food

A Rant About Diet and Responsibility

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The American diet is atrocious and largely responsible for the growing epidemics of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and obesity, not just in America, but worldwide. The highly processed, high calorie, high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated fat, and high chemical additive products that line grocery stores are products of American ingenuity; products that we have exported internationally, and sadly, products that are responsible for the declining metabolic health worldwide. This is a fact that many of us are reticent to accept. We are poisoning ourselves and everyone else around us by the products we make and consume.

A recent study found that fully 80% of metabolic disease can be attributed to lifestyle, e.g. poor diet and a lack exercise. Eighty percent. That is a staggering finding especially when one considers that 476 million people worldwide have diabetes, most of them Type 2 (T2). This represents a 129% increase since 1990, when the number stood 211.2 million. During the same time frame, the rates of cardiovascular disease have increased from 271 million to 523 million. Underlying a significant percentage of these conditions is the obesity epidemic, with 13% of the world’s population considered obese and 39% considered overweight and heading towards obesity.

In the US, the situation is quite dire, only 12-20% of the population, depending upon the criteria utilized, are considered metabolically healthy. Clearly, our approach to metabolic health is not working and yet, much of the focus in health research remains centered on either identifying that one medication or combination of medications that resolve all of our bad choices or an overly simplistic approach to health represented by balancing the calories in/calories out equation. As evidenced by the exploding numbers of metabolic disease, neither of these perspectives seems particularly useful.

While both personal choice and calories play a role in these epidemics, the problem is much broader. The food ecosystem has been decimated and in its place, we have non-nutritive chemical-toxicant food-like products that were designed to be highly addictive. When consumed, these products fundamentally change the metabolism of the individual who consumes them, and not for the better. Every bite of a chemically processed food is one step closer to metabolic disease. Beyond that however, the choice to allow industry to create, utilize, and ultimately dump these chemicals into food, other products, and into the environment, rests on us as well. Those are choices too; choices that affect the metabolic health of communities, and more broadly, the world.

We tend to think of industry and the pollution they create as amorphous, self-propelling and promoting agents of doom, forgetting of course, that each and every one of these organizations is made of people; people like you and me who make decisions to produce and promote these chemical poisons; people who choose to put poisons in foods under the auspices of the pathetically weak and ineffective GRAS guidelines. People make these choices. We do not get forever chemicals that fundamentally disrupt all aspects of metabolism without people who chose to create them, others who chose to use them in common products (and deny any and all risk), and all of us who relish in the novelty of these products. We do not get 80,000 synthetic chemical entities currently on the market without people putting them there. We do not get 1.8 billion pounds of glyphosate used every year, enough for every person on the planet to consume 4lbs annually without people that made choices to produce, use, and not regulate this chemical. We are the problem. We made these choices. We are the ones who are destroying our health and the health of others by the choices we make.

So when we look at the skyrocketing numbers of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and obesity, it is not enough to say ‘eat better and eat less’. We need to clean house, top to bottom. We need to stop producing the garbage food that pollutes our bodies and the environment. We need to take responsibility for all of the choices that lead us to the point where only 12-20% of the population can be considered metabolically healthy.

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More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

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Walking the Wrack Line: Poisonous Potatoes

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The wrack line is that “line” of organic material that ends up on beaches when tides go back out. It is a biologically important micro-ecosystem of seaweeds, crustaceans, shells, decaying birds and fish and mammals. When I need to think, I walk the wrack line. The idea for this environmental series comes from those walks; walks that for the past two years have conjured up all sorts of topics for me. Many are worthy of many books. It is a simple walk I conduct on a calm, mostly sandy, and driftwood-strewn beach in Central Oregon. The solitude allows some of my own decades studying environmental harms to both animals and plants to filter through my thoughts. For this short essay, the topic is conventionally grown potatoes, which are now grown largely as a monoculture product and have been found to contain 35 separate toxic chemicals.

The Potato Monoculture

I was just talking with an 80-year-old woman whose father’s side of the family, all 56 of them, were murdered in Germany’s death camps. She grew up in Chile, and alas, ended up Oregon. She is working on stopping the aerial spraying of 2-4-D and other weedicides onto the clear-cuts. She remarked at how insane the world is with so much lack of common sense and connecting of the dots when it comes to our factory/industrial food systems. She held up a potato:

“How did it ever become normal to use poisons on our food? Poisons that have a direct vector not just to your gut and mine, but to the developing guts and brains of fetuses?”

Oh, that potato! Originally from Peru, the potato has crossed oceans and ended up in every part of the globe.

Only two things in this world are too serious to be jested on, potatoes and matrimony.
—Irish saying.

Now, they are genetically engineered,  and part of the monoculture that triggered the Great Famine, also called the Irish Potato Famine. Then, the Irish used a single breed of potato called the Irish Lumper. It was vulnerable to a fungus to which the breed had no resistance. Other cultures, farming practices over come this vulnerability by growing many different variety of each crop. The Peruvians, for example, grow many hundreds of varieties. The diversity of breed/varieties is what keeps a single fungus or other pests from decimating a food stock.

potatoes

In the US, however, we grow only few varieties of potatoes, making them sensitive to all sorts of microbial threats and because we rely so heavily on chemical solutions for these threats, we have decimated the soils in which these crops grow. Many of the problems with conventional potatoes are tied to the fact the soil has been so eroded and robbed of nutrients, that there are no natural fungi or bacteria left. This means that ungodly amounts of chemical fertilizers have to be applied each season to contain the growth of super predator weeds and microorganisms. Each year, the amount of chemicals required increases.

But it’s the pesticides, man! Leave my spuds alone.

Just how many chemicals are there in a conventionally grown potato? According to the USDA’s Pesticide Data Program, conventionally grown potatoes carry 35 different pesticides. As is true of many of the plastic compounds, these pesticides have some lethal side effects:

One herbicide, chlorpropham, is used to stop the growth of weeds and to inhibit potatoes sprouting. Chlorpropham is found on up to 80 percent of all conventionally-grown potatoes. According to the Extension Toxicology Network, this poison is toxic to honey bees. In labs, tests bare out the effects of chronic exposure to the herbicide where the animals show “retarded growth, increased liver, kidney and spleen weights, congestion of the spleen, and death.”

Poison Potatoes

All those poisons, then, are integrated into the spud. As a root vegetable, potatoes absorb all of the pesticides, herbicides, and insecticides sprayed above the ground, which eventually spread into the soil. There are many insider testimonies from potato farmers — Jeff Moyer, CEO at the Rodale Institute and former chair of the National Organic Standards Board, says,

I’ve talked with potato growers who say point-blank they would never eat the potatoes they sell. They have separate plots where they grow potatoes for themselves without all the chemicals.

The potato is a great example of an industrial system gone crazy. Terms like Frankenfoods, fishy tomatoes and assassin seeds are not benign. Imagine, the now defunct DNA Plant Technology of Oakland, California, developed the gene therapy (sic) of inserting a fish gene into a tomato. It was the gene that helps a flounder survive in frigid waters. This “anti-freeze” fish gene was spliced into tomato cells to enhance the plant’s resistance to cold.

Monsanto, developers of the glyphosate-based herbicide Roundup, also developed the gene technology to create suicide seeds. Of all wonderfully bad things, they call this technology: Genetic use restriction technology (GURT), but it’s more commonly referred to as terminator technology or suicide seeds. This keeps farmers from saving seeds from a Monsanto crop, as the genetic alterations either activate or deactivate some genes only in response to certain stimuli. The second generation of seeds is infertile.

Roundup is what is sprayed all over our Oregon forests when clear cuts raze stands of trees – to keep opportunistic and invasive brush and other tree species, from overtaking the sawed over hills and valleys. (The Intercept)

The history and politics are not lost on people like my Chilean friend — Dow Chemical and Monsanto were the two largest producers of Agent Orange, a fifty-fifty mix of the n-butyl esters 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D) and 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4,5-T) known for a long list of neurological symptoms and physiological malformities found not only in those exposed but in their offspring; effects that were denied and ignored by both the manufacturer and the government, for decades.

Industrial Foods

The potato is just one food crop. Every conventionally grown crop contains multiple chemical pesticides and herbicides. There are many groups looking into industrial vegetables and fruits, but they all have their own version of the Dirty Dozen.  The dirty dozen are the twelve most chemically laden fruits and vegetables for that year. These foods should be purchased organic when possible. Here, another group’s dirty dozen with some specifics connected to each food.

  • Apples – at least 99 % have residue
  • Strawberries – contained 13 different pesticides each
  • Grapes- contained 15 different pesticides
  • Celery- 13 different pesticides per sample
  • Peaches
  • Spinach
  • Sweet Bell Peppers
  • Imported Nectarines – every sample tested positive for pesticides
  • Cucumbers
  • Cherry Tomatoes – contained 13 different pesticides each
  • Imported Snap Peas – contained 13 different pesticides each
  • Potatoes – had more pesticides by weight than any other food

Remember, there are literally dozens of active ingredients in one type of herbicide. There are hundreds and sometimes thousands of chemicals in a scoop or pint of poison used in industrial agriculture. There are no studies on how any of these chemical interact with each other as they bioaccumulate in the soils, plants, animals or in us. There are no studies on how two, three, or four different chemicals might interact in the lab or in life, let alone 10, 15, or 35 as in the case of the potato. Although industry boasts the safety of these chemicals, no one with a modicum of common sense believes them, unless they choose too. As I walk the wrack line, I cannot help but agreeing with my Chilean friend. The world is insane to believe that it is normal to poison our food.

When we look at what is truly sustainable, the only real model that has worked over long periods of time is the natural world. – Biomimicry Institute founder, Janine Benyus.

To Learn More:

The Future of Food

We Need Your Help

More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

Yes, I would like to support Hormones Matter. 

Nutrigenomics, Diet and Human Health

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Perhaps for the first time in human history our children face a decline in life expectancy compared to previous generations. Much of the research suggests the increase in obesity and the co-morbid chronic health issues such as diabetes, heart disease, liver disease, and cancers are to blame. Pointing the finger at the modern diet is easy. A surface level examination suggests modern man eats little more than processed foods that are high in carbohydrates but not much else. Here caloric intake is high while nutrient intake is low. Presumably, flipping the ratio of calorie to nutrient would improve health outcomes tremendously. And in many cases it does, but for many other individuals obesity and the associated health problems persist. How is that possible?

Diminishing Biodiversity in the Modern Diet

The composition of one’s diet influences health radically. It is well known, though often ignored, that dietary nutrients provide the building blocks for cell functioning and survival in every tissue of the body. Without those nutrients a myriad of health problems arise. What we eat plays a huge role in human health. What we eat has changed radically in recent decades. Beyond simply evolving from hunter-gatherer type diets to more processed and carbohydrate dense diets, the biodiversity of the plants and animals we eat has diminished dramatically as well. Indeed, 70% of the world’s diet comes from only 15 crops (sugarcane, maize, wheat, rice, potatoes, sugar beet, soybeans, cassava, palm kernel, barley, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, watermelons, bananas, brassicas). That alone should give one pause, but when one considers that these crops have been domesticated significantly with much of the genetic diversity among the different types of plants bred out, we can begin to see how limited the modern diet really is.

Some research suggests that in only a  few generations, modern farming has cultivated out 95% of the genetic variation among staple crops. Sit with that for a while. We’ve cultivated out 95% of the genetic variation from the plant based foods we eat – genetic variation that took many millennia to evolve. With 95% of the over 200,000 plant metabolites that provide nutritional sustenance critical for human health (and animal health) removed from the food chain, human health is facing a serious crisis that will require more than just a return to fruits and vegetables. We need a wholesale change in modern agriculture.

Diet-Disease Relationships: Nutrigenomics and the Evolving Microbiome

What happens when the foods we eat have limited genetic diversity? We lose critical dietary nutrients and disease develops – a boon for the supplement industry, a bust for human health. From an evolutionary standpoint, shifts in human diet evoke changes in metabolic capacities emanating from gastrointestinal microbiota. Evolutionarily, the microbiome has evolved for optimal absorption and metabolism of essential nutrients. As diet has changed, gut microbiota have changed too. As the genetic variation in food sources declines (and as we increasingly overuse antibiotics and other medicines) parallel declines in microbiome diversity have been observed leading many to suggest a connection between gut health and overall health. What can we do?

Obesity and Illness Persist Despite Dietary Changes

When obesity and chronic illness persist despite dietary changes that include increased plant based foods, consider the possibility that those foods have been nutrient depleted through commercial farming practices. And while eating plant based whole foods is certainly better than eating highly processed carbohydrate dense foods, that may not be enough to restore gut microbiota and health. It is likely that we have to return to eating an organic, heirloom diet, that is highly diverse, more genetically variable and nutrient dense. It may also be necessary to include nutrient supplements when dietary diversity is not possible.

We Need Your Help

More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

Yes, I would like to support Hormones Matter. 

Chemistry Versus Philosophy: Where Rubber Meets Road in Diet Debates

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At least once a week, I have a conversation involving all the reasons why someone cannot/does not/will not consider changes to their diet a necessary step to health. Sometimes the conversation is more about the difficulties of overcoming lifelong bad habits. For those folks, change is difficult but not impossible. Sometimes the conversation involves appreciating that diet and nutrients actually matter. For these folks, change is possible but considerably more difficult. It often does not occur until their health hits rock bottom and they have nothing else to lose by addressing diet. This, of course, makes healing that much more arduous.

Inevitably, however, there are folks for whom eating a particular way is a deeply entrenched philosophical decision. There, I am of no help. Nothing I say and no research I provide will convince them that their body chemistry does not care about their food philosophy. Maintaining that philosophical fortitude is all that matters, health be damned and it often is, sometimes quite severely. These are the conversations that simultaneously infuriate me and break my heart. To watch someone’s health degenerate, knowing all-the-while it does not have to, is perhaps one of the more painful aspects of my work.

It seems that food is no longer valued for its nourishment potential. Instead, it has become a religion of sorts, one that is wrapped tightly in emotion. It is our reason for pleasure and pain, stress, and in many cases, though we don’t like to admit it, no small amount of self-loathing. It seems no matter what we eat, we feel guilt and then, as if to bury that guilt, we give ourselves a reason to eat more of the very foods we know we should not eat. It is a vicious cycle. With all of these emotional tags to food, it is difficult to acknowledge that food, or good food rather, is a necessary component of health. What is even more difficult to acknowledge is that unhealthy foods or even just the wrong foods, can induce disease.

Food, Mitochondria and Energy

A fundamental, though unrecognized, component of health is mitochondrial functioning. As the producers of cellular energy and regulators of a host of other important functions, mitochondria determine how well our bodies respond to stressors. And let’s face it, everything in life is a stressor requiring some amount of energy to resolve. Living itself requires energy. Living in a toxic, ramped up world is a big stressor, requiring more energy. Illness is a stressor, chronic illness even more so. The medications used to treat most illnesses are stressors, damaging the mitochondria by a myriad of mechanisms including depleting vital nutrients. Those nutrients have to come from food, real food, not the processed, sugary, food-like substances we crave. Sometimes, the extra energy needed to fight illness requires supplements, at pharmacological doses, but, and this is important, supplements will never compensate for a bad diet. Ever.

A Healthier Way to Think about Food

What we ingest and how well we metabolize those foods determines to what degree and whether the mitochondria function. In that regard, food is the very foundation of health or disease. It can heal us or harm us based upon its chemistry and ours. For all the complexity of nutrition, it is really quite simple: does the chemistry of the food you eat match the needs of your chemistry? If it does not match, no matter what else you do to improve your health, there will always be something lacking. This is a critical point that is frequently ignored in modern medicine.

Folks often ask me what they should eat and while I cannot recommend a particular diet, here are three questions to evaluate the ‘healthiness’ your diet. Is the inherent chemistry of the food you eat well-suited to your body’s chemistry? Does what you eat provide your body with the necessary macro- and micronutrients it needs to function efficiently? Does what you eat reduce or induce stress in your the body?

How do you know the answers to these questions? Simple. Ask yourself, are you healthy? Are you doing all that you want to do without pain and without medications? Do you have what you consider an appropriate amount of energy? If the answer is yes to each of these questions, then congratulations, you are among the healthy and maybe there is no need to look at diet. For most folks, however, the answer is no to one or all of these questions. In fact, for most of the folks I interact with, energy levels are suboptimal, pain and other issues are present, and medications are used chronically to subsist. This is where diet matters most, and sadly, this is also where dietary changes are often the most difficult.

If one is chronically ill, using multiple medications, chances are the chemistry of the food consumed does not match the nutritional demands. Sometimes the diet is too toxic – e.g. conventionally grown, raised or processed foods. Other times, the diet simply does not provide sufficient macronutrients (protein and fat) and/or micronutrients (vitamins and minerals) to meet the body’s energetic demands. This effectively starves the mitochondria, evoking the reactions involved in chronic disease: inflammation, immune and metabolic dysfunction. Reactions, that no amount of medication can resolve.

Still Don’t Believe Diet Impacts Health?

Perhaps one of the clearest examples of the effects of diet on health can be seen below. Dr. Wahls was essentially chair/bedridden, crippled by multiple sclerosis until she addressed her diet. Sadly, none of her physicians suggested addressing diet. She, like so many others, had to come to this recognition on her own and figure out what her body needed to heal.

If you have not seen this, take 20 minutes to watch it.

And while the Wahls’ diet may not work for everyone, the point it makes is clear. Diet and nutrients matter. Chemistry matters. One’s philosophical or emotional ties to food do not.

If you are suffering from a complex or chronic condition, consider how what you are eating affects your health. Put aside your philosophical views on food and just look at the chemistry.

We Need Your Help

More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

Yes, I would like to support Hormones Matter.

Photo by George Huffman on Unsplash.

This article was published originally on March 7, 2018. 

More Turkey News: Big Breasts, No Sex

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A more humorous story for this Thanksgiving holiday; big breasts mean no sex for holiday Turkeys.  According to a recent Freakanomics report, our predilection for big breasted turkeys impairs turkey sex- the breasts get in the way of copulation. This has ‘forced’ commercial turkey farmers into artificial insemination.  There is not a Turkey on the market today, lest they be a ‘heritage’ turkey that has had the pleasure of sex. Nor for that matter, have most other livestock (90% of all cattle are artificially inseminated). Imagine if big breasts had the same effect on human sex.  Unnatural Turkeys: A New Marketplace podcast