For decades we have thought that garlic helped control our cholesterol. Now we know better.
You can't eat a hearty breakfast, big Mac and fries for lunch, Ice Cream for Dessert, and then think a garlic pill is going to help you. It just does not work that way. What is it my grandmother used to say? Nothing worth while ever comes easily.
In a recent study, garlic supplements or the actual garlic were packed into heart healthy sandwiches eaten by research subjects daily. At the end of the trial, none of the participants had even a slight decrease in their LDL (i.e. 'lousy lipids').
Additionally, no decreases in cholesterol or triglycerides were seen.
Does this mean that garlic will no longer be on the high 5 list of herbal supplements for controlling your cholesterol? Maybe. Maybe not. It is, after all, to still be studied whether garlic has any health effects at all. My grandparents must have drank a cup of garlic milk every night for some reason??????
Sources
1. Gardner CD, Lawson LD, Block E, et al. Effect of raw garlic versus commercial garlic supplements on plasma lipid concentrations in adults with moderate hypercholesterolemia. Arch Int Med 2007; 167:346-353.
2. Charlson M, McFerren M. Garlic, what we know and what we don't. Arch Int Med 2007; 167:125-126
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