MORE MEDICAL MYTHS



03/19/2007

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DIABETES MYTH   Diabetes has become epidemic in North America.  Most medical and nutritional people still apply research and therapy as though all diabetes is the same condition.
 

INFORMATION: There are a minimum of four entirely different syndrome that require differing therapy of which 70% are type II hyperglycemic believed caused by the Health care industry.  They were advised in the 1970's that their advice would cause an epidemic.

FACT: This is tantamount to treating a viral infection the same as a bacterial infection because both results in elevated body temperatures.  This is not a good analogy because 70% of doctors still prescribe antibiotic for viral infections.
 

INFORMATION: To reduce weight it is necessary to reduce fat consumption to 30% of total energy intake.  Fat is very high in calories don't you know.  This is based in part on a generally held belief that being over weight causes or contributes to a long list of health concerns, including heart disease, diabetes etc.
There is no evidence to support the contention that low fat foods result in weight loss in the treatment of obese patients. The low fat myth is based on the caloritic myth. The old belief is based on the premise that excess fat and carbohydrate are equally fattening. The new belief is that the accumulation of body fat is mostly from carbohydrates as lipogenesis of fat is quantitatively very low.
The medical profession is split between does diabetes cause obesity or does obesity cause diabetes?  This in my mind is fundamental to any treatment of diabetes.  The American Diabetes Association says; "obesity is weighing 20% more than a desired body weight."  Most anorexia people believe they are obese relative to a desired body weight.  It is noteworthy that anorexics prefer protein over carbohydrate.  The major problem with interbreting anthropometric values (height and weight measurement) is that there are no universally agreed upon standards for comparison.  Additionally, human error can result in inconsistent measurements.  Bioelectric impedance analysis suffers from the same lack of standards.  Chinese consume 20% more calories than Americans, obesity is not a major health problem in China.  Americans spend $100 billion per year counting calories with no scientific bases.   The calorie counters ignore the drugs like biguanides that restricts the absorption of glucose in the small intestines.  They also don't recognize that the body metabolism slows down if you restrict consumption and speeds back up when normal consumption resumes.    Some researchers as late as January 1999 are still arguing for fat intake reduction based on the calorie counting theory.

FACT: Low Glycemic Index diets protect you from getting diabetes regardless of body mass index.  Most obesity is a symptom of diabetes type II not the cause.  If you remove carbohydrates from a type II diabetes diet they will lose significant weight.
It is an accepted fact that high Glycemic Index foods promote fat saturation in the short term. Many in the medical community still believe, despite the existing evidence the consumption of excessive carbohydrate consumption will be beneficial in the longer term. There is no evidence to support this hypothesis.

INFORMATION: This is another one of those medical myths that has a life of it own.  In the 1960's based on statistical probability rather than clinical facts it was proclaimed that diets high in fiber lowered the risk of colon cancer.  Nutritionists grabbed the ball and ran.  In the 1970's when medical facts didn't support this hypothesis, fiber was ruled as having no nutritional value.  They assumed this plant cell wall material just passed through the gut unchanged.  Nutritionists dropped the ball.  In the 1980's intestinal diseases increased and fiber is returned to a greater place of prominence.  The nutritionists again grabbed the ball and ran.  Two recent studies find no association between fiber and the risk of diabetes.   When the nutrition Industry removed the fibers from foods they also removed the natural vitamin B's (used in digestion), the colon fermentation base and the intestinal cleaners.  It is noteworthy that vitamin B is not stored in the body and must be supplied daily.  Many of the process foods today still have no natural fiber or vitamin B's as a result of this flawed medical thinking.  Today fiber is considered an important moderator of digestion in the small bowel and a major substrate for fermentation in the colon. HOWEVER there is still no consensus on which components to include as 'dietary fibre' so the term is meaning less.

FACTS: The overall weight of evidence suggests that individuals who consume diets rich in soluble dietary fiber or which have a low glycemic index are likely to be at reduced risk of developing diabetes.  The medical industry however couldn't over look the increase of intestinal problems and reversed their former stance.  It would be interesting to research how much this medical error  contributed to the increase in colon cancers.
Fiber lowers risk of colon cancer, helps prevent constipation, colonic inflammation (diverticulitis) and hemorrhoids, may prevent pre cancerous polyps in the colon, may lower cholesterol, slows blood sugar rise.

