With thanks to Sarah Boseley at The Guardian, Friday 24 June 2011:

British study finds two-month extreme diet can cure type 2 diabetes and overturns assumptions about ‘lifelong’ condition. People who have had obesity-related type 2 diabetes for years have been cured, at least temporarily, by keeping to an extreme, low-calorie, diet for two months, scientists report today.

The discovery, reported by scientists at Newcastle University, overturns previous assumptions about type 2 diabetes, which was thought to be a lifelong illness.

In the UK about two and a half million people have been diagnosed with diabetes, the large majority with type 2, and numbers are rising across much of the world. The condition has to be controlled with drugs and eventually insulin injections. It can cause blindness and end in foot amputation, as well as shortening life.

The results of the Newcastle investigation, though the study was small, demonstrated that full recovery was possible, not through drugs but through diet. Eleven people with diabetes took part in the study, which was funded by Diabetes UK. They had to slash their food intake to just 600 calories a day for two months. But three months later seven of the 11 were free of diabetes.

“To have people free of diabetes after years with the condition is remarkable – and all because of an eight-week diet,” said Roy Taylor, professor at Newcastle University, who led the study. “This is a radical change in understanding type 2 diabetes. It will change how we can explain it to people newly diagnosed with the condition. While it has long been believed that someone with type 2 diabetes will always have the disease, and that it will steadily get worse, we have shown that we can reverse the condition.”

Type 2 diabetes, which used to be known as adult onset, is caused by too much glucose in the blood. It is strongly linked to obesity, unlike type 1, which usually develops in children whose bodies are unable to make the hormone insulin to convert glucose from food into energy. They need daily insulin injections.

The research, presented today at the American Diabetes Association conference, shows that an extremely low-calorie diet, consisting of diet drinks and non-starchy vegetables, prompts the body to remove the fat clogging the pancreas and preventing it from making insulin. The volunteers were closely supervised by a medical team and matched with the same number of volunteers with diabetes who did not get the special diet. After just one week into the study, the pre-breakfast blood sugar levels of the study group had returned to normal. And MRI scans showed that the fat levels in the pancreas had returned to normal. The pancreas regained its ability to make insulin. After the eight-week diet the volunteers returned to normal eating but had advice on healthy foods and portion size. Ten of the group were retested and seven had stayed free of diabetes.

Taylor, the director of the Newcastle Magnetic Resonance Centre, had the idea for the study after it was shown that diabetes was reversed in people who had undergone stomach stapling or other forms of bariatric surgery because of obesity. “What was remarkable was that the diabetes went away over the course of one week. It was widely believed the operation itself had done something, [that] the hormones in the gut were thought to be the cause. That is almost universally believed.”

Taylor thought the massive drop in calorie intake after surgery could be responsible and to test this hypothesis set up the study, which included MRI scans of the pancreas to look at any changes in the fatty deposits. ”We believe this shows that type 2 diabetes is all about energy balance in the body,” said Taylor. “If you are eating more than you burn, then the excess is stored in the liver and pancreas as fat, which can lead to type 2 diabetes in some people. What we need to examine further is why some people are more susceptible to developing diabetes than others.”

He warned that only a minority of people, perhaps 5% or 10%, would be able to stick to the harsh diet necessary to get rid of diabetes. But even that, he said, would dramatically improve the health of many people and save the NHS millions.

Iain Frame, director of research at Diabetes UK, said people should not embark on such a diet without a doctor’s approval and help. “We welcome the results of this research because it shows that type 2 diabetes can be reversed, on a par with successful surgery without the side effects. ”However, this diet is not an easy fix and Diabetes UK strongly recommends that such a drastic diet should only be undertaken under medical supervision. Despite [it] being a very small trial, we look forward to future results, particularly to see whether the reversal remains long term.”

Gordon Parmley, 67, of Stocksfield, Newcastle upon Tyne, a trial participant, said he first noticed something was wrong when his vision went “fuzzy” and he had trouble focusing while playing golf. He had been on medication since being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes six years ago. He said: “When my doctor mentioned the trial I thought I’d give it a go, as it might help me and other diabetics. I came off my tablets and had three diet shakes a day and some salad or vegetables, but it was very, very, difficult and I’m not sure I’d have done it without the support of my wife, who went on a diet alongside me. ”

At first the hunger was quite severe and I had to distract myself with something else – walking the dog, playing golf, or doing anything to occupy myself and take my mind off food. But I lost an astounding amount of weight in a short space of time. ”At the end of the trial I was told my insulin levels were normal, and after six years I no longer needed my diabetes tablets. Still today, 18 months on, I don’t take them. ”It’s astonishing really that a diet – hard as it was – could change my health so drastically. After six years of having diabetes I can tell the difference. I feel better, even walking round the golf course is easier.”

