Chronic Diseases Demystified Website describing ALS or Lou Gehrig disease from experimental point.
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There is a new revolution on the horizon which will positively affect human lives. It is driven by the feedback mankind has been receiving in the last 50+ years. Today people start feeling the effects of this unpleasant but highly constructive feedback in a stronger, more intensive and urgent way. This is the reason why things will start moving forward and good changes will follow. This peaceful revolution will be a food revolution.
Why Food revolution?
People already started revealing and rediscovering the power of food. This long time underestimated factor will soon show its real power and for many very surprising effects in determining human health.
You mean people will become healthier as a result of dramatic changes made to their diet?
Exactly. It is not surprising healthy food is a big factor. Every adult person knows that. However the society already created such system and environment in which the “healthy” property is so fuzzy and unspecific that people used to treat these trends in the similar way they treat fashion trends. In clothing one can be happy with any style and society does not have big issues even with quite weird and really extravagant styles. The freedom and diversity is supported. However this does not hold with food we eat and people are slowly realizing it.
I would agree on the importance of food, but why do you think something is changing?
Well first there needs to be a motivation for any changes to start happening. Do you have any idea?
Sure. People would like to live longer, perhaps 100 years on average. This is the ongoing target. The length of life is increasing.
This is a valid thought. But there is one big growing problem. It is called chronic diseases. Would you be able to incorporate it in your previous answer?
I see because I know your website. The problem is the overall quality of life not its length. It is more about being able to live a life with minimal limitations and enjoy it even in higher age, right?
Exactly! You can take a look at below graphs (and if you are interested more check this website). The explosive occurrence of chronic diseases is a wake up call for many people and they start asking questions. While some are concerned or even frightened, some are already studying and introducing changes.
Nice charts and I see the point. Diseases like cancer, diabetes, hypertension and myriad of all those terrible “syndrome” like diseases make enjoying life after age of 40 more and more harder. But still, why do you think this can change? Science is trying hard and the treatment therapies in cancer is getting better and better, right?
This is not enough. Younger generations, as always, want more. This is the main driver. It is about having more control. It is also about managing the risk. It makes sense to live healthier life and if still something bad happens, then medical services including the latest hi-tec toys will be handy. It is a generational thing. New generation always looks critically on the world and then after years of spontaneous revolting these people start making changes. There are many examples from history. Just consider the second half of 20th century – the awful era of racism in United States, the war in Vietnam and Hippies, culture of freedom and peace. End of Cold war in Europe and associated changes in many European countries. Internet and huge progress in technology which is accelerating everything due to easy information exchange and communication. It looks like every generation comes with certain mission 😀 It just needs to mature a bit and then it will partially break or destroy something not great and create something better.
That sounds rationally. So now you think there will be generation focused on food instead of politics or existing regimes?
This way it sounds a bit weird. But you need to see things in wider contexts. Food is key condition of life and this means lot of things are subject to it. It needs to be obtained and distributed. In order to have food of high quality which supports our organism even in the long term people need to resolve many problems. In past the focus was not on quality but rather on quantity. You can read something about mass or intensive agriculture. It is logical, after two world wars people had to be fed but now this needs to change. Then the distribution is key aspect as well – it is the long distribution chain which makes people to add all those conservants and chemicals into otherwise good food. Here again people sacrifice quality in favor of longer shelf life of food. Then there is incredible amount of industrial food people got used to eat – this type of food is not meeting the new requirement, it does not support good organism function in long term. People are very creative so they came with whole bunch of techniques how to make rather unhealthy food tasty enough. This is major issue still today. As usually there are monumental financial interests. But every generation will find something to touch in break/destroy & re-create way. I´m just hoping this area will be picked and I think this is already work in progress to certain extent.
Well you are right, the food is linked with many things. Agriculture, BIO certifications, industry changes. I actually see that – it is clear. It is also linked with the growing interest in environment, greenhouse gas effect & global warming, ocean looting and polluting, right?
100% agreement. You see, food is everywhere. However going back to my big topic, I can add that the direct consequences of the current state of our civilization are chronic diseases.
Health issues are part of our lives historically – chronic diseases existed even before right?
Sure, but the trend is obvious and we are yet harvesting fruits from past (toxicity, habbits). And by the way this argument using “past” I see quite often. People who don´t feel the importance or even urgency of certain problem usually say this. It is like people have always died on something opinion. Cancer existed even before and today many people say viruses are part of life so why all the global COVID stir? This is a sign of people who don´t feel endangered and thus they don´t want to bother and they don´t want to be bothered, individualists one would tend to say. It is actually very dangerous. If these people form a clear majority then unpleasant lesson usually comes as a result of their inability to see coming danger. Once hit with it, many of these people are the first who call for justice and punishments. However there is even different counter argument – past is past, present is about improving things. If people died on some disease just 30 years ago, it is not an argument for today, now we want to cure them and prevent others to get ill. People always try to do more then in past, provide better service, better healthcare. That´s us humans, right?
Of course, of course. I will remember that and be more cautious next time. Anyway is the food so powerful? Can it make a difference in cancer stats or diabetes or even the Alzheimer, Parkinson and other diseases?
I believe so but why to begin with these heavy weights? People should explore this power using much less serious issues. For example various skin disorders like acne, food allergies or allergies in general, blood pressure issues. The thing is that these are the first and non-criticial (let´s ignore serious anaphylactic allergic reactions) signals the organism is moving out of homeostatic state. It is the very first alarm which should tell people something like “Hey, this is problem, don´t ignore it and make smart changes to get back to homeostatic state“. The problem is people don´t think in this way, nobody taught them that, nobody warned them enough and even worse the system called medical healthcare system is not doing its job perfectly. It should be every person´s physician who should spread this knowledge. However many of them completelly fail. Instead they claim something like it is normal, it just happens at this age, and if they don´t send the patient home right away with “come in one month for checkup“, then they often provide a solution in a form of symptom suppressing drug. Despite they are doctors they are also patients. They have the same diseases, they are often obese and look unhealthy. That is why they can say to patient: “… but this is normal, I have it too“. I personally have heard this in the medical office. What a terrible attitude. In short, there is certain strange acceptance of these states, no big rush, no big interest in investigating root cause. What can happen? It is a lottery. Either such person introduces changes, often without even knowing and gets better or the person trusts his physician and does nothing and continues in the same style. And that is the worst thing one can do, because these light issues evolve over years and decades into much more serious problems.
Oh, I see. So the shortcut of thinking about healing cancer with proper diet is not the smartest, we should think about the whole chain of events. I got it and I need to say I know allergies or even hypertension can be cured or significantly improved just by proper change to diet. However what food can offer in case someone got that far already and is in deep troubles?
The power of healthy food remains same. It is a simple cure. However it is not a rapid cure. If we put aside some really bad, rotten or poisoned food then even unhealthy food is not rapidly effecting. It often takes years or decades before the bad food habits result in disease. Anyway the human body really is miraculous so it always does maximum to prevent bad things to happen despite receving bad input for a long time and in the opposite case it has ability to relatively quickly recover once optimal input is started to regularly provided. So it all depends on the situation, how far problems already got and let´s also note by food I mean also supplementation which can have absolutely crucial role. People can be surprised what difference simple supplements like core minerals and vitamines and other natural extracts (herbs, muschrooms, sea vegetables) can do. It is all about knowledge – if people knew what magnesium is used for in their body or how Zinc/Selenium and B vitamines are important for crucial internal processes they would perhaps look at this “food topic” differently.
Let´s stick to cancer please and not some of the most aggressive types. Is it rational to expect improvement when optimal diet or food is provided?
Well, I´m not an expert on cancer. Still I would tend to say in such cases the optimal food can really significantly boost the healing and recovering processes. I judge that based on simple logic. Human as a living organism requires air, water and food. Conditions to drink clean water and breath clean (relatively clean) air can be met easily, what is left is food. If anything went wrong in the organism then any repair works are not for free. Now what the organism needs, besides water and oxygen, critical compounds for all the chemical reactions? It requires energy and then specific substances like essential amino acids, ready-to-use vitamines, minerals and enzymes which build or break other substances. Let´s suppose there is an optimal set of inputs for human organism and this optimal set of inputs differs based on the patient organism state. For instance healthy person which does not show any symptoms of apparent deficiency can receive a basic balanced set of all before mentioned components. However a sick person will require different mix. Cancer is a problem of immune system and immune system is a very expensive from energetic point. If person receives sufficient energy and core building blocks needed by immunity (minerals, enzymes, amino acids?) then recovery is much more likely to happen. If there is a time then changes in diet can really do a miracle. Often patients already require external help, surgery or some innovative therapy with lesser collateral damage and the food factor will become key in the recovery period. Also let´s not forget development of cancer is believed to be influenced by emotional factors. If that is hard to believe than a simple link between unbalanced long term emotional states and immune system power/condition is already known. The emotional state of every human being is neglected because emotions are so natural for us, but it has such importance, future will tell us more. That would be a long discussion, so in short, watch and introspect your emotions too.
Noted. This is definitely encouraging information. You mentioned optimal inputs, but this is the problem, right? People lead never ending discussion on what is healthy or what is the best for us.
This is true, but honestly it should not be such a complex debate. Just think about it. Human organism is complex but science knows what the body needs – core nutrients. So where is the problem? I can tell you right away. The problem is we are humans and we have side interests. Since we already discussed how food is central to us and what all activities are related – we should not be surprised by the fact people want to make money on it. Food & Health are so enormously burdened with financial interests that we already pay unaccepted price. People need to eat and people need to be healthy – that answers everything if you still have problems understanding why financial pressure is so strong there. Neverending and stable demand. It is a world of hidden lobby which makes the debate so complex and it is not hard to divide people. People have different tastes and people take things personally so they are always ready to fight for their feeling or habit. Anyway it has very little to do with the fundamental needs of our bodies. It is about tastes. This is going to be the primary target for the “revolutionary forces” I´m predicting. I´m just hoping no stupid radicalism will arise and it will be smooth by-example gradual change.
