There is nothing about Keto in the study, I read some articles that called it out as rubbish. I’m still ketoing on!
Article claiming long term study suggests low carb high fat diets take years of life
MrMartyJones
#42
Ok, I must have been in a pithy mood when I responded…and I have problems with my smart arsery too! I just get a little worried when the discussion devolves into conspiratorial talk. It starts to have an anti-vaccine feel to it which is very icky…and dangerous to society in general.
I also bristle a bit when we start conjuring the spectre of “Big Pharma”. Admittedly, I may not be 100% objective (who among us is, of course) because I work in the industry. More specifically, I work with a dedicated team of CRAs, medical advisors (MD), pharmacists, and many other professionals that do research using human blood plasma. It is donated by healthy volunteers and then, through a complex manufacturing process, is turned into various medicines. For example, the trial that we are working on now is for a subcutaneous injection for pediatric patients with Primary Immune Deficiency (PID). (Think the real life version of “bubble boy”.) These are kids who would otherwise be completely unable to live normal lives without the constant danger of contracting an infection or illness from everyday bacterial/viral exposures.
The example of insurance "level"s and how doctors get reimbursed is very interesting and I admit I am quite ignorant of how that all happens. I will try to look for the Berry video when I get some time.
I’m going to assume that you are using a bit of hyperbole when you say,
I mean we didn’t beat polio with keto. If you have pneumonia, I assume you wouldn’t advise someone to just eat more fat instead of seeing a doctor and taking the prescribed antibiotics. You wouldn’t tell my grandfather to not take his blood thinner to avoid seizures. Surely you aren’t telling me to skip my flu shot this season and risk my infection carried home from work getting transferred to my newborn. Etc etc etc.
A proper diet in general, especially a “well formulated ketogenic diet”, obviously has huge health benefits that are becoming evident in more and more ways, but let’s not pretend that there’s no need for, and let’s certainly not paint with a broadly disparaging brush, the modern miracles of healthcare! And yes, that includes gasp “Big Pharma”.
Regina
(Empress of the Unexpected)
#43
I agree with MrMartyJones completely. It is up to the individual to lead a healthy lifestyle, which goes a long way. But, I’m alive today because of Big Pharma. I was born with several holes in my aortic valve, something diet cannot fix. I also am going to get a flu shot next week, as I don’t enjoy being sick or passing something on to others. I agree that there are many diseases, such as diabetes, which keto can definitely turn around. And I agree many doctors push drugs needlessly. But there is a definite place for modern medicine.
PaulL
(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing)
#44
My family has a history with the various infectious diseases, and the 1918 influenza epidemic still resonates in living memory. My mother lost a sister to whooping cough, and I wouldn’t wish any of the childhood diseases on anyone who hasn’t had them. My mother and her father both contracted poliomyelitis, and when the polio vaccine became available, she signed me and my sister up to get it as soon as she possibly could. I have also benefitted many times from the wonders of modern surgery—all problems no diet was ever going to cure, for sure.
The chronic non-communicable diseases currently afflicting our society—the so-called “diseases of Western civilization”—are a quite different matter, however. I find the evidence quite persuasive that they have been caused by progressive increases in the consumption of refined grains and sugar, and greatly exacerbated by the publication of the U.S. dietary guidelines in the early 1980’s. I strongly feel that, by turning away from the hormonal model and embracing the caloric hypothesis of weight gain on the basis of no evidence, nutrition research and the medical profession have failed us. They have further failed us by embracing Keys’s diet-heart hypothesis, also without proof, and by failing to accept the data that have invalidated that hypothesis.
David Diamond’s lectures and papers demonstrating the deceptive manipulation of the data by statin manufacturers also give good reason to mistrust the pharmaceutical industry. It certainly gives one to wonder how many other drugs have been promoted with manipulated data, especially given the number of published papers demonstrating a very strong correlation between who pays for the study and how well the drug does. If you wish your industry to be better respected, perhaps cleaning up the marketing practices might be a good first step toward that goal.
Don’t get me wrong, I quite understand that publicly-traded corporations have to give priority to maximizing profits for the shareholders over healing the sick, but the industry is setting itself up for public interventions that it isn’t going to like. (Though of course the logic of capitalism militates against self-restraint, so the outcome is probably inevitable, alas.)
Regina
(Empress of the Unexpected)
#45
Again, people need to educate themselves as much as possible, or bring someone to an appointment who can understand the issues at hand. I am on beta blockers for mitral valve prolapse. Ok, beta blockers also lower blood pressure. At one appointment, my cardiologist kept asking me if I ever felt faint, etc. I said no, and he then offered me a second medication for my heart. I politely smiled, said no, and asked him if he was worried about my passing out from the mitral valve prolapse, coupled with the beta blocker, why was he suggesting a second medication that lowered blood pressure further? No answer. It was so arbitrary - I had been seeing him for years. Guess the drug rep had just taken him out to lunch!! So yes, I see both sides of the argument.
MrMartyJones
#46
As always Paul, you provide extremely interesting and well-written (I had to google “militates” haha) perspective. You write like someone who has done it for a living. I always enjoy/appreciate your input, even on the rare occasion when I disagree.
You’re obviously more experienced and better read on the subject than myself. I will, indeed, add the “David Diamond on statins” to my “to-do” list. If you have a specific suggestion to use as an overview or starting point, let me know. I know that statins were/are one of the huge “blockbuster” drugs. (Of course in contrast, for every drug that actually makes it into a clinical trial there are thousands of compounds that fail, and for every drug that makes it to Phase-I there are thousands more that won’t make it to market and then not all of them are even profitable.)
The pharmaceutical industry is sooooo heavily regulated, I don’t understand how stuff is able to get snuck through, though obviously stuff does happen (for example the way Purdue marketed Oxycontin blows my mind). However, I would still contend that these are the rare exceptions to the rule. In any case, it’s a very complicated subject. I’m very fortunate to have good health and I’m very happy that I’m improving it even more using the keto WOE and all the great information/discussion/advice found here on the forums!