....What is finally the right food to enjoy a long healthy life, i.e. to protect you from atherosclerosis, heart attack, stroke, thrombosis, infarction, heart failure and others?
The increasing rate of cardiovascular diseases of the past few decades has given a strong incentive to research in biomedicine, biochemistry, epidemiology to try to find the culprit of such a devastating raise of coronary heart diseases, strokes, heart attacks… However what is the ‘right food’ to avoid such medical conditions has been and is still a maze of different and often opposing recommendations.
Association of saturated fats to increase of serum cholesterol and this one, in turn, to cardiovascular disease has been the accepted picture, that led to dietary recommendations supporting “safe” consumption of unsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) and carbohydrates, at the expenses of cholesterol-rich food and saturated fats which would be avoided like the pest!
However, now we can state that saturated fat can actually improve – and not damage - our health: saturated fats are now saved from the trash because needed by the brain and to protect us from dementia, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases. Likewise we now know better about PUFAs: of the once acclaimed health-protecting unsaturated fatty acids, the omega 6 are now feared because known to promote inflammation (including the one responsible for atherosclerosis and heart diseases) and increase many illnesses, while the omega 3 appear to be the winners, countering negative effects of other fats.
Now most (although not all) of the molecular mechanisms are better understood and the adverse effects of refined carbohydrates and PUFAs clarified. We now understand why, after saturated fats were declared demons to be avoided, in the 60s and 70s, and were replaced with PUFAs and carbohydrates in diets, we now observe an increased level of global obesity and other health complications like inflammatory diseases, and at the same time a lack of the expected decrease of cardiovascular diseases.
These confusing recommendations drove and drive many attentive eaters mad while trying to convince them every other decade that what they eat is wrong and that the new fad diet of the moment is the ‘real’ health-promoting and long-life assuring diet.
In this whole history of dietary inconsistencies and wars between good fats, bad fats, high carbohydrates versus high protein diets, the present focus on cholesterol control is another giant system of contradictory statements and misunderstood explanations.
I’ve been bathing for the past few years in studies of anatomy, physiology, physiopathology and researches or reviews of researches designed to explain the importance (necessity?) of lowering cholesterol (Cho) levels in the blood for preventing cardiovascular diseases (CVD). I’ve found many things being illogic, unexplained and harmful. I’ve seen a lot of discrepancies, contradictory research and inconclusive analysis on the matter Cho-heart.
At the same time I’ve watched people being prescribed drugs without a real knowledge of the cause of their condition, if there even is one. I’ve been following healthy people being prescribed cholesterol-lowering drugs almost automatically with appearance of menopause or at later age, often without need.
Thus I’ve been feeling more and more compelled to share with people what I learned by the reading of research and reviews on the connection between Cho and CVDs and on the real need and effects (expected and collateral) of the use of cholesterol-lowering drugs, as well as on the real need to avoid saturated fats.
I will try to trace what is known by biochemistry at the present day and what seems to be the logical application of such understanding to our feeding behavior, in order to help avoid the most serious and common – old and new - diseases of the 21st century society and the need to use expensive and heavily-impacting drugs.
I am a strong believer of the need of educating ourselves to understand what health is and to accept our individual responsibility to our own health, to avoid to unconsciously fall into acceptance of drugs prescriptions without understanding what they are for and how they function and what secondary effects they might cause. I hope that this story on fats will help in this process of understanding of the human body.
This reading will be presented in chapters, delivered to your e-mailbox when ordered through the web site in What we do/Lectures.
Thank you.
What about prevention? Preventive screening like mammography has recently received quite some attention. It is possible that such screening saves a life of one woman over 1,000 or 10,000, but at the same time a number of women get surgery when they did not need it. When a cancer at a very starting stage is found, in 30 % of cases it does not develop or it regresses.
The British Medical Journal published a study on about 90,000 women between 49 and 59 years of age showing that mammography does not have ANY impact on the risk of death by breast cancer. Women who had yearly mammography for 5 years did not have less risk of death than those who had simply a physical test. As a consequence of this study, the Swiss Medical Board declared that mammography was to be abandoned and recommended that women needed to be informed of the undesired effects of such test.
