Keto in a pill?

(Robert Hollinger) #1

This just popped up when i was looking at google finance. Keto in a pill? If this is legit I guess maybe we’ll finally see (hopefully) some studies on what happens if you have BHB and high glucose long term. The difference here from exogenous ketone supplementation is that apparently this pill would encourage your body to create the ketones which I would assume would require burning fat. I mean I think sticking to low carb and doing it naturally is better…but the drug companies are trying to cash in which may mean dragging the doctors and other professionals with them.

https://endpts.com/keto-in-a-pill-juvenescence-debuts-anti-aging-joint-venture-with-the-buck-dedicated-to-inducing-ketosis/

(Carl Keller) #2

Generally speaking, humans have survived for 200,000 years without a need for pills and I believe that they are repeated attempts to outsmart Mother Nature for profit.

I will stick to real food as much as possible.

#3

This was very vague and I don’t understand what they are trying to accomplish. Would you be advised to stop eating carbs? If not, that’s bullshit, if so you don’t need the pill. So again, unintelligible masturbatory woo ravings.

#4

High ketones in the context of a HC diet sounds scary to me. It’s a completely new metabolic situation for humans, and something that our physiology has no experience with, so to me it seems like a very bad idea, the consequences of which we can’t see right away.
But there’s a lot of research on exogenous ketones which sheds light on how awesome ketosis is :slight_smile:

(Robert Hollinger) #5

which they are building upon. but there are a lot of EK companies that are touting just take these supplements and you’ll be in ketosis (which leads to people sticking with high carb and wondering why they aren’t making progress)

I could see this pill being helpful for people who are very metabolically challenged and have a difficult time becoming adapted. Of course there’s always fasting :slight_smile:

#6

There’s definitely a place for exogenous ketones (I’ve listened to enough podcasts with Dom D’Agostino not to be too dismissive of them!). I just get frustrated when the main solution is a pill rather than using something that our bodies do so beautifully (and with more physiological integrity).

(Empress of the Unexpected) #7

Sorry - out of likes. So first it was Big Pharma, now Big Keto???

(Robert Hollinger) #8

lol

(Richard Morris) #9

You can buy BHB salts for $19/kg from alibaba https://www.alibaba.com/showroom/beta-hydroxybutyrate.html

Let’s forget for the moment that 50% of it is in a form that your ancestors have been able to turn into energy for roughly 3 billion years, and 50% is in a form that no one knows how we metabolize, or what the effect of decades of caloric supply will do.

Forget that none of your ancestors over the past 3Billion years has ever experienced high ketones, high insulin AND high glucose all at once.

Forget for the moment that you don’t know if why you bought is what is on the label without an NMR spectroscope.

You can cut that into 1200 pills with 800mg each, and sell a bottle of 60 pills for $120 or roughly $2400.

That’s a 125x return on investment.

We should expect to see all kinds of cowboys try to get products in this market. And be prepared to explain to people that the only reason ketones are good is because the reason you made them also stabilizes your glucose and lowers your insulin.

(Carl Keller) #10

I prefer Big Bacon.

(Robert Hollinger) #11

But that’s exogenous. The point of the pill is that it is supposed to encourage your body to make your own. I see 3 potential reasons for this. 1. to jumpstart getting into ketosis, 2. to assist if you have trouble adapting, and 3 (the only reason with any financial advantage but I see major risk here) to be in ketosis regardless of how you are eating…

(Carl Keller) #12

And what’s wrong with waiting weeks or even months to get into proper nutritional ketosis? Nothing bad is happening as long as your electrolytes are taken care of and many great things are happening. Why are we always in such a rush and have a need for instant gratification when the derangement of our health took decades?

(Robert Hollinger) #13

I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that just that it might be a potential target audience. but it’s not a very profitable one because it’s short term.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #14

There is a lack of clarity in the whole concept, I believe. Nutritional ketosis is not merely the circulation of β-hydroxybutyrate in the blood serum, but a metabolic state characterized by generally low serum insulin, generally low serum glucose resulting from controlled carbohydrate intake, a low insulin/glucagon ratio, lipolysis occurring in the muscles and adipose tissue, gluconeogenesis and ketogenesis occurring in the liver.

I don’t believe the brain will use β-hydroxybutyrate when serum glucose is elevated, though I may be wrong about that. The muscle must metabolize glucose in preference to fatty acids and ketone bodies in the presence of elevated glucose and insulin, and the adipose is forced by elevated insulin to store glucose in the form of triglycerides, likewise. Ketogenesis and gluconeogenesis are halted by a high insulin/glucagon ratio. What effect the presence of ketone bodies in blood serum would have under such conditions is anybody’s guess, except that they won’t be metabolized. It is possible they could simply be excreted in the urine and the breath, I suppose.

This is the same old question of whether exogenous ketones have any use or effect on the body. No pill can force serum insulin down in the presence of elevated serum glucose, and even if it could, the result would be systemic damage or death from hyperglycemia. There is a reason the body mobilizes so swiftly to clear excess glucose from the bloodstream, after all.

If they really want to promote ketosis, why don’t they go into farming and raise meat animals?

Of course, @richard just had to go and say it better. :blush:

@roho42 If you are right that that is what those guys are hoping to do, the problem before them is this: The body cannot produce ketones in the presence of elevated insulin. Insulin must be present to fight elevated glucose, or catastrophe or death will ensue from hyperglycemia. The easiest and least expensive way to lower serum glucose is to avoid eating carbohydrate. A pill that would prevent the digestive system from disassembling dietary carbohydrate into its constituent glucose molecules would likely have unpleasant or even disastrous consequences of one sort or another.