Friday, 26 December 2014
Tuesday, 16 December 2014
Is Meat Unhealthy? Part V
In this post, I'll examine the possible relationship between meat intake and type 2 diabetes. Type 2 diabetes is the most common form of diabetes, and it is strongly linked to lifestyle factors.
Non-industrial cultures
Non-industrial cultures have an extremely low prevalence of diabetes, whether they are near-vegan or near-carnivorous. This is supported by blood glucose measurements in a variety of cultures, from the sweet potato farmers of the New Guinea highlands to the arctic Inuit hunters. Here is what Otto Schaefer, director of the Northern Medical Research Unit at Charles Camsell hospital in Edmonton, Canada, had to say about the Inuit in the excellent book Western Diseases (Trowell and Burkitt, 1981):
Read more �
Non-industrial cultures
Non-industrial cultures have an extremely low prevalence of diabetes, whether they are near-vegan or near-carnivorous. This is supported by blood glucose measurements in a variety of cultures, from the sweet potato farmers of the New Guinea highlands to the arctic Inuit hunters. Here is what Otto Schaefer, director of the Northern Medical Research Unit at Charles Camsell hospital in Edmonton, Canada, had to say about the Inuit in the excellent book Western Diseases (Trowell and Burkitt, 1981):
Read more �
Friday, 12 December 2014
Friday, 5 December 2014
Wednesday, 3 December 2014
Is Meat Unhealthy? Part IV
In this post, I'll address the question: does eating meat contribute to weight gain?
Non-industrial cultures
I'll get right to the point: humans living in a non-industrialized setting tend to be lean, regardless of how much meat they eat. This applies equally to hunter-gatherers, herders, and farmers.
One of the leanest populations I've encountered in my reading is the 1960s Papua New Guinea highland farmers of Tukisenta. They ate a nearly vegan diet composed almost exclusively of sweet potatoes, occasionally punctuated by feasts including large amounts of pork. On average, they ate very little animal food. Visiting researchers noted that the residents of Tukisenta were "muscular and mostly very lean", and did not gain fat with age (1, Western Diseases, Trowell and Burkitt, 1981).
Another remarkably lean hunter-gatherer population is the !Kung San foragers of the Kalahari desert. The !Kung San are so lean that many of them would be considered underweight on the standard body mass index scale (BMI less than 18.5). Average BMI doesn't exceed 20 in any age category (The !Kung San, Richard Lee, 1979). Is this simply because they're starving? It is true that they don't always get as much food as they'd like, but on most days, they have the ability to gather more food than they need. The fact that they are able to reproduce normally suggests that they aren't starving. Richard Lee's detailed work with the !Kung San indicates that approximately 40 percent of their calories came from animal foods during his study period in the 1960s. This was mostly meat, with occasional eggs when available.
Read more �
Non-industrial cultures
I'll get right to the point: humans living in a non-industrialized setting tend to be lean, regardless of how much meat they eat. This applies equally to hunter-gatherers, herders, and farmers.
One of the leanest populations I've encountered in my reading is the 1960s Papua New Guinea highland farmers of Tukisenta. They ate a nearly vegan diet composed almost exclusively of sweet potatoes, occasionally punctuated by feasts including large amounts of pork. On average, they ate very little animal food. Visiting researchers noted that the residents of Tukisenta were "muscular and mostly very lean", and did not gain fat with age (1, Western Diseases, Trowell and Burkitt, 1981).
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| !Kung man gathering mongongo fruit/nuts. From The !Kung San, by Richard B. Lee. |
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Monday, 1 December 2014
Recent Interviews
For those who don't follow my Twitter account (@whsource), here are links to my two most recent interviews.
Smash the Fat with Sam Feltham. We discuss the eternally controversial question, "is a calorie a calorie"? Like many other advocates of the low-carbohydrate diet, Feltham believes that the metabolic effects of food (particularly on insulin), rather than calorie intake per se, are the primary determinants of body fatness. I explain the perspective that my field of research has provided on this question. We also discussed why some lean people become diabetic. Feltham was a gracious host.
Nourish, Balance, Thrive with Christopher Kelly. Kelly is also an advocate of the low-carbohydrate diet for fat loss. This interview covered a lot of ground, including the insulin-obesity hypothesis, regulation of body fatness by the leptin-brain axis, how food reward works to increase calorie intake, and the impact of the food environment on food intake. I explain why I think proponents of the insulin-obesity hypothesis have mistaken association for causation, and what I believe the true relationship is between insulin biology and obesity. Kelly was also a gracious host. He provides a transcript if you'd rather read the interview in text form.
