Educational information, not medical advice — ask your doctor or midwife.
Oil palm is a tall palm tree native to West Africa. Its fruit gives two different oils. Palm oil comes from the orange pulp, and palm kernel oil comes from the hard seed inside.
In Twi the tree and its fruit are called abɛ. Unrefined red palm oil is a daily cooking fat and the base of palm nut soup. The oils are also rubbed on skin and hair, and made into soap.
Here is the honest verdict. Red palm oil is a proven food source of vitamin A, and human trials back that one use. Most other health claims for it are untested, and long traditional use does not prove that a remedy works or that it is safe.
Palm oil is also one of the most common fats in packaged food worldwide. So many people eat it without ever buying a bottle.
Most of what palm oil does, it does as a fat and a food.
Red palm oil is very rich in carotenes, the orange pigments. Your body turns these into vitamin A. Human trials confirm that eating it raises vitamin A levels in people who are short of it.
Both oils are high in saturated fat. Palm kernel oil is higher still. Feeding trials in people show palm oil raises LDL cholesterol (the "bad" cholesterol) compared with oils like sunflower, rapeseed or olive oil.
Red palm oil also holds tocotrienols, a form of vitamin E. In cell and animal studies these act as antioxidants, meaning they mop up damaging molecules. Whether eating them protects the heart or brain in people is not established.
On skin, the oil works as a simple barrier. It sits on the surface and slows water loss. That is a physical effect, not a cure for any skin disease.
You will meet it in these forms:
- Red (unrefined) palm oil, sold as zomi, dendê or simply red oil.
- Refined palm oil, pale and almost tasteless, used in frying and baking.
- Palm kernel oil, white and solid, used in cooking, soap and sweets.
- Palm stearin and palm olein, the hard and soft fractions split out in factories.
- African black soap and other soaps and skin balms.
- Capsules of red palm oil or palm tocotrienols, sold as supplements.
- An unnamed ingredient in margarine, biscuits, chocolate, instant noodles and spreads.
Oil palm has been used in West and Central Africa for thousands of years. Traces of palm oil have been found in an Egyptian tomb dating back about 5,000 years.
In Ghana, Nigeria, Benin and beyond, the red oil was a staple cooking fat and a trade good. Palm nut soup and stews built on red oil remain everyday dishes.
Healers and households also used it outside the kitchen. It was poured on wounds and burns, rubbed on dry skin and babies' bodies, and used as a hair dressing.
One tradition deserves naming because people still act on it. Red palm oil was swallowed as an antidote for poison, and oils were given to newborns to "clear the stomach". Both practices are described below under safety.
Get emergency help straight away if a baby who was given oil by mouth starts coughing, choking, breathing fast or turning blue.
Call a poison centre or emergency services at once for any suspected poisoning. Do not wait to see if oil helps.
See a doctor if a wound or burn treated with oil becomes red, swollen, hot or starts weeping pus.
Talk to your doctor if a cholesterol test has come back high and palm oil is your main cooking fat.
Palm oil and palm kernel oil are ordinary foods, sold freely in the UK, EU, US and West Africa. In the EU and UK, food labels must name palm oil specifically. Capsules are sold as food supplements, not as medicines.
Evidence grades and traditional-use labels are explained in our methodology. Nothing here is medical advice.
What it is typically used for, usual dose, cautions, and the study behind it where real trial data exists.
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