LE IENE SERVICE AND DOCUMENTARY FAT FICTION

HYENAS AND FAT DRAMA SERVICE

Yesterday after watching the Le Iene report on diets (which you can watch here) I was very sad and very angry: but how can you say such things???

I would like to make a few remarks because I imagine they have left many of you somewhat confused*.

I will try to explain the underlying mechanisms so that you can UNDERSTAND, not BELIEVE.

1. "A ketogenic diet is a diet that takes away carbohydrates: very few carbohydrates and lots of protein. Our body doesn't want to burn protein, so you produce substances with some toxicity that take away the hunger and you lose weight." Dr. Franco Berrino
  Incorrect: A ketogenic diet yes has very few carbohydrates 5%, but the protein content is normal about 20-25%, while it has a very high fat content 70-75%. This breakdown of macronutrients allows our body to use ketones instead of glucose as "gasoline" for the creation of ATP, which is the energy of our cells.
  
  Ketones are much more efficient than glucose in producing ATP, in fact (1):
  - 100 g glucose generates 8.
    7 kg of ATP
  - 100 g of 3-hydroxybutyric acid (a ketone) generates 10.5 kg of ATP, thus 20.7% more than glucose
  - 100 g of acetoacetic acid (another ketone) generates 9.4 kg of ATP, so 8% more than ATP
  These numbers clearly illustrate why our body's energy reserves (the ones that enabled us to survive during famines in the past) are fats (from which ketones are produced) and not sugars (from which glucose is produced) (2)
  
  Triglyceride = fat = 100,000 calories of energy reserve*
  
  Glycogen and glucose = sugars = 640 calories of energy reserve*
  
  Protein = protein = 25,000 calories of energy reserve*
  
  * in a 70 kg human body
2. "Excess protein is what makes you fat. If we eat 20% of our calories from protein we get fat." Dr. Franco Berrino
  But how is it possible for protein to make you fat??! There is a metabolic process called Diet Induced Thermogenesis (TID) that accounts for an average of 10% of our daily caloric requirements. This value varies greatly for individual macronutrients (3):
  - 0% - 3% for fats
  - 5% - 10% for carbohydrates
  - 20% - 30% for protein
  One gram of protein and one gram of carbohydrates provide the same calories: 4 kcal. So if we need at least twice as much energy to metabolize protein as we need to metabolize carbohydrates, how is it that protein is fattening?
  
  If this reasoning is not sufficient for you in this (4) systematic review (i.e., a study that takes into account many other studies) in which the results of 50 randomized controlled trials are analyzed in which two groups of people were assigned to two different dietary regimens: a high-protein diet or a low-protein diet. Result?
  - Protein has a greater thermogenic effect than fats and carbohydrates
  - Higher protein consumption increases satiety, so fewer calories are consumed, so more fat is lost
  - Increasing the amount of protein and decreasing the amount of carbohydrates improves the lipid profile (HDL, LDL, triglycerides)
3. "The problem is that so many meats cause diabetes" Dr. Franco Berrino
  What is diabetes? I answer in the words of the Italian Society of Diabetology, "Diabetes is a disease in which there is an increase in blood glucose (blood sugar) levels due to a deficit in the amount and often the biological effectiveness of insulin (the hormone produced by the pancreas that controls blood sugar)." Now, what are the foods that raise blood glucose levels the most? Foods that contain a higher amount of sugars: carbohydrates, which once digested turn into sugars. These sugars end up in the bloodstream raising blood glucose levels, or the % of blood sugar.
  
  Now let's read about the glycemic index of foods (find the table here). As you can see, animal proteins (meat, fish, and eggs) have ZERO glycemic index, but today we know that proteins also raise blood sugar, but MUCH less than carbohydrates. Let's look at the glycemic index of carbohydrates instead:
  - Rice flour 95
  - Cassette bread 85
  - Cooked carrots 85
  - White wheat flour 85
  - Rice 70
  - Brioche 70
  - Rusks 70
  - Boiled potatoes 70
  - Black bread 65
  - Whole wheat flour 60
  - Pizza 60

If you are still in doubt, let me show you an infographic by Dr. David Unwin (you can find more here) In this very interesting table you can see how many 4-gram teaspoons of sugar correspond to X grams of a given food. For example, 140 grams of basmati rice corresponds to 10.1 teaspoons of sugar, or 40.4 grams of sugar.

Carbohydrates are also called carbohydrates, from the Greek "glucos" = sweet.

