Aspartame targeted for bogus study funded by parent company in Japan
Imagine for a moment that you read a news headline that proclaimed, "Study Concludes Eating French Fries Does Not Cause Obesity." Would that get your attention? Sure it would, until you kept reading and discovered that the company who paid for that study to be conducted was none other than McDonald's! Now how credible is that headline?
As off-the-wall as that example may sound, that is PRECISELY what has happened with a study on a rather controversial subject. This University of Maryland press release details the results of a study conducted by a panel of "experts" who declared the artificial sweetener aspartame is 100% absolutely safe for human consumption. Oh really?
Regular readers of my blog already know what I think about aspartame--or as I like to call it, NASTY-tame! I warned my fellow low-carbers to avoid aspartame if at all possible in my latest YouTube video because there are too many unanswered questions about this sugar substitute with some rather peculiar side effects.
Speaking from personal experience, I try to avoid NASTY-tame because it has done a doozy on my body in many ways when I consume more than just a little bit of it. I can tolerate about 1-2 diet sodas made with aspartame and that's it. Besides the disgusting flavor of aspartame (aka Equal and Nutrasweet), it also can bring on some of the most vicious headaches I have ever experienced.
Dr. Bernadene Magnuson assures us aspartame is completely safe
And this is something lead researcher Dr. Bernadene Magnuson, assistant professor of Nutrition and Food Science at the University of Maryland, acknowledged in this Reuters column about the study when she named headaches as "one possible area of concern" because "a small subset of the population" could be impacted by it.
Why do these "experts" attempt to say this side effect is somehow the exception and not the rule? Statin drug companies claim the same thing about their products causing joint pain in only a very small segment of the population when just about everyone I know who takes Lipitor, Crestor, or any of the other statins experience this. What's wrong with this picture?
Dr. Magnuson, along with various other panel members from the United States, The Netherlands, and Great Britain, examined previous research conducted on aspartame to determine whether there is validity in the claims that it leads to health concerns such as brain abnormalities and cancer, among other things. After sifting through over 500 studies dating back three decades, their conclusion was to give aspartame nothing but high marks as an approved sweetener.
“There have been continued questions in the media and on the Internet about the safety of aspartame,” Dr. Magnuson remarked. “Our study is a very comprehensive review of all of the research that’s been done on aspartame. Never before has a group with the breadth of experience of this panel looked at this question.”
But the real sticking point to this whole so-called study goes back to the point made at the beginning of this blog post: Guess who paid for this study to be done? It was none other than the Japanese manufacturer of aspartame--Ajinomoto Company Inc. who has an entire web site devoted to this "core strategic product" of theirs.
Just how credible is a study like this one? I'm not saying a study can't be objective simply because it is paid for by a company whose product stands to benefit from a positive report. But you have to admit something really screwy is going on around here when aspartame is given such flying colors by an allegedly unbiased panel.
The U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) has given their seal of approval for aspartame, but my personal experiences consuming it are all that matter to me. Headaches, memory trouble, and even weight stalls have occurred whenever higher amounts of aspartame are in my body. I don't know about you, but I'd rather not even mess with these side effects which is why I stick with sweeteners like Splenda instead (even if it is more difficult to find diet sodas made with it).
You can contact Dr. Bernadene Magnuson about her study on the safety of aspartame by e-mailing her at bmagnuso@umd.edu.
In our eagerness to pump out another video in our new "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb On YouTube" series, Christine and I went a bit long with Episode 4. It's not so much that we don't want to do longer videos, but YouTube limits the length to NO MORE THAN 10 MINUTES.
I found out this little factoid the hard way last night when I was up until 2AM trying to whittle this thing down to size so we didn't have to record it over again! UGH!
We had recorded a new video yesterday afternoon on artificial sweeteners and what a low-carb dieter can do to get something sweet in their diet. It was the usual fun video and I even started off serenading Christine with my own unique rendition of "Sugar, Awww Honey Honey." Plus, at the end, we gave a BIG shout out to all the wonderful people at my new "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb Discussion" forum.
