Eating porridge for breakfast really does help, for a new study has found that it keeps cholesterol at bay.
And, its benefits are such that it has been certified as a health food by UK's advertising standards watchdog ASA.ASA gave its ruling after a TV viewer challenged the breakfast cereal maker Quaker Oats commercial which stated that porridge had a 'soluble fibre called beta glucan which naturally helps to remove cholesterol from the body'.
Quaker claimed that the health claims for oats and its blood cholesterol lowering properties had been approved in the UK, US and Sweden.
The company explained that one of the major uses of cholesterol was in the formation of acids in the liver, which were secreted as bile into the intestine where they were used to digest fat.
The bile acids are mostly re-absorbed from the lower intestine and then recycled to the liver and oats increased the excretion on bile from the body, which results in the formation of new bile acid from cholesterol, thus lowering its level in the blood.
The company said that the cereal 'helps naturally remove cholesterol from your body' and this was backed by scientific evidence.
Advertisement
"We noted Quaker oats contained at least 0.75 grammes of beta glucan per serving, which was the amount required by the Joint Health Claim's Initiative to enable an oat/cholesterol lowering claim to be made," the Scotsman quoted ASA, as saying.
Advertisement
Source-ANI
SRM/B