Recently the New England Journal of Medicine reported a 16 year study of 88,757 healthy women aged 34-59 concluded white bread eaters were no more likely to get colon cancer, fruit eaters appeared to lower the risk slightly while vegetable eaters actually increased the rate of colon cancer.  This science fiction 'panacea' approach to medicine based on statistical probability is worse than the alternative medicine claims based on 'anecdotal' evidences.

 CHOLESTEROL MYTH: Elevated cholesterol is a leading cause of cardiovascular disease and a risk factor for diabetes.  The medical profession, in the 1970's, warned us to restrict our consumption of liver, cheese, butter, eggs, lard, shortening, palm oil, cocoa butter, coconut oil, cream cheese, sour cream, bacon and other animal fats like pork and beef.  Eat more vegetable, peanut, and grains as they do not contain cholesterol.  They bundled all their calorie based hypothesis into a common delivery package.  This created the system of classifying foods as either healthy or unhealthy based on cholesterol (fat) and calories.
 

INFORMATION:  Cholesterol is not a saturated fat as many would have us believe.  Fats or lipids are complex molecules composed of fatty acids.  Cholesterol is  sterols, bile acids, hormones and other substances.    All researchers are aware of the fact that if you consume 0% cholesterol your liver will manufacture the cholesterol, it thinks, it needs.  It is noteworthy that most of our cholesterol is manufactured at night during our sleep, long after we have digested our meals.

Some reports have found a correlation between high cholesterol levels and increased risk of heart disease in elderly women but not in elderly men.

The cholesterol craze is based on statistical significance, in plain words if 70% of drivers in auto accidents consume milk before the accident then milk caused the accident.  Cholesterol values alone have low predictability for actual development of coronary heart disease, on an individual basis.

 It is an accepted fact that diabetes causes significant increases of cholesterol.  Those with poor control of diabetes show signs of having depleted their store of antioxidants.  Elevated insulin with low blood sugars also causes elevated cholesterol.  The actual culprit in damaging arteries is rancid (oxidized) cholesterol and lipids in LDL, not fresh cholesterol in whole foods.  The focus should be on oxygen free radicals that damages molecules by stealing their electrons.     It is beyond reason why the medical industry tenaciously hangs on to this costly myth.

 FACTS:  High cholesterol (sterols) is not a reliable indicator for the risk of cardiovascular disease.  Clinical studies directed at lowering lipids, including cholesterol, have shown no consistent decrease in death rates in spite of success in lowering cholesterol.
Some clinical studies had more than 50% of the patients with coronary disease that had cholesterol levels below 200 mg/l. It is now generally accepted that 50% or more of heart attack victims have normal cholesterol levels. The hypothesis was that those with heart attacks had too high a level of cholesterol. (March 2000)
Some manufactures of cholesterol reducing drugs deny any relationship between Cholesterol levels and cardiovascular disease.  A study released in 2005 says cholesterol lowering drugs have incredibly small benefits.

FACT: This may be true for some of the non-disease type I diabetes among Caucasian Americans but is not likely a factor in type II.  Only 1/3 of type II has a relative with diabetes.  If both parents are diabetics the risk is only 1 in 20.  The study of identical twins does not support the genetic theory.  If projections are correct, by year 2004, 1 in 4 adults will have type II diabetes, hardly a genetic problem.  This inherited gene assumption is based on statistical significance and assumption rather than hard clinical facts.  The Pima Indians diabetes rate increased by 50% the highest known rate in the world.  The only known factor is an environment change.  The statistics leading to the inherited gene theory likely reflect family cultural eating habits.  This is clearly true in the Pima Indian study as well as the Australian study.  This is also true of the Eastern Canadian Indian studies.  It is noteworthy that immigrants from low level diabetes countries develop type II at a higher rate than indigenous peoples in America.  Asian peoples who immigrate to Hawaii have increased incidence of diabetes.  If they then move onto main land America, they have even higher rates of type II diabetes.  These studies suggest its cause is environmental not inherited.
The diabetes rate varies based on cultural background:  6% Caucasian Americans, 15% African Americans, 20% Hispanic Americans, 30% Aboriginal Americans with some peaking at 50-70%
On Chromosome 2, (NIDDM1 gene) recent research has reduced the search from 3 billion to 5-10 million genes is the search for a gene responsible for type II.  Only very rare types of type II are linked to defective genes.