Hmm, interesting so you are not a fan of any modern diet?
No I´m not a fan of any dogmatic diet. Honestly I don´t have a good overview in this but those only carbs or only proteins, only raw, vegan diets I don´t consider rational. The thing is that I really believe in some equilibrium principle so any one-sided diet is not acceptable for me. I believe there is some default balanced healthy diet where all components including meat are represented but as always and with everything the trick is in the right amount. These right amounts are then dynamic and change over time – if you are kid, if you are young or senior age, if you are an office worker or lumberjack, if you are healthy or overweight or chronically ill, this and more matters so any crowd targeted diet has little relevance for me. In the last few years I learned a lot because I was not ignorable to my body signals. I significantly decreased amount of meat (at least by 80%) but it does not mean I became an extremist and refuse it completelly. I also dramatically increased amount of vegetables and fruit or almost entirely eliminated industrial food. I think this is closer to the theoretical equilibrium than any modern diet. It seems to me these diets are more fashion and style motivated, people want to differantiate and the creative business driven minds and marketing gurus step in with diet for everyone – but not as individual as I mentioned before. For example the low carb diet (keto) needs to be a real nonsense, only rigged scientist would recommend it. Now it is cool and it looks it work for some but what about the long term? I´m not a specialist but just few simple facts completelly disqualify such silly diet in my eyes. Too much of meat proteins need to put extra load on kidney and digestive system and believe me, the system is very robust and can withstand a lot but at some point it will be too much. Also as humans we rather need to limit meat consumption and dramatically decrease it – just look at what is happening in oceans. We owe it to nature no matter how much we like it. Good thing is fashion changes quickly and so do people change their cool diets. Frankly speaking I´m conservative person and I clearly see people do with food weird things and use it for something else than its primary purpose.
What an exhaustive answer. I almost felt asleep … 😁 Just kidding, it makes me to think about it. But what do you mean by those weird things and using food for something else?
Food is food. Its purpose is to keep us alive and healthy. It is not really meant for playing with it in the way these modern chefs demonstrate. I´m not against a well served quality meal but sometimes I have feeling it is just too much. Also the newly coined term Food Porn – What is that? This all is a sign that people are putting food somewhere else and treating it inappropriately. Normal person knows there is just one porn. Adding this word to others is just another attempt of little bit disturbed individuals to get attention and do some crazy things with food. It would be better if people get little bit more conservative and realized the importance of food in terms of core nutrients, not in weird combinations or shapes. Anyway I would not restrict anything, people need to have freedom to make their choice, that is clear.
Great! I definitely agree but you know humans, it will be interesting for sure. So is there anything else you would like to add yet?
Yes, there is one thing which I have not highlighted. When it comes to food, it is not only about nutrients, vitamines and so on. The food we eat has also another consequence. Can you guess?
No, sorry. I´m already tired.
Ok 😊 The thing is the food we eat also co-creates the complete internal environment, including microbial ecosystem. It is called human microbiom. It is still not well analyzed area despite a lot has been done. What people don´t know is the myriad of mutual direct and indirect relationships among all the microbs living within our bodies. Evolutionary we again are already programmed for certain right configuration – again some homeostatic state which we don´t know exactly how it is defined but we try to approximate it. In this state human organism can face almost any threat in terms of infections, viruses etc. It is so perfectly designed so that it is practically unbeatable machine – in theory though. However just knowing this can help people to realize where the real limits are. In reality there is a lot of factors which work against this homeostatic state and that is the reason why we all are sometimes sick – perhaps except some gurus/masters 😃 Now the ingested food is one of the most important factors which affects which micro-organisms in which amounts will live inside of us. One-sided industrial food poor in core nutrients and minerals will weaken immunity and will encourage more pathogenic bacteria and viruses. Many problems can arise, if intestine bacterium leaks out and somehow gets to brain or other part for which no symbiotic relationship was formed, it can be a huge problem. However this all can happen only when immunity is weak so the patrolling cells won´t catch these “refugees”. Viruses or even bacteria are also masters in adapting to immune response and often employ sophisticated methods, like “trojan horse” attack which people know from computer world or have seen Brad Pitt in the historical epos movie in cinema. In reality virus particle can easily hijack even immune cell. I can mention for example the dreaded Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) which infiltrates B cells and even worse it is known to be capable of overriding core security protocol, cell death (apoptosis). It is like Terminator T-1000 who could morph into police officer (who he killed), get his police car and pass through all patrols and police roadblocks (lymphatic nodes). This all can get very dangerous and it all can start with bad food which does not supply immunity well. Remember that! It´s COVID era and hopefully we reach a POST-COVID era soon and humans will start asking questions and finding causes, weak spots and improvement areas. Not just in all the systems but also on individual basis.
Wow! Thank you very much. I think I gotta run buy some fruits & vegetables … Bye!
Great idea, bye 🖐.
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