These low-carbohydrate diets are conducive to atherosclerosis, there is no doubt, it is certified. The kidney, you go on dialysis. The liver, first it becomes fat and then it can become cirrhogenic. Because carbohydrates are critical." Prof. Giorgio Calabrese
Here the discussion becomes complex. In response I will use some of the results obtained by Virta Health who uses the ketogenic diet therefore very low in carbohydrates to treat their diabetic patients. After 1 year, their patients report the following benefits
- Decreased 12% cardiovascular risk (5)
- Lowering of blood pressure and subsequent reduction/removal of antihypertension drugs (5)
- Reduction of 39% of C-reactive protein (which signals inflammation) (5)
- Significant reduction in hepatic steatosis and fibrosis (6)
But there are also the amazing results achieved by Dr. Shawn Baker's patients with the carnivore diet!
- 96% pathology resolution
- 95% improvement intestinal issues
- 96% improvement in skin problems such as psoriasis
- 79% of patients eliminated all medications
- 93% improvement of mental disorders
- 91% lost weight and decreased body fat
Find their testimonies here
"Studies show..." Dr. Franco Berrino
When you hear a doctor who is talking about nutrition say "studies show..." 99% of the times they are referring to epidemiological studies. What are they? Studies that are done on very large populations who are asked to fill out a dietary questionnaire with 139 questions like this one, "In the last 12 months, how often have you eaten dried fruits like prunes or raisins?"

Do you guys remember how many times you ate raisins last year???? Now in your opinion can the answers to these questionnaires be considered reliable?

The problem is that dietary guidelines are based on these types of studies that have nothing scientific about them. Let me explain: the researchers who conduct these studies have certain data available (the health status of the population: death, heart attacks, etc.) and uncertain data (what they ate). With this available data, they try to find correlations: people who eat a lot of saturated fat have higher cardiovascular risk. The problem is that there can be a thousand confounding factors: for example, those same people smoke, don't exercise, etc.

Any rigorous scientist will tell you that even if there is a correlation between two events, it does not necessarily mean that one is the cause of the other "correlation doesn't mean causation." Epidemiological studies are great for extrapolating hypotheses, but these must then be validated by randomized controlled trials (more on this later).

To better understand that a correlation does not mean causation let us see the example of the mortality study among Adventists (7). Vegetarians lived longer than non-vegetarians, so researchers claim that a vegetarian diet extends life. Little problem: non-vegetarian Adventists were the "rebels," those who went against the dictates of the religion: in addition to eating meat, they smoked, drank, did not play sports, went to bed late, etc... In short, their lifestyle was certainly not as healthy as that of vegetarian Adventists.

This is called the "healthy users bias" basically it is like comparing apples with pears i.e. people who have a healthy lifestyle with people who have a completely opposite one.

When comparing apples to apples, that is, people who have a healthy omnivorous or vegetarian lifestyle, is there a difference? No, the mortality rate is the same. (8)

Now back to randomized controlled trials or RCTs: these studies are called the "gold standard" of clinical trials and compare two similar groups of people doing two different things. For example, low-carb diet or low-fat diet. Which one works better? In which one do you lose more weight?

In this analysis (9) Of 67 randomized controlled trials between low-carb and low-fat diets:
- In 2 studies they achieved the same weight loss
- In 58 studies the low-carb diet resulted in greater weight loss. In 36 of these studies, weight loss was SIGNIFICANTLY greater.
- In 7 studies, low-fat diet resulted in greater weight loss

But now let's change course! Yesterday after the sadness born in me from watching the Le Iene report fortunately YouTube suggested a fantastic documentary: Fat Fiction, which you can watch for free at this link

I also saved it in the playlist "INTERESTING" Of our YouTube channel.

The documentary is in English, if you don't understand it, don't worry: you can turn on automatic translation! (unfortunately this function at the moment seems to be activated only from the computer, there is also on the YouTube app but it doesn't display the translation to me, let me know if it works for you). Find instructions on how to activate machine translation at the bottom of this PDF, after the bibliography

In this documentary it is explained very well how the "lipid hypothesis" or the scientific hypothesis that it is saturated fats that cause cardiovascular disease came about. It is called a "hypothesis" because it has never been scientifically proven. Despite this, we have been told for almost fifty years not to eat saturated fat to decrease cardiovascular risk.

What I find most serious is that there are two randomized controlled trials of the highest scientific value that have shown how this hypothesis is not only wrong but also dangerous, yet there are doctors who continue to say that saturated fats are bad for you...