The first danger of a mammography is that by compressing the breast it can cause explosion of non dangerous micro-tumors and dissemination of deadly cancer cells in the body. Further, the breast is exposed to strong radiations. Dr Samuel Epstein, professor at the University of Illinois, expert of breast cancer, is against systemic mammography and states that during menopause the breast is very sensitive to radiations and each exposure to minimal radiation would increase the risk of breast cancer of 1%, i.e. 10 % in a year. Cancer diagnostic was been wrong up to 6% of cases, meaning that 20 - 49 % women doing regular mammography tests would have a false positive after 10 tests.
Knowing or believing to have cancer can be an emotional shock that can lead to a real disease such eczema and cardiac attack. Women with a false or real positive test have to go through mostly un-necessary anxieties, biopsies, surgeries. Due to such high risks of mistake, side effects and to the zero improvement in lowering the risk of death, since 2009 in the US the Preventive Services Task Force has been asking women under 50 years of age to NOT do a routine mammography; the same agency used to ask women to have one every two years once they were 40!
An alternative test is thermography, which measures the infrared emissions to obtain body images without irradiation. An alternative you can ask your general doctor or gynecologist about.
Nutrition recommendations to prevent and treat cancer:
Eat lots of veggies (especially broccoli and all the cruciferous vegetables including water cress) and fruits (especially lemons) every day (400 g day). Lemons contain monoterpenes that have been shown in 1998 to have chemoprotective and chemotherapeutic effects in breast tumors. Monoterpenes inhibit cell growths, cell cycle progression and a gene expression in breast cancer cell lines); green tea.
Turmeric has strong anti carcinogenic effects, as stated in different research works such the Cancer Prevention Research in 2008, where it was demonstrated that curcumine inhibits breast cancer cell mobility and propagation. In the medical journals Molecular Pharmacology and in the Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry in 2009 – 2011 it was observed that curcumine inhibits growth of pancreas cancer cells, increases sensitivity to chemotherapy, favors lung cancer cells death, aims to cancer cells strains and can be the solution to stop a brain cancer called glyoblastome.
Supplements (already posted in a previous post, but it never hurts to repeat): using magnesium regularly prevents cancer growth. Magnesium chloride allows the body to better face carcinogenic aggressions (Delbet).
Vitamin D acts against cancer by increasing the self destruction ability of mutating cells, by helping with cellular differentiation (lost in cancer cells) and by reducing angiogenesis (forming of new blood vessels around the cancer). Vitamin D, on the side, lowers the risk of autoimmunity diseases, seasonal depression, chronic fatigue and neurodegenerative diseases.
Fish oils (omega 3 are anti-carcinogenic).
And further, supplements helping in bearing the side effects of treatments (from Dr. Hertoghe):
- coenzyme Q10 (as ubiquinol) 100- 400 mg/day
- Selenium 200 μg / day
- Vitamin A (retionol acetate) liposoluble 50 000- 200 000 UI /day or 25 - 100 mg/day
- Vitamin C : 1 - 2 g /day
Do a lot of exercise. Exercise would lower the risk of breast cancer to 30% compared to inactive women, as stated in the journals British Journal of Cancer and Onkologie and Cancer Causes Control.
Sport activates the autophagic mechanisms to destroy the daily cellular waste.
Health is not a simple state, so “To be well one has to be well in thousands of ways at once” (Sir Russell Brian).
This because the body-mind is an extremely complex system functioning in a continuous state of change, aiming to a dynamic physiological equilibrium or homeostasis. All parts of the individual are interconnected through the circulatory, nervous, endocrine and immune systems. Modern medicine as well accepts this vision and approaches it through the application of recent disciplines like neuroendocrinology, psychoendocrinology and psychoneuroimmunology.
The dynamic equilibrium of health depends on the integration of structural (physical), biochemical and emotional functions. Physical instability as muscle contractions, joint misalignments, postural disturbances interfere with health by limiting proper nerve conduction and blood and lymph circulation, consequently impairing the nutrition to the different organs. Biochemical integrity is insured by proper nutrition, which is essential for the right flow of biochemical reactions at the base of the body-mind functioning. Emotional balance is in control of human health by influence on mental, endocrine and immunological functions.
