Myths Exposed

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  Myths, urban legends, lies. This is what we may have been placing many of our health concerns and beliefs on, a local nutrition researcher said.
  
  Wendy Repovich, an exercise physiologist at Eastern Washington University, was quoted in a recent article as saying that many of the things that we assume to be true about human nutrition, like carbohydrates making you fat, may just be wives tales.
  
  Repovich set out to clear the record on a few of these issues at the American College of Sports Medicine-sponsored health and fitness summit held recently in Dallas. Her main three culprits were the following myths:

• Eating eggs raises cholesterol
  
• Eating carbs makes you fat


• You need to drink 8 glasses of water a day

First of all she said, eggs do contain cholesterol, but no evidence has been truly used to show that one or two a day is going to put you at risk for heart disease. Carbohydrates furthermore, do not directly lead to weight gain, and the success of Atkins-based programs is primarily due to the connection between cutting carbs and loss of water-weight. The water theory, one of the biggest myths around, only applies to people who don't get water anywhere else in their diet, which almost all of us do. It's true that we need to replace water lost by sweating and urinating, but it doesn't add up to exactly 64 ounces of water a day, so put the water bottle down.

A final myth Repovich wanted to dispel was the supplement myth leading many Americans to GNC. People who eat a variety of fruits, vegetables, grains, protein and dairy do not need to take handfuls of supplements, or any at all for the most part, she said. The rest of us who don't eat so great can get by with a multi-vitamin.

Just goes to show you that you can't believe everything, no matter who you hear it from. There was some noticeable truth to each of the myths, but things like this only serve to teach us to research ourselves, and make our own conclusions.