cancer Archives

Apr

2024

Eating the right Food Determines your Health

By Ray Schilling | Cancer, diet, exercise, food, Health, heart attack, Mortality, Nutrition, Prevention, sleep, sugar

CNN had an interview with Dr. Leana Wen about the fact that eating the right food determines your health. Dr. Wen is a wellness expert, an emergency physician and adjunct associate professor at George Washington University.

How much does the quality of food we eat influence our health?

There are detailed studies that showed the following effects of healthy food on our lives.

If you eat a diet consisting of more vegetables, fruits, whole grains and nuts, the following will happen. You could exceed the age of controls eating unhealthy food by 10 to 13 years.

Specifically, a woman starting such a diet at age 20 would add 10 years to her life, when starting at age 60 she could add 8 years to her life. For men starting this diet at age 20 would allow him to gain 13 years, when starting at age 60 he would add 9 years to his life.

Additional healthy food studies

A 2023 Nature study found that men can add 10.8 years, women 10.4 years by switching their diets. This switch was from unhealthy diets to a longevity diet with more whole grains. In addition, the healthy diet contained more nuts and fruits and less sugar-sweetened beverages and processed meats.
Another 2023 study from the Jama network followed over 100,000 people for more than 30 years. There was an association between adopting healthy eating patterns and a reduction in early mortality. People on a healthy diet reduced their risk of early death by 20%! The study also noticed that people who ate more whole grains, fruits, vegetables, nuts and legumes had fewer other diseases. They were less likely to die from cancer, cardiovascular illness and respiratory and neurodegenerative disease. These were important findings.

What kinds of food make you live longer?

Dr. Wen stated clearly that it is only minimally processed, whole food that allows a person to live longer. The highly processed foods like processed meats, sausages, cakes and cookies are a “no go”. They are the ones that cost lives from heart attacks, strokes and cancer. On the other hand, leafy green vegetables, fresh fruits and whole grains associate with significantly reduced mortality. Fish contains omega-3 fatty acids, which reduce heart disease and dementia. It is also a good source of protein. So, stay away from hot dogs and chicken nuggets, instead enjoy salmon fillet or roasted chicken.

Foods that you need less of

Avoid sugar sweetened sodas and energy drinks, as they elevate cholesterol levels and cause heart attacks. Next, stay away from ultra-processed foods like chips and candies. In one study with more than 11,000 participants people who ate a lot of ultra-processed foods had a 31% higher risk of mortality.

With what do you replace junk food?

Here are a couple of examples. Somebody who used to drink a lot of sodas can replace them with water, sparkling water, flavored water or lemon juice, sweetened with stevia. Instead of snacking on ultraprocessed foods like chips, candies or pretzels eat nuts instead. Look at the list of ingredients before you buy anything in the grocery store. If there is a long list of ingredients including chemicals, this is ultraprocessed food. Replace it with minimally processed foods with only a few items on the ingredient list.

Other advice for health and longevity

If possible, eat three meals a day (breakfast, lunch and dinner). Stop eating 2 hours before bedtime to allow your guts to digest the food you previously ate. This avoids heart burn and interference with your sleep.
Exercise regularly. Studies showed that 150 minutes of vigorous exercise per week reduced mortality by 23%.
Take care of stress in your life. Cherish your social life and socialize; it is important for longevity. See your doctor regularly to take care of any medical problems you may have.
Watch your sleep habits. Many studies have shown that adults need 7 to 8 hours of sleep. Sleep restores your hormone glands, gets them ready for the next day, but it is also important for longevity.
Keep your body mass index (BMI) between 21.0 and 24.0. Personally, I keep my BMI between 21.0 and 22.0. Any extra pounds of fat merely lead to elevated cholesterol and triglycerides. Eventually this leads to heart attacks and strokes, but also to diabetes.

Eating the right Food Determines your Health

Conclusion

A recent article in CNN described that eating the right food determines your health. One study said that you should eat a diet consisting of more vegetables, fruits, whole grains and nuts. Doing this increases your life expectation by 10 to 13 years compared to controls who ate unhealthy food. It is only minimally processed, whole food that allows a person to live longer. You must eliminate ultraprocessed food. This means you should not consume sausages, fries, chips, pretzels and other overprocessed foods. Instead, eat leafy green vegetables, fresh fruits and whole grains that associate with significantly reduced mortality. Yes, eating the right food determines your health.

Mar

2024

Living with the Aging Process

By Ray Schilling | Alzheimer’s disease, andropause, Arthritis, Cancer, Cardiovascular disease, cholesterol, Diabetes, diet, erectile dysfunction, exercise, heart attack, Hormones, lifestyle, Menopause, osteoarthritis, telomeres

The following article describes living with the aging process. Older adults undergo the process of aging between the ages of 50 and 80. This is a complex process affecting various systems parallel. There are hormone factors that are particularly prominent in women during menopause. Joints are affected by degenerative changes, which can lead to total knee and hip replacements. The aging process was described in an article by Monica Jimenez at Tufts University.

What is aging?

Aging is the loss of function over time. The body is much more complex than a car, so there are more possible points of failure. Christopher Wiley is a scientist on the Basic Biology of Aging Team who studies the role of nutrition and metabolism in aging at a cellular level at Tufts University. He said:” The fact that life works is amazing”. He went on to say: “The body tries to maintain itself and restore homeostasis(self-healing) even in the face of all this stress and all this damage. We have these really sophisticated programs for dealing with these points of failure.”

Aging goes on relentlessly

He explains the aging process this way: “It can start with something as simple as a broken molecule, one little thing that goes wrong in one cell, and then it’s like the butterfly effect,” Wiley said. “The tissue starts struggling, and then the organ, and then your entire body.”

Dr. Wiley warns about those who say physicians could make people “immortal”. “There’s definitely a misconception out there that we’re trying to make people immortal. But there is never going to be an immortality vaccine,” Wiley said. “There’s never going to be one thing that defeats all of aging. There’s always going to be another point of failure.”

Slowing down biological aging

The emphasis of research about aging is not to add chronological years. It is on biological aging and on how well our cells and tissues are functioning. Dr. Sarah Booth is the director of the Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging (HNRCA) at Tufts. She said: “Lengthening the time in which we can continue to move around, care for ourselves, and participate in social life and activities, is a worthier goal than extending years of suffering.” Many people become disabled in their last years of life, then they die. “Healthspan” is a new term for our years of freedom from disability, Booth noted.

Factors that prolong healthy aging

Telomere length: One of the factors of longevity is our telomere length. Telomeres are the protective caps at the end of each chromosome. When they wear down, it leads to mistakes in the DNA copies of genetic information. There are supplements and herbs that can elongate telomeres. Exercise and the fasting mimicking diet also make telomeres longer. Older adults in good shape have longer telomeres, which stabilizes the DNA in their cells.
Healthy diet: Researchers have determined that several diets are healthier than others. The Mediterranean diet is anti-inflammatory, so is the DASH diet, which was developed for people with high blood pressure. The HNRCA of Tufts is one of six organizations that got research grants recently to investigate life-prolonging diets. The amount was for $8.5 million.

Exercise and lifestyle factors

Regular exercise: Over the years a lot of research accumulated data that shows regular exercise makes people biologically younger. Heart vessels have less atheromatous deposits and the brain stays younger as well. One study reported that 30 minutes of exercise daily prevents dementia.
Other lifestyle factors: other factors are whether or not you are smoking (it goes without saying that you must quit). In addition, genetics (longevity gene), the environment (polluted or not), stress levels and socioeconomic class all play a factor in how fast we age. These latter points are difficult to tease apart, but they influence us globally. Target organs for aging are: the brain, heart, eyes, and bones, along with cancer, obesity, and more.

Hormone replacement

Bioidentical hormone replacement: One factor about delaying aging significantly was not mentioned in the review article by Monica Jimenez. But I am including it, because bioidentical hormone replacement is important for women who undergo menopause in their 50’s. I also mention it because men enter andropause in their 60’s. BiEst estrogen and progesterone cream make a big difference for the symptoms of menopausal women. Similarly, men experience a lot of relief with testosterone injections twice a week, when blood testosterone levels are low. If they have a lack of erections (erectile dysfunction) they may in addition need to take the “happy pill”. Sildenafil or tadalafil can treat erectile dysfunction by giving a good erection to a menopausal male. Hormone replacement can add as much as 10 healthy years to your life.

