By Dr. Mercola

When it comes to treating ailments such as chronic pain, I definitely prefer nontoxic options to drugs and surgery. Americans use 80 percent of all the opioids sold worldwide¹ — a testament to the pervasiveness of pain in this country — and with drug overdoses now being the ninth leading cause of death in the U.S., we clearly need safer alternatives.

Acupuncture is one such alternative. Research shows it can be an effective option for a number of health problems, but pain in particular. Contrary to allopathic, symptom-based medicine, acupuncture aims to eliminate the root cause of your problem, which is said to originate in a dysfunction in your body’s energetic meridian system.

Basic Principles of Acupuncture

Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) views the body as a cohesive system where everything within it is interconnected. In other words, it recognizes that each part of your body has the ability to affect all other parts.

There are 14 major energy channels called meridians that flow through your body. An energy called qi (or chi) circulates along the meridians to all parts of your body, including the internal organs and every cell. This qi is the vital force that literally keeps us alive. Vibrant health is a result of balanced, unimpeded flow of energy through your body.

According to TCM, illness and pain are the byproducts of energy blockages somewhere along one or more meridians. Each acupuncture point along the meridian acts like a pass-through or gate. Energy can get “bottlenecked” in these points, slowing down the flow, sometimes to the point of standstill. This is the precursor to pain and illness.

By inserting a thin needle into the congested or “clogged” area, it opens the gate and allows the energy to flow again. With qi flowing smoothly, your body can re-regulate the flow of energy, repair itself and maintain its own optimal level of health. Herbs and other therapies such as guacha, cupping and moxibustion — the burning of herbs on or over the skin — can be used to support the healing.

Acupuncture May Offer Drug-Free Pain Relief

In a 2012 analysis^2,3 of 29 published studies involving more than 17,900 participants, researchers concluded that acupuncture has a definite effect in reducing chronic pain — more so than standard pain treatment. Real acupuncture also produced slightly better results than using sham needles, which suggests the benefits of needling are due to more than the placebo effect.

By going the extra mile and retrieving the raw data on self-reported pain, and standardizing the various study participants’ responses, they were also able to more accurately assess and compare them as a whole. Overall, the team discovered a “clear and robust” effect of acupuncture in the treatment of back pain, neck pain, shoulder pain, osteoarthritis and headaches.

On a scale of zero to 100, participants who started out with a pain rating of 60 experienced an average 30-point drop (a 50 percent reduction) in response to the real acupuncture treatments (using needles); a 25-point drop when receiving sham acupuncture; and a mere 17-point drop when receiving “standard pain care” that did not include acupuncture. According to the lead author:⁴

“The effects of acupuncture are statistically significant and different from those of sham or placebo treatments … So we conclude that the effects aren’t due merely to the placebo effect.”

Acupuncture Cuts Pain by Boosting Nitric Oxide

While there’s been a great deal of controversy as to whether or not acupuncture works “for real,” and if so, how, new research presents an answer to this question. The study^5,6,7,8,9 in question was conducted by researchers at LA BioMed.¹⁰ The research laboratory has developed a noninvasive device capable of sampling biomolecules over specific skin regions.

Using this device, they were able to determine that when acupuncture is properly administered, nitric oxide (NO) is released at the “acupoints” — the acupuncture sites into which the needles are inserted. NO is a soluble gas that is continually produced from the amino acid L-arginine inside your cells. This gas plays an important role in supporting normal endothelial function and protecting your cells’ powerhouses, the mitochondria. It’s also a potent vasodilator.

By relaxing and dilating your blood vessels, NO improves blood flow and lowers blood pressure. NO also encourages release of natural analgesics (pain relieving chemicals) in your body. Together, this helps explain why and how acupuncture works to reduce pain.

A number of acupuncture studies have produced negative results. The reason for this may have to do with the way the acupuncture is done. In order for NO release to occur, “de qi” had to be elicited. De qi feels a bit like an electric shock. Westerners are not accustomed to this sensation, which is why many Western acupuncturists won’t do it.

De qi is elicited by twisting the inserted needle. In this study, they twisted the needle for two minutes or until de qi was elicited. They then manipulated the needles for two minutes every five minutes, for a total of 20 minutes each treatment. Heat can also amplify the effectiveness of the treatment and, here, the application of heat also increased NO release at the acupoints.

Acupuncture Reduces Osteoarthritis Pain

A number of studies support the use of acupuncture for pain. A large, landmark study^11,12 published in 2004, which assessed whether acupuncture might work for osteoarthritis pain, produced remarkably positive results.

A total of 570 patients diagnosed with osteoarthritis of the knee were enrolled for this 26-week-long trial — the longest and largest randomized, controlled phase III clinical trial of acupuncture ever conducted. None of the participants had tried acupuncture before, and none had had knee surgery in the previous six months. Nor had they used steroid injections.

The participants were randomly assigned to receive one of three treatments:  acupuncture, sham acupuncture or self-help strategies recommended by the Arthritis Foundation (the latter served as a control group). Significant differences in response was seen by week eight and 14, and at the end of the trial, the group receiving real acupuncture had a 40 percent decrease in pain and a nearly 40 percent improvement in function compared to baseline assessments — a 33 percent difference in improvement over the sham group.

According to the late Dr. Stephen E. Straus, who served as the first director of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM), which is a part  of the National Institutes of Health:¹³

“For the first time, a clinical trial with sufficient rigor, size and duration has shown that acupuncture reduces the pain and functional impairment of osteoarthritis of the knee. These results also indicate that acupuncture can serve as an effective addition to a standard regimen of care and improve quality of life for knee osteoarthritis sufferers.

NCCAM has been building a portfolio of basic and clinical research that is now revealing the power and promise of applying stringent research methods to ancient practices like acupuncture.”

Other Evidence Showing What Acupuncture ‘Does’

Boosting NO release isn’t the only mechanism by which acupuncture reduces pain. Previous research suggests acupuncture stimulates your central nervous system to release natural chemicals that alter bodily systems, pain and other biological processes. In 2003, the World Health Organization (WHO) conducted an extensive review and analysis of clinical trials involving acupuncture.¹⁴ According to this report,¹⁵ acupuncture:

• Stimulates the conduction of electromagnetic signals, which may release immune system cells or painkilling chemicals
• Activates your body’s natural opioid system, which may help reduce pain or induce sleep
• Stimulates your hypothalamus and pituitary gland, which modulate numerous body systems
• Alters secretion of neurotransmitters and neurohormones, which may positively influence brain chemistry

According to the WHO’s analysis, “Some of these studies have provided incontrovertible scientific evidence that acupuncture is more successful than placebo treatments in certain conditions.” The report again confirmed its benefits for pain, saying:

“The proportion of chronic pain relieved by acupuncture is generally in the range 55–85 percent, which compares favorably with that of potent drugs (morphine helps in 70 percent of cases) and far outweighs the placebo effect (30–35 percent)”

Acupuncture Reduces Pain by Shutting Down Certain Brain Regions

In the BBC documentary, “The Science of Acupuncture,” which originally aired in 2015, a team of researchers conducted an experiment that had never been done before. Using high-tech MRI imaging, they visually demonstrated that acupuncture has a very real effect on the brain. Acupuncture, it turns out, does something completely unexpected — it deactivates certain parts of the brain, particularly in the limbic system, decreasing neuronal activity, opposed to having an activating impact.