Smash the Fat with Sam Feltham. We discuss the eternally controversial question, "is a calorie a calorie"? Like many other advocates of the low-carbohydrate diet, Feltham believes that the metabolic effects of food (particularly on insulin), rather than calorie intake per se, are the primary determinants of body fatness. I explain the perspective that my field of research has provided on this question. We also discussed why some lean people become diabetic. Feltham was a gracious host.
Nourish, Balance, Thrive with Christopher Kelly. Kelly is also an advocate of the low-carbohydrate diet for fat loss. This interview covered a lot of ground, including the insulin-obesity hypothesis, regulation of body fatness by the leptin-brain axis, how food reward works to increase calorie intake, and the impact of the food environment on food intake. I explain why I think proponents of the insulin-obesity hypothesis have mistaken association for causation, and what I believe the true relationship is between insulin biology and obesity. Kelly was also a gracious host. He provides a transcript if you'd rather read the interview in text form.
Monday, 24 November 2014
Is Meat Unhealthy? Part III
When we consider the health impacts of eating meat, cardiovascular disease is the first thing that comes to mind. Popular diet advocates often hold diametrically opposed views on the role of meat in cardiovascular disease. Even among researchers and public health officials, opinions vary. In this post, I'll do my best to sort through the literature and determine what the weight of the evidence suggests.
Ancel Keys and the Seven Countries Study
Ancel Keys was one of the first researchers to contribute substantially to the study of the link between diet and cardiovascular disease. Sadly, there is a lot of low-quality information circulating about Ancel Keys and his research (1). The truth is that Keys was a pioneering researcher who conducted some of the most impressive nutritional science of his time. The military "K ration" was designed by Keys, much of what we know about the physiology of starvation comes from his detailed studies during World War II, and he was the original Mediterranean Diet researcher. Science marches on, and not all discoveries are buttressed by additional research, but Keys' work was among the best of his day and must be taken seriously.
One of Keys' earliest contributions to the study of diet and cardiovascular disease appeared in an obscure 1953 paper titled "Atherosclerosis: A Problem in Newer Public Health" (2). This paper is worth reading if you get a chance (freely available online if you poke around a bit). He presents a number of different arguments and supporting data, most of which are widely accepted today, but one graph in particular has remained controversial. This graph shows the association between total fat intake and heart disease mortality in six countries. Keys collected the data from publicly available databases on global health and diet:
Read more �
Ancel Keys and the Seven Countries Study
Ancel Keys was one of the first researchers to contribute substantially to the study of the link between diet and cardiovascular disease. Sadly, there is a lot of low-quality information circulating about Ancel Keys and his research (1). The truth is that Keys was a pioneering researcher who conducted some of the most impressive nutritional science of his time. The military "K ration" was designed by Keys, much of what we know about the physiology of starvation comes from his detailed studies during World War II, and he was the original Mediterranean Diet researcher. Science marches on, and not all discoveries are buttressed by additional research, but Keys' work was among the best of his day and must be taken seriously.
One of Keys' earliest contributions to the study of diet and cardiovascular disease appeared in an obscure 1953 paper titled "Atherosclerosis: A Problem in Newer Public Health" (2). This paper is worth reading if you get a chance (freely available online if you poke around a bit). He presents a number of different arguments and supporting data, most of which are widely accepted today, but one graph in particular has remained controversial. This graph shows the association between total fat intake and heart disease mortality in six countries. Keys collected the data from publicly available databases on global health and diet:
Read more �
Thursday, 20 November 2014
UCOP�s Failed Funding Model
The first thing to say about the UC�s five-year plan to raise tuition 5% each year is that it is neither predictable nor logical. President Napolitano has said on several occasions that students need this plan so they can predict and plan for tuition increases, but she has also said that the 5% tuition increase is contingent on the state increasing UC�s funding by 4% each year. I have asked several UCOP officials, what happens if Governor Brown keeps his promise of only giving 4% if the UC freezes tuition? The only coherent response I have gotten to this question is that UC will be forced to increase the number of non-resident students and decrease the number of students from California.
Before we get to the question of non-resident tuition, we have to realize that several things may happen that make UCOP�s tuition plan anything but predictable: 1) the state eliminates its 4% increase and UC raises tuition by 5%, and thus gets a 1% gain for all of its efforts; 2) the state eliminates its 4%, and UC raises tuition 9%; 3) the state keeps the 4% increase and UC raises tuition 5%; 4) the states decides to increase its contribution beyond 4% and UC decreases its tuition increase by the same amount. So tuition may go up in the next five years, anywhere from 0% to 53% or even higher if there is another fiscal crisis. Making matters more complicated is that this negotiation has to happen every year for five years, and no one has asked what happens if there is another budget crisis, and the state cuts UC funding? So the first problem with the sustainable five-year plan is that it is neither logical, nor predictable, nor long-term.
The next problem with the plan is the way it was rolled out. As Gavin Newsome argued, UCOP gave the plan to the media before it discussed it with key state players. Moreover, UC never engaged in any real negotiations over the plan ahead of time, and it has presented the plan as a done deal. It is also strange that UCOP thinks that the way to get more money from the state is to attack the governor, the legislature, and Proposition 30. Although UC may need more money from the state, Prop 30 did increase revenue and prevent an even worse state budget cut.
The next major problem with the tuition plan is that UC continues to resist calculating how much it costs to educate students; so it is unclear how they can make any argument about the need for more money. For example, how do they know if bringing in more students will increase or decrease revenue if they do not know how much it costs to educate each student? Although, UCOP is required by law now to make these calculations, it has resisted so far, and the governor and the legislature are not very happy about this.
Related to the issue of not knowing the cost of education is the problem of how money is distributed among the campuses. As I have previously pointed out, the reliance on non-resident tuition means that the rich campuses get richer and the poor campuses serving under-presented California students get poorer. Present Napolitano knows this because I discussed it with her in great detail, but the UC plan says nothing about evening out the disparities among the campuses. While the rebenching program is supposed to help make up for disparities, it is only redistributing $37 million each year, which is a little more than 1% of state funds, and is dwarfed by the $246 million of new revenue brought in through non-resident tuition.
Another huge issue with UCOP�s tuition plan is that it is highly selective in its recounting of the recent past. Although, UCOP claims that the system has been cut a billion dollars since 2007-8, it fails to mention that state support for Cal Grants and the Middle Class Scholarship has increased by over $1 billion during the same period. UC loves to hide this fact because it does not want to reveal that as the state has reduced its funding for UC, it has replaced direct support with financial aid. Following the high tuition/high aid mode, UC knows that it can raise tuition because state and federal aid can make up for most of the new costs to students. Meanwhile during this period when state support was replaced by financial aid, UC continued to increase the number of high-paying, non-resident students, and so UC core funds have actually gone up by $1.3 billion since 2007-8, and this is after subtracting institutional aid.
As I wrote in Why Public Higher Education Should Be Free, the current way we fund and support higher education institutions is completely incoherent and counter-productive. If we just took the money we are currently spending on the irrational mix of state aid, federal aid, higher ed tax breaks, institutional aid, and subsidized student loans, we could make higher ed free to the students. However, free public higher ed will not happen if our leaders continue to march towards the high tuition/high aid model of backdoor privatization.
Tuesday, 11 November 2014
The Problems with UC�s New Tuition Plan
The university has engaged in a major media campaign to promote a new plan to raise tuition a maximum of 5% each year for the next five years.One major problem is that Governor Brown and the legislature have already said that they will only give UC an additional 4% this year and next year if the UC continues to freeze tuition. It looks like the UC will raise tuition 5%, and the state will eliminate the 4% increase, and so UC will increase its funding by less than 1%; however, in the process, UC has angered the state and has moved further in the direction of privatization.
UC received $2.8 billion from the state this year and issupposed to get $2.98 billion next year (this includes the 4% increase). In 2013-14, its net tuition (after subtracting financial aid) was $2.6 billion, and next year they plan to bring in an additional $50 million in tuition (mostly from non-resident students). This means that UC could lose the state increase of $140 million, in order to increase tuition by $132 million unless they significantly increase the number of non-resident students and decrease the number of in-state students in the following years.
Although many people want to put all of the blame on the governor, one also has to look at four tragic UC decisions that have shaped the current funding situation: the twenty-year pension contribution holiday, the secret redistributing of state funds and tuition, the 32% tuition increase in 2009-10, and the false accounting of the cost of educating undergrad students.
Many people blame the UC Regents for these problems, but my experience is that the regents usually rubber-stamp what UCOP puts in front of them. For example, the twenty-year pension contribution holiday was based on UCOP�s projections and strategy; after all, the regents have to rely on what UCOP tells them, and if UCOP uses bad math and strategy, the regents have to make decisions based on this information.
The problems with the pension holiday are threefold: the university and its employees must now come up with massive contributions to make up for the under-funded pension; the state and other parts of the university got accustomed to not paying for their share of the pension, and so it is hard to reverse the initial policy; and during the twenty years that the university did not pay into the pension, they used the freed up funds to expand the number and compensation of a growing administrative class.
We cannot reverse the bad pension decision, and so will have to live with the consequences. In a similar way, when UCOP urged the regents to raise tuition 32% in one year, they created a new system of university funding that will be hard to change. For example, the LAO now includes tuition as part of its public funding calculation, and this means that there is no incentive for the state to return to a tuition-free model. While some may say that the 32% increase was inevitable, UCOP pushed it through by not counting $716 million of federal stimulus money that was earmarked to replace the state reductions to the UC system.
The pension mistake and the tuition mistake are dwarfed by the secret funding mistake. As my work and a state audit showed, for decades, UCOP was secretly taking in all of the tuition money and state funding from the campuses and redistributing it according to some unknown formula. The result was huge disparities between campuses, and while they are trying to correct this situation, it will take a very long time, and it will never make up for the historical imbalances between the campuses. In short, UCSB and UCSC will never catch up to UCLA, and as I have shown, the campus imbalances areactually increasing.
Making matter worse, UCOP�s refusal to calculate how much it costs to education undergraduate students has resulted in a situation where the governor and the legislature wrongly believe that the cost of undergrad instruction is driving UC budget increases, and so they have proposed online education as the solution. In reality, UC has driven down the cost of undergraduate instruction through the use of large lecture classes and non-tenure-track faculty, but they cannot make this argument because they need to hide the real cost of research and graduate education.
In all of these cases, UCOP has dug a hole that will be hard to get out of. These faulty accounting moves have also increased the distrust that many lawmakers have towards the management of the UC system. Moreover, the failure to have transparent budgets means that the regents are making their decisions on false and misleading information; in turn, many faculty representatives recycle UCOP budgets myths, and the end result is that no one knows the truth about how money circulates within the system.
If we want to argue for more money from the state, we have to know where the money is going. We also have to identify where new funds can come from. Since most of the state budget is now mandated, we need to find a way of raising revenue and dedicating it to the UC system, but this process will require the governor, the regents, UCOP, students and faculty all getting on the same page.
Thursday, 30 October 2014
Vote November 4th: Higher Education, Not Incarceration
One of the main reasons why funding for public higher education has decreased in California and around the country during the last thirty years is that states have been forced to pay for the increasing costs of healthcare and prisons. While most parts of the state budget are now locked in because of ballot initiatives and legislation, higher education is considered discretionary, and so whenever there is a budget decrease, it ends up being cut.
This November 4th, you can vote to help support higher education by reining in the costs of healthcare and incarceration. Proposition 47 reduces sentences for certain nonviolent crimes and invests savings in treatment programs. Overtime, this change could free up money to be used for public higher education. Meanwhile proposition 45 requires insurance companies to justify premium increases and obtain pre-approval for rate hikes. This measure will control healthcare costs, which can leave more funds for higher ed.
Another way to support higher education is to vote for Tom Torlakson for Superintendent of Public Instruction. Torlakson has been a strong supporter of public education and faculty and has worked closely with the California Federation of Teachers. For the CFT voter�s guide, click here.
Monday, 27 October 2014
Is Meat Unhealthy? Part II
Over time, animals adapt to the foods they regularly consume. This is how archaeologists can, for example, determine that Triceratops was an herbivore and Tyrannosaurus was a carnivore just by looking at the structure of the skeleton. Adaptations to diet extend beyond skeletal structure, into digestion, metabolism, the brain, musculature, and other aspects of physical function. What is our evolutionary history with meat?
Human Evolutionary History with Meat: 200 to 2.6 Million Years Ago
Mammals evolved from ancestral "mammal-like reptiles" (therapsids, then cynodonts) approximately 220 million years ago (Richard Klein. The Human Career. 2009). Roughly 100 million years ago, placental mammals emerged. The earliest placental mammals are thought to have been nocturnal shrew-like beasts that subsisted primarily on insects, similar to modern shrews and moles. Mammalian teeth continued to show features specialized for insect consumption until the rise of the primates.
65 million years ago, coinciding with the evolution of the first fruiting plants, our ancestors took to the trees and became primates. For most of the time between then and now, our ancestors likely ate the prototypical primate diet of fruit, seeds, leaves/stems, and insects (1). