Conflicts of interest: “M.S. declares no conflicts of interest, and R.M. is an employee of Kewpie Corporation. There are no other patents, products in development, or marketed products to declare. Kewpie Corporation has no conflicts of interest with this research.”

Comment: Really?  No conflicts of interest?  But Kewpie is Japan’s #1 mayonaise company.  Kewpie says that it “uses about four billion eggs a year. Recognizing that eggs contain all the necessary ingredients for creating life, we continually study ways of effectively utilizing such ingredients and manufacture fine chemicals for use in a broad range of food, cosmetic, and pharmaceutical applications.”

One of those ways, apparently, is to get its employees to write opinion pieces like this.

With that said, concerns about eggs and cholesterol have diminished in recent years.  The 2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans says not a word about eggs and cholesterol; it just recommends eggs as a source of protein.  A study in the American Heart Association Journal finds no association between eggs and heart disease mortality.

The American Heart Association notes that eggs are the leading source of dietary cholesterol but their negative effects may be confounded by the fact that they are so often eaten with bacon and sausage.  The AHA egg recommendations:

• Vegetarians (lacto-ovo) who do not consume meat-based cholesterol-containing foods may include more dairy and eggs in their diets within the context of moderation discussed herein.
• Patients with dyslipidemia, particularly those with diabetes mellitus or at risk for heart failure, should be cautious in consuming foods rich in cholesterol.
• For older normocholesterolemic patients, given the nutritional benefits and convenience of eggs, consumption of up to 2 eggs per day is acceptable within the context of a heart-healthy dietary pattern.

And even with that said, the authors should have disclosed Kewpie’s evident conflicted interests.

Here’s another nutrition question that doesn’t go away.

This new study is just out: Egg and cholesterol consumption and mortality from cardiovascular and different causes in the United States: A population-based cohort study.

Its conclusion:

In this study, intakes of eggs and cholesterol were associated with higher all-cause, CVD, and cancer mortality. The increased mortality associated with egg consumption was largely influenced by cholesterol intake. Our findings suggest limiting cholesterol intake and replacing whole eggs with egg whites/substitutes or other alternative protein sources for facilitating cardiovascular health and long-term survival.

This gets right into the funny business of the 2015 Dietary Guidelines.  As I explained,

the recommendation to limit cholesterol has been dropped [from the 2015 Guidelines], but the document says, confusingly, that “this change does not suggest that dietary cholesterol is no longer important to consider when building healthy eating patterns. As recommended by the IOM, individuals should eat as little dietary cholesterol as possible while consuming a healthy eating pattern.”  Could the dropping of the limit have anything to do with egg-industry funding of research on eggs, the largest source of dietary cholesterol, and blood cholesterol?  The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine has just filed a lawsuiton that very point.

Well, here we go again.  My thoughts:

This is association, not causation.  The paper gives this caveat: “At baseline, participants with higher whole egg consumption had a higher BMI and lower household income. They were less educated, less physically active, more likely to smoke and have a high cholesterol level, and less likely to take aspirin. They also had higher red meat intake; lower intakes of fruit, dairy products, and sugar-sweetened beverages; and lower HEI-2015 score.”

Eggs, it seems, track with other unhealthful dietary behaviors.

The egg situation is a mess to sort out because the egg industry funds so many studies in its own defense and these invariably show no effect.

But eggs are one food in complicated diets and it’s really hard to look at them independently of everything else in the diet and lifestyle.

What to do?  Moderation is always good advice.

I read a report in the Washington Post discussing a study done by Neal Barnard and his colleagues associated with the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, a group advocating for plant-based diets and animal welfare.

More than 85 percent of the studies in Barnard’s meta-analysis, whether funded by industry or not, showed that eggs have unfavorable effects on blood cholesterol. Industry-funded studies, Barnard found, were more likely to play down these findings.

The study, a meta-analysis, reviewed 153 studies examining the effects of eggs on blood cholesterol levels.  It found the proportion of egg studies funded by the egg industry to have increased since 2010, and the industry-sponsored results to be spun—no surprise—in favor of the benefits of eggs.

This matters because advice in the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans is unhelpful about eggs.

Here’s how I explained the confusion in my January 7, 2016 post:

Cholesterol: the recommendation to limit cholesterol has been dropped, but the document says, confusingly, that “this change does not suggest that dietary cholesterol is no longer important to consider when building healthy eating patterns. As recommended by the IOM, individuals should eat as little dietary cholesterol as possible while consuming a healthy eating pattern.”  Could the dropping of the limit have anything to do with egg-industry funding of research on eggs, the largest source of dietary cholesterol, and blood cholesterol?  The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine has just filed a lawsuit on that very point.

The lawsuit was about undue influence of the egg industry, but the judge threw the suit out of court because no legal standard exists for undue influence.  Oh.