Their experiment also clearly showed that superficial sham needling does not have this effect. Your limbic system is associated with the experience of pain, adding further evidence that something unique happens during acupuncture. It quite literally alters your experience of pain by shutting down these deeper brain regions.

Another Simple Way to Boost NO Production

As mentioned, NO can help reduce pain, and a simple way to boost your body’s NO production is by performing high intensity exercises. In the video above, I demonstrate an updated version of the “nitric oxide dump” exercise developed by Dr. Zach Bush. If you have previously watched this video, please review it again as I recently updated it to correct a couple of errors and omissions that sneaked into my previous video.

You don’t need any weights, and all it takes is three minutes, two to three times a day, with at least two hours between sessions. A key component I forgot in my earlier video is to make sure you’re breathing through your nose and not your mouth.

I am convinced that this gentler strategy — although it has not been evaluated or compared to other high intensity interval training protocols (HIIT) — is a far healthier strategy to obtain the benefits of HIIT without any of the downsides. I only wish I had known about this more effective approach earlier. Depending on the type of pain you’re struggling with, you might conceivably be able to control it through this natural NO boosting exercise.

Other Nondrug Solutions for Pain Relief

There are many other ways to address pain beside acupuncture. Below is a long list of suggestions. Clearly, there are times when pain is so severe that a narcotic pain reliever may be warranted. But even in those instances, the options that follow may allow you to at least reduce the amount you take, or the frequency at which you need to take them.

If you need an acute pain reliever, you can consider an over-the-counter (OTC) option. Research¹⁶ shows prescription-strength naproxen (Naprosyn, sold OTC in lower dosages as Aleve) provides the same pain relief as more dangerous narcotic painkillers.

However, while naproxen may be a better alternative to narcotic painkillers, it still comes with a very long list of potential side effects,¹⁷and the risks increase with frequency of use, which is why I discourage anyone from taking them, especially long term. It would be far better to try some of the nontoxic options below.

By Dr. Mercola

Your diet can have an enormous influence on how long you live and your likelihood of contracting disease. In this interview, Valter Longo Ph.D., professor of gerontology and biological sciences at the University of Southern California and director of The Longevity Institute, discusses the health benefits of a fasting-mimicking diet.

The fasting-mimicking diet developed by Longo’s team is thus named because it affects important disease and aging pathways in your body, such as insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1), IGFBP1, glucose and ketone bodies, in the same way water-only fasting does. Longo has done extensive research in one of my areas of passion, which is optimizing mitochondrial metabolism through dietary interventions. He’s also spent many years looking at the health effects of calorie restriction.

“I was a student of Roy Walford many years ago. Roy was one of the pioneers of calorie restriction. He was a medical doctor [who] was very interested in using diet to prevent and even treat diseases. That started back in the early ’90s.

Then I went on to turn to a more molecular understanding of what connects each ingredient, what connects each amino acid, the sugars, the fats, the type of fats, to the pathways that we were studying, particularly the pro-aging pathways. Two of them we discovered: the RAS-PKA pathway [and] TOR-S6 kinase. Both have now been shown to be central in the aging process, not just in simple organisms and mice but possibly also in humans,” Longo says.

Longo’s lab also discovered the role of the target of rapamycin (TOR) pathway in aging and in the protection of cells. (The TOR pathway itself was discovered by Michael Hall.) Understanding the impact of food on this pathway is essential for understanding how to optimize your diet.

Calorie Restriction and Longevity

You’ve probably heard that calorie restriction has been linked to longevity. However, the scientific evidence for this is still rather weak. Calorie restriction typically refers to cutting calories by 30 to 50 percent on a continuous or consistent basis. According to Longo, most of the long-term studies done on monkeys and other animals have produced questionable results. And, while some studies have found beneficial effects on mortality and diseases, others have not.

“This is why we never really focused on calorie restriction, but tried to get the benefits of calorie restriction and at the same time not the negative effects. That’s where these periodic fasting-mimicking diets come from,” Longo explains.

There’s also the practical challenge of actually applying calorie restriction, as most people simply cannot remain compliant on a general “starvation diet” for years on end.

The Benefits of Fasting-Mimicking Diets

Fortunately, evidence suggests you can get the molecular benefits of long-term calorie restriction by only periodically restricting calories and, more importantly, by restricting mostly proteins and sugars. This includes the long-term effects on GH and IGF-1, one of the factors that regulate growth pathways and growth genes.

IGF-1 seems to be a major player in accelerated aging, and slowing the aging process is one of the effects of Longo’s fasting-mimicking dietary intervention. Calorie restriction has also been shown to boost cellular and intracellular regeneration and rejuvenation (autophagy and mitophagy). As far as aging is concerned, IGF-1 and growth hormone are in the same axis, the growth hormone-IGF-1 axis. Studies have shown that IGF-1 and growth hormone receptor deficient mice have record-long lifespans.

“For a number of years, we followed a group of people in Ecuador who are also growth hormone receptor deficient. They have the same or very similar mutation to the mice that have record longevity.

A few years ago, we showed they seem to be protected from cancer and diabetes,” Longo says. “We suspect that this protection is also extendable to more diseases. Although they may not be very much longer-lived than their relatives, they seem to be much healthier.”

In essence, by optimizing your diet for longevity, you’re indirectly preventing most chronic degenerative diseases, and optimizing the IGF-1-growth hormone axis is a key aspect of this.

Effects of Fasting-Mimicking Diet in Mice

While you cannot fast continuously, for life, or remain on a calorie-restricted diet forever, Longo’s research shows that when you do calorie restriction intermittently, your body maintains a memory of the metabolic switch that can last a long time. This hypothesis was initially tested in simple organisms and mice, and was found to work very well.

For example, Longo placed middle-aged mice on a periodic fasting schedule in which, twice a month, the mice were placed on a restricted diet for four days. Their diet was relatively high in fats while being restricted in proteins and sugars. So, for eight days a month, they were on a low-calorie, low-protein/low-sugar diet.

The remainder of the time, they ate normally. When the volume of food was averaged out over the month, they were actually not calorie restricted at all, as they made up for the temporary restriction by eating slightly more afterward. Still, these mice had half the tumors of the control group, which had no fasting period. Even when tumors did develop in the treatment group, they developed later and were mostly benign. They also maintained better cognition with age, had less inflammation and a longer mean lifespan.

“They don’t have a longer maximum lifespan, and we suspect that is because the very old mice did not like fasting or to be on the fasting-mimicking diet,” Longo says.

“It doesn’t mean that it may not be beneficial, but I think we have to do more studies, and maybe we need to come up with a higher calorie version of the fasting-mimicking diet, which is now about 50 percent calorie restricted, so that we don’t have the good and the bad after [age] 70.

