News regarding traditional wisdom and native diets regarding nutrition.
Are Government Nutrition Recommendations Killing Us?
Latest research suggests government nutritional advice is likely killing us. The study, published in The Lancet, is the first major study to look at all-cause mortality and cardiovascular disease and nutrition. Here are just two of the major takeaways: 1. High carb diets are killing many of us around the world. The study tracked over 135,000 people aged between 35 and 70 from 18 countries; those on a low fat/high carb diet had an increased risk of early death compared to those on a lower carb/higher fat diet. 2. Raw and cooked vegetables are not created equal. Broadly speaking, the study showed that consumption of raw vegetables was more protective against cardiovascular disease than cooked vegetables. As our colleagues at ANH-International point out, many phytochemicals, vitamins, and other nutrients are heat-sensitive and may be damaged by heat. These findings, particularly on fat versus carbs, echo our criticisms of the government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans that were released in 2016. Those guidelines encourage Americans to reduce consumption of saturated fat, based on the outdated notion that fat leads to heart disease. Don’t wait until 2020 when the US government next updates its Dietary Guidelines. History tells us the revised guidelines won’t change much. Pressure from Big Food, Big Ag, Big Biotech and their revolving doors with the USDA, NIH and FDA will likely still override the state-of-the-art of nutritional science. The bottom line is that government should not be in charge of doling out nutrition advice.
Study: High Fat Ketogenic Diet Enhances Gut Microbiota in Healing Epilepsy
Health Impact News has reported on many of the disease reversing results of the ketogenic (high fat-moderate protein-low carb) diet. Now, a new study is looking at the positive effects of gut bacteria among those following a ketogenic diet for epilepsy. Even though Johns Hopkins used a ketogenic diet for curing epilepsy over 80 years ago, when medical drugs did not help epilepsy effectively, mainstream medicine continues to rely on new and expensive toxic drugs for epileptic children. The “cocktail” combinations of pharmaceutical drugs prescribed often worsens childhood epilepsy. Health Impact News previously published a report on how a four year old child with refractory epilepsy (not treatable with pharmaceutical medications), was treated at the Rochester, Minnesota Mayo Clinic using a ketogenic diet. At first, the child was also kept on pharmaceuticals. The results were poor until he was taken off the medications; then he began healing completely. A new Chinese study on pediatric epileptic cases may even draw the attention of mainstream medical professionals, due to the results seen in children's gut microbiota structure when following a high-fat ketogenic diet.
Study: Those Following a High Fat Diet Live Longest
A ketogenic diet — which is very low in net carbohydrates and high in healthy fats — is key for boosting mitochondrial function. Healthy fats also play an important role in maintaining your body's electrical system. When your body is able to burn fat for fuel, your liver creates water-soluble fats called ketones that burn far more efficiently than carbs, thereby creating fewer reactive oxygen species (ROS) and secondary free radicals. Ketones also decrease inflammation, improve glucose metabolism and aid the building of muscle mass. The benefits of a cyclical ketogenic diet are detailed in my latest bestselling book, "Fat for Fuel." While the book was peer-reviewed by over a dozen health experts and scientists, a new large-scale international study (known as the international Prospective Urban Rural Epidemiology, or PURE, study) adds further weight to the premise that high intakes of healthy fats — especially saturated fats — boost health and longevity.
Is the Gluten Intolerance “Epidemic” as Bad as Claimed or a Clever Marketing Tool?
Currently grains, especially wheat, are blamed for most of our digestive ills, which are rampant within a variety of autoimmune diseases, Crohn's, IBS, and leaky gut syndromes that create other diseases. Now we have the gluten free rage, similar to the low or no fat crazes of the past. The commercial food industry “solutions” for the faulty lipid theory of obesity and heart disease, which is a "low-fat diet," has probably created more cases of obesity and heart disease than what had previously existed. So how will this current gluten free fad pan out? Gluten free labels have become such a food industry marketing tool that it’s put on foods and beverages that have nothing to do with wheat or grains. This marketing tool seems to be working for the food industry. But are the proclamations from recent books and the food industry marketing feeding into the anti-grain hysteria? A 2015 Italian study demonstrated that most of those who think they are gluten sensitive actually are not.
The Great Salt-Sodium Hoax: Eating More Salt Might Actually Save Your Life
Despite the growing evidence that low sodium causes more harm than high sodium, and using unprocessed salt has more benefits than commercial processed table salt, the mostly unsubstantiated belief that salt needs to be demonized persists. The revelations of good science are continually crushed by the pressures of public health policy. Dr. Kendrick explains that the low sodium diets seem to forget that salt is composed of two molecules, salt (Na) and chloride (Cl). The chemical formula for salt is NaCl, or sodium chloride, which is salt. He quotes a study that warned low serum chlorine was more dangerous than previously considered, concluding: "Low, not high Serum Cl- (<100 mEq/L), is associated with greater mortality risk independent of obvious confounders. Further studies are needed to elucidate the relation between Cl- and risk." Dr. James DiNicolantonio, Pharm. D., is the author of recently (2017) published book, The Salt Fix: Why the Experts Got It All Wrong--and How Eating More Might Save Your Life .
The Trade Secrets Behind Store-bought “Fresh Squeezed” or “Not From Concentrate” Orange Juice
You’ve seen them and maybe you’ve bought them, cartons and plastic bottles of orange juice labeled "freshly squeezed." But there are some relatively unknown trade secrets that will question the validity of these marketing claims for orange juice. "Freshly squeezed" does not mean they are not highly processed. Juices with short shelf lives are financially risky. Regardless of how “natural” the carton or bottle ingredients read, there are chemical additives to keep them from spoiling during storage, shipping, and time in store refrigerators. The process of supplying orange juice or other juices that are labeled “not from concentrate” involves sleight of hand maneuvers hidden from label exposure. Again, because of seasonal growth and juicing, these juices can’t last forever. So the juices that are freshly squeezed from oranges are stored in large tanks. Then the oxygen is sucked out of the tanks to prevent spoilage. This process is known as “de-aeration,” and it allows the juice to be stored for a year in large tanks. But this process removes a lot of the flavor that either Valencia or Hamlin Florida oranges offer at different seasons. So the orange juice producers contract fragrance producers to supply them with processed flavors to give the desired taste.
Study: Vegetable Oils Contribute to Fatty Liver Disease – Saturated Fats Do Not
Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is rapidly becoming an international epidemic. The mainstream medical mantra for its underlying cause is "fat consumption." However, "fat" is a very general term and does not distinguish between traditional healthy fats and unhealthy modern processed fats and oils. The common belief is that saturated fat is the culprit in fatty liver disease, but a new study published in the July 4, 2017 European Journal of Nutrition comes to a different conclusion. This peer reviewed study, "Chronic consumption of fructose in combination with trans fatty acids but not with saturated fatty acids induces nonalcoholic steatohepatitis with fibrosis in rats," examined more closely the effects of trans fatty acids (from vegetable oils derived from corn and soybeans) versus saturated fats, found in traditional fats such as butter, coconut oil, and palm oil. The study’s title gives away their conclusion: fructose is bad for the liver, but it is worse with trans fats than it is with saturated fats.
Meta-Analysis Study: Whole Fat Dairy Healthy, Saturated Fats Myth Exposed
A 2017 meta-analysis of 29 studies has concluded that consuming dietary dairy fat has no negative effects on all cause mortality or mortality from cardiovascular disease (CVD) and coronary heart disease (CHD). This includes dairy fats of all types. One of the researchers, Ian Givens of England’s Reading University, commented on the record: “There’s been a lot of publicity over the last 5 to 10 years about how saturated fats increase the risk of cardiovascular disease and a belief has grown up that they must increase the risk, but they don’t.” Actually, dairy and other animal sourced saturated fats have been wrongly condemned as a contributor to obesity and higher cardiovascular risk since Ancel Keys' notorious seven countries study over 50 years ago, which spawned the “lipid theory” of heart disease and obesity.
Are You Consuming Plastic with Your Sea Salt?
When plastic garbage makes its way to the sea, it eventually breaks down into tiny fragments that return to us in salty seasonings, Malaysian researchers report in Scientific Reports. In a survey of 16 sea salts from eight countries, researchers found microplastic particles lurking in all but one. In total, the researchers collected 72 particles from the salts and used micro-Raman spectroscopy to identify their components, which were mainly plastic polymers and pigments.
The Connection Between Insulin Resistance and the High-Carb, Low-Fat Diet
One of the absolute worst things conventional medicine does is treat type 2 diabetics with insulin. This only exacerbates the problem. The key to treating and reversing type 2 diabetes is to cut down on net carbs, replacing them with high amounts of healthy fats and moderate amounts of protein. Dr. Tim Noakes has researched reversal of type 2 diabetes in South Africans, coming to the same conclusion.
The Diet Police: Harassing Doctors Who Promote Low-Carb High-Fat Dieting
LCHF stands for a low carbohydrate and high fat diet. Not only does this diet protocol threaten the official nutritional dietary dogma of high carbohydrates and low fats (including NO saturated fats, as per USDA nutritional guidelines), promoting LCHF also threatens the sugar and processed food industries where it hurts, financially. So as with all things proven unscientific that support current industrial endeavors, promoting accurate current science to upset all endeavors associated with misinformation warrants attacks on the messengers while suppressing their scientific evidence. The science behind LCHF has been known at least since the 1920's when the ketogenic diet was developed at Johns Hopkins Hospital as a cure for childhood epilepsy, being used when drugs failed. Dr. Tim Noakes, MD, a South African scientist and emeritus professor at University of Cape Town’s Division of Exercise Science and Sports Medicine was attacked by nutrition officials almost three years ago in 2014. After three years of public court room hearings, with all its legal expenses and stressful distractions, he was recently acquitted.
Avocados as a Super Food: “It Would Be Hard to Eat Too Much”
Registered dietician Cynthia Sass, with master's degrees in both nutrition science and public health, calls avocados worthy of superfood status: They can effectively combat nearly every aspect of metabolic syndrome. The high-fat content in avocados is a good thing — it's not "bad" fat. In fact, it's good, necessary fat from oleic acid, which is the same monosaturated fatty acid contained in olive oil. Oleic acid is associated with decreased inflammation, which helps stave off such diseases as cancer.
The Big Fat Lie is Officially Exposed in the British Medical Journal
The saturated fat lie is officially exposed now that the British Journal of Sports Medicine, a division of the BMJ (British Medical Journal) emphatically declared: “Saturated fat does not clog the arteries: coronary heart disease is a chronic inflammatory condition, the risk of which can be effectively reduced from healthy lifestyle interventions.” The beginning of this very recent BMJ letter, 31 March 2017, reviewing several mega-studies, states early in their editorial: “Despite popular belief among doctors and the public, the conceptual model of dietary saturated fat clogging a pipe is just plain wrong.” Wrong, unequivocally and indisputably, not maybe or could be or further studies needed, but completely wrong. It’s over. And the root cause of arterial inflammation is cited with dietary recommendations that lean toward the Mediterranean Diet.
Healthy Traditions Adds Glyphosate-tested Italian Pizza Flour to Product Line
In 2014 when we tested our USDA certified organic grains, we found that almost all of them had traces of the herbicide glyphosate at levels similar to non-organic wheat. Some scientists and researchers believe that the epidemic of gluten-sensitive diseases we are seeing today are related to glyphosate, and not necessarily the gluten.(See: Common Weedkiller Used in Modern Agriculture Could be Main Factor in Gluten Intolerance.) While anyone with gluten sensitivities definitely needs to avoid gluten, for the rest of us, we need to be consuming healthy grains that are not contaminated. After much research, we found a source in Italy that grows traditional soft wheat where batches we tested showed no trace of herbicides. Healthy Traditions is excited to bring you this high quality Italian Type 00 Flour! This is the flour Italians use to make the absolute best pizza crust. It is also very versatile and can be used to make light and fluffy bread, cakes, fresh pasta and more! The light airy texture makes this flour a joy to work with and your creations will turn out fantastico!
Healthy Traditions Introduces New Estate-bottled Premium Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Do you trust the label on your Extra Virgin Olive Oil? Numerous scandals have been uncovered over the last twenty years which have revealed that many extra virgin olive oils being sold in the United States do not meet the high standard for this product. Many have been adulterated with lower grade olive oils or with nut and seed oils. Others simply have serious flavor and aroma defects, which should prevent them from being called “extra virgin.” Our superb estate-bottled cold pressed extra virgin olive oil is from SANTIAGO, CHILE. The Mediterranean climate of this region is perfect for growing olives. The valley where the olives are grown is nestled between a small Pacific costal mountain range and the larger Andes Mountains. This unique setting allows for warm days and cool nights to help produce the wonderful taste of this fruity oil. This estate practices sustainable agriculture principles and no chemical pesticides or fertilizers are used on the olives or the trees. As an added assurance the oil has been tested for the herbicide glyphosate. This estate-bottled organic extra virgin olive oil has a polyphenol count of 416 milligrams, which is very high for an extra virgin olive oil.
Healthy Traditions Announces GMO-tested Corn Chips fried in Coconut Oil
Healthy Traditions is proud to bring you our Authentic Mexican Corn Tortilla Chips; made with our GMO-tested White Corn from Mexico and fried in our Tropical Traditions Coconut Oil! This hardy chip will stand up to any guacamole, salsa, or nacho recipe you can bring. Our chip is very different from most other chips you will find in the market. These are made in small batches using authentic ingredients; the result is a chip that has a firm “bite” and won’t break at the site of that cold hummus from the fridge. We start by sourcing our corn from a farm in Central Mexico near what is thought to be the “birthplace” of corn. We went to this region because GMO corn is banned, therefore the risk of cross contamination from GMO corn is much lower. We also appreciate that the farmers grow corn from seed that has been passed down from generation to generation. By using heirloom corn we believe the real corn flavor comes through in our chip. The corn is grown using organic standards, but as an added assurance we have lab tested samples from the farm, with no trace of GMOs or glyphosate found in the batches we tested. Once we have the corn in the U.S. we send it to an expert tortilla maker in Austin, TX, where the corn is transformed into masa, through the traditional Aztec process of nixtamalization. During this process the corn is soaked and cooked in an alkaline solution of limewater (calcium hydroxide and water), which allows the husk to “slip” from the kernel. This process is beneficial in several ways.
New Healthy Traditions Website Launched Featuring GMO-tested and Glyphosate-tested Products
Visitors to TropicalTraditions.com and other websites owned by Tropical Traditions, including Grass-fed Traditions and Household Traditions, will now notice that they are doing their shopping on HealthyTraditions.com. In 2002 Tropical Traditions was formed to distribute Virgin Coconut Oil made by hand by small-scale producers in the Philippines. Tropical Traditions was the first one to introduce "Virgin Coconut Oil" from the Philippines to the U.S. market. Demonized for years as "unhealthy" due to the high content of saturated fat in coconut oil, there were very few places where one could purchase coconut oil in 2002, and the few sources available were generally highly refined coconut oils. Tropical Traditions changed the market and the public's perception regarding coconut oil and saturated fats, and today coconut oil is widely available in stores everywhere and only considered unhealthy by those misinformed by the propaganda against saturated fats. Today, the business is so much more than just a coconut oil company, and as the company continues to grow and develop unique healthy products that are hard to find elsewhere in the market, they are now bringing all of their product lines under the banner of "Healthy Traditions" to more accurately describe the mission of the company.
Antibiotic Drugs in America’s Meat Supply: Scorecard Rates Worst Offenders in Restaurant Industry
A stunning 70 percent of all antibiotics important in human medicine in the U.S. are sold for use in animal agriculture. These lifesaving drugs are fed routinely to animals that are not sick in order to promote growth and prevent diseases that spread easily in crowded, filthy factory farm conditions. Public health agencies have declared antibiotic resistance a top health threat in the U.S. -- and the rampant misuse of antibiotics in livestock production is a major cause. Chain Reaction II is the second annual report and scorecard that grades America’s top restaurant chains’ on their policies and practices regarding antibiotics use and transparency in their meat and poultry supply chains. The good news is that consumer and investor pressure has pushed twice as many companies as last year to create more responsible antibiotics policies, particularly for chicken. The bad news is that Olive Garden, KFC and 14 other chains received F grades and little progress has been made on pork and beef. Only two restaurant chains received an A grade: Chipotle and Panera. Read the 2016 scorecard to see how restaurants fared.
Health Benefits of Blackstrap Molasses for Missing Minerals
It has been established for some time that our agricultural topsoil is depleted and lacking the full complement of minerals that should be there. Large industrial monoculture farming practices that include no fallow time or alternating crops with the extensive use of herbicides and pesticides are rightly blamed for this lack of minerals. This mineral deficiency is no light matter. It affects the crop foods we eat. Without minerals, vitamins are dysfunctional, and metabolizing them is hampered. Almost everyone is magnesium deficient, for example, and magnesium is involved with over 300 cellular metabolic functions. Some say more. Even organic farmers often have to overcome topsoil deficits initially. Some organically oriented farmers do over time, but it’s safe to assume that other large scale farms don’t or don’t bother much. After all, USDA organic certification depends on how crops are grown, not necessarily on the quality of its soil. Trace minerals are also vital for our health, yet they are mostly ignored and considered insignificant by many medical practitioners and mainstream nutritionists. Relying on supplements for enhancing one’s bodily mineral content has its drawbacks. One doesn’t know the purity of supplemental contents and their other ingredients. How well they’re digested and assimilated is also an issue. Blackstrap molasses is an excellent source of many minerals.
Medical Doctors Punished & Silenced for Giving “Unapproved” High Fat Dietary Advice
Dr. Gary Fettke, MD, of Australia and Professor Tim Noakes, MD, of South Africa are both being attacked for saving lives by promoting the low carbohydrate high fat diet. In the case of orthopedic surgeon Dr. Fettke, his offence against the Australian medical establishment was to teach his patients how to use the low carb high fat (LCHF) diet to reverse their type 2 diabetes and avoid the amputation of their feet and legs. He and his wife Belinda Fettke established two clinics to help people adopt a low carb high fat eating lifestyle. The sanctions placed on him prevent him from recommending or speaking about the LCHF diet to anyone, anywhere, and at any time for the rest of his life. In the case of Professor Emeritus Dr. Noakes, his offence against the South African medical establishment was to show that a low carb high fat diet could reverse numerous diseases. His LCHF book The Real Meal Revolution, is the all-time top selling non-fiction book in South Africa with more than 200,000 copies sold in the last two years. Affiliated with the University of Cape Town, Professor Emeritus Dr. Noakes has distinguished himself as one of the world’s most famous sports scientists. His work has evoked considerable backlash from those who seek to enforce compliance with high carb low fat dietary dogma. Dr. Noakes is refusing to yield to persecution by the trivial charge that was brought against him, and is using his trial to bring the science of the LCHF diet into public view in South Africa and around the world. Together, Drs. Noakes and Fettke used decades of scientific research to show the link between the government recommended high carb low fat diet and arterial disease, diabetes, obesity, heart disease, cancer, and dementia.