Study: Soda and Sugar Drive Obesity

New research powerfully implicates soda and other sugary drinks as culprits in the obesity epidemic.

A huge, decades-long study involving more than 33,000 Americans has yielded the first clear proof that drinking sugary beverages interacts with genes that affect weight, amplifying a person’s risk of obesity beyond what it would be from heredity alone.

This means that such drinks are especially harmful to people with genes that predispose them to weight gain. And most of us have at least some of these genes.

In addition, two other major experiments have found that giving children and teens calorie-free alternatives to the sugary drinks they usually consume leads to less weight gain.

Collectively, the results strongly suggest that sugary drinks cause people to pack on the pounds, independent of other unhealthy behavior such as overeating and getting too little exercise, scientists say.

That adds weight to the push for taxes, portion limits like the one just adopted in New York City, and other policies to curb consumption of soda, juice drinks and sports beverages sweetened with sugar.

Soda lovers do get some good news: Sugar-free drinks did not raise the risk of obesity in these studies.

“You may be able to fool the taste” and satisfy a sweet tooth without paying a price in weight, said an obesity researcher with no role in the studies, Rudy Leibel of Columbia University.

The studies were being presented Friday at an obesity conference in San Antonio and were published online by the New England Journal of Medicine.

The gene research in particular fills a major gap in what we know about obesity. It was a huge undertaking, involving three long-running studies that separately and collectively reached the same conclusions. It shows how behavior combines with heredity to affect how fat we become.

Having many of these genes does not guarantee people will become obese, but if they drink a lot of sugary beverages, “they fulfill that fate,” said an expert with no role in the research, Jules Hirsch of Rockefeller University in New York. “The sweet drinking and the fatness are going together, and it’s more evident in the genetic predisposition people.”

Sugary drinks are the single biggest source of calories in the American diet, and they are increasingly blamed for the fact that a third of U.S. children and teens and more than two-thirds of adults are obese or overweight.

Consumption of sugary drinks and obesity rates have risen in tandem —both have more than doubled since the 1970s in the U.S.

In one study, researchers randomly assigned 224 overweight or obese high schoolers in the Boston area to receive shipments every two weeks of either the sugary drinks they usually consumed or sugar-free alternatives, including bottled water. No efforts were made to change the youngsters’ exercise habits or give nutrition advice, and the kids knew what type of beverages they were getting.

After one year, the sugar-free group weighed more than 4 pounds less on average than those who kept drinking sugary beverages.

“I know of no other single food product whose elimination can produce this degree of weight change,” said the study’s leader, Dr. David Ludwig of Boston Children’s Hospital and the Harvard School of Public Health.

The weight difference between the two groups narrowed to 2 pounds in the second year of the study, when drinks were no longer being provided. That showed at least some lasting beneficial effect on kids’ habits. The study was funded mostly by government grants.

A second study involved 641 normal-weight children ages 4 to 12 in the Netherlands who regularly drank sugar-sweetened beverages. They were randomly assigned to get either a sugary drink or a sugar-free one during morning break at their schools, and were not told what kind they were given.

The studies “provide strong impetus” for policies urged by the Institute of Medicine, the American Heart Association and others to limit sugary drink consumption.

The genetic research was part of a much larger set of health studies that have gone on for decades across the U.S., led by the Harvard School of Public Health.

Researchers checked for 32 gene variants that have previously been tied to weight. Because we inherit two copies of each gene, everyone has 64 opportunities for these risk genes. The study participants had 29 on average.

Every four years, these people answered detailed surveys about their eating and drinking habits as well as things like smoking and exercise. Researchers analyzed these over several decades.

A clear pattern emerged: The more sugary drinks someone consumed, the greater the impact of the genes on the person’s weight and risk of becoming obese.

For every 10 risk genes someone had, the risk of obesity rose in proportion to how many sweet drinks the person regularly consumed. Overall calorie intake and lifestyle factors such as exercise did not account for the differences researchers saw.

This means that people with genes that predispose them to be obese are more susceptible to the harmful effects of sugary drinks on their weight, said one of the study leaders, Harvard’s Dr. Frank Hu. The opposite also was true — avoiding these drinks can minimize the effect of obesity genes.

“Two bad things can act together and their combined effects are even greater than either effect alone,” Hu said. “The flip side of this is everyone has some genetic risk of obesity, but the genetic effects can be offset by healthier beverage choices. It’s certainly not our destiny” to be fat, even if we carry genes that raise this risk.

Vitamin D Linked to Lower Rates of Tooth Decay

A new review of existing studies points toward a potential role for vitamin D in helping to prevent dental caries, or tooth decay. These trials showed that vitamin D was associated with an approximately 50 percent reduction in the incidence of tooth decay.

According to Dr. Michael Holick, professor of medicine at the Boston University Medical Center, "the findings from the University of Washington reaffirm the importance of vitamin D for dental health." He said that "children who are vitamin D deficient have poor and delayed teeth eruption and are prone to dental caries."

The vitamin D question takes on greater importance in the light of current public health trends. Vitamin D levels in many populations are decreasing while dental caries incidence is increasing.

Parents may increase vitamin D levels in children through the use of supplemental cod-liver oil or other products containing the vitamin.

Folate and Vitamin B-12 Linked to Depression

A low intake of folate and vitamin B12 is linked to a greater risk of melancholic depressive symptoms. Typical depressive symptoms are associated with melancholic depression, such as a depressed mood. Folate helps produce chemicals that control brain functions, such as sleep, mood, and appetite, and can be found in foods like green vegetables. Vitamin B12 is also a water soluble vitamin and it plays a crucial role in the function of the brain, nervous system, and formation of red blood cells.

The results from the study showed the subjects with the highest folate intake had a 50% lower risk for melancholic depressive symptoms, compared to those with the lowest intake. And the people who had the highest vitamin B12 levels had a 3 times lower risk for melancholic depressive symptoms than those with the lowest levels.

Journal of Affective Disorders 2012

Foods high in rutin can help prevent blood clots.

Research by investigators at Harvard’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) and published in online in The Journal of Clinical Investigation (JCI) has led to a strategy for preventing thrombosis (blood clotting) — feeding rutin to patients.

“It’s not always fully appreciated that the majority of Americans will die as the result of a blood clot in either their heart or their brain,” says senior author Robert Flaumenhaft, MD, PhD, an investigator in the Division of Hemostasis and Thrombosis at BIDMC and Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. “Approximately half of all morbidity and mortality in the United States can be attributed to heart attack or stroke.”

Foods high in rutin can help prevent blood clots
Among the more than 5,000 compounds that were screened by researchers,, quercetin-3-rutinoside (rutin) emerged as the most potent agent to prevent blood clots.

“Rutin proved to be the most potently anti-thrombotic compound that we ever tested in this model,” said Flaumenhaft. Rutin was shown to inhibit both platelet accumulation and fibrin generation during thrombus formation.

Foods that are high in rutin include buckwheat, apples and asparagus.

6000 Steps May Save Your Life

Habitual physical activity that adds up to moving 6,000 or more steps a day may protect women's health in midlife, because, whether through formal exercises or just the activities of daily life, this level of activity is linked to a lower risk for developing diabetes and metabolic syndrome in midlife women.

For most people, that is the equivalent of walking for about an hour a day.

Studies suggest that people who set themselves goals with a pedometer are more likely to increase their levels of physical activity, lose weight and lower their blood pressure. 

But setting yourself a goal of walking for an hour a day can be rather daunting if you are just starting out. It might be easier to achieve such a goal if you break it down and find ways to add in extra steps to what you already do: ten minutes here, and ten minutes there, for instance. 

People who have used pedometers successfully to increase their daily activity do things like:

• Park further away from entrances, eg at the supermarket or workplace,
• Use the stairs rather than the elevator,
• Take a walk at break times, and
• Enjoy a stroll in the evening, for instance after dinner, with family or friends.

Grapefruit Juice Mixed With Prescription Drugs Can Be Deadly

Many prescription drugs have severe side effects when they are mixed with grapefruit juice, and the number of these medications is rapidly growing, however, doctors are often unaware of the side effects, according to a new study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ).

Serious side effects of mixing grapefruit juice with certain prescription drugs include:

• respiratory failure
• gastrointestinal bleeding
• bone marrow suppression in patients with weak immune systems
• renal toxicity
• acute kidney failure
• sudden death
• According to the new findings, over 85 different medications may have interactions with grapefruit, and 43 can have harmful effects. Seville oranges, which is found in marmalade, as well as limes and pomelos have the active ingredients, or furanocoumarins - substances which naturally occur in grapefruit. They irreversibly inhibit the drug metabolizing CYP3A4 enzyme that inactivates the effects of approximately half of all medications.
  
  Medications that mix with these substances have three traits:
  • They are given as oral drugs.
  • They possess very low to middle bioavailability (the percentage of the oral dose of the medication which is soaked into the blood circulation unaltered).
  • They go through drug metabolism in the gastrointestinal tract by CYP3A4.
  For low bioavailability drugs, consuming just one grapefruit can multiply the dosage effect of that medication several times, and this interaction can take place regardless of whether the grapefruit was eaten hours before the drug was taken. Therefore, a moderate amount of grapefruit can impact interacting medications which are taken only once a day at any hour during when the dose is taken.
  
  Taking regular amounts of medications on a daily basis can increase side effects. For example, when Simvastin, a popular statin, is mixed with one 200-mL glass of grapefruit juice for 3 days, it results in a 330% systematic concentration of the medication in comparison with water.
  
  Adults over the age of 45 are the most common buyers of grapefruit and also tend to be prescribed the most medications. The population of adults over 45 is extremely large, therefore, many of these interactions are likely to occur. The report notes that older adults are more likely to have decreased capability to endure extreme systematic drug concentrations, making them more likely to experience these adverse effects. 

Newly Discovered Effects Of Vitamin D On Cancer

Vitamin D slows the progression of cells from premalignant to malignant states, keeping their proliferation in check. 

The sunshine vitamin acts by several mechanisms to inhibit both the production and function of the protein cMYC. cMYC drives cell division and is active at elevated levels in more than half of all cancers.

lthough vitamin D can be obtained from limited dietary sources and directly from exposure to the sun during the spring and summer months, the combination of poor dietary intake and sun avoidance has created vitamin D deficiency or insufficiency in large proportions of many populations worldwide. It is known that vitamin D has a wide range of physiological effects and that correlations exist between insufficient amounts of vitamin D and an increased incidence of a number of cancers. These correlations are particularly strong for cancers of the digestive tract, including colon cancer.

Source: McGill University

Do not buy into IOM's new advice on vitamin D.

I can hardly find words to describe just how crazy the Institute of Medicines new guidelines on vitamin D make me.
Ignore them please. Or should I say follow them at your own peril.
They are saying that if we just reduce the definition of adequacy regarding our level of vitamin D from 30 ng/ml to 20 ng/ml that 80% of Americans will not need supplements.
In other words, 80% of Americans are at or above 20 ng/ml so lets just call that OK.
But it isn't ok. Being at 30 ng/ml ( compared to being deficient) is linked to dramatically reduced incidence of heart attack, stroke, major cardiovascular events, respiratory infections and rates of major cancers. 
DO NOT accept a reduced standard. It is the equivalent of austerity measures for your health. It is nutritional foolishness. old school thinking. All of the noted vitamin D experts challenge this mindset. And I agree with them.
Keep your target level of vitamin D ( measured as 25OH D) at or above 30 ng/ml. Normal range is 30-100 ng/ml. Anything less is a call to action.

High Carb Diet Bad For Elderly Cognitive Function

Just say no!

Seniors who follow a high-carbohydrate diet are nearly four times as likely to develop mild cognitive impairment, especially if their food intake is high in sugar, researchers from the Mayo Clinic report in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease. They also found that seniors whose diets are high in protein and fat are less likely to develop cognitive impairment.

The researchers found that:

      

    The highest carbohydrate eaters had a 1.9 times higher risk of mild cognitive impairment than the participants who ate the fewest carbs.

             

   The highest sugar consumers had a 1.5 times higher risk of cognitive impairment compared to the lowest consumers.           

    

   The participants with the highest fat intake had a 42% lower risk of developing cognitive impairment compared to the lowest fat eaters.

            

   The highest protein consumers had a 21% lower chance of developing dementia compared to the lowest consumers of protein.

      

   When taking into account fat and protein intake, the highest carb eaters had a 3.6 times higher chance of developing mild cognitive impairment.

"Relative Intake of Macronutrients Impacts Risk of Mild Cognitive Impairment or Dementia"
Rosebud O. Roberts et al
Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, October 2012. 10.3233/JAD-2012-120862

Fruits and Vegetables: Seven-A-Day for Happiness and Mental Health

Yes that's right...in this study done in the UK, happiness and mental health were highest among people who ate seven portions of fruit and vegetables a day. Now heres the problem.  Only one in ten people actually ate that many servings of fruits and vegetables and 25% ate less than one serving daily. Clearly we can do better.

–University of Warwick (2012, October 9). Fruits and vegetables: Seven-a-day for happiness and mental health. ScienceDaily. Retrieved October 10, 2012, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­

Taking statins? Also take Coenzyme Q10 and Vitamin D

An experimental study involving statin-treated mice found that coenzyme Q10 could reverse atorvastatin-related mitochondrial dysfunction. atorvastatin-treated mice developed muscular mitochondrial dysfunction due to ubiquinone deficiency and a decrease in exercise endurance. The findings of this study in mice suggest that coenzyme Q10 supplementation may benefit those taking statin drugs by reversing some of the adverse effects induced by these medications. But coenzyme Q10 is not the only supplement that may be beneficial for those taking statins to control cholesterol. Vitamin D in a separate study was found to reverse the muscle pain and weakness associated with statin use, even when patients continued taking the statins.

Coenzyme Q10 reverses mitochondrial dysfunction in atorvastatin-treated mice and increases exercise endurance," Muraki A, Miyashita K, et al, J Appl Physiol, 2012

Ahmed W, Khan N, Glueck CJ, Pandey S, Wang P, Goldenberg N, et al. Low serum 25(OH) vitamin D levels (<32 ng/mL) are associated with reversible myositis-myalgia in statin-treated patients. Transl Res 2009;153:11-16

Asthma patients breathe easier when they eat more vegetables and fruit.

A comparison in asthma patients of the difference between high antioxidant intake vs low found better breathing and less episodes of symptoms requiring use of inhalers. Breathing improvements were measured by a higher predicted forced expiratory volume and percentage predicted forced vital capacity in the high-antioxidant group while the low-antioxidant diet group showed an increased level of inflammation, measured as plasma C-reactive protein elevation.

The high antioxidant group averaged 5 servings of vegetables and two servings of fruit daily while the low antioxidant group ate only two servings of vegetables and one serving of fruit.

"Manipulating antioxidant intake in asthma: a randomized controlled trial," Wood LG, Garg ML, et al, Am J Clin Nutr, 2012 Sep

Higher vitamin D levels associated with lower tumor size and better overall survival in breast cancer patients.

Researchers collected serum from 1800 early breast cancer patients at diagnosis, measured 25-hydroxyvitamin D(3) (vitamin D) levels and determined genetic variants in vitamin D-related genes. The results showed that lower vitamin D levels significantly correlated with larger tumor size at diagnosis but not with lymph node invasion, receptor status, or tumor grade. Genetic variants in 25-hydroxylase (CYP2R1) and vitamin D-binding (DBP) protein significantly determined serum vitamin D levels but did not affect the observed association between serum vitamin D and tumor size. High serum vitamin D (>30ng/mL) at diagnosis significantly correlated with improved overall survival and disease-specific survival and additionally had a modest effect on disease-free interval, which only became apparent after at least 3 years of follow-up. When considering menopausal status, serum vitamin D had a strong impact on breast cancer-specific outcome in postmenopausal patients, whereas no association could be demonstrated in premenopausal patients. The authors conclude "high vitamin D levels at early breast cancer diagnosis correlate with lower tumor size and better overall survival, and improve breast cancer-specific outcome, especially in postmenopausal patients".

Hatse S, Lambrechts D, Verstuyf A, Smeets A, Brouwers B, Vandorpe T, Brouckaert O, Peuteman G, Laenen A, Verlinden L, Kriebitzsch C, Dieudonné AS, Paridaens R, Neven P, Christiaens MR, Bouillon R, Wildiers H. Vitamin D status at breast cancer diagnosis: correlation with tumor characteristics, disease outcome, and genetic determinants of vitamin D insufficiency. Carcinogenesis. 2012 Jul;33(7):1319-26.

Reduce breast cancer risk with exercise.

This study investigated the relationship between recreational physical activity (RPA) and breast cancer risk in a population-based sample of 1504 cases (n = 233 in situ, n = 1271 invasive) and 1555 controls from the Long Island Breast Cancer Study Project, in Long Island, New York. The results showed 10-19 hours per week of RPA at any intensity level during the reproductive and postmenopausal years has the greatest benefit for reducing breast cancer risk. However, substantial postmenopausal weight gain may eliminate the benefits of regular activity. The authors conclude "Collectively, these results suggest that women can still reduce their breast cancer risk later in life by maintaining their weight and engaging in moderate amounts of activity".

Note: 10-19 hours a week had the greatest benefit...we need to get out and play more!

McCullough LE, Eng SM, Bradshaw PT, Cleveland RJ, Teitelbaum SL, Neugut AI, Gammon MD. Fat or fit: The joint effects of physical activity, weight gain, and body size on breast cancer risk. Cancer. 2012 Jun 25. [Epub ahead of print]

Folic acid supplementation may reduce progression of atherosclerosis.

Researchers have conducted a meta-analysis of relevant randomized trials to assess whether folic acid supplementation reduces the progression of atherosclerosis as measured by carotid intima-media thickness (CIMT). This analysis included 2,052 subjects from 10 folic acid randomized trials. The analysis showed that folic acid supplementation significantly reduces the progression of CIMT, particularly in subjects with chronic kidney disease (CKD) or high cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk but not in subjects who were generally healthy with only elevated homocysteine concentrations. Furthermore, meta-regression analysis of the data showed that the baseline CIMT levels and the percent reduction of homocysteine were positively related to the effect size. Consistently, a greater beneficial effect was seen in those trials with baseline CIMT levels ≥0.8 mm, and a reduction in the homocysteine concentration ≥30%. The authors conclude "Our findings underscore the importance of identifying target populations that can particularly benefit from folic acid therapy".

Qin X, Xu M, Zhang Y, Li J, Xu X, Wang X, Xu X, Huo Y. Effect of folic acid supplementation on the progression of carotid intima-media thickness: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Atherosclerosis. 2012 Jun;222(2):307-13.

Reduced stroke risk associated with B vitamin supplementation.

This study systematically reviewed the effects of B vitamin supplementation on plasma homocysteine (Hcy), cardiovascular and all-cause mortality in randomized controlled trials. Data from 19 studies including 47,921 participants was analyzed and the results showed a significant protective effect on stroke and a decrease in blood Hcy levels with B vitamin supplementation.

Note, be sure your daily multi-vitamin provides at least 400 iu folic acid and 25 to 50 mg of the B complex vitamins, including at least 1000 mcg B-12.

Huang T, Chen Y, Yang B, Yang J, Wahlqvist ML, Li D. Meta-analysis of B vitamin supplementation on plasma homocysteine, cardiovascular and all-cause mortality. Clin Nutr. 2012 Aug;31(4):448-54.

Vitamin C and E supplementation is beneficial for oral contraceptive users.

Oral contraceptives may increase oxidative stress and increase cardiovascular risk in susceptible women. This study aimed to assess whether supplementation with vitamins E and C reduced this oral contraceptives effect. 120 healthy female individuals were divided into three groups: A, control; B, untreated oral contraceptives users; and C, treated oral contraceptives users with vitamin E (200 IU) and C (150 mg) supplementation for 4 weeks. In all cases, plasma glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and glutathione reductase (GR) activities and malondialdehyde (MDA) level were determined. The results showed significant increases in the plasma MDA level, and activities of GPx and GR in plasma were decreased in Group B compared to the control group. Supplementation with vitamin C and E significantly increased the activity of GPx and GR activity, and reduced plasma MDA levels in Group C. The authors concludes "These data suggest that low-dose oral contraceptives, by enhancing the stress oxidative and lipid peroxidation, may represent a potential cardiovascular risk factor, and the use of vitamins E and C may be beneficial in ameliorating this side effect of oral contraceptives".

Note: while there are food sources of these important antioxidants, I suggest taking a daily multi-vitamin that provides at least 400 IU of vitamin E and 500 mg

vitamin C.

Zal F, Mostafavi-Pour Z, Amini F, Heidari A. Effect of vitamin E and C supplements on lipid peroxidation and GSH-dependent antioxidant enzyme status in the blood of women consuming oral contraceptives. Contraception. 2012 Jul;86(1):62-6.

Mixed Berry~Fruit Tart

This recipe makes two tarts. Go ahead and make two, they will vanish in no time! Use whatever fresh berries you would like. Be artistic with the arrangement of the fruit.

Almond tart crust:

1 1/2  sticks butter


2/3 cup powdered sugar


1 large egg


1/2-teaspoon vanilla


2 and 1/2 cup flour


1/4 cup almond meal
 (In a food processor grind 1/2 cup sliced almonds with 1-tablespoon powdered sugar)


Pinch of salt

In the bowl of an electric mixer combine butter, sugar, salt and vanilla until well blended. Mix in the flour and almond meal just until it is mixed. Do not over mix. Wrap in plastic and chill over night. Divide the dough in half and roll each out on a well-floured surface to desired size. Spray two tart pans with non-stick spray and place the dough in the pans. Prick the bottom. Bake in a preheated 350 oven for 25 minutes until golden brown. Cool on a rack.

Cream Filling:

2 (8-oz) packages cream cheese


1/2 cup granulated sugar


1/2 cup chopped crystallized ginger (4 oz)

Blend cream cheese and granulated sugar in a food processor until sugar is dissolved and mixture is smooth. Add ginger and pulse until finely chopped and mixture is combined well.

To assemble:

1-pint raspberries


1-pint blueberries


1-pint blackberries


1-pint strawberries


Feel free to use any fruit and/or berry combo that you like


Kiwi slices are especially pretty!

1-cup red current jelly




Spread 1/2 of the cream filling into each pre-baked tart shell. Cover artfully with berries and or fruit. When ready to serve melt the jelly over medium heat. Using a pastry brush carefully brush over fruit. Serve immediately.