Coconut Oil For Skin

Five years ago food companies used highly saturated palm, palm kernel and coconut oils. Then along came a soybean growers' campaign, a crusade by consumer advocate-millionaire-heart patient Phil Sokolof and poof!, manufacturers started switching to soybean, canola and other vegetable oils.

So what's happened to coconut oil for skin usage since the anti-tropical-oil campaign, and did this remarkable change really benefit consumers? ''It was an overblown issue," said Robert Reeves, president of the Institute of Shortenings and Edible Oils, a trade association. ''The percentage of market share of tropical oils was very low to begin with, and its percentage contribution to saturated fat in the American diet was very, very low."

All fats and oils contain saturated, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, but in different proportions. For example, coconut oil contains 94 percent saturated fat. Soybean oil contains 15 percent saturated fat.

In recent years, health authorities have urged consumers to cut the total amount of fat they eat, as well as the amount of saturated fat. Both total fat and saturated fat can raise cholesterol levels, which increase the risk of heart disease.

In 1986, the year before soybean growers launched a campaign aimed at slowing the growing rate of tropical-oil imports and Sokolof began taking out ads in major newspapers charging that tropical oils were ''poisoning America," 10 billion out of 16.1 billion pounds of edible oils used in the United States were soybean. Coconut, palm and palm kernel oils only amounted to 1.9 billion pounds. The rest were other domestic oils.

At close to the same time 75 percent of saturated fat in the nation's diet was coming from meat and dairy products. Approximately 14 percent came from soybean oil; 5 percent came from tropical oils. The remaining saturated fat was from miscellaneous fats, oils and other sources.

Tropical oils are far more saturated than vegetable oils such as soybean, corn and peanut, but when the latter are hydrogenated, which hardens the oil to form margarines or add texture and taste to processed foods, they become more saturated. In hydrogenation, hydrogen molecules are added to polyunsaturated or monounsaturated oils, forming new unsaturated fats called trans-fatty acids. TFA's have raised health concerns of their own, including a possibly higher risk of heart disease and certain cancers.

Today, palm and coconut oil consumption has ''gone down significantly," Reeves said. For example, the use of palm oil in foods declined 65 percent while coconut oil fell 47 percent, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.