The Raelian Movement
for those who are not afraid of the future : http://www.rael.org
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Everything you thought you knew about food is WRONG
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1325453/Everything-thought-knew-food-WRONG.html
Fibre's bad for you. Fat's healthy. And five-a-day is a gimmick to
make fruit and veg firms rich. Or so claims a remarkable new book...
By Alice Hart-davis
Last updated at 3:45 PM on 2nd November 2010
We think we know what to eat: less red meat and more fibre, less
saturated fat and more fruit and veg, right? Wrong, according to a
controversial new book by obesity researcher and nutritionist Zoe
Harcombe.
In The Obesity Epidemic: What Caused It? How Can We Stop It? Harcombe
charts her meticulous journey of research into studies that underpin
dietary advice — and her myth-busting conclusions are startling.
Myth: The rapid rise in obesity is due to modern lifestyles
According to Zoe Harcombe, the obesity epidemic has less to do with
our lifestyles than with what we are eating.
Young woman eating a burger
Ditch conventional diet advice: Zoe Harcombe says vitamins and
minerals in meat are better than those in fruit
'The key thing that people don't realise is that throughout history,
right until the Seventies, obesity levels never went above 2 per cent
of the population in the UK,' she says. 'Yet by the turn of the
millennium, obesity levels were 25 per cent.
'What happened? In 1983, the government changed its diet advice. After
that, if you look at the graphs, you can see obesity rates taking off
like an aeroplane. You might feel it is coincidence, but to me it is
blindingly obvious.
'The older dietary advice was simple; foods based on flour and grains
were fattening, and sweet foods were most fattening of all.
'Mum and Granny told us to eat liver, eggs, sardines and to put butter
on our vegetables. The new advice was "base your meals on starchy
foods" — the things that we used to know made us fat (rice, pasta,
potatoes and bread). That's a U-turn.'
Myth: Starchy carbohydrates should be the main building blocks of our diet
We've been told that carbohydrates such as rice, pasta, bread and
potatoes should form the bulk of what we eat. The trouble with this,
says Zoe Harcombe, is that as carbs are digested, they are broken down
into glucose.
This process makes your body produce insulin, in order to deal with
the extra glucose. One of insulin's main roles in the body is fat
storage, so whenever you eat carbs, you are switching on your body's
fat-storing mechanism. Whatever carbs you don't use up as energy will
be quickly stored away in the body as fat.
We should get back to doing as nature intended and eat real,
unprocessed food, starting with meat, fish, eggs, vegetables and
salads.
Myth: Losing weight is about calories in versus calories out
'If only it were that simple,' says Harcombe. 'People think that if
they cut out 500 calories a day, they will lose 1lb a week.
'They might at first, but then the body will recognise that it is in a
state of starvation and turn down its systems to conserve energy.
'So you may be putting fewer calories in, but at the same time you
will be using up fewer calories to get through the day.
'Losing weight is more a question of fat storage and fat utilisation.
You need the body to move into a fat-burning mode and, to do that, you
need to cut down your consumption not of calories, but of
carbohydrates.'
Myth: More exercise is a cure for the obesity epidemic
Don't over do it: Too much exercise could make you hungry so you eat more
This is standard wisdom; exercise, we think, will burn calories, lose
fat and speed up our metabolism. Think again, says Harcombe.
'If you push yourself into doing extra exercise, it will be
counterproductive because you will get hungry — your body will be
craving carbohydrate to replenish its lost stores.
'If you are trying to control weight, it is so much easier to control
what you put into your mouth. Not how much, but what. Then it doesn't
matter what you do or don't do by way of exercise.'
Myth: Fat is bad for us
'Real fat is not bad for us,' says Harcombe. 'It's man-made fats we
should be demonising. Why do we have this idea that meat is full of
saturated fat? In a 100g pork chop, there is 2.3g of unsaturated fat
and 1.5g of saturated fat.
'Fat is essential for every cell in the body. In Britain [according to
the Family Food Survey of 2008], we are deficient in the fat-soluble
vitamins A, D and E, which are responsible for healthy eyesight, bone
strength, mental health, cancer and blood vessel protection and,
therefore, heart health. We need to eat real fat in order for these
vital vitamins to be absorbed into the body.'
Myth: Saturated fat causes heart disease
Over the past 50 years, we have accepted this as one of the basic
nutritional truths. But Zoe Harcombe says: 'No research has ever
properly proved that eating saturated fat is associated with heart
disease, let alone that it causes it.'
Myth: Cholesterol is a dietary enemy
Controversially, Harcombe does not consider 'high' cholesterol levels
a bad thing!
'To pick a number — 5 (mmol/l) — and to say everyone should have
cholesterol levels
no higher than this is like declaring the average height should be 5ft
4in and not 5ft 9in and medicating everyone who doesn't reach this
meaningless number to reduce their height. It really is that horrific.