Discussion

Dr. Booth said: “We’re looking at the same question through different lenses with different tools, technologies, and perspectives. Progress in aging research is only going to be achieved by bringing together different disciplines addressing the same problem.”

Christopher Wiley added: “The biggest change I’ve seen in the past ten years is that we really are finding new, different ways of actually intervening somewhere that could potentially extend the healthy years of life, and prevent people from getting age-related diseases.” He mentioned that scientists are gradually reducing the suffering associated with aging: “What aging research is really trying to do is compress the morbidity and make it as small as possible – to alleviate suffering,” Wiley said. “I think that’s a much more humanitarian goal, and I think we’re having a lot of success with those efforts.”

Living with the Aging Process

Conclusion

Aging is a slow process that starts the moment we are born. But between the age of 50 and 80 we age faster. I mentioned 5 specific areas that can slow down the aging process. If somebody smokes, he/she must stop smoking. Cigarette and tobacco smoking the biggest aging factor. The protective caps at the end of each chromosome go by the name of telomeres. When they shorten prematurely, mistakes occur in the DNA copies of genetic information. This leads to premature aging.

What keeps you younger for longer

The good news is that exercise, the fasting mimicking diet and several supplements can elongate telomeres. A healthy diet like the Mediterranean diet and regular exercise keeps the arteries open preventing heart attacks and strokes. Bioidentical hormone replacement helps to rebalance your hormones, which is important for normal cell function. In anti-aging circles they talk about life prolongation of about 10 years for hormone replacement alone. It comes down to not simply extend your lifespan, but to extend your years of healthy living without disability.

Oct

2020

Irregular Periods are Linked to Premature Deaths

By Ray Schilling | Hormones, irregular periods, Menopause, prostate cancer

A review in CNN describes that irregular periods are linked to premature deaths. This review is based on the original publication in the British Medical Journal published on September 30, 2020.

Essentially, the researchers followed 79,505 premenopausal women without a history of cardiovascular disease, cancer, or diabetes for 24 years. The researchers recorded 1975 premature deaths. The definition for a premature death was someone dying before the age of 70. There were three age groups that the researchers followed separately for 24 years.

ages 14-17 years
18-22 years
29-46 years

The most common causes of death were 894 from cancer and deaths from 172 strokes and heart attacks.

Death rates after 24 years for the three subclasses just mentioned

The researchers noted that there were differences in survival for different age groups. But there were also differences in survival for irregular periods versus prolonged intervals between periods. Crude mortality rates for 1000 person years of follow-up for women with normal versus irregular periods were as follows.

Normal periods Irregular periods

14-17 age : 1.05 14-17 age: 1.0

18-22 age: 1.23 18-22 age: 1.37

29-46 age: 1.0 29-46 age: 1.68

Women with a cycle length of 40 days or more had a higher mortality rate. The researchers compared this to women with a normal cycle length (26-31 days). Here are the data in detail for two age groups at the outset of the study.

Women with a cycle length of 40 days or more

Age 18-22: 1.34

Age 29-46: 1.40

Heart attacks and strokes followed these death statistics closest.

Discussion

The researchers concluded that teenagers and women in their middle-age were at the highest risk. This risk was for premature mortality, if they had irregular periods or a cycle length of 40 days or more. There was also an association between irregular periods and a prolonged cycle length and type 2 diabetes, ovarian cancer and coronary heart disease. In addition, mental health problems were also related, the study said.

Dr. Adam Balen, a professor of reproductive Medicine at Leeds Teaching Hospitals in the UK said: “Young women with irregular periods need a thorough assessment not only of their hormones and metabolism, but also of their lifestyle so that they can be advised about steps that they can take which might enhance their overall health”.

Too much estradiol in women and men can cause cancer

In this context it is interesting that other studies have shown that unopposed estradiol may be the culprit for both irregular periods and larger intervals between periods. When estrogen is elevated in females, irregular periods can result. Unopposed estradiol can cause breast, uterine and ovarian cancer.

In males who also have a small amount of estrogen in their blood, it is important that a larger amount of testosterone balances the two hormones. Otherwise there is a risk of prostate cancer.

In addition, cardiovascular disease has been described as a side effect of standard hormone replacement therapy (HRT) in women with synthetic hormones.

The good news is that treatment with bioidentical hormones can treat these abnormal periods. This eliminates premature mortality and in many cases prolongs life.

Conclusion

Researchers followed 79,505 premenopausal women without a history of cardiovascular disease, cancer, or diabetes for 24 years. They found that there is a linkage between irregular periods and premature deaths. There were three age groups that the researchers followed. Some of them suffered from irregular periods and others had periods that were 40 days or longer apart. The researchers recorded the premature mortalities. At an age of 29-46 there was a 68% higher mortality in women with irregular periods. The scientists compared this to women who had regular periods. In addition, women aged 29-46 with a cycle length of 40 days or more had a 40% higher mortality.

Estrogen dominance could explain premature deaths

The researchers compared this to women with a normal cycle length. It is possible that women who died prematurely were having too much estrogen in their system, which can produce cardiovascular disease and cancer of the breast, uterus and ovary. Further studies need to clarify the mechanism behind irregular periods and why a cycle length of 40 days or more causes mortality.

Feb

2020

Clinical Applications of the Fasting Mimicking Diet

By Ray Schilling | Alzheimer’s disease, Anti-aging medicine, autoimmune disease, Cardiovascular disease, Diabetes, diet, fasting mimicking diet, food, Health, Hormones, Inflammation, lifestyle, mitochondria, Multiple sclerosis, Prevention, regenerative medicine, stem cells, telomeres, Weight loss

Dr. Kurt Hong, professor of clinical medicine spoke about clinical applications of the fasting mimicking diet in Las Vegas. This was at the 27th Annual World Congress on Anti-Aging Medicine on Dec. 14, 2019. Although he spoke on various forms of fasting, he concluded that the fasting mimicking diet had the best results and was most consumer-friendly.

How we age

Dr. Hong reviewed the processes of aging. We age, because our cells experience oxidative damage and our telomeres (the end caps of our chromosomes) get shorter in time. We also age, because there are genetic mutations in our cells’ DNA and our mitochondria are aging as well. The mitochondria are the small energy packages inside the cells that give us energy. When people age, they have lost mitochondria, there is less energy that the body makes out of food and we feel chronically tired.

Above the age of 65 we are also likely to develop diseases of various organs:

Heart disease: 31%
Cancer: 24%
Chronic lung disease (lower respiratory disease): 21%
Alzheimer’s disease: 13%
Diabetes: 11%

Women are generally healthier than men and their life expectation is 4 to 5 years longer than that of men.

Cellular and molecular aging

Longevity researchers have done mouse experiments and human clinical trials for decades. Dr. Hong asked the question: how much longer could humans live, if we could cure cancer, heart disease, stroke and diabetes? The answer is: 13 years. But if we transfer the animal data to humans it should be 30 years of longer life. Why is there such a discrepancy? The answer is that it is easy to force good lifestyles onto animals, but humans are resistant to changes. Humans have their habits; they like to continue to smoke and eat fast food instead of switching to a healthier Mediterranean diet. Humans also resist a regular exercise program. And they do not want to hear that they should replace missing hormones with bioidentical ones. The result is that we humans will prolong our lives only by less than 50% of what we could achieve.

The concept of intermittent fasting

Dr. Hong stated, that ten thousand years ago, people did not always have enough food to eat. They were forced to intermittently fast. That did not mean that they had long life expectancies, as there was no cure for any disease. But one fact was true: the body learnt to rejuvenate itself during periods of fasting. And these longevity genes are still present in our genes. But they will only help us when we actually fast for some periods of time.

Dr. Hong reviewed what kind of fasting methods are available.