There’s no indication that before [age 70] there are any problems. In fact, mice that are fairly old perform very well under fast-mimicking diet, but the very old ones do not.”

Effects of Fasting-Mimicking Diet in Humans

In the human trial, fasting was done five days per month for three months. The diet was very low in sugar, relatively high in complex carbohydrates, low in protein (no animal products at all) and high in healthy fats. This type of intervention was enough to put most people into temporary nutritional ketosis, which is when your body starts burning fat as its primary fuel rather than sugar.

From a metabolic perspective, clearance of damaged cell and cell content actually occurs during the fasting phase, much in the same way exercise actually produces damage to your tissues. The “magic” occurs during the refeeding phase, when cells are rebuilt and rejuvenated. Longo explains:

“The process is really comprehensive, meaning almost everything changes … For example, the IGF-1 goes way down, the glucose will go way down, the ketone bodies are greatly elevated. The reason is that the body starts burning fat … primarily the visceral fats. This is a really important point. We really did not see much of a significant difference in the subcutaneous fat.

We saw a significant difference in the abdominal fat, indicating that this is coming mostly from one source. Maybe this is the reservoir where the body goes first when the glucose is not coming in. I think the clearance of damaged cells is also very important.

We’ve shown this in a mouse and human preliminary multiple sclerosis trial, in which we were able to show that each cycle of the fasting-mimicking diet is able to kill some of the autoimmune cells and then turn on the stem cells and regenerate cells that are no longer autoimmune.

The human trial is still preliminary, but certainly it was very promising. Especially when you consider, like in the mouse [study], we saw a temporary reduction of the white blood cells in the patients. Over 70 percent of the patients had over 20 percent reduction in the white blood cell number. That told us it is probably working in people like it’s working in mice.

The system tries to … [kill] off white blood cells, turning on the hematopoietic stem cells. Then when you refeed, and only if you refeed, the stem cells are now giving rise to young and functional white blood cells … [The] human clinical trial supports the notion that this is happening everywhere in the human body.”

The Regenerative Benefits of Periodic Fasting

A particularly fascinating aspect is that it also seems to improve stem cell production, which you need to maintain good health. In fact, people undergo stem cell transplantation for a variety of reasons. But it would seem far safer, less expensive, and perhaps even more effective to do it naturally with this kind of dietary modulation.

Longo also points out that when you inject stem cells, the stem cells lack the program that tells them what to do. When you fast, and the level of white blood cells drops, the refeeding phase automatically provides the instructions to rebuild everything that is missing. His book,The Longevity Diet,is expected to be released in the U.S. in January, 2018.

This book details Longo’s decades’ long research into longevity and aging, describing not only the fasting-mimicking diet but also other diets shown to promote longevity. Overall, a pescetarian, or mostly fish- and plant-based diet low in protein and sugar and high in complex carbs and healthy fats, is the most effective.

“The everyday diet has a lot of similarities with the fasting-mimicking diet, but of course, in a way to allow people to maintain a normal weight, and also maintain high nourishment,” he says. “It’s about 55 percent complex carbohydrates, 35 percent fats and 10 percent protein, trying to keep the protein above 0.7 to 0.75 grams per kilogram of body weight per day, or 0.35 grams per pound of body weight per day.”

That would come out to about 1 gram of protein per kilogram of LEAN body mass, which I believe is a more accurate way to assess your protein requirement. As explained in previous articles, restricting protein to just what your body needs, and no more, is an important consideration that promotes longevity and protects against chronic disease, and this has to do with the way protein influences the mTOR pathway.

The Importance of Limiting Protein

As explained by Longo:

“We published a paper , … showing increased mortality in Americans, particularly cancer mortality in Americans, who had a high-protein diet. This makes sense. One of the reasons it makes sense is that proteins, in particular short amino acids (such as leucine and methionine) are central regulators of these growth factors, particularly mTOR and IGF-1 … and have a pro-aging and also pro-damage effect.

The higher level of protein, the higher level these amino acids, the higher activity of TOR-S6 kinase pathway. As a consequence, we now have very clear evidence in many organisms that TOR accelerates aging and also accelerates mortality, meaning that all kinds of organisms will die earlier and develop many more diseases when they maintain this pathway activated …

A good amount of calories come in from proteins, which we have shown … to be able to largely reverse the protection of normal cells. If you have the fasting-mimicking diet or fasting, and then you give mice a normal level of protein, they can reverse a lot of the protective effect …

The other pathway, which is much less known … is the sugar PKA pathway or RAS/PKA pathway (protein kinase A). Now there is starting to be evidence from our lab and others that this may also be conserved. Meaning that, in addition to the protein pathway, there is also a sugar pathway that is as bad, or almost as bad …

The more sugar there is available, the more the PKA pathway … gets activated. This gene then in turn can inactivate certain transcription factors … that are very important for protection of the cell, but also for the reprogramming of the cell into a more what we call a maintenance state.”

Maintaining Protein Adequacy Through Protein Cycling

One of the factors that really intrigues me about Longo’s work is his focus on protein cycling. As mentioned, there are significant downsides to excess protein, but too little is hazardous as well. It’s important to maintain a balance of “just enough” protein in order to avoid losing lean muscle mass as you age, while still avoiding the activation of TOR, which speeds up the aging process.

Longo’s answer to this complexity is to cycle high and low amounts of protein. For example, you could eat 1.5 grams of protein per kilogram of lean body weight on days when you’re doing strength training exercises, and then cut back to 1 gram/kilo on non-training days.

“There are a number of groups that are now looking at the relationship between protein and muscle protein synthesis,” Longo says. “I think they’ve clearly shown, for example, that 30 grams of salt proteins are needed in one single meal, associated with strength training, in order for the muscle protein synthesis to occur. I will say that there is an optimal level.

We have also … shown … people that were 65 or younger benefited from the very low protein, but people who were 65 and older did not benefit … Now, the correct study has never been done, meaning there has never been a study where you take 1,000 healthy 80-year-olds and you give them exactly a low level of protein and see how they do compared to the ones that eat 1.5 to 2 grams per kilogram a day. I suspect they will still do better.

[But] there was no evidence in our study that the people [who] had high protein intake, even at older ages, did better. It was sufficient to do the moderate protein intake even in older ages … [T]he pulses are key because that’s all that matters. You just have to have enough protein, TOR activation, the building process occurs and then that’s long lasting …

They haven’t done long-term studies on this, so we don’t know the best way. But certainly, the short-term studies indicate that you don’t need a very high protein, but you do need sufficient protein and you need the training to optimize the muscle building.”

So, in summary, for strength building purposes, the science tells us 30 grams of optimized for branched-chain amino acids combined with strength training is an ideal amount to achieve long-term protein synthesis in the muscle, and more is not better. In fact, while more protein has no beneficial effect on muscle building, it may, however, have an adverse health effect by activating mTOR.

Notably, it is not clear how muscle synthesis would be affected by multiple daily combinations of 30 grams of proteins plus training, but it’s likely not a wise strategy if you want to keep mTOR chronically inhibited.

Feast-Famine Cycling

On a personal note, I engaged in long-term (six months or so) chronic nutritional ketosis. But then I started noticing some adverse effects. I think these effects may be related to action of insulin, which many aren’t aware of. I then discovered a process I call “feast-famine cycling,” which is similar to the protein cycling Longo recommends.

The way insulin works is not by driving glucose into the cells, which is what’s conventionally taught. Insulin actually works by stopping the liver’s ability to produce glucose (hepatic gluconeogenesis). If you have very low levels of insulin, you’re not going to be able to suppress hepatic gluconeogenesis. Paradoxically, your blood sugar will rise pretty dramatically, even though you’re not having any carbohydrates.

Interestingly, when you have relatively high glucose level and really low insulin levels, if you eat sugar, your blood sugar drops, which is absolutely counterintuitive. But again, that’s related to the mechanism of insulin. This was when the importance of cycling became really clear to me, because you really do want to keep your glucose level low. If you restrict glucose and protein too much, it’ll be counterproductive.

So this cycling is absolutely imperative. In fact, I believe feast-famine cycling may be the key to optimizing the molecular pathways involved in chronic disease and longevity. Longo agrees, saying:

“I think you hit it right in the head. Meaning that if you understand the mechanisms, like you just described, this is really important. This is essential. You have to understand exactly what goes on. Because if you don’t, you’re going to get surprises.

I think maybe you were surprised after six months that you’re starting to see problems. I’ve also seen some of that, for example, in the alternate-day fasting. There are papers showing benefits, but there are some papers showing detrimental effects. It’s just up and down, up and down.”

How to Increase Your Longevity

As an aging and longevity researcher, Longo offers the following suggestions for those interested in achieving a long and healthy life:

More Information

To learn more about Longo’s work, you can follow him on Facebook @profvalterlongo. His book will also be published sometime this summer or fall, although the American title is still undetermined.

By Dr. Mercola

Vaccines: Are they safe? Are they effective? To help answer those questions is Neil Z. Miller,¹ a medical research journalist and director of the Thinktwice Global Vaccine Institute.

Miller has investigated vaccines for three decades and written several books on the subject, including “Vaccines: Are They Really Safe and Effective?,” “Vaccine Safety Manual for Concerned Families and Health Practitioners” and, most recently, “Miller’s Review of Critical Vaccine Studies: 400 Important Scientific Papers Summarized for Parents and Researchers.”

“Miller’s Review,” published in 2016, is a magnificent piece of work. In it, he reviews the concern about vaccine safety and efficacy raised by 400 peer-reviewed published studies. The book doesn’t review studies that support vaccination (almost all of which are funded by the industry and the government, by the way) as those studies are available on the CDC website.

“I got started when my own children were born … over 30 years ago … When my wife was pregnant, I felt I had to do due diligence about vaccines. I have to be honest, though. Before I even started to research vaccines, my wife and I pretty much knew intuitively that we were not going to inject our children with vaccines.

When I give lectures, I often tell people, ‘How can you expect to achieve health by injecting healthy children with toxic substances?’ I intuitively knew that … but still felt an obligation to do my due diligence and to do the research,” Miller says.

“The thing is that when I do things, I do them pretty thoroughly … I was doing my research at medical libraries. I was gathering everything and I started to collate it and coordinate it … People started to find out about the information I had organized. They were asking me about vaccines even way back then. I organized it into a booklet. I started to share that with people. Everything snowballed from that first booklet.”

Don’t Believe the ‘There’s No Evidence’ Argument

“Miller’s Review” was created in response to the common refrain that “there are no studies showing vaccines are unsafe or ineffective.”

“I hear this often,” Miller says. “Parents come to me all the time, saying, ‘My doctor told me that vaccines are safe and there are no studies that prove [otherwise].’ I’ve been doing the research for 30 years. I know of literally thousands of studies that document [concerns]. My books all document [those] studies.”

“Miller’s Review” is unique in that it summarizes 400 studies in bullet points with direct quotes from the study — with one study per page — plus citations so that you can find and read the study in full should you decide to do so. All of the studies are published in peer-reviewed journals and indexed by the National Library of Medicine.

“These are valid studies by valid researchers in many journals that people have heard about — The Lancet, New England Journal of Medicine, all the mainstream journals (and some of the smaller journals, but they’re still valid peer-reviewed studies) that show there are problems with vaccines: There are safety problems, there are efficacy problems.

They’re all in one place so that people, like doctors, can get this information all in one convenient place. This book has been very effective with medical doctors. When medical doctors who are on the fence, or who are pro-vaccine, get this book and read it, I hear back from parents that their doctor is no longer pressuring them to get the vaccines.

Their doctor is now respecting their decisions to not vaccinate or to go to some sort of alternative vaccine schedule if that’s the choice these parents make …

I am all about having uncensored, unfettered access to all of the available information out there about vaccines. Not just what your medical doctor wants you to know. Not just what the pharmaceutical companies want you to know and not just what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is telling doctors to share with their patients.

I want [parents] to be absolutely free to make a decision whether or not they want to vaccinate their children … It’s really a human rights issue. It’s really about the mandatory aspect of vaccines. I think all vaccines are problematic. I think this not just based on my own feelings, but based on the evidence I’ve researched over the years.”

Uninformed Decision-Making Is Part of the Problem

Ultimately, every parent will make a decision about whether or not to vaccinate. The problem is, most of the time, it’s an uninformed decision. An issue brought up in some of his earlier books is that there’s been a deliberate misinformation campaign aimed at making you believe vaccines are far more effective than they actually are.

For example, disease incidence data is used to suggest vaccines have dramatically reduced the incidence of a given disease, when in fact the disease rate had already declined by 90 percent, or more in some cases, before a vaccine was ever available. Measles has been problematic in developing nations, mostly because of malnutrition, vitamin A deficiency, lack of clean water, sanitation and quick access to medical care. As these measures are addressed, the mortality from measles declines on its own.

Vitamin A appears particularly important, and studies sponsored by the World Health Organization (WHO) have confirmed that high doses of vitamin A supplementation protect children against complications and death associated with the disease.

“By the time the measles vaccine was introduced in the United States in 1963, by the late 1950s, the mortality rate from measles had drastically dropped. This was due to the [fact] that the population had gained protection against the more dangerous ravages of the disease. This happens with a lot of different diseases.

In my book, I’ve got many different types of graphs and illustrations to help the reader understand the main points I’m making … [M]any of these graphs show that these diseases were declining significantly on their own, well before vaccines were introduced.

For example, scarlet fever. Where did scarlet fever go? Why don’t we see cases of scarlet fever when we didn’t have mass vaccinations with a scarlet fever vaccine? That’s an important point to be made.”

Many Childhood Diseases Are Protective Against Cancer

Another significant point is there are dozens of studies demonstrating that contracting certain childhood diseases actually protects you against various types of cancer later in life — everything from melanoma to leukemia.

It’s important to realize that when you have a naturally-acquired infection, you’re really exercising your immune system quite profoundly, developing authentic, lifelong immunity in the process, which is radically different from the type of artificial and temporary immunity you get from a vaccine.