Treatment is aimed at the cause of disequilibrium and the patient is treated and not the disease. The patient is viewed as a whole person with specific and interdependent physical, mental, emotional and social aspects. When the physiological equilibrium is disturbed by external or internal forces, disease results. Natural medicine strengthens the body’s defenses and supports the physiological functions against such disturbances through the use of dietary adjustments, medicinal herbs, physical exercises, breathing, life-style changes, meditative practices, hydrotherapy, physical manipulation, counselling, social and cultural changes….
Natural medicine is a philosophical orientation towards health which employs different healing methods to aid a person’s own internal regulatory processes or homeostasis. It is aimed at the promotion of health and the prevention of disease and at the support to the body-mind in the natural healing efforts.
The rate of breast cancer is augmenting in the present times: an increase of 138% of number of breast cancers in 25 years between 1980 and 2005 has been observed only in France. Breast cancer is responsible for cancer death in women, of which about 30% are younger than 50 years of age. Cancer affects younger women more and more often, i.e. 50 % of cases affect women before 40 years of age. All cancers on their own are the second cause of death after cardiovascular diseases.
According to Prof. Henri Joyeux, an internationally recognized oncologist and digestive surgeon at Montpellier University , Cancer Institute and Hospitals, whenever a woman affected by breast cancer is operated, nobody tells her that the definite cure can be established only after 27 years beyond her first treatment. In the meanwhile it is possible to get new tumors. However, this recurrence and the onset of cancer itself are avoidable if one addresses the primary causes of such cancer.
Causes of breast tumor are several, identifiable and different for each woman:
- genetic risk: 5 to 8% of women with breast cancer present the genetic risk [with such low values I wonder if it’s worth going through preventive surgery if one has the risk genes!],
- risk caused by tobacco and drugs. (For women, due to their lower lung capacity being 30 to 50 % lower than men, the effect of smoking is catastrophic. Tobacco and marijuana are also immuno-depressant, thus they further weaken the system in face of other risks),
- risk caused by chronic stress
- risk caused by bad nutrition
- risk caused by artificial hormones
- and other risks: lack of physical exercise , atmospheric pollution, pesticides, insecticides,
In regards to bad nutrition, I would just state here two major obvious facts, supported by Professor Henri Joyeux, active educator on the dominant importance of nutrition in the prevention and treatment of cancer and the first to alert French women on the danger of the pill with a book published in 2001.
Here are the two facts:
1.being overweight and obesity are conditions in which the fat (from excess sugars, milk products and excessive animal fats) is stored in the mammary glands, and this fat is a carcinogen.
2. According to Prof Joyeux, use of milk and milk products is strictly linked to the explosion of the number of breast and prostate cancers of the last decades. More specific information on food for cancer will be given at the end of this post. However, consider this: researchers estimate that 40 % of breast cancers could be avoided in US by simple life style modifications!
As for the risk due to artificial hormones, .i.e. those NOT produced naturally by our own body… Hormones are steroids and these are growth factors. Growth factors induce cellular division in all cells. Cancer is uncontrolled cellular division. Hormonal treatment, such as the contraceptive pill and hormonal replacement therapies, increases the risk of breast cancer. For menopaused women under HRT this risk is calculated to be up to 30%.
The use of the contraceptive pill has been proven to be linked to the appearance of breast, ovarian and uterine cancer (showing earlier and earlier in life) as well as to vascular problems, phlebitis, cerebral thrombosis, heart infarction. Other ‘side effects’ of the use of synthetic hormones are libido changes, immune depression, allergic reactions, candidiasis, anxiety, insomnia, skin problems, acne, hirsutism, loss of hair, breast tenderness and headaches, hypercholesterolemia, hypertension, water retention, liver tumor, ovarian cysts.
The awareness of the link between hormones and cancer has a long history (at least in the research arena). In 1932 Dr Antoine Lacassagne at the Institute Curie of Paris caused breast cancer in mouse with oestrogens. In 1971 diethylstilbestrol (DES), an oestrogenic anti-progesterone prescribed in the 60s and 70s to prevent natural abortions, was found to be responsible for giving genital cancer to the baby girls of the mothers who took it at the beginning of their pregnancy. It is now abolished for the undesired « side effects ». In 1987 the scientific journal Cancer showed that oral contraceptives increase the cellular mitosis of normal and carcinogenic breast cells in vitro. In 1998 the International Centre of Cancer Research, depending on the World Health Organization, classified oral contraceptives and replacement therapy hormones as « carcinogenic of class I - i.e. of whose the action on humans is certain ».