Prolonged fasting and juice fasting are not among the options. With prolonged fasting electrolyte disturbances become an issue. Juice fasting does not remove enough calories and nutrients. This, however is needed to allow the body to stimulate the longevity genes.

How fasting diets work

Dr. Hong explained that there are essentially 5 fasting diets that are effective in regulating the key nutrient sensitive pathways of IGF-1, TOR and PKA. This increases cellular protection and maintenance. It also increases activation of stress resistance pathways and removes and replaces damaged and dysfunctional cells. Finally, a fasting diet also reduces inflammation, which is often the start of disease.

A review of the 5 fasting diets

Time-restricted eating (TRE)

With TRE the person fasts for 12 to 16 hours every day. The person restricts the daily food consumption to a 4- to 12-hour window. The disadvantage is that this fast is done every day. The period of fasting may not be long enough to change the metabolism, where the above-mentioned effects take place.

Alternate-day fasting

This is a 24-hour fast every other day with a 1:1 day eating-fasting cycle. This does not appear to be physiological and is disruptive with regard to social activities.

5:2 intermittent fasting

With this fast you fast for 2 days every week. With this 2:5 eating-fasting cycle the person fasts for 2 days every week; the other 5 days you eat as much as you desire.

Although this is effective, it can be quite disruptive to your lifestyle.

Periodic fasting

You fast for 48 to 72 hours every couple of months. This fast is socially more acceptable. It is not that often, just a couple of times in a year. The question remains whether it is effective in changing the metabolism to trigger the effects mentioned above.

Fasting-mimicking diet (FMD)

The original suggestion by Dr. Longo, the inventor of the FMD was that you should fast for 5 days once every month. Since then he has modified it and said that you can achieve similar metabolic changes, if you only fast for 3 days and do this a couple of times per year. I have done the FMD since December 2017 and I adhere to the original schedule of doing the FMD monthly for 5 days. This has provided me with more energy. It is easier to keep my body mass index in the 21.0 to 22.0 range. Dr. Hong explained that the FMD allows you to eat, but it tricks the body into acting like you are fasting. Because you are eating 500 to 600 calories per day, you are getting some fluid and nutrients, so the hunger pangs are tolerable.

More details about the FMD

Here is Dr. Hong’s summary about the FMD: “The stomach sees food, while the cells see fasting”. Dr. Hong said that the FMD is the most user-friendly method of fasting. It also has had the most scientific studies to validate that it is indeed working. Poorly functioning mitochondria and misfolded proteins are removed by a process of phagocytosis. The FMD reduces heart disease, cancer, and neurodegenerative disorders. Stem cell production also gets a boost. This promotes cell regeneration and reduces risk factors of premature aging.

Publication on the effectiveness of the FMD

A publication came out in 2017 reporting about the findings of a clinical trial regarding the FMD.

Researchers followed markers of aging, diabetes, cancer and cardiovascular disease in 100 volunteers. They underwent a FMD for 5 days on 3 consecutive months. The results were astounding. The body mass index, the fasting blood sugar level, triglycerides, total and LDL cholesterol and the CRP were all lower. CRP stands for C-reactive protein, which measures the degree of inflammation in the body. The blood pressure was also lower. Overall the 5-day FMD was a safe method with no side effects. The FMD reduced markers and risk factors of aging and age-related diseases. In doing so it prolongs life by reducing the likelihood of coming down with disease.

Who should abstain from fasting?

Dr. Hong mentioned that the FMD is not for everybody. Pregnant women should refrain from going on it, also type 1 and type 2 insulin dependent diabetics. Anybody who has a sign of an active infection (coughing, having a fever or diarrhea) should be excluded. Other exclusions are people who are underweight (BMI less than 18.5) or are malnourished (protein deficiency). Patients with heart failure and advanced kidney or liver disease should not take part in a fasting program.

Autoimmune diseases and FMD

The myelin sheath around the axon of nerve cells in the central nervous system are supported by oligodendrocytes. In multiple sclerosis (MS) patients T lymphocytes activate macrophages and B cells to produce autoantibodies. They destroy oligodendrocytes breaking down the insulating barrier of the myelin sheath. In MS patients the broken-down myelin sheath suppresses the electrical impulses transmitted through the nerve fibers. The FMD led to clinical improvements.

In a pilot study intermittent fasting changed the gut flora into a healthier flora.

This triggered the immune system in the gut to make less inflammatory T cells producing the IL-17 cytokines. There was also an increase in regulatory T helper cells.

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBM) can be improved with several courses of FMD. As the authors showed, intestinal inflammation improved with FMD. The intestinal gut flora improved with the FMD and it promoted intestinal regeneration.

Reversal of physical and functional decline

The fasting mimicking diet (FMD) has a variety of effects on the human body. Dr. Hong showed a slide where we could see that ketone bodies, cortisol and ghrelin levels are increased in the blood. At the same time glucose, insulin, leptin and IGF-1 levels are reduced. In addition, triglycerides and LDL levels are getting lower. Inflammatory markers including the C-reactive protein (CRP) are reduced as well.

Effects of the FMD on various organs in the body

A look at all of the organs shows that in the liver the ketone body production and insulin sensitivity are up. Glycogen production in the liver as well as the liver size are down.

The intestines produce ketone bodies. In the skeletal muscles the insulin sensitivity is increased, while the muscle structure and function are improved. In the brain the hunger feeling increases the release of neurotropic factors including the neuropeptide Y. Cognitive function and stress resistance increase with the FMD. The FMD reduces inflammation and oxidative stress in the brain. With respect to the cardiovascular system the heart rate drops down and blood pressure gets lower. The insulin production in the pancreas is reduced.

Fatty tissue

In fatty tissue lipolysis is up and also the production of adiponectin. This is a protein hormone involved in glucose and fatty acid metabolism. Insulin sensitivity with the FMD is also increased. On the other hand, the FMD reduces fat mass, leptin production and inflammation.

The FMD is the solution to preventing disease and prolonging your life

All of these effects lead to a reversal of physiologic and functional declines. Age-related metabolic diseases like type 2 diabetes are postponed or eliminated. The FMD prevents neuro-cognitive decline like Alzheimer’s disease. In addition, the risk of developing cancer is getting lower. In summary, the FMD improves the health-span, quality of life and can prepare you for a long life.

Clinical Applications of the Fasting Mimicking Diet

Conclusion

Dr. Kurt Hong is a professor of clinical medicine at UCLA. He gave a talk at the 27th Annual World Congress on Anti-Aging Medicine in Las Vegas on Dec. 14, 2019. He discussed what we could do to help patients with various autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis and inflammatory bowel disease. It turns out that the fasting mimicking diet (FMD) is the best solution to reduce inflammation and modify the autoimmune response from aggressive T lymphocytes. With the FMD you consume only 500 to 600 calories per day for 5 days every month. The rest of the days of the month you eat a healthy Mediterranean-type diet.

Fasting mimicking diet, the best way to treat autoimmune diseases

Dr. Hong explained in detail what cellular mechanisms are at work to achieve the modification of the immune system in autoimmune diseases. The FMD is also the solution to slow down aging in healthy people. Dr. Hong discussed clinical applications of the fasting mimicking diet fort autoimmune diseases. It is easier to prevent disease than it is to cure an illness. The FMD is an easier way, because you don’t fast completely, you only reduce your food intake to the bare minimum, but your body “thinks” that you are fasting.

Ultimately, this approach does take some effort, and it does take time to familiarize yourself with it. If patients do it for the first time, they will experience some hunger, the first and second day tend to be a hurdle! Once you make it part of a health routine on a regular basis, it is a lot easier.

Sep

2019

What Makes Us Sick And What Keeps Us Healthy

By Ray Schilling | diet, food, green tea, lifestyle, Nutrition

An article in Nature Communication essentially asks what makes us sick and what keeps us healthy? The publication is about eating enough flavonoids to protect you from heart attacks and cancer.

The publication appeared on Aug. 13, 2019. It is a prospective study involving 56,048 participants of the Danish Diet, Cancer, and Health cohort. The medium age of the participant in the beginning of the study was 56 (range 52 to 60). This was cross-linked with Danish nationwide registries. The observation time was 23 years during which 14,083 participants died. As this study had a high number of participants and had a long observation period, the data are quite robust.