ALCOHOL MYTH: One leading risk factor of cardiovascular disease is alcohol consumption.  Alcohol is always bad for you was the cry of the 1970's.  This assumption is also based on the calorie count theory.  Alcohol has a very high calorie count.
 

FACT: Study after study has destroyed this myth, especially the red wine studies but the calorie count theory still holds firm.  Alcohol increases the HDL-2 and HDL-3, the good guys, and decreases plasma fibrinogen, decrease's platelet stickiness and aggregation.  Wine revives brain cells, prevents the initiation of cancer, is toxic to existing cancer, it prevents blood clotting (anti-oxidant), changes blood lipid (fat) patterns, it acts like a phyto estrogen.  Responsible use of alcohol is necessary.  Three drinks per day is maximum, one per day is ideal based on 1991 study results.  The 1997-98 studies suggest 2 drinks per day is optimal.  If you don't consume some alcohol the 'statistical significance' is you will get a stroke and/or a heart attack.  Two drinks per day for men reduces heart disease by 50%.  It reduces the likelihood of Alzheimer's disease, osteoporosis, type II diabetes and hypertension.

TOBACCO MYTH : Tobacco causes lung cancer, heart and blood vessel disease, heart attack, and naturally diabetes.  We are constantly being told of the hundreds of thousands being killed each year.
 

FACT: This is one of those big myths that has a life of it own.  Anyone who researches early Canadian history is aware that the Couriers des Bois and Voyagers all smoked Indian tobacco quite heavily.  Distance is measured in the number of pipes they smoked rather than miles.  If you do genealogy research you will note that most of these early traders lived long lives.  England & Wales have the highest rate of lung cancer for men.  They also smoke the highest sugar content tobacco at 17%.  The French smoke 2/3's as many cigarettes per capita as Englishmen but only have 1/3 the cancer rate and their tobacco sugar rate is 2%.  Don't forget they also have the 2nd lowest heart disease rate in the world.  Americans smoke more cigarettes per capita than the British but the lung cancer rate is 1/2 and the sugar content is 10%.  In Russia, China, Formosa and other countries where cigarettes are made, they use the air dried process.  These countries are unable to find any correlation at all between smoking and lung cancer.  The Asian process for tobacco is similar to the process the Canadian Indians used.  Chinese cigarettes are low in sugar, low in nicotine & tar content.  The high content cigarettes are flue-cured vs. air-dried.  Americans use a blend of air-dried and flue-cured.  The tobacco industry artificially increases the tars and nicotine's.  The refining process also adds the sugar, nicotine and tar to give tobacco a bad rap.  This is not to say that the intentionally doctored tobacco is safe but we should focus on the evil practice and outlaw it rather than continue dealing with symptoms.

It is unlikely that the tobacco industry will return to the ancient air dry method of curing tobacco as its too expensive but new methods will be developed. There are about 60 cancer-causing agents in tobacco but nitrosamines are considered the most dangerous. These agents are formed by bacterial activity on the tobacco leaves as they dry and turn brown during the curing process. The major problem is the tobacco loses its hit effect and addictive effect when the agent is removed.

MEDICATION MYTH : The benefits of medication outweighs the potential threats.

FACT: Recent studies suggest we really don't know the potential risks.  As an example the simple application of sun screen blockers, is a no brainier, to prevent skin cancer and is endorsed by 100% of the medical community.  Recent studies however suggest this blockage of vitamin D can cause colon and breast cancers, other skin diseases, schizophrenia, multiple sclerosis and lung disease.

 

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