'Ancel Keys, who studied cholesterol extensively in the Fifties, said
categorically that cholesterol in food does not have any impact on
cholesterol in the blood.
'What is abnormal is the amount of carbohydrate we eat, especially
refined carbohydrate, and this has been shown to determine
triglyceride levels — the part of the cholesterol reading your GP may
be most concerned about.
'It's the ultimate irony. We only told people to eat carbs because we
demonised fat and, having picked the wrong villain, we are making
things worse.'
Myth: We should eat more fibre
For three decades, we have crammed fibre into our bodies to help us
feel full and keep our digestive systems moving. This is not a good
idea, says Harcombe.
'The advice to eat more fibre is put forward along with the theory
that we need to flush out our digestive systems. But essential
minerals are absorbed from food while it is in the intestines, so why
do we want to flush everything out? Concentrate on not putting bad
foods in.'
Myth: You need to eat five portions of fruit and veg a day
Avoid fruit to lose weight: The sugar in them will be stored as fat
'Five-a-day is the most well-known piece of nutritional advice,' says
Harcombe. 'You'd think it was based on firm evidence of health
benefit. Think again!
'Five-a-day started as a marketing campaign by 25 fruit and veg
companies and the American National Cancer Institute in 1991. There
was no evidence for any cancer benefit.'
Myth: Fruit and veg are the most nutritious things to eat
Apparently not. Harcombe allows that vegetables are a great addition
to the diet — if served in butter to deliver the fat-soluble vitamins
they contain — but fructose, the fruit sugar in fruit, goes straight
to the liver and is stored as fat.
Fruit is best avoided by those trying to lose weight, says Harcombe,
who adds: 'Vitamins and minerals in animal foods — meat, fish, eggs
and dairy products — beat those in fruit hands down.'
Myth: Food advisory bodies give us sound, impartial advice
the organisations we turn to for advice on food are sponsored by the
food industry. The British Dietetic Association (BDA), whose members
have a monopoly on delivering Department of Health and NHS dietary
advice, is sponsored by Danone, the yoghurt people, and Abbott
Nutrition, which manufactures infant formula and energy bars.
The British Nutrition Foundation, founded in 1967 to 'deliver
authoritative, evidence-based information on food and nutrition in the
context of health and lifestyle', has among its 'sustaining members'
British Sugar plc, Cadbury, Coca-Cola, J Sainsbury PLC and Kraft
Foods.
'When the food and drink industry is so actively embracing public
health advice, isn't it time to wonder how healthy that advice can
be?' says Harcombe.
THE OBESITY EPIDEMIC by Zoe Harcombe (Columbus Publishing, £20). © Zoe
Harcombe. To order a copy, tel: 0845 155 0720.
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WARNING FROM RAEL: For those who don't use their intelligence at its full
capacity, the label "selected by RAEL" on some articles does not mean that I
agree with their content or support it. "Selected by RAEL" means that I believe
it is important for the people of this planet to know about what people think or
do, even when what they think or do is completely stupid and against our
philosophy. When I selected articles in the past about stupid Christian
fundamentalists in America praying for rain, I am sure no Rael-Science reader
was stupid enough to believe that I was supporting praying to change the
weather. So, when I select articles which are in favor of drugs, anti-semitic,
anti-Jewish, racist, revisionist, or inciting hatred against any group or
religion, or any other stupid article, it does not mean that I support them. It
just means that it is important for all human beings to know about them. Common
sense, which is usually very good among our readers, is good enough to
understand that. When, like in the recent articles on drug decriminalization, it
is necessary to make it clearer, I add a comment, which in this case was very
clear: I support decriminalizing all drugs, as it is stupid to throw depressed
and sad people (as only depressed and sad people use drugs) in prison and ruin
their life with a criminal record. That does not mean that there is any change
to the Message which says clearly that we must not use any drug except for
medical purposes. The same applies to the freedom of expression which must be
absolute. That does not mean again of course that I agree with anti-Jews,
antisemites, racists of any kind or anti-Raelians. But by knowing your enemies
or the enemies of your values, you are better equipped to fight them. With love
and respect of course, and with the wonderful sentence of the French philosopher
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your right to say it".
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"Ethics" is simply a last-gasp attempt by deist conservatives and
orthodox dogmatics to keep humanity in ignorance and obscurantism,
through the well tried fermentation of fear, the fear of science and
new technologies.
There is nothing glorious about what our ancestors call history,
it is simply a succession of mistakes, intolerances and violations.
On the contrary, let us embrace Science and the new technologies
unfettered, for it is these which will liberate mankind from the
myth of god, and free us from our age old fears, from disease,
death and the sweat of labour.
Rael
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