So, in summary, neither saturated fats nor certain types of cholesterol are necessarily bad for you. Trans fats are a different story. Not only do trans fats dramatically increase vLDL, the worst kind of cholesterol, but they also dramatically decrease HDL, the helpful cholesterol. For that reason, in 2006, an article in the New England Journal of Medicine declared, “On a per calorie basis, trans fats appear to increase the risk of coronary heart disease more than any other macronutrient.”
