Inconsistent with the current consensus of medical opinion

My nutritionist asked me to read the book Back to the Basics of Human Health by Mary Frost. I paid a deposit for it, which I'll get back if I return it in good shape (or I could just keep it). I also got a quiz; the answers are obvious when I read the book. Here are some of the things it explores in detail.

* A great many of modern diseases are flourishing because our diet no longer provides sufficient nutrition. In 1950 an orange contained 50 mg of vitamin C. Today it contains 5 mg. A big reason is we replaced nutrients in the soil, previously supplied by manure and other natural sources, with fertilizer. That replenishes only the basic materials for plant growth. And industry makes a profit from fertilizer.

* Healthy plants can combat fungus and insects. But modern farm plants aren't healthy. That requires the use of lots of harmful pesticides and fungicides.

* Congress enacted a food protection agency (what eventually became the Food and Drug Administration) in 1906. It was captured by the food additive industry in 1912 and since then serves their interests, not ours. Remember how for years studies "proved" cigarette smoking was harmless? That has been going on in the food additive industry since the 1930s. Sound nutrition science has been drowned out by this industry.

* Oils from seeds, including canola and cottonseed, are made using components of gasoline.

* The goals of processed food are (1) taste great and otherwise be appealing, (2) be inexpensive to create, and (3) have a long shelf life. Nutrition has nothing to do with these three goals, though if a nutrition angle can be exploited for advertising, so much the better. If we could last as long as the food on our shelves.

* Should city water be fluoridated? Perhaps with calcium fluoride. But it is sodium fluoride that is added. That is created as a waste product of aluminum smelting. It is considered a hazardous material and companies would have to pay to have it neutralized. There is so much industry-sponsored science that Congress won't let the FDA test whether sodium fluoride is actually safe. A diet that includes proper nutrition protects teeth better than fluoridation can.

* Vitamins in natural whole form are more than one kind of molecule. They appear with various "enzymes, co-enzymes, antioxidants, trace elements, activators, and other unknown factors" (I take "unknown" to mean "not studied"). But the vitamin industry (a big business!) only supplies the basic molecule. When the body sees that it draws on its reserves of the factors, etc. to use the vitamin. When those are depleted the vitamin cannot be used by the body. Which means one can suffer from a vitamin deficiency while taking the synthetic vitamin. It is, of course, the synthetic version that is added to processed food.

* Complete vitamin complexes are natural cannot be patented; isolated synthetic molecules can be. And patents lead to profits.

* Very few doctors study nutrition in medical school. Because they're the doctor and you're not, they tend to discount ideas and research not included in their training. In addition, all nutrition research in medical schools has been funded by the vitamin industry.

* Because vitamins and associated compounds are so complex, science doesn't know how to study them. Research deals with one compound at a time. So only synthetic vitamins are studied.

* Daily recommendations of vitamins are based on what they do for rats, not humans.

* Processing food takes natural vitamins out and replaces them with synthetic. The FDA only knows how to label synthetic vitamins because that's all that is standardized.

* Anti-oxidants are hyped by the vitamin industry to sell more synthetic substances that are only as useful as synthetic vitamins.

* Effects of malnutrition (such as not consuming whole vitamins) can be passed on to later generations.

* Dr. Royal Lee founded the company Standard Process to create products that contain whole vitamins. He was harassed by the FDA because they reviewed his promotional materials and concluded it was "inconsistent with what they contended was the current consensus of medical opinion" and thus "false and misleading." The battle resulted in a Consent Decree requiring Lee to burn all his "misleading" research. Fire barrels burned for a month. Yes, in the USA in the 1960s. America is under the control of food companies.

* As I've already seen in my own dietary experience, the highly prescribed low-fat diet is the wrong thing to do. To have energy the diet compensates with high carbohydrates. And that leads to weight gain, diabetes, and a whole host of other problems. Yes, the standard weight-loss diet leads to weight-gain and disease.

* The low fat diet became standardized as healthy through "a jungle of mishaps: scientific 'leaps of faith,' political agendas, media frenzies, and food industry concoctions." A leap of faith: First, the general rule (later proved false): "carbohydrates and protein have 4 calories per gram and fat has 9 calories, so cutting fat will be faster in cutting pounds." It sounds so reasonable. Second is the leap "from cholesterol-lowering drugs and health to cholesterol-lowering diet and health." Not that the drugs improved the chances of avoiding a heart attack all that much.

* Another leap: After World War II heart disease began to sweep the country. Dr. Ancel Keys proposed that the culprit was fat. What he used for evidence isn't reported. But Keys ignored another possibility. The food industry created C-Rations for the troops and were now putting all they learned into the nation's food. The rise of heart disease corresponds to the rise of processing and the use of additives.

* Fat in the bloodstream comes from three sources: Fat we eat. Fat converted from the carbs and protein we eat. The fat previously stored in the body. That means for a diet to be "low fat" it must be low carb. A high carb diet triggers a lot of insulin that a high fat diet doesn't. And lots of insulin causes lots of medical problems -- high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart disease -- in addition to obesity.

* The normal treatment for high blood pressure is a low fat -- and thus high carb -- diet. When that doesn't work (and it doesn't) you become a lifelong consumer of cholesterol and blood pressure meds -- to the delight of the drug industry. Which means the drug industry is pushing the low fat diet so they get more customers.

* Excess carbs lead to excess insulin, which leads to insulin resistance and pancreas burnout, which leads to diabetes.

* Cholesterol is a basic component of cell structure and brain function. LDL (the "lousy" kind) carries cholesterol from the liver, where it is created, to cells. HDL (the "happy" kind) carries excess and waste cholesterol back to the liver for disposal. It is this transport that a blood test looks at. Insulin -- not cholesterol in the diet -- raises LDL. Insulin also increases the buildup of plaque -- LDL based deposits in blood vessels -- which causes heart attacks.

* Heartburn isn't caused by excess stomach acid. It is caused by insufficient stomach acid that leaves food undigested, which sits in the stomach and ferments. The results of that fermentation is what causes heartburn. Standard antacids reduce what is already in short supply. Good nutritious food allows the body to create the proper stomach acids.

* Heartburn is only one of many digestive problems caused by improper diet. There is a long list of diseases that result from nutrition-free food and food additives: carpal-tunnel syndrome, low birth weight, asthma, ADHD, easy bruising, painful joints, slow healing, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, rage and anxiety, and craving of sweets. Most of these problems develop so slowly we attribute them to getting older -- even by people in their 30s.

* Milk is a good source of calcium as well as the enzymes to use the calcium. But pasteurization kills the enzymes, leaving the body unable to use the calcium. So go for raw milk. Alas, I haven't found a raw cheese that I like.

* The dietary solution: no sugar (and most sweeteners aren't better), low carbs, high protein, high fat -- though the right kinds of fats, lots of veggies, not many fruits (and none as juice), enough water, lots of exercise, and whole food supplements (as in vitamins that are not synthetic).

There is a big question remaining: Why believe this book (and my nutritionist) when it is so inconsistent with the current consensus of medical opinion? Some thoughts:

* Current medical opinion doesn't know how to properly manage the hypoglycemia I was diagnosed with almost 3 decades ago (though today they say I'm not really). They could not explain why I was hungry an hour after eating and strongly urged me to see a psychiatrist. My nutritionist proposed a diet that manages my sugar level quite well.

* I would use my weight lost as a reason to believe this book, but I haven't lost enough and kept it off to offer it as proof.

* I've had an ongoing skin problem for more than 20 years. Various doctors only treated it. My nutritionist thinks my current regimen of supplements will cure it within a few more months. Again, not proof yet.

* From what I've seen in various other aspects of commerce and government (especially the entire GOP) I can readily believe that the food industry controls the FDA and that the profit motive, not nutrition or safety, controls what is in our food.

* Some aspects of this book -- organic is better, whole grains are better than refined, whole fruit is better than juice, processed foods aren't healthy, sugar isn't good for you -- are things I've heard from other sources.

While much of this can't be taken as "proof" the book makes sense to me. I'll believe it a lot more than I would believe the claims thrown at me by the processed food industry.