Unfortunately, the raw feed went 13 1/2 minutes long and that didn't even count the intro and outro! BOO HOO! Oh well, so I had to chop off the front and the back and leave the primary meat of the video as the totality of the content. It's just a lesson learned for future videos to keep a closer eye on the clock.
So, with that perspective in mind, now you'll understand why it seems the video abruptly begins and ends. Sorry about that, we'll do better next time. Check it out as we talk about Splenda, aspartame, xylitol, maltitol, oligofructose, and erythritol as well products that contain these sweeteners:
Yes, I know about stevia and even included several minutes of the original video talking about this all-natural supplement that's a popular sweetening agent that low-carbers use, but it was part of the chopping block. Perhaps I could do an entire video just on the subject of stevia since it is becoming more and more popular.
Leave a comment for Episode 4 and be sure to rate it and favorite it if you enjoyed what was presented. :) If not, then I'd still love to know what you thought about it.
Just in case you missed any of our previous YouTube videos, here they are:
- Promo video--A half-minute promotion of the new video series - Episode 1--Introduction of Jimmy & Christine Moore - Episode 2--What kind of fruits can you have on a low-carb diet? - Episode 3--What kind of veggies can you have on a low-carb diet?
Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube videos so you'll never miss an episode! THANK YOU so much to everyone who has supported us by watching and commenting on our videos. Please send your suggestions for future YouTube video topics to me anytime at livinlowcarbman@charter.net.
Did you know Diet Coke in Japan is sweetened with the plant-based stevia?
About a year ago I blogged about the controversial all-natural sugar alternative called stevia. At the time, I lamented that stevia was not approved by the Food and Drug Adminstration (FDA) to even be called a sweetener...yet! But that may be about to change if a joint venture with The Coca-Cola Company and a major food additive business has anything to say about it (and you KNOW they will because money talks!).
This USA Today story notes that Coke as well as Cargill Foods have decided to take a serious look at a sweetener they want to call rebiana (a shortened word used for Stevia Rebaudiana). Remember that name they have come up with because it's the term these companies are going to be using for stevia soon and it's been three years in the making.
For people who are livin' la vida low-carb and choose to avoid the use of the chemical-based sweeteners that dominate the marketplace, such as saccharin (Sweet 'N Low), aspartame (Nutrasweet, Equal), and sucralose (Splenda), many of us have been using stevia instead because it contains ZERO calories and carbohydrates. That's certainly impressive nutritional info for a natural alternative to sugar.
But it's gonna be a bit of an uphill battle to get stevia approved since the FDA has come down so strongly AGAINST approving it while this list of sugar alternatives get a free pass--all of which are made from chemicals. But there are still a lot of people who have concerns over the safety of these products (and I get e-mails from people ALL THE TIME about my support for Splenda--get over it already people. That stuff helped me overcome morbid obesity, so leave it be!).
As a result, that's the allure of having commercial acceptance of stevia in a popular product like Diet Coke. With crazy new product concepts like the vitamin-infused Diet Coke Plus (made with aspartame), the "calorie-burning" Enviga (also sweetened with aspartame and a touch of ACE-K), and their marketing darling of the moment Coke Zero (yep, you guessed it, sweetened with aspartame and ACE-K), this idea of making a Diet Coke with Stevia is the best thing they've come up with since my favorite sugar-free soda Diet Coke with Splenda was released to the market (although they've never given it the proper marketing IMHO!).
Interestingly, stevia IS already being used in Diet Coke--in Japan, where stevia boasts a robust 40% of the sweetener market, as well as in Brazil, China, and nine other industrialized countries. So what's taking America so long to get going with this in this country already? The FDA needs to get its head out of their backside and approve stevia as a sweetener.
Are they afraid of the competition it will give that disgusting NASTY-tame? If so, then GOOD! They should be because it's high time people have other alternatives. I'm tired of seeing Nutrasweet in EVERYTHING sugar-free/low-carb I would want to purchase. Put Splenda or stevia in some of these products already! There's a bunch of us who don't like aspartame at all!
Currently, the Coca-Cola Company has been seriously looking at this since 2004 and last week filed a total of 24 patents to begin removing the sweetest parts of stevia so they can come up with the perfect taste and blend of rebiana to be used in their future versions of Diet Coke.