The researchers found that when people consume 500 mg of flavonoids from vegetables and fruit per day, they are dying significantly less from heart attacks and cancers.

Details of the study on flavonoid intake

Flavonoids are polyphenolic compounds in plant-derived foods and beverages such as vegetables, fruit, dark chocolate, coffee, tea, and red wine. There are six major subcategories of flavonoids: flavonols, flavan-3-ols, flavanones, flavones, isoflavones and anthocyanins. But it does not matter, which ones we consume, just that we consume enough (more than 500 mg per day).

The results were obtained with much stratification. For instance, in one set of results they normalized for age and sex. They called this model1. In another set they adjusted for age, sex, BMI, smoking status, physical activity, alcohol intake, hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, social economic status (income), diabetes, and prevalent disease. They called this model 2.

Participants with 536 mg of daily flavonoid intake had a reduction of 39% of heart attacks according to model 1. Using model 2 this changed to a reduction of 18% of heart attacks.

Cancer mortality reduction

The investigators did a similar analysis for cancer mortality reductions. At 536 mg of daily flavonoid intake model 1 showed a 36% reduction of cancer mortality. Model 2 still calculated a 21% reduction of cancer mortality. In both cases, the cardiovascular mortality risk and the cancer risk showed that more than 500 mg of flavonoids per day were not necessary as no more lives were saved by increasing the flavonoid dose beyond that. Unfortunately the opposite is true: people eat too many processed foods devoid of flavonoids, and they die of heart attacks and cancer prematurely.

Reducing the risk of heart attacks and cancer is not new

Many studies have shown what researchers found in this study, namely that vegetables and fruit can prevent heart attacks and cancer. Here is a brief summary with links to show this.

We heard many times that small amounts of alcohol consumption will keep the arteries clear of fatty deposits. This prevents heart attacks and strokes, but as the following study shows even small amounts of alcohol can cause various cancers.

Small doses of alcohol are still cancer producing

Dr. Timothy S. Naimi from Boston University Medical Center was the main investigator of an international team of scientists. The study found that every year 18,200 to 21,300 cancer deaths in the US (that is 3.2% to 3.7% of all US cancer deaths) are due to alcohol consumption. The authors of the study determined that every person who dies from alcohol related causes lost on average approximately 18 years of his/her life (scientists call this “years of potential life lost”). 51% of women developed breast cancer from alcohol exposure, 62% of men came down with upper airway and esophageal cancers. Less than 1.5 drinks per day caused between 26% and 35% of alcohol-related cancer deaths. There was no safe lower margin. The authors concluded, “Reducing alcohol consumption is an important and underemphasized cancer prevention strategy”.

Lifestyle important for longer life expectancy

I am reminded of a talk that Dr. David Katz delivered in a keynote address. He said that lifestyle improvements create profound changes in our system. This talk took place at the 22^nd Annual World Congress on Anti-Aging Medicine in Las Vegas Dec. 10-14, 2014. One study that was mentioned showed that in men who adopted a healthy lifestyle 35% of heart attacks could be prevented. With healthy lifestyle the authors meant consuming a healthy diet, not exceeding moderate alcohol consumption, no smoking, regular physical activity and having a normal waist circumference (less than 95 cm).

The ingredients you need to make it to age 100

A Swedish longevity study that went on for 50 years gave me the idea to write a blog about the factors that can help you to turn 100 and still have your mental capacity and good health.Let me introduce you to this study. Researchers at the Sahlgrenska Academy in Göteborg, Sweden (which is located at the University of Gothenburg) decided back in 1963 to follow a group of 855 Gothenburg men born in 1913 until they would either die or turn 100. The idea was to find out what killer diseases are in the way to reach such a ripe old age and if they would survive, what was it that made them reach this age. Think of it as a race to turn 100.

What diseases killed at older age and what led to longevity?

The researchers had checkpoints along that journey: various surveys were conducted at the age of 54, 60, 65, 75, 80 and 100 to analyze the factors that lead to longevity. 27% (232) of the original group reached the age of 80, and 13% (111) made it to 90. Only 1.1% of the men made it to the age of 100. What were the causes of death for the other ones who did not make it? 42% of deaths after the age of 80 were due to heart attacks, 20% due to infectious diseases, 8% due to strokes, 8% due to cancer, 6% due to pneumonia and 16% due to other causes. 23% of the men over 80 were diagnosed with Alzheimer’s or dementia. Factors that made people survive were refraining from smoking, maintaining a healthy cholesterol level and limiting coffee consumption to not more than 4 cups per day.

Beneficial effects of green tea and black tea

A meta-analysis involving 194,965 people and 4378 strokes found that there was a reduction of strokes with increasing tea consumption. Those who drank 3 or 4 cups of green tea or black tea per day were the experimental group. Researchers compared them to the control group that drank less than one cup of tea per day. The experimental group had a 21% lower risk of getting a stroke than the control group.

A meta-analysis of 18 studies from China showed that green tea and black tea consumption was beneficial for prevention of cardiovascular disease and for cancer prevention. The highest consumption of green tea reduced cardiovascular mortality (heart attacks and strokes) by 33%. The highest black tea consumption lowered mortality by 12%. Cancer mortality turned out different. Green tea did not produce a reduction in mortality, but black tea lowered it by 21%. I suspect that the different subcomponents of the bioflavonoid content in green and black tea are key to those findings.

Plant-based diet versus animal protein based diet

A 2016 study that had gone on for 49 years was involving 131,342 participants. Animal protein intake showed an association with higher mortality from heart attacks and strokes. The investigators substituted 3% of energy from processed red meat by an equivalent amount of plant protein. This reduced the all-cause mortality by 34%. For unprocessed red meat the 3% substitution reduced the all-cause mortality by 12%. If 3% of egg consumption is reduced, all cause mortality drops by 19%.

British Medical Journal study

A new study has shown that you can save lives when you replace red meat and processed red meat. The replacement was with fish, poultry or protein from vegetables. The study appeared in the British Medical Journal on June 12, 2019. It involved 53,553 women nurses and 27,916 male doctors in the United States and ran from 1986 to 2010. Here is my summary of the blog where I reviewed this study in detail. A new study in the British Medical Journal showed that an increase in red meat consumption of only ½ serving per day for 8 years caused an increased mortality of 9% over the following 8 years. With regard to processed red meat the mortality was even bigger, namely 13%. The researchers replaced some of the meat with white chicken meat or vegetables and the mortality normalized.

In contrast, a Japanese study showed that there was no increase in cardiovascular disease with the consumption of up to 100 grams of beef or other meat products per week. The study went on for 16 years.

Using antibiotics as growth promoters is illegal in Japan and Europe

I pointed out before that there is literature explaining why there is a discrepancy: the beef industry in the US feeds the animals antibiotics as growth promoters. This changes the bowel flora in humans who eat the beef. The changed bacterial strains in the gut use carnitine from beef and make trimethylamine N-oxide (TMAO). This is a toxin that causes both cardiovascular disease and cancer. This explains why in the US beef is one of the culprits that cause heart attacks and colorectal cancer. In Japan this is not the case. Both Japan and Europe do not use antibiotics as growth promoters in the cattle industry, as it is illegal.

In the US it is likely safe to eat organic meats (beef, chicken) as these meats will not contain antibiotics. Due to the numerous additives in processed red meat, it is a sensible idea to skip these products altogether, as they produce cancer.

What Makes Us Sick And What Keeps Us Healthy

Conclusion

Several studies have pointed out the importance of eating less animal protein and increasing vegetables and fruit in your diet. Heart attacks, strokes and cancers are still the major causes of death in all of the developed countries. The Danish study mentioned in the beginning showed that keeping the daily intake of bioflavonoids at 500 mg or more prevented 18% to 39% of heart attack mortality and 21% to 36% of cancer mortality.

In other studies we learnt that deaths between the ages of 80 and 100 were mainly due to heart attacks, strokes and cancer (these accounted for 58% of deaths). Only 1.1% of the men in that Swedish study made it to the age of 100.

