“Gluten is just one variety of a common, and highly toxic, plant-based protein called lectin. Lectins are found not only in grains like wheat but also in the “gluten-free” foods most of us commonly regard as healthy, including many fruits, vegetables, nuts, beans, and conventional dairy products. These proteins, which are found in the seeds, grains, skins, rinds, and leaves of plants, are designed by nature to protect them from predators (including humans). Once ingested, they incite a kind of chemical warfare in our bodies, causing inflammatory reactions that can lead to weight gain and serious health conditions.” The Plant Paradox.
There is much truth to the statement above, but it does ignore two basic concepts that exonerate plants.
One, we humans adapt, too. After thousands of years eating plants we have also adapted.
Two, our Microbiome has most surely adapted along with us. Anything we put in our mouth, that is food, chemicals, and even pharmaceutical drugs are transformed, digested, modulated, and processed by our gut bacteria. A food or a drug will have completely different effects from person to person given that no two of us have the same bacteria. Google POSTBIOTICS and you will see for yourself.
A glaring example is soy. It can have salutary effect in one person, while another may be deathly allergic to it. It all depends on the fact that some of us have the right gut flora to turn soy into a healthy molecule, Equol, while others do not.
Lastly, I ask, are you not tired of people demonizing one food after another? Have we not seen one food be bad for you, then good, then bad again? Let us use common sense.
References
Post-biotics may help shield obese from diabetes Date:April 20, 2017. Source:McMaster University. Summary:
“It was previously thought that bacteria only caused problems such as higher inflammation and higher blood glucose. But this is only half of the story. Now researchers have discovered that a specific component of bacteria actually lowers blood glucose and allows insulin to work better during obesity. You’ve heard of pre-biotics and pro-biotics, but now you’ll be hearing a lot more about post-biotics. Researchers at McMaster University have begun to identify how post-biotics, or the by-products of bacteria, lower blood glucose and allow insulin to work better.”
J Nutr. 2010 Jul; 140(7): 1355S–1362S.
doi: 10.3945/jn.109.119776 Equol: History, Chemistry, and Formation
‘Healthy’ foods have most of us confused, survey finds By Jacqueline Howard, CNN. Updated 4:05 PM ET, Tue May 16, 2017
“Americans Confused: What Foods Are “Good for You”? NBC Nightly News, New York, NY: NBC Universal, 07/26/1999. Accessed Sat Jan 17 2015 from NBC Learn: https://archives.nbclearn.com/portal/site/k-12/browse/?cuecard=2278
TOM BROKAW, anchor:
So what does it take to eat healthy? More of tonight’s LIFELINE from NBC’s chief science correspondent, Robert Bazell.
ROBERT BAZELL reporting:
When Debbie Rego, a research psychologist, buys food for her family, she feels like many of us do.
Ms. DEBBIE REGO: I think there’s an immense amount of confusion about what’s good and what’s bad.
BAZELL: In fact, the latest survey from the American Dietetic Association shows that almost four in five Americans believe that nutrition affects their health, but only two in five think they are doing all they can to eat the right diet. One problem, the seemingly endless barrage of new and often contradictory findings.
Dr. JEANNE GOLDBERG (Tufts University): Nutrition is not a science of breakthroughs. The story goes together very slowly, in little bits and pieces.
BAZELL: Take fat, like butter and margarine. The old advice: avoid all fats at all costs. Many nutritionists now think that was a big mistake.
Dr. GOLDBERG: We threw out the baby with the bathwater there.
BAZELL: It turns out not all fats are the same. Scientists now believe vegetable oils can be healthy, that animal fats generally are not, but the worst of all is trans-fat, chemically altered vegetable fat found in many margarines and processed foods.
Scientists are now changing the advice about other tasty things, too, like salt and eggs.
Dr. WALTER WILLETT (Harvard School of Public Health): For many years dietary advice was based really on guesses.
BAZELL: The new studies show the guesses were often wrong. Salt does not usually raise blood pressure, and eggs do not raise cholesterol. But the biggest problem is not what we eat but how much we eat. Whether it is good for you or bad for you, Americans are eating more of everything, creating an epidemic of obesity.
Government figures show that in this century, the average person’s intake of red meat, poultry, fish, cheese, fats and sweeteners have all gone up.
Dr. GOLDBERG: That’s where we’ve gone off the deep end in terms of excess consumption.
BAZELL: And that is the unhealthy reality, no matter what the latest nutrition study finds.
