Recently I opened my morning paper (Vancouver Sun, Saturday, January 22, 2011) and was jolted out of my seat when my eyes glanced at the title of a article: "Hands off my statins (and please pass the steak)." The article simply underscores the stupidity of mainstream thinking when it assumes that (saturated) fat leads to cholesterol which, in turn leads to a heart attack. This myth is so saturated (pardon the pun) in our mindset that we actually believe it - it has become mainstream dogma. The result can lead one to embrace a stupid way of living.
Andrew Brown, the author, admits to taking a statin, knowingly that he may be "imperiling" his health because of various possible side effects. On the advice of his doctor, because he had "raised cholesterol" and a family history of heart disease, Brown readily buys into the belief that a pill is the answer to avoiding future cardiac events - as he says, " I believe in it .... I'm more inclined to welcome wonder drugs with enthusiasm than to be skeptical ... I listen to the good it can do and tune out the stuff about side-effects." He also readily admits that "I'm temperamentally inclined to trust the latest products of the pharmaceutical laboratory."
Is this what the modern world has come to to be? Yes, this is indeed the world that pharmaceutical companies are trying to create. Have you noticed the advertisements these days? Pills are offered for everything. Perhaps it is a noble idea; after all, we wear glasses to see better (if needed), we use binoculars to see distance, scientists use microscopes to overcome the limitations of our eyesight. But Mr. Brown says that he has been on statins because it is "massively more convenient for me to have this backup that somehow mops up some of the fats in my diet." This is a better option than "to enforce on myself the strictures of an unpalatable low-fat diet." Brown goes on to say that "I love my food. I enjoy a varied diet that does contain cheese, cream, red meat, and butter." What???
He seems to want to eat the "low-carb" way - yet he is very afraid of its outcome. I could just see Dr. Atkins turning in his grave as if experiencing a bad dream. It sort of reminds me how often doctors allow their patients to lose weight on the low-carb diet while at the same time warning them of long-term consequences. That fat results in "cardiac events" is the prevailing myth. But in this case Mr. Brown is deprived of worry - he's got the statin; the future looks bright. Why fear heart attacks? The statin is preventive medicine. There is no mention in the article that he has a weight problem and he does admit that "I haven't, to my knowledge, had any cardiac events."
Is it possible that Mr. Brown has made this up? Could he be trying to bait the readers to write in and offer their opinions on the matter - certainly the article raises more than just health issues. It raises ethical questions regarding the artificiality of the modern world - he may take statins but others take botox. Are pills the answer? Is it as smart as putting on a helmet when riding a bike -that seems to make sense; parents watching their kids my not dispute that. But the comparison is not similar. Riding a bike does pose its risks. Eating fat does not - at least not in an absolute way.
The causal link between fat and heart disease goes back to the work of Ancel Keys and his diet-heart hypothesis. Dr. Jonny Bowden (in his book Living Low Carb) summarized the history of this notion this way: " Keys concluded that cholesterol is a cause of heart disease, saturated fat causes a rise in cholesterol, and therefore saturated fat causes heart disease. Key's seven-country study became the basis for dietary policy for more than three decades, indirectly birthed the fat phobia of the 80s, and indirectly spawned an entire bureaucracy devoted to lowering cholesterol (the National Cholesterol Education Program) and also to producing some of the most profitable pharmaceutical drugs in history."
The diet-heart hypothesis has been discredited - but the media and the majority of doctors still uphold the dogma. Why? Because they refuse to look at the history and scientific studies from that point onwards and even going backwards to uncover its threads - it has been ignored. Why? Too many careers are at stake. For doctors and the media and the drug companies and governments to suddenly turn around and say "yes, we were wrong, we take it back" amounts to career suicide and a questioning of the integrity that is demanded of our health care practitioners. Litigation would be the order of the day. For more than 40 years we have been presented with a lie- the one believed by Andrew Brown and his doctor. The scientific studies and books that are currently being published suggest that it has all been a big fat lie as Gary Taubes has boldly been asserting since his 2002 article in the New York Times. The current position of the low-carb community is this: fats (saturated & monounsaturated) are good; avoid polyunsaturated types - they are inflammatory; refined carbs are bad - avoid grains and sugar/fructose.
The way that Andrew wishes to eat - loaded on fats - is good. For millions of years of our evolution, fat has been the preferred dietary staple, supported by plants. Our bodies never evolved to eat out of a box, or a package. My advice to Andrew - throw away your pills, eat two steaks a day (with eggs), drink water, eat organ meats, once or twice a week; eat some veggies (a few berries); enjoy the sun. That's it. Oh yes, I forgot - tell your doctor to take a hike.
