I cant find any information about this honestly. Everywhere I look it says ALA omega 3 is an essential fatty acid. And the body can in theory make EPA & DHA from ALA. So from that point of view, taking only fish oil wouldn’t be enough, because it doesn’t contain ALA but EPA & DHA omega 3.
Does the body need ALA for anything else? Or do these articles mean, you need ALA because the body makes EPA & DHA out of it.
Do you need all three, ALA, EPA & DHA?
OP I have had no luck finding that answer myself. So I am most curious too.
Update: ok so it’d been a while since I’d looked. I think it is also used for DGLA production:
https://lipidworld.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1476-511X-11-25