More recent research: last year, in a study including more than 50,000 women, the epidemiologist Lynn Rosenberg (Boston University) found that the risk of developing a particularly aggressive form of breast cancer increased to 65% in women who took the pill. In 2002 during the Women Health Study on hormonal replacement therapy the tests had to be stopped when the researchers realized that the women who were taking synthetic hormones developed a much higher risk to get breast cancer, heart attack, stroke, embolism.
Respectful organizations and scientific journals at international level such as the WHO, the American Cancer Society, the US National Cancer Institute, the International Centre of Research of Cancer , The Lancet Oncology connect the use of the pill and hormone replacement therapy to breast and cervical cancer and benign liver tumors, among other undesired effects such as thromboembolism, coronary events, stroke.
All these risks need to be further weighed by considering that, as stated in the New England Journal of Medicine, the rate of success of oral contraceptive pill protection wobbles between 80 and 95% (i.e. like a condom).
This image presents an example of how one can smooth muscular tensions and physical and mental stesses with the help of a soft material and of Gravity.
Aerial yoga helps the body with compressions and decompressions on all body parts, from legs to arms to the trunk, ameliorating in this way the lymphatic and blood circulation. Furthermore it brings to the relaxation of tensed body parts thanks to the work of gravity on the suspended body. Aerial yoga is very effective on backaches and scaitica issues since it allows the back to freely adn gently stretch under the effct of gravity. Aerail yoga helps also increase flexibilty and strength: it strengthens the core of the body, working on abs and dorsal muscles, strenghtens the arms that lift the body with the help of the 'silk', as well as the legs which are in constant contration to control the balance.
I would never have thought that my coconut cookies had such beneficial effects for so many ailments and were preventative for disastrous diseases! I recently dove into research on the properties of coconut oil and discovered some very interesting results.
Coconut oil ameliorates the cholesterol1 profile: it reduces total cholesterol1, triglycerides, phospholipids, LDL, and VLDL and increases HDL cholesterol.
Coconut oil is strongly antioxidant2 due to the presence of lauric acid and phenolic compounds, as was measured in the liver, heart and kidneys. It has antimicrobial effects, antibacterial, antiviral and anti-mycotic (treats infections from Candida): some of the viruses that have been destroyed by a derivative of lauric acid contained in coconut oil include HIV, measles, herpes simplex virus-1, vesicular stomatitis virus, influenza and cytomegalovirus. For its antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory effects it is used in treating acne.
There is also evidence that the coconut oil prevents osteoporosis, stimulates the thyroid functions, is thermogenic, helps reduce body weight and abdominal fat, is hepatoprotective, protects the heart by protecting heart mitochondria (producers of energy on all cells), alleviates arthritis, and has shown to improve Alzheimer’s disease condition and cognitive functions and to attenuate progression of weakness and spinal cord motor neuron loss in ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis).
Most of the properties of coconut oil derive from it being a saturated fat3 (yes a SATURATED fat, you read well!). Moreover, it contains medium chain fatty acids (and not long chain as in most vegetable oils). Beside their beneficial chemical properties, MCfas are burned for energy and do not accumulate as body fat!
So…my cookies. I am never a good deliverer of recipes because I never measure ingredients but mix them by eye and feel. So let’s say I will approximate a recipe which changes at every time, but which always gives good results!
Hearty Coconut Cookies
3/4 cup of wholewheat flour (you can replace with spelt or any other liked flour)
1/2 cup of buckwheat flour
1/2 cup of coconut flour
3 spoonfuls of coconut oil
2 eggs
1/3 cup of raw sugar
¼ cup of raisins
1/4 cup of dark (80%) chocolate chips
1 teaspoonful of cardamom
2 teaspoonfuls of cinnamon
(if the dough is too brittle, you can add 1/2 cup of oatmeal milk or soya milk)
Work the dough with your hands until smooth, flatten with roller, cut cookies at a 3 mm height, place in over at 180 degree Celsius and cook for 15-20 minutes. Taste after cooling!
1 Soon to appear on this blog, a summary of latest research on cholesterol and why, according to many doctors and researchers, it is not always a good idea to lower it.