One of the reasons for this is because vaccines stimulate a completely different part of your immune system than does fighting off a naturally-acquired infection. There’s even evidence suggesting childhood diseases help protect against future heart disease.

“[A] Japanese study … looked at over 100,000 men and women of elderly age. They looked back at their history of catching these common childhood illnesses. Did they catch chickenpox, rubella, measles and mumps? What they found was it’s actually protective against heart disease.

You’re protected against heart attacks and various types of arteriosclerotic disease of the artery systems. It’s protecting the arterial system so that you are protected not only — when you catch these diseases — from cancers, but from heart disease, heart attacks and strokes as well … There are different theories on why that takes place. But the important thing is that study after study confirms that it takes place.”

Vaccines Create Problematic Mutations

Another vaccine-related problem that many are completely unaware of is the fact that vaccines cause mutations in the disease-bearing microorganisms, much in the same way antibiotics cause bacteria to mutate. The diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis vaccine (DTaP), for example, has caused the pertussis microorganism, Bordetella pertussis, to mutate and evade the vaccine. The same thing happened with the pneumococcal vaccine and the Haemophilus influenzae type B vaccine.

“They’re finding, for example, when you’ve got a vaccine that targets only certain strains of disease where multiple strains are actually causing the disease, the vaccine is pretty effective at reducing the incidence of disease from that particular strain. But what happens is the other strains come and take their place …  They come back even stronger.

That’s what [happened] with Prevnar, a vaccine for pneumococcus, pneumococcal disease. All infants that receive vaccines according to the CDC’s standard immunization schedule receive a pneumococcal vaccine at 2, 4 and 6 months of age. That vaccine only targeted seven strains. Pneumococcal has 90 different strains capable of causing pneumococcal disease.

They were pretty effective at reducing the amount of disease caused by the pneumococcal strains targeted by the vaccine. But what happened within just a few short years, the other strains became more prevalent … taking the place of the original strains [and] they became more virulent.

They came out with a new vaccine in 2010 … to deal with the vaccine losing its efficacy because of what I just explained. The new vaccine included the original seven strains plus six additional strains, the ones that were causing most of the pneumococcal disease now. Within two years of the new upgraded, updated pneumococcal vaccine, the strains had already mutated … ”

Tragically, parents are being blamed and harassed for many of these vaccine failures. Parents are being told that if you don’t vaccinate your kids, you are responsible for spreading the disease. That’s the idea the CDC, the medical industry and the pharmaceutical industry are promoting.

However, if you actually read the studies, you’ll find what the scientists know —the real problem is evolutionary adaptation. Dr. Meryl Nass expounded on this issue in a 2013 interview. The microorganisms adapt. “What’s happened with pertussis [is] the pertussis microorganism has changed. It’s now not only become more virulent; it’s become more prevalent,” Miller explains. “It’s evaded the actual vaccine.”

Herd Immunity Cannot Be Achieved Through Immunizations

Another core argument for mass vaccinations is achieving herd immunity. Miller believes, and I agree with this belief that herd immunity may never be achieved through vaccination because high vaccination rates encourage the evolution of more severe disease-causing agents. In a vaccinated population, the virulence increases due to selective pressure, as the pathogen is strengthened and adapts in its fight for survival against the vaccine.

Meanwhile, in an unvaccinated population, the environment actually promotes lowered virulence, as the pathogen does not want to kill its host. A wise pathogen is one that’s able to infect many hosts without killing them, because when the host dies, the pathogen loses the environment upon which its own survival depends.

However, once the disease organism mutates and becomes more virulent within the vaccinated population, it raises the stakes not only among the vaccinated but also among the unvaccinated, who are now faced with a far more virulent foe than normal.

“In terms of herd immunity, you not only have … this selective pressure that’s keeping you from being able to achieve herd immunity (because the microorganisms are always attempting to evade the vaccine), but pertussis vaccine is only 60 percent effective. That’s with the best estimates. And that’s only for a couple of years.

Studies show that even after three, four or five years, you’re back to almost no efficacy whatsoever, almost back to the pre-vaccine period.

How can you expect to achieve herd immunity with a vaccine that is only 60 percent effective? You can vaccinate 100 percent of the population and you cannot achieve herd immunity with a vaccine that is only 60 percent effective. Influenza vaccines — many years, these vaccines are not good matches for the circulating virus — so you have zero percent efficacy. In the best years, you only have 30, 40 or 50 percent efficacy.”

Studies Show Vaccinations Increase Infant Mortality

One of the tenets of conventional medicine is that if you vaccinate a population, everyone is going to be healthier. There will be less disease. But when you compare vaccination rates and health statistics, you find the converse is actually true. This is some of the most compelling information Miller shares in his book.

For example, when comparing vaccination rates in 34 developed nations, they found a significant correlation between infant mortality rates and the number of vaccine doses infants received. Developed nations like the United States that require the most vaccines tend to have the highest infant mortality. You can read this study here.²

“I’m the lead author on that study, actually. My co-author was Gary Goldman [Ph.D., who] worked for the CDC for seven years. He quit when he found that the CDC was not allowing anything detrimental [to get out]. Goldman found problems with the chickenpox vaccine and wanted to publish that data. The CDC said, ‘We’re not going to allow you to do that.’ That’s when Goldman quit …

Goldman and I did two peer-reviewed studies … The children in the United States are required — if they follow the CDC’s immunization schedule — to receive the most vaccines in the developed world, actually throughout the world. Globally. Twenty-six vaccines. Other developed nations require less.

Some nations only require 12 vaccines — Switzerland, Sweden, Iceland and other European nations — yet they have better infant mortality rates. That’s what our study looked at. [V]accines are promoted as being lifesaving. They’re given to children to protect them against dying from infectious diseases.

We gathered all the immunization schedules from the 34 nations [and found] the United States had the 34th worst infant mortality rate … It had the worst. Thirty-three nations in the developed world had better infant mortality rates. We did the study and we found what many people would find to be a counterintuitive relationship.

We found a statistically significant relationship. There was a direct correlation between the number of vaccines that a nation required for their infants and the infant mortality rate. The more vaccines that a nation required, the worse the infant mortality rate.”

Why Is This Not Front-Page News?

Many naïvely believe that if all of this is true, if vaccines truly were doing more harm than good, it would be front-page news. The reason you rarely if ever hear anything about studies such as this one is because the vaccine industry has an iron grip on the information being publicly disseminated. Collusion between federal regulatory agencies, the government and the industry is just one of several hurdles preventing this kind of information from being widely known.

You have individuals like Dr. Julie Gerberding, who headed up the CDC and was in charge of infectious disease recommendations for seven years before moving on to become president of Merck Vaccines, one of the largest vaccine manufacturers in the world. That’s just one of many dozens of examples of this revolving door, which in turn has led to the breakdown of true science-based medicine.

“We have a serious problem where top scientists admit that they drop data points from studies that they’ve been influenced by the people who are funding their studies to sometimes not publish the study because it didn’t come up with the results they wanted, and so on,” Miller says.

“We have a serious problem with the pharmaceutical industry controlling which studies get published. Also, there’s a serious problem because the pharmaceutical companies are controlling the advertising dollars that go out to the major media.