The first study is the Minnesota Coronary Experiment. (10) conducted between 1968 and 1973 on 9423 patients admitted to nursing homes and psychiatric hospitals. This study is of very high value in that we could control at 100% what patients ate.

The lipid hypothesis states that cholesterol lowering achieved by replacing saturated fats with vegetable fats decreases cholesterol deposition in the arteries, progression of atherosclerosis, cardiovascular disease, and thus increases survival. There have been randomized controlled trials showing that if we replace saturated fats with vegetable fats, cholesterol is lowered, but no study has shown that this reduces cardiovascular disease and mortality.

In the Minnesota Coronary Experiment, the cholesterol-lowering diet included a 50% decrease in saturated fats and a 280% increase in omega-6 linoleic acid (i.e., vegetable fats) compared with the other group's diet.

Result? With the cholesterol-lowering diet, cholesterol lowered, but the participants' mortality increased. Do you realize the importance of these results?!!!

But because the results were dramatically different from what the researchers who conducted the study expected, they were never published... It was only through the work of Christopher Ramsden of the NIH that these very important findings were published in the British Medical Journey in 2016.

But that's not all: the same Ramsden also published in the British Medical Journal in 2013 the results of another very important study the Sidney Diet Heart Study (11) carried out between 1966 and 1973 to evaluate the effectiveness of replacing saturated fat with omega-6 linoleic acid to prevent further cardiovascular events and/or death in patients who had recently suffered a coronary event.

Again, patients were divided into two groups, with one group having saturated fats replaced with sunflower oil and sunflower margarine.

Result? Replacing saturated fats with linoleic acid increased mortality. And even then the results were not published because they were contrary to what the researchers expected. Does this sound serious to you? Does it sound scientific? Does it sound rigorous to you?

I tell you this because I wish you to understand that a degree means nothing. Even doctors and scientists are human beings, victims of their egos and beliefs. Unfortunately, there are very few people who have upstanding intellectual honesty and are willing to change their minds when they realize they are wrong.

One of these is Dr. David Unwin (the one with the infographics with the teaspoons of sugar). His story is beautiful: in 2012 a patient of his was completely cured of diabetes on a low carb diet by following information she had found on her own online. Dr. Unwin was stunned because he had been prescribing her medication for years without getting any results. And so he began researching to better understand how this low carb diet could have healed his patient.

Understanding its efficacy, he has been prescribing it to his patients for ten years, achieving excellent results!

Unfortunately, however, most doctors are not like Dr. Unwin-which is why I always urge you to think for yourself and trust no one. If you understand the basics of how our bodies work and look at what we have been eating for 99% of our evolution, it becomes easy to understand what diet is most appropriate for our species.

But back to Fat Fiction: there are several doctors who tell how a Low Carb - High Fat LCHF diet has cured a great many of their patients of type 2 diabetes. Yes you read that right: CURED.Try asking your primary care physician how many patients he has been able to cure from diabetes....

For example, 63% of Virta Health patients have eliminated all diabetes medications, i.e., they are completely cured. Dr. David Unwin has also had crazy successes in diabetes remission: in August 2022 he celebrated the 120th patient he has cured of diabetes!

So what is the moral of the story? What doctors think is the best solution is not always really the best solution. Unfortunately, wrong beliefs take a long time to change first of all because human beings in general do not like to admit they are wrong. The sad thing is that when it comes to doctors, their egos destroy the lives of hundreds of patients....

So my advice is: try to learn, try to inform yourself, try to listen to those who say white and those who say black so that you can UNDERSTAND without having to BELIEVE anyone. The truth is that we still know so little about how the human body works. Imagine what we will know in 500 years... The men of that time will look at our knowledge as we look at that of the doctors of the 1500s, they will look extremely backward.

So keep an open mind, do not cling to any belief, always question everything and be amazed by the wonderful machine that is the human body.

On this page you will find some insights I have written, which I hope will be helpful to you. My only desire is to share what I have learned so that you, too, can understand for yourself what is the most appropriate nutrition for your body.

Have a good life and as the legendary Dr. says. Cristina Tomasi "be the protagonist of your own health"!

BIBLIOGRAPHY

HOW TO ENABLE AUTOMATIC TRANSLATION ON YOUTUBE

Clicking on the "settings" icon (scroll wheel) will open a menu
Click on "subtitles" and choose ENGLISH
Click again on the scroll wheel and then "subtitles" now you will see the option "automatic translation," click it
In the window that pops up when you click the scroll wheel, in the upper right corner you have an "options" button that allows you to change the subtitle font size, color, background, etc.