Comments on: More supporting evidence for the sugar hypothesis

By: Cynthia Duke

Cynthia Duke — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 01:01:36 +0000

Dr. Eades,
I am 61 yoa, had 6 gestational diabetic pregnancies, and upon looking back have never had an acceptable blood glucose level. My fasting insulin is less than 1 and my HA1C about 13, I have never taken insulin, my BG stays in the 200’s unless I eat simple carbs. Would the no carb/low complex carb regimen work for me. I want to heal my pancreas and would like to contact you by phone for a consultation. Thank you

For medico-legal reasons I can’t do phone consults. Given your history as presented in your comment, I think a no-carb/low-carb regimen would work fine for you. As low as your insulin is, you may not be making a lot. You should find a physician who understands low-carb diets and work with him/her to get you going.

By: Carol Moore

Carol Moore — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 18:22:43 +0000

I am thinking seriously about the carnivore connection and was wondering …what caused the death of the hunters…how long did they live…how active were they?

By: Matt

Matt — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 19:33:02 +0000

I was in the eye dr.’s office today, and she had some sort of diabetes magazine published by Better Homes and Gardens. The cover photo was of some sort of apple cake, about 5 inches high. Inside it said (I swear) that to control your diabetes it is important that you eat a low-cholesterol, low calorie, low saturated fat diet. No mention of carbohydrates? How do they even have the gall to get away with that?? I have no concept of how the system could be THAT broken.

In other news I have been eagerly awaiting the posting of minutes from the 2010 Dietary Guidelines meeting from 29 Jan, and they have not yet been posted. http://www.cnpp.usda.gov/DGAsMeeting2.htm Hopefully they are having a tough time incorporating the low carb research that I sent them. Dare to dream eh?

Dare, indeed.

By: Trinkwasser

Trinkwasser — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 22:56:42 +0000

A sorry state of affairs it is. I wonder why Kirschenbaum thinks that those same 75 percent of genes didn�t cause kids to be obese 40 years ago when the percentage of fat in the diet was a lot higher than it is today?

$6350/month will help you think *anything*

Is this guy a financial genius or what? He has developed a reversible diet thus guaranteeing plenty of repeat business.

Give a man a cure and you have an income for a day. Give a man an incurable but treatable condition and you have an income for life.

By: heart disease prevention

heart disease prevention — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 09:09:54 +0000

Thanks for sharing this post! Very informative!

By: beth

beth — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 21:07:55 +0000

I’m glad to see your support for relying primarily on breastmilk for the first year of a baby’s life in a comment above. My son wasn’t big on solids until more like 15 months (ate a wide variety of tastes, textures, but small quantities). My daughter is approaching 2 and still enthusiastically nursing along with eating solids (she has always been more interested in them than DS, but prefers meats, cheese, sour cream, etc. to sweet tastes or carbs, funny enough). Neither child started on any solids until 6 months and we skipped rice cereal altogether.
I did want to add that while I am thrilled to see you actively encouraging moms to rely on breastmilk for the first year of life, many *non* primitive moms nurse their babies into toddlerhood (2-3 years or later), LOL. The AAP recommends a minimum of one year of breastfeeding (with no “upper limit” established), and the WHO recommends a minimum of 2 years of breastfeeding, including in industrialized nations.
Anyway, kudos for the overall support for BFing

Any chance you could do some posting on PCOS in the near future? I’m a woman without weight issues but with PCOS…I lowcarb and take metformin. Past tests for IR haven’t shown IR, but metformin helped me get pregnant with DD which was a pleasant surprise

It may not have come through in my response to the comments, but I am a proponent of breast feeding until at least age 1, but for however long beyond that mother and kid are happy with it. And you are right, many primitive cultures do breast feed until toddlerhood. I don’t see a problem with it – it’s probably the way our ancient ancestors did it, which means that’s the way we’re hard wired.

I’ll see if I can come up with a post on PCOS in the future.

Thanks for the suggestion.

MRE

By: gareth

gareth — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 06:18:25 +0000

Hi DrEades,

Can you comment on the soon-to-be-released diabetic medicine Liraglutide(GLP 1- glucagon like peptide 1) that promises to regenerate(to some degree) beta cells?

Also, what are your parameters for blood sugar and HbA1C?

Thank you for your great blog.

I don’t know enough about the new medicine to comment intelligently. I do know that a lot of good work has been done on GLP-1, but I don’t know exactly what this drug does. I’ll give it a look. Thanks for pushing me.

I like to keep blood sugar levels in the 75-85 level and HgbA1C as low as possible, somewhere below 5 if possible.

By: kris

kris — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 13:02:35 +0000

The antibiotic concern is due to the belief that cattle are given antibiotics and as a result we ingest them making us more resistent to them in general.

The concern for the planet is related to the enormous amount of cattle raised and how their waste breaks down into chemicals that end in rivers and water tables that upset the eco balance in a negative way. I believe this was explained in a book called “diet for a small planet”, a book from the early 80’s i believe, promoting vegetarianism.

Btw, I was a vegetarian for around 10 years and now trying to fight the obesity it caused by low carbing.

I think the antibiotic concerns and the planet-related concerns are total hogwash. But that’s just me. Others may think differently. I’ll try to do a post on my perspective on all this in due course.

By: lovebeef

lovebeef — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 18:39:49 +0000

I�m wondering what other people think. I�ve been doing some research on healthy eating and low carb diets in particular and came up with this one site called OpposingViews.com where there are debates by experts on various subjects. There is one debate called: �Are Low Carb Diets Healthy?�.
I like the idea that these people are experts in their fields, but this one guy says something that gives me pause. He says something to the effect that eating whole plant foods is associated with having good health but diets high in animal protein and fats are not. He also says that in a global sense, a sustained low carbohydrate diet which comes mainly from animal foods creates significant challenges for the planet and also other health issues for people such as antibiotic resistance.�
What do you think he means when he says that a diet which comes primarily from animal proteins is bad for the planet? That�s the first time I ever heard that. If you have time, take a look and let me know what you think by posting your comment. Thanks! http://www.opposingviews.com/questions/are-low-carb-diets-healthy

I think the idea that the eating meat “creates significant challenges for the planet” is absolutely absurd. As is the idea that eating meat causes antibiotic resistance. This idiocy has almost become a religion for some. I will have to post at length on this in due course.

By: Peter Silverman

Peter Silverman — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 17:36:46 +0000

Re: my puzzlement about why Asians on the traditional diet (mostly rice) didn’t get much diabetes or heart disease and you said read Gary Taubes.

I actually asked him that question and he said he didn’t know but he thought it was because in the past they didn’t refine the rice as much and they didn’t eat sugar.

I also asked him why vegetarians are skinnier and he gave the same answer, he thought maybe it was because they tend to eat less refined foods.

My take on the situation is that Asians on a traditional diet don’t eat refined carbs and they don’t eat many calories. Even a high-carb diet (as a percentage of calories) isn’t all that high if the calories are low. And, traditionally, Asians following a traditional diet (who usually live in rural areas) work pretty hard. Plus, they generally eat a fair amount of fish, which has fats that are protective. These are all points Taubes makes in his book (or maybe were left on the cutting room floor when the book was edited down from 700-800 pages to about half that. I read the first version and the last, but can’t remember if this was in both or just the first).

As Asians become more Westernized they are beginning to develop all the diseases that we do.

I think the same applies to some vegetarians, but not all. It’s not a general finding that vegetarians are all skinny. In fact, some are downright fat. If they consume small amounts of food that isn’t very energy dense, it stands to reason that they’ll be slim. Which also doesn’t necessarily equate to health.