2 In a future post I will be talking about oxidation and the deeds caused by such a devastating chemical event
3 In an imminent post I will discuss about saturated fats, the not so bad (the best?) fats to better include in the healthy diet.
News have been flowing through the papers, tv and the web that fats are not our worst enemies. Nutritional research has been claiming this for the past 20+ years. But as usual, the information to the normal public through media (mainstream and alternative) arrives - even if with interpretational errors - with a little delay compared to science.
CHOLESTEROL is not all bad, and not even the splitting between LDL (bad?) and HDL (good!) tells the whole metabolic tale of cardiovascular disesases risks. So, should we lower it or not? Check this research done in Australia project that disclosed that at higher serum LDL and TOTAL cholesterol corresponded better memory in women bewteen 52 and 63 years old.
There is also information that in people over 60, the rates of death and dementia go UP if cholesterol is lowered beyond 250. (btw. why did it used to be 350?). Simple to understand, the brain NEEDS fats and it is high in cholesterol, which acts as precursor of neurotransmitters. Take away those fats and the brain does not function that well.
But here come the so ever popular statins, which DO reduce cholesterol, but also cause neuropathies and myopathies, by lowering the level of CoQ10, highly demanded by the heart (!). Statins lower CoQ10 by up to 40%. So, we lower the fats that are needed for good functioning of the brain and the same time lower a substance that is essential for optimum health and longevity of all cells, and especially those of the heart (Wait a minute, don't we take statins to prevent CARDIO vascular problems??).
Anyway, coming back to the fats and how their reputaion has incredibly improved so that they are considered our passport to a good health.... Let's consider the fact that in the past 40 years we have been told to stop eating butter and move to margarine, to stop eating lard and cook with vegetable oils, and yet, the rates of obesity, diabetes, metabolic syndrome, Alzheimer's disease, dementia, cardiac disease, hypertension and cancer have been skyrocketing. Now the culprit is understood to be grains, or charbohydrates or complex sugars, which have been replacing the free slot left by low fat diets.
So, the 'new' diet recommendation tells us to move to high proteins, low or no carbs, and high fat (including SATURATED animal fats!) diets: the Paleolothic diet. This regime, with its compelling logic, is taking the place of the low fat diets of the 80s and 90s.
PALEOLITHIC: in the past 10,000 years, our DNA hasn't YET had the time to adapt to the grain and milk farming of the pastoral civilizations, therefore we should still be eating grass-fed meat, nuts, roots and berries. Right. Without going to extremes and excesses and depriving ourselves of self indulging and short-term rewarding carbs-rich foods, we should keep in mind that QUALITY is more important than QUANTITY. We do not have to sacrifice our cooking pleasures to measure and weight grams of proteins and avoid all grains as the devil. However, we should be aware of choosing the good foods. The GOOD FATS, to undo the mistakes of the low-fats preaching, should be NATURAL, not man-made, not saturated and industrially-manipulated- such transformations are mostly introduced by the food companies for getting longer-lasting packages that can sit on shelves for months and NOT to provide the healthiest foods.
Still in terms of quality, the rate between OMEGA 3 (craved by the brain) to omega 6 fatty acids has been decreasing in western diets from 4:1 during the processed food revolution, to 8:1 in WWII times, to 20:1 as today, while this same ratio should be 1:1!!! Now, the problem with omega 6, is that they are favoring inflammatory states, which are implicated in issues like atherosclerosis, asthma, arthritis, thrombosis, cancer, autoimmune diseases and dementia! Where do we get such omega 6? Seeds oils! Soybean, sunflower, cottonseeds, peanut, grapeseed, corn oils etc. The under-represented omega 3 are found in linseeds (flax), canola, cold water fish and nuts such as walnuts and few others.
So, coming down to few simple recommendations: avoid processed food (which always contain processed omega 6 rich oils), cook with coconut butter (or, if you are not lactose intolerant, a little butter, organic and from grass-fed cows) and use extravirgin olive oil for crude condiment. Eat tons of antioxidants in the shape of vegetables. Eat few grains and focus on others than wheat (which has been loosing its protein content with farming processes and gives gluten intolerance or low tolerance to many) such as buckwheat (not a grain), whole oats and barley, quinoa, amaranth.
This article is not to be taken as a suggestion to stop using statins. Please keep to your doctor's recommendations, while you are always free to ask clarifications.