More evidence that flavonoids and plant protein save lives

Another study measured the effect of green and black tea consumption: There was a 21% reduction of strokes with green or black tea consumption.

Another study found reduced cardiovascular mortality by 33%. Green tea reduced cancer mortality by 21%.

Another study showed that when plant protein replaced red meat there was an astounding drop of the all-cause mortality by 34%.

All of these studies show that you must eat enough flavonoids to protect yourself from heart attacks and cancer. Of course you also need to engage in a regular physical exercise program to stay fit and healthy.

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Aug

2019

The Best Ways To Prevent Cancer

By Ray Schilling | alcohol, andropause, breast cancer, Cancer, Cardiovascular disease, coffee, Diabetes, diet, exercise, fiber, food, green tea, heart attack, Hormones, lifestyle, lung cancer, Menopause, Nutrition, Obesity, omega-3 fatty acids, Prevention, Processed food, prostate cancer, sleep, Smoking, Stroke, sugar, testosterone, Vitamins and supplements

Cancer is the second leading cause of death, that’s why it is important to learn about the best ways to prevent cancer. Generally speaking you want to remove cancer-producing substances (carcinogens) from your diet. But diet is only part of your lifestyle that can contribute to cancer. I shall list some of the more important dietary factors below and briefly touch on important other factors.

Avoid burning your meat

When you use the BBQ, you should avoid burning your meat. Even though the marks of “charring” are considered desirable on meat from the grill, this is really burnt! As a matter of fact it is a lot better to use a slow cooker at low heat and simply cook your food longer. This way you don’t create carcinogens. Avoiding to burn your meat is particularly important for the red meats.

Sugar and an overabundance of starchy foods can cause cancer

You never thought that sugar and an overabundance of starchy foods could cause cancer, but they do. The reason is that the metabolism of cancer cells is using 10- to 12-times more sugar than the metabolism of normal cells. The worst thing a cancer patient can do is to over-consume sugar. Replace sugar by stevia, which is a harmless, plant-based sweetener and does not lead to an insulin reaction. Avoid all other sugar substitutes, as there are other heath problems with most of them.

Avoid phthalates

Those who have a craving for macaroni and cheese are out of luck. This food contains phthalates that are part of the ingredients of almost every sample of cheese powder used to manufacture macaroni and cheese. Phthalates can cause infertility and breast cancer. So you must definitely avoid macaroni and cheese, at least the stuff from the box. Prepare your own!

A high fat diet

What does a high fat diet do? It increases the risk for breast cancer. But it can also increase colorectal cancer risk. Limit your fat intake to about 10% of saturated fat. That is the recommendation of the FDA. Increase your consumption of fish and seafood. Only one proviso: predator fish like shark, marlin, tilefish, swordfish and grouper are high in mercury. But wild salmon, sardines and oysters are low in mercury. You can also enjoy shrimps and prawns.

Take high dose vitamin D3 supplements

High dose vitamin D3 supplements help you to avoid cancer. There are strong statistics showing that vitamin D3 is a powerful tool to lower your risk of developing cancer. Your family doctor should take a blood test called 25-hydroxy vitamin D level to make sure that you absorb enough vitamin D3. There are slow and fast absorbers and the only thing to know how well your gut absorbs vitamin D3 is in doing this blood test.

Also, curcumin (turmeric) 500 mg once per day is good for cancer prevention.

Take enough fiber

Make sure you take enough fiber, which does not only reduce colorectal cancer, but also many other cancers. When you eat plant-based food, you automatically get fiber in it. North Americans are not consuming enough fiber in their diet.

Avoid processed meat and too much red meat consumption

Processed meat and red meat cause cancer.

Beef, lamb and pork seem to contribute to causing cancer according to the WHO. Use common sense and eat fish, chicken and turkey. Reduce your beef consumption. My grandmother served beef as a Sunday dish.The rest of the week simple, plant-based foods appeared on the table. Ask your grandmother, what she used to cook. Or ask your mother what she ate as a child.

Eat moderate amounts of fruit and vegetables

The claim that fruit and vegetables would protect you from cancer is not as solid as researchers thought of in the past. Newer research has shown that a basic intake of fruit and vegetables is needed for nutrients, but consuming more than that will NOT protect you from cancer.

This link explains that eating more vegetables or fruit beyond a certain point will not do harm, but will not protect you further from cancer.

Drink green tea or black tea

If you like tea, drink green tea or black tea. Sweeten it with stevia, but not with sugar. Tea has been shown to have cancer prevention properties.

Avoid alcohol consumption to prevent cancer.

Coffee is a healthy drink and it has mild anti-cancer effects as well. It does not matter whether you drink it caffeinated or decaffeinated.

Other lifestyle issues

Quit smoking

If you are still smoking, quit smoking! Smoking is by and large the biggest risk for developing lung cancer, throat cancer, esophageal cancer and pancreatic cancer.

Watch your calorie intake

Eat smaller meals more often. This way the production of your digestive juices will consume some calories. In addition your taste buds are satisfied, so your hunger for food is more controlled. The end result is that you will not gain weight.

Prevent obesity and type 2 diabetes

This will help prevent obesity and type 2 diabetes, both of which are established risk factors to develop cancer. Here is a review that shows you, which cancer types are caused by obesity. With regard to diabetes, there is a strong association to developing liver cancer, pancreatic cancer and endometrial cancer (=uterine cancer). There is a lesser risk (only 1.2 to 1.5-fold) to develop cancer of the colon and rectum, breast cancer and bladder cancer.

Pollution

Poor air quality with pollution can also be a factor in causing cancer. Pollution does not stay local, but travels through the stratosphere around the globe. The result is that now 10 to 15% of lung cancer in the US occurs in patients who never smoked. This translates into 16,000 to 24,000 deaths annually of never-smokers in the US. In certain cities such as Beijing lung cancer rates have doubled in 9 years between 2002 and 2011. Lung cancer in non-smokers can be caused from exposure to radon, to second-hand tobacco smoke, and other indoor air pollutants.

Bioidentical hormone replacement

When males do not replace missing testosterone in andropause they are much more prone to develop prostate cancer. Similarly, when women are menopausal and do not get progesterone supplementation, they develop a higher amount of breast cancer due to estrogen dominance. It follows from this that bioidentical hormone replacement in menopause and andropause will help to prevent prostate cancer and breast cancer.

The Best Ways To Prevent Cancer

Conclusion

There is strong evidence that certain foods can cause cancer. Other foods including supplements like curcumin and vitamin D3 can help prevent cancer. Basically, you want to avoid all that is known to cause cancer and eat more of the healthy foods that do not cause cancer. This will help to decline your cancer risk. I suggest that in addition you should quit smoking, avoid pollution as much as possible, reduce excessive alcohol intake and watch your calorie intake. By doing this you prevent obesity and type 2 diabetes, and you will move into the low-risk cancer group. We all need to work on this on an ongoing basis.

Practical hints regarding the best ways to prevent cancer

The best ways to prevent cancer is to avoid processed red meat and all other processed foods. Eat more vegetables, fruit, wild salmon and other seafood. Don’t eat red meat more often than once a week and make it red meat from grass fed animals. In addition exercise regularly, get enough sleep and practice some form of relaxation (yoga, Tai Chi, self-hypnosis etc.). This lifestyle will not only prevent heart attacks and strokes, but also the majority of cancers.

Previously published here.

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Nov

2018

Gut Bacteria Crucial To Healthy Aging

By Ray Schilling | Alzheimer’s disease, Anti-aging medicine, Cancer, lifestyle, Mortality, Parkinson’s disease

New research presented at the London Microbiome Meeting asked the question “are gut bacteria crucial to healthy aging?” Marina Ezcurra, is a Ph.D. is a researcher working at the Queen Mary University of London in the United Kingdom. She uses a nematode (round worm) model to investigate various aspects of aging. Nematodes like C. elegans provide a useful model not only for genetic work, but also for the human gut flora as well. Moreover, it allows making observations about the connection between bacterial genes and aging. Coupled with the fact that the worm has such a short lifespan, the researchers can test bacterial genes, the aging of the worm and get meaningful results in short order.

It seems like one of the research objectives was changing the nematode’s gut flora and observing life expectancy and age-related diseases.

Pathological versus healthy gut bacteria composition

Dr. Ezcurra did a couple of experiments with the nematode C. elegans as a model. She could show that the worm’s gut bacteria composition mattered. First of all, if there was a pathological composition of the gut flora, the worm did not turn as old and there were various age-related diseases that developed. Secondly, they were very comparable to human age-related degenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s disease.

Another senior author researched how genes of gut bacteria influence life expectancy

Meet Dr. Meng Wang, associate professor of molecular and human genetics, Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX. He did extensive genetic research on C. elegans. He used this model, because C. elegance lives only 2 to 3 weeks. This animal model is easy to manipulate. For instance, he studied the gut bacteria composition. This link explains that he tested about 4000 E.coli bacteria with various gene defects. 29 E.coli strains when deleted, increased the worms’ lifespan.12 bacterial mutants among those prevented cancer and amyloid-beta, found in Alzheimer’s disease. Some mutant bacteria caused longevity by acting on processes linked to aging.

Colanic acid is an important anti-aging factor in C.elegans

Dr. Wang joined Dr. Christophe Herman, associate professor of molecular and human genetics at Baylor, for further research. It turned out that one of the keys to longevity of the nematodes were the mutant bacteria in the gut over-producing the polysaccharide colanic acid. This allowed the nematodes to live much longer. The researchers could show further that fission and fusion processes with regard to mitochondria are important. Mitochondria are the energy packages in cells and these processes are regulated by the presence of colanic acid. As a result, if your gut has good bacteria you can grow old and escape Alzheimer’s disease and cancer.

Dr. Meng Wang said: “Of the nearly 4,000 bacterial genes we tested, 29, when deleted, increased the worms’ lifespan. Twelve of these bacterial mutants also protected the worms from tumor growth and accumulation of amyloid-beta, a characteristic of Alzheimer’s disease in humans.”

Creating longevity with metformin, a diabetic drug

Physicians have known for some time that metformin stimulates longevity genes. This is the reason why diabetics on metformin live longer than diabetics on insulin. Dr. Ezcurra mentioned on 24 October, 2018 in her talk at the London microbiome Meeting that she had done experiments with C. elegans and metformin. Metformin reduces the risk of cancer and increases longevity in C. elegans as well as in mice (other experiments). Currently there is a clinical trial going on that investigates anti-aging under the influence of metformin in older people.

Effects of metformin on anti-aging

Metformin has the potential to target diabetes, cancer and Alzheimer’s pathologies all at once.

The anti-aging effect in humans with metformin involves the gut bacteria. Dr. Ezcurra says that this is the reason why diabetics on metformin live longer than diabetics on insulin. Metformin influences the folate bacterial metabolism of the gut flora. Other research has shown that the Akkermansia bacteria in the gut, which are good, desirable bacteria, will increase from 3-5% to 12.44% of the gut flora under the influence of metformin. Here is the discussion in detail in the following link.

Effect of gut bacteria on psychiatric diseases, obesity and diabetes

Dr. Ezcurra said that there are many studies showing that dysbiosis of the gut can lead to psychiatric diseases, Parkinson’s disease, obesity and diabetes etc.

We need to know more about whether a healthy gut flora will let us age without causing age-related diseases. Dr. Ezcurra stated: “By better understanding the links between nutrition, microbiome, and health, we can understand how the elderly can maintain their microbiome, and also help them directly by using pre- and probiotic strategies. This would help us age in a better way, maintaining health and quality of life in old age without drugs or surgery.”

Gut Bacteria Crucial To Healthy Aging

Conclusion

The composition of the gut microbiome appears to determine whether we age gracefully or not and whether we get sick as we age or not. Everything depends on the diversity of the gut flora. There are bacteria in the gut that are good for us and also bacteria that are bad for us. Metformin has been shown to stimulate the good gut bacteria to multiply. Dr. Ezcurra is continuing her research into this. She clearly stated that it should be possible for us to age in a better way and maintain health and quality of life in old age without drugs or surgery.

Oct

2018

Four Diseases Cause Most Of The Deaths

By Ray Schilling | Angina, Cancer, Cardiovascular disease, Diabetes, Fitness, heart attack, Heart Disease, lifestyle, Lung Disease, Mortality, Nutrition, sugar

Four diseases cause most of the deaths around the world: cancer, cardiovascular disease, chronic respiratory diseases and diabetes. This story is the news right now. 50% of the 193 UN member states that signed a treaty in 2015 are falling short of their promise. They wanted to reduce premature deaths from these diseases by 2030. But this is not happening as this story shows.

I like to review these 4 key diseases and what we can do ourselves about eliminating them. We cannot afford to wait for things to happen on a national level. Rather we need to go to the grass roots of every country and change the risk factors that cause these 4 diseases.

Cancer

First, cancer is a disease of older people, unless strong genetic factors are present. In this case even children can get leukemia, brain tumors and osteogenic sarcoma. In older people DNA mutations and DNA breaks happen more often as we age. On the other hand, if we diagnose cancer in stage 1 or 2 (in the early stages), it is quite often curable.

Oncoblot test, a cancer screening test

Probably one of the less known new criteria is the fact that there is a very sensitive cancer blood test, called the Oncoblot test (released about 4 years ago by the FDA). The latest screening test that came out of the human genome project is called the Oncoblot test. It screens for 25 of the most common cancers. And it is screening for ENOX2 proteins from cancer cells. It is a 1000 USD test in the US that health plans will not cover, but it will screen for more than 25 different common cancers 6 to 8 years before they would otherwise become clinically manifest.

If you discover cancer with this early blood test and you treat it right away, you have a good chance to live a few years longer. You may come down with another cancer down the road, but treat it early again, and you will still have a better life expectancy. Remember: four diseases cause most of the deaths, cancer is one of them!

Cardiovascular disease

Furthermore, people develop cardiovascular disease from poor eating habits and a lack of regular exercise. There are a few percentage points of people with familiar high cholesterol. These people need to see their family doctor for a prescription to lower cholesterol. But the majority of people will do well by changing their diet into a Mediterranean diet; lose weight until their body mass index reaches a value of 21 to 24. With this diet it is important to cut out all refined sugar and starchy foods. Regular exercise in a gym will also prevent hardening of the arteries. Chelation therapy has been shown in this study to help reduce hardening of arteries.

Diabetes patients have accelerated hardening of the arteries

We know from diabetic patients who have accelerated hardening of the arteries how devastating cardiovascular disease can be. Heart attacks, strokes, kidney failure, amputations of the lower leg and blindness are just some examples. Even patients who do not have diabetes can get these complications at an older age. The key is to think preventatively, change the diet, exercise regularly and you will lower all those risks. Remember: four diseases cause most of the deaths; cardiovascular diseases belong to that group and are a major player.

Chronic respiratory diseases

There are different reasons why a person may develop chronic respiratory disease. A common disease is chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). COPD often has a link to smoking heavily as a younger person. This is where the damage to the lung tissue has started. Exposure to cigarette smoke leads to loss of elastic tissue in the bronchial tubes. The lungs have a difficult time to exhale to get rid of the CO2. The end result is that your breaths are shallow and you can’t get enough oxygen, because the lung is already filled with air.

Asthma and COPD

Another disease is asthma. Nowadays physicians can treat this condition well with a corticosteroid inhaler and salbutamol. Salbutamol dilates the airways by relaxing the muscles of the bronchial tubes. The corticosteroid keeps the lining of the bronchial tubes thin, so that the air can move in and out of the lung.

If asthma is not treated properly there can be permanent damage to the airways and the clinical picture would look similar to COPD.

With end-stage COPD patients the only therapy the physician can offer is continuous oxygen flow treatment. With power failures these machines that supply oxygen will stop working. People need to make provisions to have a back-up generator. Again, we need to remember: four diseases cause most of the deaths. Chronic respiratory diseases belong to them.

Diabetes

Patients with type-2 diabetes (Type 2 DM) are usually older than 30 years of age.