What to do about eggs?  I vote for moderation, of course.

As readers of this blog should know by now, I’m a big fan of food safety lawyer Bill Marler, whose blog keeps me up to date on food safety matters.

He posted recently on a Salmonella outbreak caused by contact with backyard chickens.

The CDC keeps track of such things.  By its count,

A total of 279 people infected with the outbreak strains of Salmonella have been reported from 41 states.

• 40 (26%) people have been hospitalized and no deaths have been reported.
• 70 (30%) people are children younger than 5 years.

The CDC’s advice:

I was interested in Marler’s account because I knew that he had backyard chickens at his place near Seattle.

Here’s what he says about that:

We have had hens in our backyard since just after the DeCoster egg debacle in 2010.  I clean the chicken house about twice a month and the shoes and clothes I wear are removed before going inside.  I wear a mask and gloves when I clean and either wash my hands well or take a shower.  I do not pick up the chickens unless they are ill, and I wash my hands after I do.  I wash the eggs and refrigerate then.  They tend to get used within the week.

I do my best to think about the possibility of cross-contamination with Salmonella and/or Campylobacter.  So far, so good.

Good advice.

Here’s another in my series of post-Unsavory Truth examples of studies whose funder can be predicted by their titles.

The consumption of 12 Eggs per week for 1 year does not alter fasting serum markers of cardiovascular disease in older adults with early macular degeneration Hassan Aljohia , Mindy Dopler-Nelson , Manuel Cifuentes , Thomas A. Wilson.  Journal of Nutrition & Intermediary Metabolism 2019;15:35-41.

Hypothesis: Egg consumption is associated with reduced risk of macular degeneration, but because eggs are so high in cholesterol, they might increase the risk for cardiovascular disease.

Conclusion: “This study suggests that the consumption of 12 eggs per week for 1 year does not significantly alter fasting serum lipids, lipoprotein cholesterol, or other biomarkers of CVD in older adults diagnosed with early macular degeneration” [the hypothesis is shown to be false].

Funding: “The authors would also like to thank the American Egg Board, Egg Nutrition Center, Washington, DC (T.A.W.) and the Massachusetts Lions Eye Research Fund Inc., New Bedford, MA (T.A.W.) for their funding support. The funding played no role in data collection, analyses, or interpretation.”

Comment: So the authors say, but industry influence is often unrecognized.    Independently funded studies sometimes come to quite different conclusions, as one in JAMA did last week.  Its conclusion: “Among US adults, higher consumption of dietary cholesterol or eggs was significantly associated with higher risk of incident CVD and all-cause mortality in a dose-response manner.”

You have to have some sympathy for egg producers.  Egg consumption has been declining for years.

Egg producers blame the decline on cholesterol concerns; eggs are by far the largest dietary source of cholesterol.

Now Pete and Gerry’s Organic Eggs is petitioning the FDA to forget about cholesterol and update its definition of “healthy” so the company can advertise its eggs as “healthy.”

FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said in a speech last month that the FDA would be updating the definition.

I, of course, think “healthy” is a slippery slope best avoided, and that Congress never should have allowed health claims on foods in the first place.,

But too late for that.

I don’t envy the FDA’s challenge here.  The petition is based on the dietary guidelines, but what the guidelines say about dietary cholesterol, and therefore eggs, is extremely confusing.

As I explained in a previous post, the guidelines no longer recommend a cap on dietary cholesterol of 300 mg/day (the equivalent of 1.5 eggs), but do say that people should eat as little cholesterol as possible.

Good luck on this one.

I’m trying to get my head around 200 million eggs being recalled because of Salmonella.

The Washington Post has the story:

An investigation by the federal agency led to an inspection of the farm, [Rose Acre Farms of Seymour, Ind.] which is located in Hyde County, N.C., and produces 2.3 million eggs a day from 3 million hens. Eggs produced at the farm are distributed to retail stores and restaurants in Colorado, Florida, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and the Carolinas.

The recalled eggs were sold under brand names such as Great Value, Country Daybreak and Crystal Farms. They were also sold to Waffle House restaurants and Food Lion stores. (Click here for a full list of brands and stores.)

 Rose Acre Farms produces 2.3 million eggs a day from 3 million hens?

Bill Marler has the technical details: 22 people ill, and 206,749,248 eggs recalled.  I like his image:

In my book “Safe Food: The Politics of Food Safety,” I explain how Salmonella gets into eggs and how it got into them in the first place.  This was a preventable problem.  It still is, if egg producers paid close attention to following standard egg safety procedures.

These, of course, are more difficult if you are dealing with millions of eggs every day.

But that doesn’t help the people who became ill.

• The FDA announcement of the voluntary recall
• USA Today’s  Egg recall: What you need to know about salmonella
• The FDA’s report on what it found at the site (sigh)