PHOTO: DR. HENRY M'GILL JR., DR. JACK P. STRONG African Baboons Raise Questions
A high-fat diet apparently is not responsible for the fatty deposits of cholesterol which form in human arteries.
Which could mean that cholesterol in the diet may not be a! primary factor in hardening of the arteries.
That's what pathologists from the Louisiana State university medical school have decided following more than a year of studying East African baboons.
But in case you're reaching for gobs and gobs of butter, listen to this—
Although fatty deposits tend to develop in arteries regardless of how much or how little fat you consume, the later changes in the arteries—changes which lead to such serious heart ailments as coronary thrombosis, seldom show up in arteries of persons whose diet contains little or no fat. SCAK TISSUE
So where does that leave us?
The LSU scientists do not know for sure. It may be years before there is any clear proof one way or another, admit the pathologists —Dr. Henry McGill Jr. and Dr. Jack P. Strong.
In the meantime, it might be Interesting to contemplate these facts:
The East African baboons, who subsist chiefly on fruits, vegetables, berries and nuts, develop fatty deposits in their arteries just as do North Americans who are noted for high fat diets. Ditto the Bantus of South Africa, who live on a low-fat diet. Ditto the Guatemalans and the Puerto Ricans.
But here, explained the scientists, the picture changes.
In arteries of North Americans, they explained, scar tissue has a way of developing over the fatty deposits. Yet similar scar tissue is seldom seen among the Bantus, the Guatemalans, the Puerto Ricans, the East African baboons.
As North Americans head toward a heart attack, a clot forms over the scar tissue, a clot which cuts off the supply of blood to the heart muscle. Result? Coronary thrombosis. But again in the Bantus, the Guatemalans, the Puerto Ricans and the East African baboons, the clot practically never forms.
EVIDENCE LACKING
Whichv one the surface, admits Dr. McGill, sounds like a high-fat diet is the prime culprit.
But with a caution for which all top scientists are noted, the pathologist refuses to accept suet a simple solution.
"We have no evidence to prove that fat in the diet will cause scar tissues to form over the fatty deposits," he said. "We have no evidence to prove a high-fat diet will cause blood clots to form over 'the scar tissue. If fat does cause heart attacks, it is certainly not a simple matter of the fat we eat settling in our arteries like corrosion settling inside a water pipe. Other factors could be involved-such factors as metabolic changes and hereditary tendencies. Negroes, for instance, seem to have a hereditary tendency toward high blood pressure."
So we asked Dr. McGill if we should throw away the butter dish.
"No," he replied, "although I
wouldn't advise going tcT town on the butter. But then neither would I advocate a food-fad diet which contained no fat. Anyway, who wants to live on mush for the rest of their life like the Bantus?" JOURNEY TO NAIROBI
Dr. Strong was inclined to agree. He said that groups of people like the Bantu who subsist on meager, fat-free diets often develop other ailments such as cirrhosis of the liver, cancer of the liver, parasitic infections or protein malnutrition. And these ail-1 ments, he reminded, can also cutj idown on the life span.
About two years ago pathologists over at Tulane university medi-ical school began sending to the LSU pathologists arteries from all animals they autopsied for Audu-bon Park. They'd send arteries of bears, of lions, of tigers. One day one of the Tulane pathologists ;Dr. Freidrichs Harris, autopsied a 16-year-old baboon, who hadj died from an infection. Knowing LSU would be interested, he sent over the arteries.
"The autopsy showed extensive hardening of the arteries," Dr.! Strong recalled. "Naturally this in-1 terested us very much since ba-j I boons live on a diet containing I practically no fat."
As their interest in the baboons mounted, said the scientists, they decided to journey to Nairobi East Africa to study the animals in their native habitat.
AUTOPSY 163 BABOONS When they reached Nairobi in mid-July of 1958 they trapped, sacrificed and autopsied 163 baboons.
"We could of course have had the 163 shipped to this country for experiments," admitted Dr. Strong. "But, in addition to the advantages of studying the ani-- mals in their natural surroundings, it was cheaper for us to go to Africa. It would have cost us at least $30,000 to have had them shipped to this country."
The diets of the 163 baboons studied was almost exclusively a vegetarian diet with very little fat and practically no fat of animal origin. Yet more than half the baboons exhibited early
changes associated with harden-i ing of the arteries. In not a single case, however, were the changes of such a nature that they pro-7 duced in the animal a disability J comparable to a heart attack in humans.
OPEN OWN CAGES [ The scientists spent two months in Nairobi. When they returned they were asked if their findings would blow the cholesterol theory ' sky - high; whether this would I mean that there is little or no connection between a high fat ~ diet and the formation of fatty deposits of cholesterol in the arteries.
They said it was too early to tell. Now, more than a year later, they still haven't got the com-
plete answer. The scientists said life in Nairobi was plenty rugged at times what with lions turning over baboon traps and killing one baboon and what with the baboons being smart enough to unlock their own cages.
"They'd reach out and make a grab for us," Dr. Strong recalled.
The project is being supported by the Louisiana Heart Association. It is all part of an overall study being financed by the National Heart Institute and other agencies.
;i partment at LSU, is the principal investigator. Co-operating in the project is the Southwest Foundation for Research and Education, San Antonio, Tex.