It's not yet known if this new sweetener will eventually be phased in to replaced aspartame or if it will be mixed with ACE-K or other sweeteners in totally different products altogether. But clearly Coke is ready to put stevia on the fast-track to FDA approval.
As for Cargill Foods, they intend to use this stevia-based sweetener in foods like yogurt, cereal, ice cream, and other sugar-free sweet treats. This is expected to be a huge undertaking that could quite literally shake up the food and beverage industry unlike anything that has come along in the past few decades. This is long overdue in America and I can't wait to see it come.
A Cargill representative said this was a "significant investment," so don't expect them to take no for an answer from self-serving interest groups who will oppose the use of stevia in this manner to cover their bedonkadonks with the artificial sweetener companies. That's why Cargill has already begun the process of petitioning the FDA to use stevia as a food additive. It's gonna be difficult, but I'm confident they'll get approval. Stay tuned!
Although Coke is saying the stevia they have tested in several of their products has performed just as well as the aspartame and sucralose for sweetness, I'm not as convinced about it. Sure, stevia is an excellent product and I have used it myself in various forms, but the black licorice-like bitterness can be a real turn-off to some people. The blend will have to be perfect.
I'm sure if stevia finally does make it into a Diet Coke product in the next few years that they'll make it taste as sweet as possible by very likely using an ACE-K blend. It'll probably resemble the aspartame/ACE-K blends that dominate the Coca-Cola line of sugar-free products today. This will be a HUGE step in the right direction for the world's #1 beverage maker (although I wouldn't mind having more Splenda-sweetened options, too--HINT HINT!).
If rebiana becomes a household name thanks to Coke and Cargill Foods, then you can expect PepsiCo, Dannon, and other rivals in the sugar-free/low-carb market to develop their own versions of stevia-sweetened products--perhaps they'll be allowed to actually call it stevia. Actually, if they're smart, then they'll start working on this NOW!
I've long held that having an "all-natural" sweetener like stevia is already on the cutting edge and it's only a matter of time before it is as widely used in the United States just as it is in Japan today. It's not a matter of if, but when. I can't wait to try a Rebiana Coke with a green stevia leaf on the can as a logo to distinguish it from the other versions. This will be the most unique diet soda product to ever release!
I'd like to introduce you to someone who I have grown to love and respect for the products she is offering people who are diabetic and/or on the low-carb lifestyle. Her name is Mary Jo Kringas and she is the owner of Low-Carb Specialties, makers of the most amazing sugar-free, low-carb chocolate bars you'll ever taste--CHOCOPERFECTION!
As a big fan of her chocolates, I asked Mary Jo if I could invite her here for an interview and she remarked that she never does any interviews with anyone--but she'd be HAPPY to do one for me! Awww, that was soooo sweet! THANKS so much, Mary Jo! Check out what makes this woman so happy to wake up in the morning and how she eats 2-3 chocolate bars DAILY to help her keep her weight under control and her body healthy.
1. Joining me today at the "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb" blog is a woman who many would say has one of the best jobs in the entire world--SELLING CHOCOLATE! Mmmm! It's Mary Jo Kringas from LowCarbSpecialties.com, makers of those yummy ChocoPerfection bars you hear me raving about so much at my blog. Welcome, Mary Jo! Tell us a little bit about how you got into the sugar-free chocolate-making business.
Hi Jimmy and thank you for inviting me to be part of your low-carb blog. I truly respect you for telling others what is real about low-carb and sharing your story about losing weight the low-carb way.
I got into the sugar-free chocolate business because I felt I had no other choice. I LOVE CHOCOLATE, but my body did not like sugar or artificial sweeteners. I grew up working behind the counter of my grandfather’s candy store, starting at age five. By the time I was 16, I weighed 475 pounds. I lost weight by implementing more balanced eating and I tried about 20 different “diets” over the years. But even after all that and two stomach stapling surgeries, my weight still hovered around 275 pounds.
I continued to rely on chocolate as the only food in life that I cannot live without. The problem being that there was no “healthy chocolate” available anywhere. All the ones I saw were either made with sugar or with artificial sweeteners, both of which caused insulin surges and kept me from losing weight.