That’s why they are called “mature onset diabetes” or “adult onset diabetes”. For several decades a patient may “incubate” diabetes and have one or more of the diabetes risk factors, such as high blood pressure, obesity, high cholesterol or high triglycerides, but have normal blood sugars.

Physicians have followed patients like this for several decades in the well known Framingham Heart Study and found that a high percentage of them do come down with type-2 diabetes later in life. In the past this time of incubation was termed “pre-diabetes”. Now we call it “syndrome of insulin resistance” or “metabolic syndrome”. Diabetes belongs to the group of diseases that are associated with chronic inflammation in the body.

Causes of type-2 diabetes

Type-2 diabetes often associates with other endocrinological diseases such as Cushing’s syndrome (an adrenal gland hyperactivity) or acromegaly (increased growth hormone production). In these diseases other hormones are tilting the hormone balance by counteracting insulin thus leading to a relative shortfall of insulin, which is another cause for type-2 diabetes. There is confusion among scientists regarding possible genetic reasons for type-2 diabetes. The environment or weight gain may trigger various genetic loci that exist. The syndrome of insulin resistance has shown some connections between hypertension, obesity and type-2 diabetes.

Death in diabetics usually comes from a heart attack, a massive stroke, but it may also come from systemic infections, called sepsis. Dr. Taylor from Newcastle University showed on 30 volunteers that 43% of diabetics could be cured by a diet of 600-700 calories for 8 weeks. The medical literature also knows that regular exercise is beneficial for diabetics. It cannot be overstressed that four diseases cause most of the deaths; diabetes belongs to them and is a major player.

Four Diseases Cause Most Of The Deaths

Conclusion

Four diseases cause most of the deaths. They were the cause of death for several years. They are cancer, cardiovascular disease, chronic respiratory diseases and diabetes. The secret is to minimize the impact of each of these diseases. You can prevent chronic respiratory diseases by stopping to smoke and treating asthma properly. To treat cancer successfully one needs to diagnose it early and remove it surgically. With cardiovascular disease chelation therapy has shown a difference. Otherwise a regular exercise program and a Mediterranean diet, which has anti-inflammatory qualities, will help. Dr. Taylor from Newcastle University demonstrated that he can treat diabetes with a low calorie diet. Each one of us has a responsibility to do something about our diagnosed condition. We cannot wait for magic cures. We need to do what has known benefits. Hopefully with these short hints will help you to improve your health.

Sep

2018

No Amount Of Alcohol Is Good

By Ray Schilling | alcohol, Cancer, Cardiovascular disease, Dementia, Diabetes, heart attack, Heart Disease, High Blood Pressure, immune system, Obesity, Stroke

New research, more extensive than previous research has shown that no amount of alcohol is good.

This is completely against the widespread belief that moderate consumption of alcohol would prevent heart disease.

Specifically, previous research had shown the following: one glass of alcohol per day for women and 2 glasses of alcohol for men was reportedly make us live longer.

New research with larger population numbers

But a new study involving much larger population groups, all ages, and drinkers versus non-drinkers came to a different conclusion. It concluded that the previous recommendation was based on only heart attack rates, but excluded other causes of sudden death like heart failure, a rupture of the aorta (aneurysm), high blood pressure that kills (fatal hypertensive disease) and strokes. With the compilation of all these cardiovascular diseases, the statistics suddenly started to look different. Now even small amounts of alcohol killed. What is worse, there was clear evidence that binge drinkers have much worse survival statistics than moderate drinkers. When you drink according to the American Heart Association’s recommendation, you drink smaller amounts of alcohol daily.

Binge drinking

But many of us like to live it up on weekends or whenever there are friends over who also like a few drinks. This binge drinking habit lowers the life expectancy by an average of 10 years. It does so because the list of complications I mentioned above. In addition there are alcoholic liver cirrhosis, pancreatitis and various cancers that shorten your life.

Global health study

The funders of this global health study was the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and it looked at the burden that alcohol puts on 195 countries. The original study appeared in the Lancet. The combined study population was 28 million individuals. There were 649,000 cases of various deaths due to alcohol. Here is a summary of the abbreviated outcome of the global health study. As you can see from this, there is no safe level of alcohol consumption as even small amounts of alcohol over a long period of time lead to significant damage in the body. You can prevent heart attacks to a certain extent. But instead people die from a ruptured aorta, from strokes or from heart failure. The leading cause of death for men and women age 15 to 49 worldwide was alcohol. It accounted for almost 1 in 10 deaths.

Some alcohol-related statistics

The following were the observations in the study.

Over 300 disabilities and diseases were directly related to alcohol consumption. The findings were collected in 195 countries, classified by age and sex. The data was gathered between 1990 and 2016.
Globally, 2.4 billion people drink alcohol. 25% are women who consume 0.73 drinks on average each day, 39% are men drinking 1.7 drinks a day.
Denmark, Norway and Germany drank the most alcohol globally.
For ages 50 and up the leading causes of death were: road injuries, suicides and tuberculosis.

More statistics

Most deaths caused by alcohol came from cardiovascular disease and cancer for all countries.
When you look only at drinkers, the standard recommendation of the American Heart Association regarding low alcohol consumption seems true. But the new study compared non-drinkers with drinkers. From this it is clear that even one drink a day has a risk of premature death.
At the age of 40 cutting down long-term alcohol use will add 1 to 2 years of life expectancy.
For all ages 2.8 million people die globally every year from alcohol related diseases.
Half of the world does not drink at all. This means that the ones, who drink, consume double as much as the statistics show.
Americans prefer beer. They drink about 27 gallons of beer, 2.6 gallons of wine and 2.2 gallons of spirits per adult/year.

Common clinical conditions from alcohol consumption

Binge drinking is the consumption of 5 drinks or more in an evening for men or 4 drinks for women. The CDC is concerned about binge drinking, because of its association with significant organ damages. There are 4 major concerns regarding these effects. Heart disease and cancer; diabetes; memory loss and appearance. In the following I will zero in on these alcohol-related conditions.

Heart disease

As this article pointed out above, there is a very limited protective effect, but mostly in above 55-year-old women who drink in moderation (1 glass of alcohol; per day). They have some protection from developing heart attacks, because their LDL cholesterol gets lowered and their clotting system is influenced in positive ways. But 6% of breast cancer in women is due to the effect of alcohol consumption, which is a downfall. For both men and women binge drinking is what kills. Binge drinkers who drink more than 100 grams of alcohol per week (more than 7 drinks in the US) experience increased deaths. The causes are heart failure, strokes, fatal hypertensive disease and fatal aortic aneurysm, where the main artery bursts. Apart from that alcohol-related pancreatitis and liver cirrhosis can kill as well.

Cancer

A relatively new finding is that alcohol has a close relationship to causing various cancers. Alcohol weakens the immune system. Also, alcohol has a negative influence on the bacterial composition, the microbiome in our digestive tract. This can be a cause for colon cancer. Liver cancer, mouth cancer and breast cancer also has a direct relationship to increased alcohol consumption. Esophageal cancer and laryngeal cancer are also related to alcohol consumption.

Diabetes

Alcohol can stimulate the pancreas to release insulin, which may give you hypoglycemic attacks. As alcohol contains empty calories, over the course of several years alcohol consumption can add to your weight, causing obesity and type 2 diabetes. As diabetes has detrimental effects on the heart and blood vessels, this mixed with alcohol consumption, can worsen cardiovascular disease thus increasing the risk for heart attacks and strokes.

Memory loss

In the beginning of chronic alcohol consumption you may enjoy the relaxing effect of alcohol. This is merely the toxic effect of alcohol on brain cells. Alcohol has the effect of inhibiting brain cells, which makes you feel relaxed, super-sociable and even silly. In reality you are starting to loose control. After several years of this effect you are left with feelings of anxiety, depression and anger. This is when trouble starts to occur. People out of control are more likely to get into fights and get injured or killed. People can develop blackouts where they do not remember parts of the evening or an entire event. Memory loss is starting. The hippocampus is an important part of the brain that is involved in processing short- term memory into long-term memory. A form of dementia can occur that was brought on by chronic alcohol overconsumption.