Mainstream media makes approximately 70 percent of its income from pharmaceutical ads. They do not want to publish or promote anything, even in their newscasts that would be critical of vaccines because it could compromise their potential to keep bringing in these millions of dollars they make every year from the pharmaceutical companies.”

The greatest, most serious problem we currently face is the concerted push to mandate vaccines and eliminate personal belief exemptions. For example, to go to school in California, you now have to be fully vaccinated. No exemptions are allowed, which is really a violation of human rights.

Giving Multiple Simultaneous Vaccines Is Extremely Risky, Study Shows

The second study³ Miller and Goldman published analyzed nearly 40,000 reports of infants who suffered adverse reactions after vaccines. Here, they found that infants given the most vaccines were significantly more likely to be hospitalized or die compared to those who received fewer vaccines.

It’s worth noting that this data was obtained from the vaccine adverse event reporting system (VAERS) database, a passive reporting system, and that research has confirmed passive reporting systems underreport by 50 to 1.

What this means is that when you find one report in VAERS, you have to multiply that by 50 to get closer to reality because, on average, only 1 in 50 adverse events are ever reported. Doctors have a legal obligation to report side effects to VAERS, but they don’t, and there are no ramifications for failure to make a report. Parents can also make a report to the database, and I encourage all parents to do so, should your child experience a vaccine reaction.

At present, VAERS has over 500,000 reports of adverse reactions to vaccines, and every year, more than 30,000 new reports are added to it. Miller and Goldman downloaded this database and created a program to extract all the reports involving infants. In all, they extracted the reports of 38,000 infants who experienced an adverse reaction following the receipt of one or more vaccines.

They then created a program that was able to determine the number of vaccines each infant had received before suffering an adverse reaction, and stratified the reports by the number of vaccines (anywhere from one to eight) the infants had received simultaneously before the reaction took place. They specifically honed in on serious adverse reactions requiring hospitalization or that led to death. Here’s what they found:

• Infants who received three vaccines simultaneously were statistically and significantly more likely to be hospitalized or die after receiving their vaccines than children who received two vaccines at the same time
• Infants who received four vaccines simultaneously were statistically and significantly more likely to be hospitalized or die than children who received three or two vaccines, and so on all the way up to eight vaccines
• Children who received eight vaccines simultaneously were “off-the-charts” statistically and significantly more likely to be hospitalized or die after receiving those vaccines
• Children who received vaccines at an earlier age were significantly more likely to be hospitalized or die than children who receive those vaccines at a later age

Childhood Vaccination Schedule Is Based on Convenience, Not Science or Safety

As noted by Miller:

“The industry, the CDC and Dr. Paul Offit tell us that you can take multiple vaccines. Offit said you could theoretically take 10,000 vaccines at one time; that an infant can be exposed to that many pathogens simultaneously without hurting the child. The CDC’s immunization schedule requires that children receive eight vaccines at 2 months of age, eight vaccines at 4 months of age and eight vaccines at 6 months of age.

I ask parents, ‘When did you ever take eight drugs at the same time? … If you did take eight drugs at the same time, would you think it was more likely that you would or would not have an adverse reaction?’ Because toxicologists know that the more drugs you take at the same time, the more potential for some kind of a synergistic or additive toxicity … What this study confirms is that it’s a dangerous practice to give multiple vaccines simultaneously.

The CDC has put together a schedule based on convenience. They say ‘[G]ive eight vaccines at 2 months, give eight more vaccines at 4 months and give eight more booster shots at 6 months’ because it’s convenient. They’re afraid that parents will not come to the pediatrician again and again and again if they have to keep coming back for more vaccines, so they get multiple [shots all at once].

They said, ‘We’re going to make this schedule based on convenience.’ Not based on evidence. Not based on science. There’s nothing scientific about the CDC’s recommended immunization schedule. We’ve shown it with our study …

We also showed that children who received vaccines at an earlier age are statistically significantly more likely to be hospitalized or die than children who receive it at a later age. We divided it up to children who receive their vaccines in the first 6 months of age versus children who receive their vaccines in the last six months of infancy.

Again, off-the-charts statistically significant, it’s much more dangerous to give younger infants multiple vaccines than to give older infants multiple vaccines. This makes sense because they’re giving the same dose to a newborn or a baby that might be 8, 9, 10, 11 or 12 pounds at 2 months of age versus a child who might be 15 or 17 pounds … at a later age.”

More Information

You can find “Miller’s Review of Critical Vaccine Studies: 400 Important Scientific Papers Summarized for Parents and Researchers” on ThinkTwice.com. This book is an invaluable resource for parents who want to do their due diligence before making up their mind about whether or not to vaccinate their children. On his website, you will also find his other books, along with studies and publications relating to vaccine safety and efficacy concerns.

Another resource is the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC). NVIC is leading the charge when it comes to educating the public about efforts to impose mandatory vaccinations, and how to preserve our health freedoms on the local, state and federal levels.

Ultimately, everyone will have to make a choice about vaccinations. They key is to make it an informed one — to understand and weigh the potential risks and benefits. To do that, you need access to both sides of the debate, and Miller has done us all a great favor by making the largely hidden side of the equation more readily accessible.

Many Americans suffer from various chronic diseases such as diabetes and obesity, and the main culprit is usually the food they eat. The standard American diet contains excessive amounts of protein and carbohydrates, neither of which is good for your health because it eventually causes you to develop insulin and leptin resistance.

As a result, you gain excess weight, develop inflammation and become prone to cellular damage.

To avoid this problem, significant changes in your diet are necessary, and the best way is inducing your body into a state of nutritional ketosis, a condition where your body burns fat as its primary fuel instead of sugar. In order to reach nutritional ketosis, you must follow a ketogenic diet. But what exactly is a ketogenic diet?

This guide will tell you everything you need to know about a ketogenic diet — how you can apply it to your lifestyle and what positives you can reap from it.

The Various Benefits of the Ketogenic Diet

A ketogenic diet is a dietary approach that focuses on minimal carbohydrates, moderate amounts of protein and high healthy fat consumption — the three keys to achieving nutritional ketosis. In fact, it’s what I recommend for most people who would like to optimize their health.

There are many reasons why you should try a ketogenic diet. It can be very beneficial for people suffering from chronic conditions, or for people who would simply like to be healthier than their current state. You’ll be excited to know that a ketogenic diet can help with the following:

Different Types of Ketogenic Diets You Can Try

There are several variations of the ketogenic diet based on specific needs:⁴

Put Away These Foods Before Going on a Ketogenic Diet

Before coming up with an actual ketogenic diet food list, it’s important to take a look at what you’re eating first and take out anything that’s unhealthy. This means that you have to remove sugars, starches, packaged and processed foods from your diet, because a ketogenic diet focuses on eating real, whole food.

Furthermore, avoid drinking milk because it contains the carbohydrate galactose — drinking just one glass can basically eat up your entire carb allotment for the day. In addition, avoiding milk helps lactose-intolerant people to implement the ketogenic diet. Many other products should be avoided, such as hydrogenated vegetable oils (canola, sunflower, etc.), peanut butter, soy products and sodas. They may be low on carbohydrates, but they are unhealthy and can wreak havoc on your health.