 

 

With thanks to TIMESONLINE

THE biggest study into organic food has found that it is more nutritious than ordinary produce and may help to lengthen people’s lives.

The evidence from the £12m four-year project will end years of debate and is likely to overturn government advice that eating organic food is no more than a lifestyle choice.

The study found that organic fruit and vegetables contained as much as 40% more antioxidants, which scientists believe can cut the risk of cancer and heart disease, Britain’s biggest killers. They also had higher levels of beneficial minerals such as iron and zinc.

Professor Carlo Leifert, the co-ordinator of the European Union-funded project, said the differences were so marked that organic produce would help to increase the nutrient intake of people not eating the recommended five portions a day of fruit and vegetables. ‘If you have just 20% more antioxidants and you can’t get your kids to do five a day, then you might just be okay with four a day,’ he said.

This weekend the Food Standards Agency confirmed that it was reviewing the evidence before deciding whether to change its advice. Ministers and the agency have said there are no significant differences between organic and ordinary produce.

Researchers grew fruit and vegetables and reared cattle on adjacent organic and nonorganic sites on a 725-acre farm attached to Newcastle University, and at other sites in Europe. They found that levels of antioxidants in milk from organic herds were up to 90% higher than in milk from conventional herds.

As well as finding up to 40% more antioxidants in organic vegetables, they also found that organic tomatoes from Greece had significantly higher levels of antioxidants, including flavo-noids thought to reduce coronary heart disease.

Leifert said the government was wrong about there being no difference between organic and conventional produce. ‘There is enough evidence now that the level of good things is higher in organics,’ he said.

Letter from the Food Standards Agency | The Food Standards Agency’s current stance on organic food

With thanks to Mercola.com, Reuters, CBS News and Circulation 2008;117:754-761:

Drinking diet soda increases the risk of metabolic syndrome.

The study found that diet soda consumption was linked to these elevated risk factors for heart disease and diabetes, echoing the findings of a study published in July.

Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of risk factors such as excessive fat around your waist, high cholesterol, high blood sugar and high blood pressure, all of which can raise your risk of heart disease and diabetes.

The researchers examined the diets of over 9,500 people between the ages of 45 and 64. They were categorized into two groups: a “western-pattern diet” that included processed meat, fried foods and red meat, or a “prudent-pattern diet” that included more fruits and vegetables, poultry and fish.

Eating two or more servings a day of red meat increases your risk of metabolic syndrome by 25 percent, compared to those who have two servings of red meat each week, a new study found.

“When we found that diet soda promoted risk we were surprised,” said Dr. Lyn Steffen, an associate professor of epidemiology at the University of Minnesota.

“But then we thought about other behavior patterns,” she added in a telephone interview. “It may be associated with compensating for eating higher calorie food. People may say, ‘I can eat this cookie because I am drinking this diet soda.’”

Lots of meat, fried foods and diet soda add up to heart disease, the researchers said, and the conclusions add to a swelling body of evidence linking fast food with unhealthy lifestyles.

Steffen’s team examined the diets of 9,514 people in a study funded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. In a departure from related studies, this one went into a detailed look at precisely what people were eating.

Most were aged 45 to 64. Based on a 66-item food frequency questionnaire, the volunteers were categorized into two groups: those with a “western-pattern” diet, heavy on processed meat, fried foods, red meat; and a “prudent-pattern” diet with more fruit and vegetables, with small amounts of fish and poultry.

After nine years, nearly 40 percent of those involved developed three or more of the factors linked to metabolic syndrome, they wrote. This was clear even when smoking and exercise were factored in.

Circulation 2008;117:754-761

See also CBS News 23.2.08: Diet Soda Drinkers Gain Weight

People who drink diet soft drinks don’t lose weight. In fact, they gain weight, a new study shows. The findings come from eight years of data collected by Sharon P. Fowler, MPH, and colleagues at the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio.

Fowler reported the data at this week’s annual meeting of the American Diabetes Association in San Diego.

“What didn’t surprise us was that total soft drink use was linked to overweight and obesity,” Fowler tells WebMD. “What was surprising was when we looked at people only drinking diet soft drinks, their risk of obesity was even higher.”

In fact, when the researchers took a closer look at their data, they found that nearly all the obesity risk from soft drinks came from diet sodas.

“There was a 41 percent increase in risk of being overweight for every can or bottle of diet soft drink a person consumes each day,” Fowler says.

Fowler’s team looked at seven to eight years of data on 1,550 Mexican-American and non-Hispanic white Americans aged 25 to 64. Of the 622 study participants who were of normal weight at the beginning of the study, about a third became overweight or obese.
For regular soft-drink drinkers, the risk of becoming overweight or obese was:

* 26 percent for up to 1/2 can each day
* 30.4 percent for 1/2 to one can each day
* 32.8 percent for 1 to 2 cans each day
* 47.2 percent for more than 2 cans each day.

For diet soft-drink drinkers, the risk of becoming overweight or obese was:

* 36.5 percent for up to 1/2 can each day
* 37.5 percent for 1/2 to one can each day
* 54.5 percent for 1 to 2 cans each day
* 57.1 percent for more than 2 cans each day.

For each can of diet soft drink consumed each day, a person’s risk of obesity went up 41 percent.

Fowler is quick to note that a study of this kind does not prove that diet soda causes obesity. More likely, she says, it shows that something linked to diet soda drinking is also linked to obesity.

“One possible part of the explanation is that people who see they are beginning to gain weight may be more likely to switch from regular to diet soda,” Fowler suggests. “But despite their switching, their weight may continue to grow for other reasons. So diet soft-drink use is a marker for overweight and obesity.”

Why? Nutrition expert Leslie Bonci, MPH, RD, puts it in a nutshell.

“You have to look at what’s on your plate, not just what’s in your glass,” Bonci tells WebMD.

People often mistake diet drinks for diets, says Bonci, director of sports nutrition at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and nutrition consultant to college and professional sports teams and to the Pittsburgh Ballet.

“A lot of people say, ‘I am drinking a diet soft drink because that is better for me. But soft drinks by themselves are not the root of America’s obesity problem,” she says. “You can’t go into a fast-food restaurant and say, ‘Oh, it’s OK because I had diet soda.’ If you don’t do anything else but switch to a diet soft drink, you are not going to lose weight.” continue reading:

Mono-Sodium Glutamate (looks like a little pile of white powder and causes as much damage as other little piles of white powder!!!)

Peter Chappell News

Slow Poison MSG The food additive MSG (Mono-Sodium Glutamate) is a slow poison. MSG

hides behind 25 or more names, such as “Natural Flavouring.” MSG is even in your favourite coffee from Tim Horton’s and other brand-name coffee shops!

Peter Chappell writes:

I wondered if there could be an actual chemical causing the massive obesity epidemic, and so did a friend of mine, John Erb. He was a research assistant at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, and spent years working for the government.

He made an amazing discovery while going through scientific journals for a book he was writing called The Slow Poisoning of America.

Jamie Oliver’s website continues:

In hundreds of studies around the world, scientists were creating obese mice and rats to use in diet or diabetes test studies. No strain of rat or mice is naturally obese, so scientists have to create them. They make these creatures morbidly obese by injecting them with MSG when they are first born.

The Sunday Times continues:

The MSG triples the amount of insulin the pancreas creates, causing rats (and perhaps humans) to become obese. They even have a name for the fat rodents they create: “MSG-Treated Rats.”

Doctor talk continues:

When I heard this, I was shocked. I went into my kitchen and checked the cupboards and the refrigerator. MSG was in everything — the Campbell ‘s soups, the Hostess Doritos, the Lays flavoured potato chips, Top Ramen, Betty Crocker Hamburger Helper, Heinz canned gravy, Swanson frozen prepared meals, and Kraft salad dressings, especially the “healthy low-fat” ones.

The items that didn’t have MSG marked on the product label had something called “Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein,” which virtually always has Monos odium Glutamate in it-makes the otherwise terrible taste acceptable!!

It was shocking to see just how many of the foods we feed our children everyday are filled with this stuff. MSG is hidden under many different names in order to fool those who read the ingredient list, so that they don’t catch on. (Other names for MSG are “Accent, “Aginomoto,” “Natural Meat Tenderizer,” etc.)

But it didn’t stop there.

When our family went out to eat, we started asking at the restaurants what menu items contained MSG. Many employees, even the managers, swore they didn’t use MSG.

But when we ask for the ingredient list, which they grudgingly provided, sure enough, MSG and Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein were everywhere.

Burger King, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Taco Bell, every restaurant — even the sit-down eate ries like TGIF, Chili’s, Applebee’s, and Denny’s — use MSG in abundance. Kentucky Fried Chicken seemed to be the WORST offender: MSG was in every chicken dish, salad dressing. and gravy. No wonder I loved to eat that coating on the skin — their secret spice was
MSG!

So why is MSG in so many of the foods we eat? Is it a preservative, or a vitamin?

Not according to my friend John Erb. In his book The Slow Poisoning of America, he said that MSG is added to food for the addictive effect it has on the human body.

Even the propaganda website sponsored by the food manufacturers lobby group supporting MSG explains that the reason they add it to food is to make people eat more.

A study of the elderly showed that older people eat more of the foods that it is added to. The Glutamate Association lobbying group says eating more is a benefit to the elderly, but what does it do to the rest of us?

Not good for anyone!!!

Betcha can’t eat [just] one,” takes on a whole new meaning where MSG is concerned! And we wonder why the nation is overweight!

MSG manufacturers themselves admit that it addicts people to their products. It makes people choose their product over others, and makes people eat more of it than they would if MSG wasn’t added.

Not only is MSG scientifically proven to cause obesity, it is an addictive substance.

Since its introduction into the American food supply fifty years ago, MSG has been added in larger and larger doses to the pre-packaged meals, soups, snacks, and fast foods we are tempted to eat everyday.

The FDA has set no limits on how much of it can be added to food. They claim it’s safe to eat in any amount. But how can they claim it’s safe when there are hundreds of scientific studies with titles like these:

“The monosodium glutamate (MSG) obese rat as a model for the study of
exercise in obesity.” Gobatto CA, Mello MA, Souza CT , Ribeiro IA. Res
Commun Mol Pathol Pharmacol. 2002.

Adrenalectomy abolishes the food-induced hypothalamic serotonin release
in both normal and monosodium glutamate-obese rats.” Guimaraes RB,
Telles MM, Coelho VB, Mori C, Nascimento CM, Ribeiro. Brain Res Bull.
2002 Aug.

Obesity induced by neonatal monosodium glutamate treatment in
spontaneously hypertensive rats: An animal model of multiple risk
factors.” Iwase M, Yamamoto M, Iino K, Ichikawa K, Shinohara N,
Yoshinari Fujishima. Hypertens Res. 1998 Mar.

Hypothalamic lesion induced by injection of monosodium glutamate in
suckling period and subsequent development of obesity.” Tanaka K,
Shimada M, Nakao K Kusunoki. Exp Neurol. 1978 Oct.

No, the date of that last study was not a typo; it was published in 1978.

Both the “medical research community” and ?food manufacturers” have known about the side effects of MSG for decades.

Many more of the studies mentioned in John Erb’s book link MSG to diabetes, migraines and headaches, autism, ADHD, and even Alzheimer’s.

So what can we do to stop the food manufactures from dumping this fattening and addictive MSG into our food supply and causing the obesity epidemic we now see?

Several months ago, John Erb took his book and his concerns to one of the highest government health officials in Canada . While he was sitting in the government office, the official told him,

“Sure, I know how bad MSG is. I wouldn’t touch the stuff.”

But this top-level government official refuses to tell the public what he knows.

The big media doesn’t want to tell the public eith er, fearing issues with their advertisers.

It seems that the fallout on the fast food industry may hurt their profit margin.

The food producers and restaurants have been addicting us to their products for years, and now we are paying the price for it.

Our children should not be cursed with obesity caused by an addictive food additive.

But what can I do about it?

I’m just one voice!

What can I do to stop the poisoning of our children, while our governments are insuring financial protection for the industry that is poisoning us?

This message is going out to everyone I know in an attempt to tell you the truth that the corporate-owned politicians and media won’t tell you.

The best way you can help to save yourself and your children from this drug-induced epidemic is to forward this article to everyone.

With any luck, it will circle the globe before politicians can pass the legislat ion protecting those who are poisoning us.

The food industry learned a lot from the tobacco industry. Imagine if big tobacco had a bill like this in place before someone blew the whistle on nicotine?

If you are one of the few who can still believe that MSG is good for us and you don’t believe what John Erb has to say, see for yourself.

Go to the National Library of Medicine at www.pubmed.com. Type in the words “MSG Obese” and read a few of the 115 medical studies that appear.

We the public do not want to be rats in one giant experiment, and we do not approve of food that makes us into a nation of obese, lethargic, addicted sheep, feeding the food industry’s bottom line while waiting for the heart transplant, the diabetic-induced amputation, blindness, or other obesity-induced, life-threatening disorders.

With your help we can put an end to this poison.

Do your part in sending this message out by word of mouth, e-mail, or by distribution of this printout to your friends all over the world and stop this “Slow Poisoning of Mankind” by the packaged food industry.

Blowing the whistle on MSG is our responsibility, so get the word out.

]]> http://avilian.co.uk/2009/01/is-mono-sodium-glutamate-behind-our-obesity-problem/feed/ 0 http://avilian.co.uk/2009/01/the-perils-of-coca-cola/ http://avilian.co.uk/2009/01/the-perils-of-coca-cola/#comments Thu, 01 Jan 2009 10:19:21 +0000 Sue http://avilian.co.uk/?p=829

With thanks to Nutrition Research Centre.org and Mercola.com

Don’t drink cola if you want to be healthy. Consuming soft drinks is bad for so many reasons that science cannot even state all the consequences. But one thing we know for sure is that drinking Coke, as a representative of soft drinks, wreaks havoc on the human organism. What happens?

Writer Wade Meredith has shown the quick progression of Coke’s assault.

The main problem is sugar. It’s an evil that the processed food industry and sugar growers don’t want people to know about. Even dietitians, financially supported by sugar growers and sugary product manufacturers, are loathe to tell us the truth.

When somebody drinks a Coke watch what happens…

• In The First 10 minutes: 10 teaspoons of sugar hit your system. (100% of your recommended daily intake.) You don’t immediately vomit from the overwhelming sweetness because phosphoric acid cuts the flavor allowing you to keep it down.
• 20 minutes: Your blood sugar spikes, causing an insulin burst. Your liver responds to this by turning any sugar it can get its hands on into fat. (There’s plenty of that at this particular moment)
• 40 minutes: Caffeine absorption is complete. Your pupils dilate, your blood pressure rises, as a response your livers dumps more sugar into your bloodstream. The adenosine receptors in your brain are now blocked preventing drowsiness.
• 45 minutes: Your body ups your dopamine production stimulating the pleasure centers of your brain. This is physically the same way heroin works, by the way.
• >60 minutes: The phosphoric acid binds calcium, magnesium and zinc in your lower intestine, providing a further boost in metabolism. This is compounded by high doses of sugar and artificial sweeteners also increasing the urinary excretion of calcium.
• >60 Minutes: The caffeine’s diuretic properties come into play. (It makes you have to pee.) It is now assured that you’ll evacuate the bonded calcium, magnesium and zinc that was headed to your bones as well as sodium, electrolyte and water.
• >60 minutes: As the rave inside of you dies down you’ll start to have a sugar crash. You may become irritable and/or sluggish. You’ve also now, literally, pissed away all the water that was in the Coke. But not before infusing it with valuable nutrients your body could have used for things like even having the ability to hydrate your system or build strong bones and teeth.

So there you have it, an avalanche of destruction in a single can. Imagine drinking this day after day, week after week. Stick to water, real juice from fresh squeezed fruit, and tea without sweetener.

Update New York Times December 2008:

Federal regulators have approved two versions of a new zero-calorie sweetener developed by the Coca-Cola Company and PepsiCo, paving the way for new products.

Cargill, which is marketing the sweetener Truvia from Coca-Cola, said on Wednesday that it had received notification from the Food and Drug Administration that it had no objection to the product, calling it “generally recognized as safe.”

PepsiCo said it also had received a no-objection letter and the same designation from the agency related to its sweetener, PureVia.

Both products use rebiana, an extract from the stevia plant.

This week, Coca-Cola said it would begin selling products made with the new zero-calorie sweetener despite not yet receiving the official word from the government.

PepsiCo said it would not follow suit until the F.D.A. issued the designation.

PepsiCo, based in Purchase, N.Y., said Wednesday that it would be releasing three new zero-calorie SoBe Lifewater flavors: Fuji Apple Pear, Black and Blue Berry and Yumberry Pomegranate. The products will be in stores this year, the company said.

Coca-Cola, based in Atlanta, said Wednesday it would introduce an extension of its Sprite line with the Truvia sweetener.