Showing posts with label low-carb. Show all posts
Showing posts with label low-carb. Show all posts
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Friday, January 21, 2011
Defining Low-Carb
The concept of "low-carb" should be easy to understand but there have been times when researchers have missed the point. We have seen instances where the clinical trials held 100 grams of carb/day as "low-carb."Of course, the results are not what they should be when such a diet is compared to the Standard American Diet in these studies. The low-carb way of eating means that fat is being consumed in the place of carbs. Hospitals and doctors, who are currently treating children for seizures using the "low-carb" approach, are generally worried about the long-term results. The seizures go away but they worry about what looms on the horizon for these kids. They worry that the price for success in one therapeutic outcome will exact a price somewhere else on the horizon. After the seizures are gone along come the heart problems - that is what they think.
The low-carb community consists of those who are trying to promote the view that, since the 1970s, the American Standard Diet, supported by multinational corporations, health agencies, and governments, has impacted the health and well-being of countless people in a negative way - the results are the diseases of civilization - obesity, heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and a host of others. Researchers are scared of experimenting with very low-carb intake; researchers, eliminating seizures through the low-carb diet, are afraid of the long term effects; doctors, who have long noted that low-carb diets reduce tumors, are afraid to support it in public. Mainstream society seems to think fat is bad and to be avoided; the low-carb community has an opposite view - it is not fat that is the problem, it is the carbs - the foods that are not in tune with our evolutionary journey.
The idea of eating fat in place of carbs is the universal maxim of the low carb lifestyle, often referred to as "paleo." The differences between the two are minimal -paleo avoids dairy because the "caveman" didn't drink it. They have to be understood within a context. To illustrate this, I've gathered (in no special order) a number of low-carb advocates from my blog list and see how they are similar and different in their presentations of what constitutes a low-carb diet or a low-carb way of life.
Some blogs lay it out in detail and some don't, but the gist of what low carb is actually does clarify itself. Robb Wolf starts off his blog by saying that the "Paleo diet" is "effective for fat loss and halting or preventing a number of degenerative diseases." The building blocks of the Paleo meals are meat, fowl, and fish -wild and grass fed; fruits and veggies in season and "healthy fats such as nuts, seeds, avocado, olive oil, and coconut oil." Operating under the shadow of his mentor, Loren Cordain, animal fat is not mentioned here. Elsewhere he suggests lean meat.
At the blog of Dr. Art Ayers (Cooling Inflammation), the emphasis is on the contrast - what not to eat. These are starches, simple sugars, and high fructose corn syrup. He says the focus of our diet ought to be "meats, fish. eggs, and leafy vegetables." Trans-fat are a no-no but probiotics are good as well as saturated fats - in fact he says that "saturated fats are healthy and reduce the peroxidation of omega-3 fatty acids at sites of local inflammation." He seems to emphsize that "saturated fats should be the major source of dietary calories."
Over at the PaNu blog of Dr. Kurt Harris we find a 12 step solution that will "remove the neolithic agents of disease in an efficient and practical manner." The steps are to be followed in the order as they are set out - you get healthier the further you go along this path: 1) get rid of sugar - fruit juices, sport drinks - and foods that contain flour; 2) eat proper fats -animal, coconut oil, and whole cream; 3) get rid of gluten grains - limit grains like corn and rice; 4) get rid of "grain and seed derived oils" - those are "cooking oils" that should be replaced with coconut oil, butter, animal fats, or ghee; 5) eat meat from ruminants & include eggs and some fish; 6) get sun & supplements for Vitamin D; 7) two or three meals a day is all you need; 8) adjust the omega 6 and omega 3 ratio; 9) exercise using resistance and interval training instead of aerobics; 10) ease up on fruits because of fructose - emphasize berries; 11) get rid of legumes; you may want to avoid dairy, if allergic or concerned with casein - stick to butter and cream. He is not concerned about numbers but says that Paleo should range along this ratio: 5-35% carbs, 10-35% protein, 50-80% fat. This depends if you are dieting or maintaining your weight. One point he makes is that the issue is not fat vs. carbs but "neolithic agents of disease versus everything else."
These views are succinctly summarized by Mark Sisson (Mark's Daily Apple) where, on his blog, he says the following: "Focus on quality sources of protein (all forms of meat, fowl, fish), lots of colorful vegetables, some select fruits (mostly berries), and healthy fats (nuts, avocados, olive oil)..... Eliminate grains, sugars, trans - and hydrogenated fats from your diet."
From Richard Nikoley's Free the Animal blog we get a five-point summary: one should eat "real foods" and by that he means meat, fowl, fish, natural fats from animals, coconuts, and olives; veggies, fruits, and nuts. He points out that one should remove grain, sugar, and vegetable oils from one's diet, supplement with omega 3 fats, and engage in intermittent fasting; get sunshine, supplement it with Vitamin D, and do short intense exercises.
From this we can come away with some universal maxims: eat animal fat, tropical oils (coconut/palm) & avoid industrial oils (vegetable -canola, safflower etc...); get rid of all carbs (starch/sugars) except for some nuts, some vegetables & minimal fruits; get into the sun, supplement with Vitamin D; exercise briefly but intensely. The bottom line is to eat like the human race has done for millions of years or at least the last 200, 000 years, since our last migration out of Africa. We did not evolve to eat synthesized, processed, boxed, packaged, wrapped, and canned foods.
The low-carb community consists of those who are trying to promote the view that, since the 1970s, the American Standard Diet, supported by multinational corporations, health agencies, and governments, has impacted the health and well-being of countless people in a negative way - the results are the diseases of civilization - obesity, heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and a host of others. Researchers are scared of experimenting with very low-carb intake; researchers, eliminating seizures through the low-carb diet, are afraid of the long term effects; doctors, who have long noted that low-carb diets reduce tumors, are afraid to support it in public. Mainstream society seems to think fat is bad and to be avoided; the low-carb community has an opposite view - it is not fat that is the problem, it is the carbs - the foods that are not in tune with our evolutionary journey.
The idea of eating fat in place of carbs is the universal maxim of the low carb lifestyle, often referred to as "paleo." The differences between the two are minimal -paleo avoids dairy because the "caveman" didn't drink it. They have to be understood within a context. To illustrate this, I've gathered (in no special order) a number of low-carb advocates from my blog list and see how they are similar and different in their presentations of what constitutes a low-carb diet or a low-carb way of life.
Some blogs lay it out in detail and some don't, but the gist of what low carb is actually does clarify itself. Robb Wolf starts off his blog by saying that the "Paleo diet" is "effective for fat loss and halting or preventing a number of degenerative diseases." The building blocks of the Paleo meals are meat, fowl, and fish -wild and grass fed; fruits and veggies in season and "healthy fats such as nuts, seeds, avocado, olive oil, and coconut oil." Operating under the shadow of his mentor, Loren Cordain, animal fat is not mentioned here. Elsewhere he suggests lean meat.
At the blog of Dr. Art Ayers (Cooling Inflammation), the emphasis is on the contrast - what not to eat. These are starches, simple sugars, and high fructose corn syrup. He says the focus of our diet ought to be "meats, fish. eggs, and leafy vegetables." Trans-fat are a no-no but probiotics are good as well as saturated fats - in fact he says that "saturated fats are healthy and reduce the peroxidation of omega-3 fatty acids at sites of local inflammation." He seems to emphsize that "saturated fats should be the major source of dietary calories."
Over at the PaNu blog of Dr. Kurt Harris we find a 12 step solution that will "remove the neolithic agents of disease in an efficient and practical manner." The steps are to be followed in the order as they are set out - you get healthier the further you go along this path: 1) get rid of sugar - fruit juices, sport drinks - and foods that contain flour; 2) eat proper fats -animal, coconut oil, and whole cream; 3) get rid of gluten grains - limit grains like corn and rice; 4) get rid of "grain and seed derived oils" - those are "cooking oils" that should be replaced with coconut oil, butter, animal fats, or ghee; 5) eat meat from ruminants & include eggs and some fish; 6) get sun & supplements for Vitamin D; 7) two or three meals a day is all you need; 8) adjust the omega 6 and omega 3 ratio; 9) exercise using resistance and interval training instead of aerobics; 10) ease up on fruits because of fructose - emphasize berries; 11) get rid of legumes; you may want to avoid dairy, if allergic or concerned with casein - stick to butter and cream. He is not concerned about numbers but says that Paleo should range along this ratio: 5-35% carbs, 10-35% protein, 50-80% fat. This depends if you are dieting or maintaining your weight. One point he makes is that the issue is not fat vs. carbs but "neolithic agents of disease versus everything else."
These views are succinctly summarized by Mark Sisson (Mark's Daily Apple) where, on his blog, he says the following: "Focus on quality sources of protein (all forms of meat, fowl, fish), lots of colorful vegetables, some select fruits (mostly berries), and healthy fats (nuts, avocados, olive oil)..... Eliminate grains, sugars, trans - and hydrogenated fats from your diet."
From Richard Nikoley's Free the Animal blog we get a five-point summary: one should eat "real foods" and by that he means meat, fowl, fish, natural fats from animals, coconuts, and olives; veggies, fruits, and nuts. He points out that one should remove grain, sugar, and vegetable oils from one's diet, supplement with omega 3 fats, and engage in intermittent fasting; get sunshine, supplement it with Vitamin D, and do short intense exercises.
From this we can come away with some universal maxims: eat animal fat, tropical oils (coconut/palm) & avoid industrial oils (vegetable -canola, safflower etc...); get rid of all carbs (starch/sugars) except for some nuts, some vegetables & minimal fruits; get into the sun, supplement with Vitamin D; exercise briefly but intensely. The bottom line is to eat like the human race has done for millions of years or at least the last 200, 000 years, since our last migration out of Africa. We did not evolve to eat synthesized, processed, boxed, packaged, wrapped, and canned foods.
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