The Ideal Foods to Eat for a Ketogenic Diet

So now that you’ve taken out all the unhealthy food sources, what’s the next step? When it comes to the core of an actual ketogenic diet, remember that you need to consume only a moderate amount of protein, or about one-half gram per pound of lean body mass, each day. In addition, carbohydrates must be minimized and high-quality fats increased to serve as your new fuel source.

To ease yourself into a ketogenic diet meal plan, I usually recommend adding C8 medium-chain triglyceride (MCT) oil into your food. It’s typically more expensive than other types of MCT oil, but I prefer it more because it converts into ketones more effectively. You can start with 1 teaspoon per day, then gradually increase your consumption to 2 to 3 tablespoons per day.

If your stomach does not agree with MCT oil, you can try MCT powder, which is easier on your stomach. The table below provides a good overview of other foods rich in high-quality healthy fats:

When building your ketogenic diet meal plan, it’s important to stick to green leafy vegetables because they are rich in fiber, antioxidantsand various nutrients. Your best choices include broccoli, spinach, parsley, Brussels sprouts and zucchini.

While fruits are generally healthy for you, majority of them should be are avoided in a ketogenic diet because of their high amounts of sugar. However, certain berries are safe to eat in moderate quantities, such as blackberry, blueberry and cranberry, because they are rich in antioxidants that can support your health.

As for beverages, there are several you can choose from. The most important is water, but you may also drink organic black coffee (without any sweeteners or milk), which is rich in antioxidants. Coconut milk can be consumed as well, as well as herbal teas because they are rich in various antioxidants and nutrients. If you want a more extensive list, Paleo Flourish Magazine has recommendations that encompass various food groups.¹⁵

Ketogenic Recipes You Can Try

It may look like there are plenty of foods not allowed when following a ketogenic diet, but there are actually many recipes that you can cook that adhere this method. Here are three ketogenic recipes that I personally use in my daily routine:

The Side Effects of a Ketogenic Diet

Starting a ketogenic diet can help optimize your health tremendously in many ways. But like any major dietary changes, it can have several undesirable (but not alarming) side effects, such as:

Going into nutritional ketosis by following a ketogenic diet is one of the most radical but highly beneficial lifestyle changes you can make to improve your health. As with most dietary changes, always remember to listen to your body. If you feel any side effects other than the ones listed above, then necessary adjustments may be needed to your food intake.

Frequently Asked Questions About the Ketogenic Diet

By Dr. Mercola

While all cells in your body can use glucose for energy, when you burn fat as your primary fuel your liver produces ketones that burn far “cleaner” in that they generate fewer reactive oxygen species (ROS) and secondary free radicals than sugars. The conventional view is that you need sugar or glucose to satisfy your energy needs, but only a very small amount of sugar is actually required. Because sugar represents calories, excessive consumption will negatively affect your health.

If you haven’t given much thought to how much sugar you consume and what it may be doing to your health, now is the time to get educated. Overconsumption of sugar is increasingly being linked to brain-related health issues such as depression, learning disorders, memory problems and overeating.¹

Your Body Recognizes Sugar as a ‘Drug’

Writing in The Atlantic, neuroendocrinologist Dr. Robert Lustig, professor of pediatrics in the division of endocrinology at University of California, San Francisco, states:²

“… [T]he [U.S.] war on drugs has taken a back seat, but not because it has been won. Rather, because a different war has cluttered the headlines — the war on obesity. And a substance even more insidious, I would argue, has supplanted cocaine and heroin.

The object of our current affliction is sugar. Who could have imagined something so innocent, so delicious, so irresistible … could propel America toward … medical collapse?”

Previous research³ involving humans and laboratory rats suggests consumption of sugar and sweets can trigger reward and craving states in your brain similar to addictive drugs. Not only can sugar and sweets substitute for drugs like cocaine, in terms of how your brain reacts to them, they can be even more rewarding.

The dramatic effects of sugar on your brain may explain why you may have difficultly controlling your consumption of sugary foods when continuously exposed to them. Another study⁴ suggests a high degree of overlap exists between brain regions involved in processing natural rewards, such as sugar and sweets, and drugs of abuse.

“‘Non-drug’ or ‘behavioral’ addictions have become increasingly documented …  and pathologies include compulsive activities such as shopping, eating, exercising, sexual behavior and gambling. Like drug addiction, non-drug addictions manifest in symptoms including craving, impaired control over the behavior, tolerance, withdrawal and high rates of relapse.”

The Biology of Your Brain: How Bad Habits Like Sugar Addiction Take Root

An article published by CNN Health⁵ reminds us that the connection between your nucleus accumbens and prefrontal cortex drives intentional actions, such as deciding whether you will take another bite of chocolate cake, for example.

Your prefrontal cortex also activates hormones like dopamine, triggering thoughts such as, “Hey, this cake is really good. And I’m going to remember that for the future.” Lustig explains the biological process that takes place when you consume sugar or any addictive substance:⁶

“The brain’s pleasure center, called the nucleus accumbens, is essential for our survival as a species. … Turn off pleasure, and you turn off the will to live. But long-term stimulation of the pleasure center drives the process of addiction.

When you consume … sugar, your nucleus accumbens receives a dopamine signal, from which you experience pleasure. And so you consume more. The problem is with prolonged exposure, the signal … gets weaker. So you have to consume more to get the same effect — tolerance. And if you pull back on the substance, you go into withdrawal. Tolerance and withdrawal constitute addiction. And make no mistake, sugar is addictive.”

Brain-injury survivor and author Debbie Hampton explains how habits are formed around addictive behaviors:⁷

“Every time you follow the same path, a specific pattern is activated and becomes more defined … and it becomes easier to activate the circuit the next time. … Pretty soon, the bad habit neuronal pathway becomes the unconscious default, and your brain, wanting to be efficient, just takes the easiest, most familiar route. This is particularly true in the case of depression.

In a depressed brain, there’s less dopamine activity happening in the nucleus accumbens, which means that things that used to be enjoyable are not as pleasurable, and the only things that motivate it have to have a big dopamine payoff, which are the baddest of the bad habits, such as junk food, drugs, alcohol [and] gambling.”

Brain Imaging Shows Food Addiction Is Real

Research published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition⁸ examined the effects of high-glycemic index (GI) foods on brain activity, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Twelve overweight or obese men between the ages of 18 and 35 consumed one high-GI and one low-GI meal.

Imaging was completed four hours after each test meal to assess the cerebral blood flow as a measure of resting brain activity. The researchers expected brain activity to be greater after the high-GI meal in regions related to craving, eating behavior and reward. According to the researchers:

“Compared with a … low-GI meal, a high-GI meal decreased plasma glucose, increased hunger and selectively stimulated brain regions associated with reward and craving in the late postprandial period. … [T]he high-GI meal elicited greater brain activity centered in the right nucleus accumbens.”

The study demonstrates what you may experience when eating a high-GI meal. After rapidly digesting net carbohydrates, your blood sugar initially spikes, followed by a sharp crash later. As noted by researchers, this crash in blood glucose stimulated greater brain activity in the nucleus accumbens, the brain’s pleasure center Lustig mentioned above.

Can Too Much Sugar Contribute to Alzheimer’s Disease?

While insulin is usually associated with its role in keeping your blood-sugar levels in a healthy range, it also plays a role in brain signaling. In one animal study, when researchers disrupted the proper signaling of insulin in the brain, they were able to induce many of the characteristic brain changes seen with Alzheimer’s disease, including confusion, disorientation and the inability to learn and remember.⁹

It’s becoming increasingly clear that the same pathological process that leads to insulin and leptin resistance, as well as type 2 diabetes, may also hold true for your brain. As you overindulge on sugar and grains, your brain becomes overwhelmed by the consistently high levels of insulin. Eventually insulin, leptin and signaling become profoundly disrupted, leading to impairments in your memory and thinking abilities.

A study published in Diabetes Care found that type 2 diabetes is associated with a 60 percent increased risk of dementia in men and women.¹⁰ Research featured in the New England Journal of Medicine noted a mild elevation of blood sugar, such as a level of 105 or 110, is also associated with an elevated risk for dementia.¹¹

Dr. David Perlmutter, neurologist and author of the books “Brain Maker” and “Grain Brain,” believes Alzheimer’s disease is primarily predicated on lifestyle choices, including sugar consumption. He suggests anything that promotes insulin resistance will ultimately also raise your risk of Alzheimer’s.

Glucose and Fructose: How Do They Affect Your Brain?

Increases in processed fructose consumption, typically in the form of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), seem to be running parallel to the spikes seen in obesity rates, so much so that diets high in it are thought to promote insulin resistance and weight gain. The Journal of the American Medical Association featured a study¹² involving 20 adult volunteers who underwent magnetic resonance imaging sessions at Yale University to identify neurophysiological factors related to fructose versus glucose consumption.

The research suggests fructose — a type of sugar commonly extracted from corn and found in sweetened products like soda — may activate brain pathways that increase your interest in food, whereas glucose ingestion appears to trigger your brain’s satiation signal, effectively telling you “you’ve had enough.” When participants ingested glucose and were then shown food pictures, their brains registered increased measures of satiety and fullness. The researchers noted:

“Glucose … ingestion reduced the activation of the hypothalamus, insula and striatum — brain regions that regulate appetite, motivation and reward processing; glucose ingestion also increased functional connections between the hypothalamic-striatal network and increased satiety.”

In contrast, when the participants consumed fructose and were presented with images of food, more activity was noted in the orbitofrontal cortex, an area linked to increased motivation to seek out rewards, such as drugs or food.¹³

Subsequent research,¹⁴ presented in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, went a step further to investigate the effects of sugar on food-approach behavior. After ingesting either fructose or glucose, 24 volunteers underwent two fMRI sessions while viewing pictures of high-calorie foods and nonfood items in a block format.

After each block, participants were asked to rate their hunger and desire for food, as well as perform a decision task. The decision task involved choosing between an immediate food reward or a delayed monetary bonus. Hormone levels were measured at baseline and 30 and 60 minutes after the sugars were consumed. The authors of the study noted:

“Parallel to the neuroimaging findings, fructose versus glucose led to greater hunger and desire for food and a greater willingness to give up long-term monetary rewards to obtain immediate high-calorie foods. These findings suggest ingestion of fructose relative to glucose results in greater activation of brain regions involved in attention and reward processing, and may promote feeding behavior.”

Both of these studies underscore the importance of paying attention to the type of sugars you consume. Clearly, fructose disrupts your brain’s signaling mechanism that is designed to tell you when you’ve had enough. Because fructose fails to stimulate insulin, which in turn fails to suppress ghrelin, or “your hunger hormone,” which then fails to stimulate leptin or “your satiety hormone,” you are likely to eat more and develop insulin resistance when consuming fructose.

The second body of research seems to indicate fructose intake can influence you to act impulsively with respect to food, consuming more and more of it even when your body should have told you it’s had enough. As you may imagine, continuing to consume large amounts of fructose will become increasingly problematic if you’ve already developed a bad habit of overeating.

Fructose Packs on the Pounds Faster Than Any Other Nutrient

Because fructose is often consumed in liquid form, mostly as HFCS, its negative metabolic effects are even further magnified. Energy drinks, fruit juices, soda and sports drinks, as well as countless other sweetened beverages, contain HFCS. Like all fructose, HFCS is metabolized as body fat far more rapidly than any other sugar.

Similar to alcohol, the entire burden of metabolizing fructose falls to your liver. This severely taxes and overloads it, introducing the possibility of liver damage. Fructose also promotes a particularly dangerous kind of body fat called adipose fat. This type of fat collects in your abdominal region and is associated with a greater risk of heart disease.

Although HFCS has about the same amount of fructose as cane sugar, it is in a “free” form that is not attached to any other carbs. In contrast, fructose in fruits and cane sugar is bonded to other sugars, resulting in a decrease in metabolic toxicity. Consuming foods containing high amounts of fructose — even if it’s a natural product — is the fastest way to trash your health.  Among the health problems you invite when you consume high amounts of fructose are:

• Arthritis, cancer, gout and heart disease
• Insulin resistance, metabolic syndrome, obesity and type 2 diabetes
• Elevated blood pressure, LDL (bad) cholesterol, triglycerides and uric acid levels
• Liver disease, especially non-alcoholic fatty liver disease

In addition, unbound fructose, found in large quantities in HFCS, can interfere with your heart’s use of minerals like chromium, copper and magnesium. Furthermore, as you likely know, HFCS is most often made from genetically engineered corn, which is fraught with its own well-documented health concerns and side effects, many of which are linked to glyphosate or Roundup residues.

How to Manage and/or Limit Your Sugar Consumption

Sugar, in its natural form, is not inherently bad when consumed in amounts that allow you to burn fat as your primary fuel. However, you should avoid all sources of processed fructose, particularly processed foods and beverages like soda. According to SugarScience.org, 74 percent of processed foods purchased from the grocery store contain added sugar.¹⁵

Other sources have suggested it may be as high as 80 percent. I recommend your diet be composed chiefly of naturally occurring whole foods, with 10 percent or less coming from processed foods.

I also recommend severely limiting your consumption of refined carbohydrates found in cereal, bread, pasta and other grain-based foods, as they break down to sugar in your body, which increases your insulin levels and causes insulin resistance. As a general recommendation, I suggest you keep your total fructose consumption below 25 grams per day, including whole fruit. Keep in mind while fruits are rich in nutrients and antioxidants, they naturally contain fructose.

If consumed in high amounts (especially if you are not burning fat as your primary fuel), fructose from fruit worsens your insulin sensitivity and raises your uric acid levels. Also, be sure to avoid artificial sweeteners like aspartame and sucralose due to the health problems associated with them, which are worse than those associated with corn syrup and sugar. Below are some additional tips to help you manage and/or limit your sugar consumption: