The comic strip Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller, from November 10 to 22, had Bob struggling with weight gain:
Trying to eat better:
Ending up in the hospital:
Considering his options:
And opting against the $200,000 surgery, bypass brain, rehab, and lifelong medications.
Just a comic?
Thanks to RB!
This doesn’t look good for meat eaters. The chemical N-Glycolylneuraminic acid (Neu5Gc) is found in most mammal tissue except for our own. We lost the ability to manufacture it “two to three millions of years ago, which occurred just before the emergence of the genus Homo.” Because we don’t make it, our body sees it as foreign if we eat it. That triggers an immune reaction. Chronic exposure to Neu5Gc leads to chronic inflammation which is known to promote cancer … and did in this new study.
Study: A Red Meat-Derived Glycan Promotes Inflammation And Cancer Progression, PNAS, 25 December 2014
Press Release: Sugar Molecule Links Red Meat Consumption and Elevated Cancer Risk in Mice, UC San Diego Health System, 29 December 2014
We present an unusual mechanism for the well-known association between red meat consumption and carcinoma risk involving the nonhuman sialic acid N-glycolylneuraminic acid (Neu5Gc). We first evaluate the Neu5Gc content of various foods to show that red meats are particularly rich in orally bioavailable Neu5Gc and then investigate human-like Neu5Gc-deficient mice fed this form of Neu5Gc. When such mice were challenged with anti-Neu5Gc antibodies, they developed evidence of systemic inflammation. Long-term exposure to this combination resulted in a significantly higher incidence of carcinomas (five-fold increase) and an association with Neu5Gc accumulation in the tumors. Similar mechanisms may contribute to the association of red meat consumption with other diseases, such as atherosclerosis and type 2 diabetes, which are also exacerbated by inflammation.
Notable:
The study did not involve exposure to carcinogens or artificially inducing cancers, further implicating Neu5Gc as a key link between red meat consumption and cancer.
The Telegraph covered it and said this:
A study published by Harvard University in June suggested that a diet high in red meat raised the risk of breast cancer for women by 22%.
…
In 2005 a study found those who regularly ate 5.6oz (160g) of red meat a day had one third higher risk of bowel cancer.
– Red Meat Triggers Toxic Immune Reaction Which Causes Cancer, Scientists Find, The Telegraph, 1 January 2015
I think a five-fold increase in tumors, when the mice weren’t even exposed to a carcinogen, is considerable. (Besides red meat, Neu5Gc is also found in dairy products and seafood.)
When I think about what one thing would benefit the most people, I keep coming back to income inequality. And I keep recalling this speech by Obama from a year ago. I really like it. There’s so much here. It’s the one where he said:
I believe [inequality] is the defining challenge of our time.
– Remarks by the President on Economic Mobility, The White House, 4 December 2013
A dangerous and growing inequality and lack of upward mobility [has] jeopardized middle-class America’s basic bargain — that if you work hard, you have a chance to get ahead.
He also said, notably, that the income and opportunity gap, “is now as much about class as it is about race.” That’s it’s now affecting large swaths of people. I see this. People can’t afford to buy a home, to send their children to college, to become educated themselves. (“Education is the most important predictor of income.”) Students are saddled with untenable loan debt. Can you believe there was a time when higher education was free to students? In the 1960s it was.
The median income in this country hovers around $50,000. That means half of Americans make that or below. How do they afford the $5,000 or $10,000 deductible and co-pay on their health insurance policy? (Dr. King once said, “Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.”) So, they pay the premium but never go to the doctor.
Health insurance in this country is a racket. The more sick people, the better for business. And when people can’t afford to eat a good diet, make time for exercise and rest … their ranks swell. By the time they reach retirement age, they have poor health, little savings (“About half of all households don’t have any retirement savings.”) and grim prospects. Given the growing lack of empathy in this country, seniors, as I’ve noticed, are becoming invisible, especially poor seniors. Obama recalled the Pope’s remark in his speech:
The Pope himself spoke about this at eloquent length. “How can it be,” [Pope Francis] wrote, “that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?”
Speaking of the Pope, he reiterated Obama’s call at the beginning of this post, in his Tweet:
Inequality is the root of social evil.
— Pope Francis (@Pontifex) April 28, 2014
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When we exchange wishes for a happy and prosperous new year, are these the things we think about?
When I say that sugar doesn’t cause diabetes, I’m not making it up. Below is a short clip of Joslin’s Dr. Kahn saying, “eating a lot of sugar definitely does not cause diabetes.” Dr. Kahn is a world-recognized expert in diabetes and obesity research. He’s authored more than 800 studies, reviews, and chapters. You can read more about him here and see some of his studies here.
Narrator: Could eating too much sugar cause diabetes?
Kahn: Eating a lot of sugar definitely does not cause diabetes, if you don’t eat so much sugar that you gain weight.
And in fact, sugar to a certain extent, is okay because it stimulates the pancreas to make more insulin which actually helps control the blood sugar. And so, actually you need a certain amount of carbohydrate in your diet to have your pancreas working normally.
What I always tell people is that, especially if you’re at risk for diabetes, I have people tell me all the time, that I’ve got a family history of diabetes. I watch how much sugar I eat. And I say that that’s not the right focus. The focus for you should be to make sure you keep your weight down, because people who have a family history of diabetes, if they stay thin, have no more risk of diabetes than the general population.
But if they become overweight, then their risk is 10 times higher than in the general population. So you can make a difference ten fold in your risk of diabetes if you’ve got a family history. If you stay thin, it’s good, if you gain weight it’s bad.
Having worked in diabetes for 18 years, I’d say this is one of the biggest myths surrounding the disease. People think blood sugar directly equates to sugar that they eat. Sugar in, sugar out. It just doesn’t work that way. In fact, the fat people eat is probably a better indicator of whether they’ll develop diabetes or not.
Related: No Strong Evidence That Sugar Or Fructose Causes Obesity
Fanatic Cook 