Appearance

Alcohol dries out the skin cells and body cells. The face gets wrinkles. Your skin looks parched and gives you the appearance of a prematurely aged person. Alcohol can interfere with your sleep and when you have a lack of it you end up with dark circles around your eyes as well as puffy eyes. It does not make for a good picture, whether it happens inside the body or on your skin!

No Amount Of Alcohol Is Good

Conclusion

A new study that was larger and more comprehensive than any previous study has exposed the myth that one drink for women and two drinks for men would protect you from heart disease. It may protect you from heart attacks, but it definitely does nothing to protect you from other heart conditions. There is also sudden death from heart failure, a rupture of the aorta (aneurysm), high blood pressure that kills (fatal hypertensive disease) and stroke. When you factor all that in as well, even your low, moderate alcohol consumption has health risks. The global health study, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation looked at the burden that alcohol puts on 195 countries. The combined study population was 28 million individuals.

Alcohol related deaths and diseases

649, 000 registered cases of various deaths occurred due to alcohol. This included deaths from traffic accidents, injuries, cancer, heart disease and suicide. This global study compared the life expectancy and disease frequencies of alcohol-consuming people with non-alcohol consuming people. It concluded that non-alcohol consuming people live on an average up to 10 years longer than their alcohol-consuming counterparts. No studies up to now have been that comprehensive. The results from twenty-eight million people speak for themselves, and the death statistics are clear. It is worthwhile to look at the details and draw your own conclusion.

Sep

2018

Cell Phones Can Cause Cancer After All

By Ray Schilling | Cancer, leukemia

Re-investigation of whether or not cell phones can cause cancer revealed that cell phones can cause cancer after all. This publication comes from the Journal “The Guardian”. It turned out that for 25 years the cell phone industry managed to suppress scientific evidence of cancer. In many experiments scientists found brain cancer and adrenal gland cancer in rats from exposure to electromagnetic fields. Regulatory authorities based their statements on fake experiments that showed no apparent effect of EMF (electro-magnetic fields) on animals. There were never any human trials. But 25 years ago cell phones received a “clear signal” though in retrospect that was wrong. Now it turns out that this is one of the biggest human mass experiments.

Human cancer statistics

Exposure to radiation from an atom bomb can indeed bring on brain tumors. This Australian study investigated brain cancer rates in the 1980’s and in the early 2000’s. The conclusion was that cell phone exposure was about the same in the 1980’s and the early 2000’s. Brain tumors were also the same. But at the bottom of this review the authors show some interesting statistics about Hiroshima. Brain cancers are shown as bar graphs in people who suffered exposure to the radiation of Hiroshima. The bar graphs compared brain cancer statistics between 31 years after Hiroshima and 41 to 50 years after Hiroshima. There still was a clear increase of brain tumors in the population 41 to 50 years after Hiroshima.

Long lag time

This is because brain cancer has a long lag time between radiation exposure and actual brain cancer occurrence. The prominent Sydney neurosurgeon, Dr. Charlie Teo said that there can be a long lag period of 10 to 20 years for electromagnetic frequencies (EMF) to cause brain cancer. EMF also has the name EMR (electromagnetic radiation). If one takes into account that EMF is much weaker than radiation from an atom bomb, the lag period of causing brain cancer could be much longer than what Dr. Teo assumed.

An international study found that gliomas were 40% more common in high cell phone users than in low cell phone users. For meningiomas the high cell phone users had 15% more meningiomas than low cell phone users. A previous British study assuming a lag period of 10 years found no gliomas in children and young persons as I reported 12 years ago. But this data might change with a lag period of 20 or 30 years or longer.

Political manoeuvres

The cigarette industry did not want to admit that cigarette smoke was causing lung cancer. In a similar vein the cell phone producers attempted to suppress any negative information about their products. They have been suppressing information that found any biological effect of EMF on tissues. And they funded studies that showed no effect by EMF.

The Guardian states: “The key strategic insight animating corporate propaganda campaigns is that a given industry doesn’t have to win the scientific argument about safety to prevail – it only has to keep the argument going. Keeping the argument going amounts to a win for industry, because the apparent lack of certainty helps to reassure customers, fend off government regulations and deter lawsuits that might pinch profits.” By pursuing this strategy over 30 years the industry has been very successful to undermine any scientist who found that cancer of the brain and cancer of the adrenal glands can occur after prolonged exposure to EMF.

What is the truth about EMF?

The National Cancer Institute

The findings of the National Cancer Institute review are that there is no evidence that the exposure rate or intensity of EMF is strong enough to pose any risks to children or adults. It did acknowledge that exposure to living within 1 kilometer of high voltage power lines could cause leukemia in children. But EMF exposure is not comparable to EMF from these high power lines. The problem with the attitude of the National Cancer institute is that they don’t mention how the lag period can delay the occurrence of cancer by several decades. In other words, their observation time was cut short, and they simply concluded prematurely that EMF could not cause cancer.

World Health Organization

The WHO has done a thorough review of the world literature on the topic of EMF and possible effects on humans. It did acknowledge that the top 10% of heavy cell phone users are at a higher risk of gliomas and meningiomas as mentioned above. EMF exposure has to last for at least 10 years for this to occur. But the vast majority of cell phone users show no effect on the brain or elsewhere. The WHO makes the point that brain cancers may be more common, if EMF exposure to a person is 10 years or longer. The International Agency for Research on Cancer has classified EMF as “possibly carcinogenic to humans”. It means that more exposure, longer duration of exposure, and closer tissue contact with EMF could cause cancer.

Cancer literature supports that cell phones can cause cancer after all

In a website by Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby several factors come up that support the notion that EMG is capable of causing DNA damage to cells given the right circumstances.

Children are much more vulnerable in their brains than adults to get brain cancer. As a result, when children play with cell phones and other gadgets that emit EMF they will be more likely to develop brain cancer later in life.
Acoustic neuromas in the auditory nerve are 5-fold more likely to develop in children than in adults.
Swedish researcher, Prof. Lennart Hardell presented a talk at a cancer conference, which stated the following: People who started to use cell phones before the age of 20 had a 5-fold risk to get gliomas, which is a brain cancer type.
Other research showed that exposure of children to EMF from cordless phones in a household caused a 4-fold higher risk of developing gliomas later in life than controls who did not have EMF exposure.
Keith Scott-Mumby also stated that brain tissue of children absorbed EMF twice as much as adults do, and similarly, bone marrow of children absorbed EMF 10 times as much as adults do.
An Indian study in 2005 was comparing people who had no EMF exposure with people who used a cell phone for 1 to 15 hours per day. DNA damage was measured from buccal scrapings (the lining inside the cheek). The controls had only 4% of DNA damage. The frequent cell phone users had DNA damage in 39.75% of their buccal scrapings. We know from other literature that the first step to developing cancer is a mutation of the DNA. After a certain lag period cancer can develop in tissue with mutated DNA.

Cell Phones Can Cause Cancer After All

Conclusion

EMF, the low-grade radiation of electronic gadgets like i-phones, cell phones in general and cordless phones, has an effect on our body cells. We are not aware of this effect. But the body knows on a cellular level that part of our DNA has been damaged. Fortunately, we do have protective mechanisms in place that safe us from most of these damages. But children who are not fully developed yet are at a disadvantage. Their bone marrow and brains are much more prone to develop various types of leukemia and brain cancers. This is why it makes sense to limit their exposure to EMF emitting devices.

At this point the government institutions have not developed recommendations what to do about this problem. The industry has no interest in providing guidelines, as they want to sell more gadgets and increase their market share.

Add to this that even the wiring in a house is sending out weak signals of EMF, which is added to all of the other effects of EMF from cell phones, TV and computer use. We need to rethink our exposure to EMF and balance our lifestyle with other activities where we are not subject to this exposure.

We also need to eat an anti-cancer diet, like a Mediterranean diet. This diet has shown to be an anti-inflammatory and antioxidant diet preventing cancer. All of this can balance our exposure to EMF and offer us preventative measures to stay healthy.