> Indians in India have skyrocketing diabetes and obesity numbers in recent decades

About a decade ago, my Indian colleagues told me that Indians had been encouraged to switch away from ghee, based on health concerns. I forget which oil most moved to, but I think it was palm, vegetable or sunflower oil. In addition, they said consumption of refined sugar had skyrocketed, where palm sugar had previously been used.

Ghee has been consumed for centuries (at least) in India - I wonder if it's these ghee alternatives and refined sugar are the main causes of increased diabetes and obesity.

> Ghee has been consumed for centuries (at least) in India - I wonder if it's these ghee alternatives and refined sugar are the main causes of increased diabetes and obesity.

Yes, carbohydrates like sugar are of course a huge part of the problem, but the health crisis has many factors and my intention was to convey that ghee has downsides. Saturated fats are saturated fats regardless of how many thousand years they have been used.

> I wonder if it's these ghee alternatives and refined sugar are the main causes of increased diabetes and obesity.

This is the most likely cause. People in India are consuming way more sugar, refined flours and seed oils than they used to three decades back. That is when all these colas/biscuits/chocolates/chips/pizzas and oils started being advertised heavily on television.[1]

[1] Sundrop super-refined sunflower oil: the healthy oil for healthy people (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WI-39Wxd5U8)

[2] Saffola: refined Kardi/Safflower oil (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTaMTD3taVc)

People in India are consuming way more of everything, including ghee, than they did three decades ago. Ghee was a luxury then and carefully portioned out. Growing up I ate a lot more Dalda than ghee, simply as a matter of what we could afford. Traditionally ghee was even more of a luxury than in my time. Outside the traditional cowbelt areas, ghee was substantially more expensive relative to other goods prior to Operation Flood. So while Indians have been eating ghee for millennia, they probably ate a tiny fraction of how much we eat it now.

> Indians in India have skyrocketing diabetes and obesity numbers in recent decades. 20+ years ago you would struggle to see a single non thin person.

I have noticed that. I have also noticed that youngsters started adopting Western habits and diets and consumption patterns over the same time period.

> Drastic increase in quantity of ghee

Unless you are rich or belong to the upper middle class, ghee is generally consumed in moderate quantities because the family would not be able to afford it.

Today, ghee is between Rs. 500-600/kg. Seed oils are about Rs. 125/kg.

Yup. Rich/Upper Class people used to consume a lot of Ghee (rich people - they can afford it. Upper class - usually because they're connected to temple food preparation and ghee is abundant there). The rest of us used a tiny amount at the very end for flavor. Peanut oil & Coconut oil were common in our household. Followed by sunflower oil.

Presumably, the Indian immigrant populations discussed above would belong to upper middle classes, by virtue of being able to immigrate at all. But also, the sheer scale of Indian population can mean we are talking about a couple hundred million people easy in India whose lifestyle is no longer conducive to the amount of ghee they were used to eating.