I eventually went total low-carb and discovered “oligofructose” (a very scary sounding word that describes a sweetener made from ground up chickory root), which many food scientists are now discovering is one of the healthiest foods on the planet (see Men’s Health, May/06, Weight Loss Research Update) and I started to develop a chocolate bar around this sweetener. I experimented with my chocolate for about 1 1/2 years, and I lost 75 pounds during this time. I have been in the ChocoPerfection business for 2 ½ years now and my weight is down a total of 100 pounds.
2. WOW, congratulations, Mary Jo! Your amazing weight loss success story can be attributed to your regular consumption of ChocoPerfection bars both during your weight loss and now well into maintenance. That's what I call "suffering" on your diet! LOL! Why is eating chocolate so important for people following a sugar-free, low-carb diet?
I don’t know about others, but I find that if I am suffering, I will not continue. I truly believe that there are three critical stages to going low-carb.
Stage 1: Admitting that this is what needs to be done and making a full commitment to avoiding sugar, pasta, breads, cake, and most fruit.
Stage 2: Actually doing the low-carb lifestyle and implementing low-carb eating in your life. The first 4 weeks are usually the hardest because I also believe the carb-craving is intensified by yeast infections and/or parasites in the colon. These yeasts and parasites thrive on carbs, and when one cancels the “carb program” the yeasts and parasites fight back with headaches, bad breath and depression.
This 2nd stage is not for light-weights--it took everything I had within me to persist. Weight loss is assured in this stage if one is truly low-carbing and avoiding all refined sugars and artificial sweeteners and dairy.
Stage 3: Weight loss has been achieved and/or is consistent. One starts to feel good about their appearance, and their weight loss success. They have forgotten the pain of Stage 2, and they have adapted the low-carb lifestyle as a workable solution for the foreseeable future.
ChocoPerfection is useful in Stage 2, but, in my opinion, it is critical in Stage 3 when one is maintaining their low-carb lifestyle as well. Many people ask me how I lost my weight. I tell them I went low-carb and they tell me “Oh, I tried that, but when I stopped, I gained all the weight back and then some.” I want to cry when I hear this.
Like you, I know the pain of being fat. To actually be free of the weight and then have it all come back is a complete nightmare. The diligence involved in maintenance is critical, and it requires a different kind of thinking. Maintenance requires a commitment to long-term low-carbing that, as a priority, needs to be enjoyable. A critical aspect of this strategy allows one to avoid Little Debbies and Ding Dongs because they have found alternatives that turn them on just as much, and are healthy.
3. I have been criticized by many low-carb purists for my preference to eat what they consider low-carb "junk" foods such as nut-based bars and even your ChocoPerfection bars. I don't personally care what other people think of my diet as long as I'm losing weight because I'm eating healthier than I have ever eaten in my entire life. How do you respond to those who label products like ChocoPerfection bars as "junk" food?
Like you, I am healthier than I have ever been in my entire life. I eat 2-3 ChocoPerfection bars a day and I have never felt or looked better than I do right now. I firmly believe that without ChocoPerfection bars I would weigh much more and that is why I started the ChocoPerfection business.
I would not agree with the description of ChocoPerfection as a “junk food” which is a term I reserve for stuff like diet sodas and other things that are utterly senseless to consume. ChocoPerfection has 14g of fiber in every bar, is packed with all the antioxidants and mood enhancement of chocolate, is highly satiating, and due to the oligofructose, actually helps clear the body of parasites and yeasts.
4. One of the reasons I consider ChocoPerfection bars to be the best chocolate bar for diabetics and low-carbers is the phenomenal European chocolate taste they have without all the cheap artificial sweeteners that are packed into so many of the so-called sugar-free, low-carb products these days. What makes ChocoPerfection sweeteners different and are there any health benefits to choosing them over the more inferior sweeteners?
The sweeteners in ChocoPerfection are oligofructose, which is made from ground-up chickory root, and erythritol, which comes from fermented natural foods such as grapes, melon, and mushrooms. Almost all other sugar-free products are made from maltitol, sucralose (Splenda), or aspartame (Nutrasweet). As you have blogged about many times, most people experience diarrhea and/or other laxative effects from maltitol.
