My apologies for this slow response, I was on an extended weekend get-away with limited internet.
Jan18 wrote:Where do you get Braggs Olive Oil?
We get Braggs Organic, Extra Virgin, unfiltered, unrefined olive oil at a specialized grocery/supplement store around here called Natural Grocers. They are a chain and in many areas but not everywhere. It can also be found on Amazon. I don’t know if it’s the best EVOO, but it does seem to be good quality.
Jan18 wrote:I would be interested on your thoughts about the Blue Zones.
I’ve not read that book or studied Blue Zone populations, so I really can’t comment too much. Certainly diet has a lot to do with their longevity, but so do many other factors that they likely have in common:
- -inheriting good mitochondria and gut bugs from mom
-being born vaginally vs cesarean section
-getting breast feed, being exposed to clean air, water, and light (as in lots of sunshine – not artificial light)
-following circadian rhythm, being active during daylight hours and not subjecting lots of blue light when it's dark out and getting good quality sleep
-eating in alignment with the seasons (as in fruit when in season, not year round, and not the super sweet fruit we get at the grocery store) and calorie restricting when food is scarce
-having a good, supportive social life
-keeping active throughout lifetime – not going to the gym and running 10ks, but working the fields, tending the goats, whatever – just moving
-And of course, diet. The folks from blue zones eat fresh, real, whole food, not processed, long shelf life, sugar charged, fructose corn syrup added, preservatives added, dyes added, etc. Also the oils they use are “virgin” such as in olive and coconut oil, not made with chemical processing, Their meat comes from natural sources, not artificially fed grains to fatten them up and treated with antibiotics.
Jan18 wrote:the conclusion the author of the Blue Zones book came to was that what the various zones had in common were "greens and beans." Yet Gundry has outlawed beans. In fact, I am a bit perplexed about lectins, overall.
I think saying that “greens and beans” are the key to longevity is an oversimplification, as would saying all lectins are bad and everyone should stay away from them. Again, everything in context.
Dr Gundry is not against lectins per se, but his experience in treating thousands of patients in his restorative medicine practice after his career as a heart transplant surgeon and gaining expertise on immunity has taught him a lot about autoimmunity. Dr Gundry has indicated that everyone is sensitive to lectins to some degree and much of that sensitivity is related to the health or lack thereof of the gut. For those with a healthy gut, the sensitivity is often minimal and unimpactful with the benefits of the micronutrients and polyphenols from the food source outweighing the negatives. But some are more sensitive than others, and
Western populations seem to be particularly sensitive given our practices, diet, and consuming food generated by industrial farming:
- -The use of antibiotics in western medical practices has been pervasive, thus degrading gut biome and integrity.
-Our sensitivity to lectins has raised greatly due the recent introduction to chemical and other body disruptors. Such things food additives and food preservatives. The introduction of NSAIDS pain pills in the early 1970’s. Stomach Acid Reducers (Prilosec, Prevacid, Nexium) plastic food packaging/containers (like those containing BPA), petrochemical fertilizers introduced after World War II, herbicides, biocides, food that is now Genetically Modified (GMOs), skin-care products, hand sanitizers, on and on. These are compromising today’s body to deal with lectins.
- We eat a lot more lectins today than in the past, largely because the dietary guidelines changed in 1980 resulting in greater carbohydrate consumption.
-Foods today have been modified and contain more lectins than that same food product did that our parents/grandparents ate.
Those in blue zones eating greens and beans probably don’t suffer leaky gut issues and probably aren’t nearly as sensitive to lectins as we are.
In a December 2017 interview
https://articles.mercola.com/sites/arti ... ealth.aspx Dr Gundry stated he’s not against lectins and even said he is fine with reintroducing lectins for the benefits after leaky gut issues have healed.
Excerpts from Dr Gundry in the interview.:
You know, I’m not against these things. [lectins] In fact, I’ve got a bean recipe in my book. All I’m saying is that we have to be very cognizant of the lectin content in grains and beans, and that there are ways to destroy lectins, by pressure cooking the beans. It makes them perfectly safe if you want to eat beans.
I’ve been doing this for 15 to 17 years now. I’ve amassed a rather impressive file of thousands of patients. As time went on, I had better and better tests to look at the inflammatory response of the immune system. I wrote about that in response to removing or introducing some major dietary lectins. I didn’t do this with an agenda. I didn’t have a grudge on my shoulder against lectins. If I could eat mashed potatoes, French fries and phenomenal French bread every day, I’d probably be a happy guy. I would probably be a lot sicker, like I used to be. But I have nothing against these things. It’s just that as the data came forward from thousands of people, very distinct patterns emerged, reproducible patterns. I could reintroduce these things and literally watch the immune system get turned on again. Then I could remove some of these factors and watch the immune system calm down. There was clearly a cause and effect.
Almost every author in the autoimmune space, absolutely removing major lectin-containing foods is kind of part and parcel of the treatment of autoimmune disease. You look at Dr. Izabella Wentz or Dr. Amy Myers. Dr. Dale Bredesen is now on my program. Dr. David Perlmutter removes lectins. You [Dr Mercola] recommend removing lectins. I mean really, anybody who talks in this space and not remove lectins – everybody else is removing lectins. I think that’s a very important part of treating autoimmune disease. Certainly, I’ve written about this and shown it in actual patients.
I think that when you look at traditional cultures that have not been inundated by antibiotics, by nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), by proton pump inhibitors with all of our personal care items, then I think you can make the argument. In fact, these guys’ defense system against lectins is pretty doggone intact. They have a really good tolerance for lectins. On the other hand, our defense system in the West has been decimated….
Everybody’s a little bit different. But I think, like I say in the book [Plant Paradox], that once we kind of get the gut back in shape, that we solve the leaky gut problem – we could see it on lab tests – then it’s time to – if you want to reintroduce dietary lectins – start with small vegetables, peel and deseed them if you want to. Certainly, pressure cooking solves the problem for most people. But I have no problem and actually urge people to start reintroducing dietary lectins.