Nutrasweet breaks down into formaldehyde in the body, which is toxic, and has been linked to brain tumors and retinal damage. Despite all this, the biggest problem for me, with all of the artificial sweeteners, is that they completely stopped my weight loss and, in my opinion, they really don’t taste that good.
It was not until I started using the sweeteners in ChocoPerfection that I was able to feel like I was really eating something that tasted like real chocolate and still lose weight. There are big health benefits to oligofructose, which was named as one of the healthiest foods on the planet due to its prebiotic properties to clean the colon and strengthen the immune system. Also, erythritol supports the minerals in the bones and teeth, stops sugar cravings, and converts to glutathione in the body which helps clean the liver.
Aside from these great benefits, oligofructose and erythritol are the only known sweeteners approved by the USDA that rank zero on the glycemic index. This is a very big deal to me. All the artificial sweeteners use the label “sugar-free” but fail to disclose that laboratory tests show the glycemic index of many of these "healthy" products to be 51 to 59, which is more than the glycemic index of macaroni.
Most low-carbers know that the key reason to avoid the carbs is their effect on insulin levels. The glycemic index of artificial sweeteners shows that they surge insulin levels, so even if they were not toxic, which they are, they would still keep you fat.
5. Erythritol is a sugar alcohol just as the stomach-exploding maltitol is. Why is it a better sweetener for people who are livin' la vida low-carb and does it have any known side effects that you are aware of as well?
The thing that baffles me everyday is how erythritol ever got its name. I mean, it is named like a sugar alcohol (which is a class of sweeteners that is almost uniformly artificial and uniformly toxic), yet erythritol is completely natural and shares more in common with the production methods of sugar than that of stuff in a test tube which is where nearly all the other sugar alcohols come from.
To the best of my knowledge, erythritol has no known side effects and is completely healthy. If I knew otherwise, I would not eat 2-3 of these ChocoPerfection bars a day.
6. You also use oligofructose in your ChocoPerfection bars, which is another up-and-coming sweetener among quality sugar-free, low-carb products. In fact, a recent study confirms that eating oligofructose can improve intestinal health and cut down on infections. Tell us a little more about this sweetener and why you decided to use it in your chocolate bars.
For me, the way to evaluate a sweetener is to find out how it tastes compared to sugar. Erythritol is a great sweetener and is completely healthy, but it has a sweetness intensity of only about 80% of sugar and it has a “coolness” to its taste on the tongue. I found that oligofructose balances the loss of sweetness from erythritol and also balances the coolness. Oligofructose is also the most intense source of dietary and healthy fiber in the ChocoPerfection bars.
7. There is a ton of fiber packed in every single ChocoPerfection bar--14 grams to be exact! How important is fiber in a healthy diet? Does the fiber impact the taste or texture of the chocolate?
As you know, it is pretty difficult to get the recommended amount of fiber in your diet. The USDA recommends about 22g daily and even most fruits and vegetables only have 2-3 g each of fiber at most. The source of fiber in ChocoPerfection is oligofructose, which is very fine and not gritty. So, even though the ChocoPerfection bars have a huge concentration of fiber, you'd never know it by the taste and texture of the bar which is just like fine European chocolate.
8. In addition to your fantastic ChocoPerfection bars, you also have a sweetener product you call SweetPerfection which is made from finely ground chicory root. When I tasted this for the first time, it reminded me of eating cotton candy. Where did you discover this sweet, low-glycemic sugar substitute and why should people begin using this product instead of any of the other artificial sweeteners on the market today?
I love oligofructose which we also sell in equivalent conversion to sugar as SweetPerfection. I bake with SweetPerfection, I use it in ice cream, as a sweetener in tea and coffee and in all my recipes that call for sugar. SweetPerfection tastes like sugar, measures like sugar, and performs in recipes like sugar, except it has a zero glycemic index, is high in healthy fiber, and has properties to support the immune system.
9. Whenever I try to tell people about sugar-free products these days, they turn their nose up at me as if the products cannot possibly taste good without the sugar. I'm sure you run into this often with many of your prospective customers. What do you do to assure people that eating a ChocoPerfection bar will be as delightful an experience as they will ever taste out of a "diet" food?
Jimmy, I feel there is no way to convince people of anything other than to let them see for themselves. What I do is offer a “100% Satisfaction/No Questions Asked Guarantee.” This means that if anyone ever buys any of our products and is not completely happy with it for any reason at all, they get a full refund. It is my hope that low-carbing, chocolate lovers will give themselves a chance to taste ChocoPerfection, and to support their healthy lifestyle with no risk for their purchase.
10. THANKS for sharing a little bit of time with me and my readers today at the "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb" blog, Mary Jo! I sincerely hope that people take advantage of the fantastic products you have to offer them as they seek a healthier lifestyle for themselves. Do you have any parting words of encouragement or advice you would like to share?
Thanks Jimmy, my chance to share with you about my life has been great. As you know, I promised you my only interview and this has been it. I have lived most of my life as a fat person. The emotional pain was tremendous. The persistent hope that I could eat foods I loved, be satisfied, and yet somehow be thin was a dream I never thought I would get. Now, I live my dream. I eat at least 3 desserts a day in addition to meals, without mood swings, sugar cravings or weight gain. Is this heaven or what?
Heaven indeed, Mary Jo! THANKS so much for sharing with my readers about the outstanding products you have available at Low-Carb Specialties. Now, pardon me for a moment, I think I need to go order me some more ChocoPerfection bars! CLICK HERE to order some for yourself! :D Mary Jo GUARANTEES you'll LOVE 'em or your money back. What do you have to lose...besides weight?!
(This is fourth and final part of my interview with Dr. Dean Ornish with Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 in a four-part series already published this week. Part 4 has Dr. Ornish sharing what he thinks about sugar substitutes, his unique role working with companies like McDonald's, the worldwide obesity epidemic, and coming together on a consensus about good nutrition.)
JIMMY MOORE: You were talking about chocolate a moment ago, what do you think about the sugar substitutes?
DEAN ORNISH: I think they can be a transition for some people. I think that sucralose, aka Splenda, is probably better than aspartame just based on what the studies are showing. I think clearly sugar substitutes can be a better choice than eating a lot of sugar. But it's also to me a transition because they tend to perpetuate a preference for sweets. What we find is your palate is remarkably adaptive.
For example, if you switched from whole milk to skim milk, then at first it will taste watery and doesn't taste good. If you stay with it, after a while it tastes fine. But then you go out to dinner and someone gives you whole milk it tastes too rich. The cow is the same, but your palate has adapted.
If you begin to stop eating sweets, then you begin to prefer foods that aren't so sweet. However, if you use a lot of sugar substitutes your palate never really gets a chance to adapt. But in the transition I think it can be very helpful. I think it's even better if you train your palate to prefer foods that are lower in salt and sugar.
JIMMY MOORE: Let's talk about McDonald's for a second. I noticed that you're now working with them and they recently donated $2 million to childhood obesity research. Everybody seems to be pointing the fingers at fast food and soft drink companies for causing obesity in America. Talk about why you decided to join forces with them and what kind of changes you think you are going to help bring about there.
DEAN ORNISH: I've been working with McDonald's for several years. I also sit on the health & wellness advisory boards of some other major food companies like PepsiCo, I consult with Del Monte, and Safeway as well. To me, it's a great opportunity to make the difference in the lives of a lot of people.
You know, 50 million people go to McDonald's every day. And so, when I began working with them, they didn't have the premium salads, the fruit and walnut salads, the Asian salads and so on. They are now giving people the choice of apple dippers with caramel sauce made with low-fat milk as opposed to a burger, fries and a shake.
I've been working with them to make healthier food choices available so that they could truly offering their customers a full spectrum of choices. But also as a way to educate people about energy balance, the importance of exercise, and about making healthier food choices as well.
Are they moving as quickly as I would like? No, of course not. Are they moving faster than I ever dreamed possible? Yeah. So there a divergence of forces that have raised the awareness of the American public and food companies.
For example, I was able to introduce the President Clinton Foundation and the American Heart Association to the heads of PepsiCo which ultimately led to the agreement that they brokered to block the sale of soft drinks to elementary schools and to reduce the sweetened beverage consumption in middle and upper schools as well.
It's a tremendous platform to make a difference in the lives of tens of millions of people every day. I'm also hoping to change the whole mystery of how we choose foods. The old joke says, "Am I gonna live longer or it just gonna seem longer if I eat healthier?" The reality is that you can eat foods that taste good that are good for you, make you feel good and look good.
These big food companies with their celebrities and advertising and marketing have the opportunity to make it fun and sexy and hip and convenient to eat more healthfully not only in this country, but worldwide. And there's a growing epidemic of the globalization of illness which I wrote about in Newsweek earlier this year. Other countries are starting to live like us, eat like us and die like us and it's completely preventable for most people.
JIMMY MOORE: Obesity has become a worldwide epidemic. Why?
DEAN ORNISH: With all the attention on AIDS and tuberculosis and malaria, in most countries around the world more people are dying from chronic diseases such a heart disease and obesity and diabetes that are essentially completely preventable for the vast majority of people simply by changing diet and lifestyle.
What's ironic is people in Asia are forging their own lifestyle and copying ours and unfortunately they're copying our ways of living and copying our ways of dying. We are trying to change that through my work with McDonald's. We helped them develop an Asian salad. It's almost like the people in Asia need to see their own diet come back to them when they eat at McDonald's so they can appreciate the value of what they already have.
JIMMY MOORE: One final question for you, Dr. Ornish, and again I appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to do this interview with me. Two out of every three Americans right now are either overweight or obese. What can we do to turn the tide of obesity that is headed towards 100 percent by the year 2056 according to a recent study? We've got various people ascribing to a low-fat diet, cutting your calories, cutting your portions, cutting your carbs--how are we going to put all of this together to make it palatable to the public so that we can try to turn this tide before it's too late?
DEAN ORNISH: Well, I think it's a very important question you've asked and I think that education is ultimately the key. I think the web site that you have can be a powerful force for that. If you can help people get out of this adversarial mindset of low-fat versus low-carb and say, "Wait a minute, what's really going on here?" You can help people understand it's a little more complicated than that and ultimately that makes it more sustainable.
So in my own way, I'm trying to educate people in any way that I can by doing the best science that we can and PCRM and collaborating with investigators around the world on studies. Also by levering with other food companies to provide healthier products and educate the people about the benefits of eating healthier. I also educate people through my monthly columns with Newsweek and Reader's Digest as well as writing books for the general public. By educating physicians and scientists through getting more insurance coverage for the kinds of interventions we talked about. And finally by giving public lectures and media appearances, whatever I can do to try and educate people the importance of all of this.
Because ultimately awareness if the very first step in any kind of healing. And science can help us understand what the effects of our choices are in our lives for better or for worse. Then to try to implement them in ways that can not only help us to live longer, but also to help us live better as well.
So I applaud your efforts trying to educate people. I think to the degree we can look for common ground at this point is going to be everyone's advantage. Otherwise, people will just throw up their hands and say, "The damn doctors, they can't even make up their minds. To Hell with them, I'll just eat whatever I want." This is bad for me, this is good for me--people get so frustrated by this.
The irony is there's more evidence than ever what a powerful difference a change in diet and lifestyle can make. So, to the degree that we can find ways of working together rather than be adversarial towards each other--which is why I agreed to do this interview with you--I think that's gonna be very helpful.
JIMMY MOORE: Well, I certainly appreciate that you've taken time because your voice is an important one and you have been for a long time. And I wanted people to know that despite our differences that we could come together and certainly try to make sense of this whole diet and nutrition thing to help people because that if my bottom line goal as well is to help people.
DEAN ORNISH: I know that and I think that's why we're here. As insipid as that may sound, I think that's why we're here is to help each other. And so the more we can do that, I think everyone will benefit from that. I am grateful for the chance to be interviewed by you today.
JIMMY MOORE: Thank you very much for agreeing to the interview, Dr. Ornish.
Did you miss one of the previous three part of my interview with Dr. Dean Ornish? If so, then go back and read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of this enlightening interview with arguably the most influential diet and health icon of our lifetime. Like him or not, he gets attention for what he believes.
I couldn't resist sharing with you this press release bragging about how consumers "overwhelmingly prefer pure cane sugar to Splenda in taste tests." Ooooookay, let's see what this is all about.
Not surprisingly, the suspicious "taste tests" were commissioned by the C&H Sugar Company and was conducted on June 9 and 10 in Redwood City, California and Buffalo Grove, Illinois by an independent market research company. This "independent survey" found that people who cook fresh baked desserts such as brownies were much more pleased with the taste, texture, and appearance of pure sugar cane (which C&H sells) than either Splenda or Splenda Blend (which is C&H's primary competition). I wonder how objective a study paid for by a company against it's #1 competitor is REALLY gonna be? But I digress.
They go on in the press release to show statistics that allegedly prove that people prefer pure cane sugar over Splenda and even found a pastry chef from a restaurant in San Francisco to slam Splenda on their behalf.
"Sucralose (Splenda) tends to block flavors provided by other ingredients, especially chocolate," this pastry chef said. "Brownies baked with Splenda and Splenda Blend don't offer the rich cocoa flavor or taste of those made with pure cane sugar. They are dry and dense."
He goes on to sing the praises of the product made by C&H Sugar Company to help them solidify their point even further.
"Pure cane sugar adds more than sweetness to recipes; it also provides bulk, moisture and browning. Artificial sweeteners do not," he explained. "Why would you want to sacrifice the taste of something you love just to save a few calories?"
This is where I have to step in to steer this debate back in the right direction.
Is this "world renowned pastry chef" really telling people to ignore the nutritional content of sugar and to just eat, drink, and be merry gorging yourself on sugar?!
I have been using Splenda almost exclusively since I started livin' la vida low-carb and losing over 180 pounds since January 2004. It is 600 times sweeter than sugar and can provide people who are wary of the impact sugar can have on their weight with an alternative way to give the foods they eat sweetness.
Despite the advancements in sugar substitutes and artificial sweeteners in recent years, I am still seeing people scrunch up their nose at me when I tell them I don't eat sugar but rather sugar-free products. That's what one television reporter who interviewed me the other day about my weight loss did. I assured her and others who react like she did that the taste is absolutely fabulous.
When I was addicted to sugar at the beginning of my low-carb lifestyle, there was a transitional period where my body had to wean itself off of the negative effects of sugar and literally detoxify itself from the years of damage that had been done to both my weight and my overall health. I discuss these issues in a special chapter on sugar of my book "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb" because this is much too important an issue to turn a blind eye to.
Even "The Biggest Loser" personal trainer Bob Harper said in an exclusive interview with the "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb" blog recently that "sugar is a very powerful and strong drug that people are extremely addicted to" and "has most everything to do with our problem with obesity." Why aren't we listening to voices like this one and pushing harder to provide the public with the truth about sugar? There are fundamental facts that should not be overlooked about how sugar is impacting the health of the American people.
Nobody will argue with you that consuming a lot of sugar can and will harm your body. It's an understood fact, although millions of people still consume it like there's nothing wrong with eating gobs and gobs of sugar.
But I saw what it can do firsthand to a person's body (MINE!) and it's not a pretty sight. The cravings and headaches that come when I didn't get my "hit" of sugar would slam me in the face like a cast iron skillet until I stuffed my face with even more sugar. Over and over again, that ruthless cycle continued until I "got clean" last year. Thankfully, that rollercoaster ride is one that I don't ever plan on getting on again. It's just not worth it!
Thanks to products like Splenda, I can enjoy the great sweetness of sugar without suffering the consequences it will have on various aspects of my health. Quite simply, Splenda is a miracle product for people who are livin' la vida low-carb. Sure, there are some like my friends Connie Bennett and Regina Wilshire who do not promote ANY sugar or sugar substitutes as part of a healthy lifestyle, but a lot of people are like me and need to have some sweetness in the foods we eat.
This little "taste test" released by a sugar company really means nothing regarding comparisons to Splenda because they only show the front-end qualities of their product. On the back end over the long-term, sugar will do more to pack on the pounds and destroy people's health than Splenda ever will. That's why I said goodbye to sugar once and for all nearly two years ago. And so should you!
I guess I've just invited Qorvis Communications back to my blog again today with this post! :-O
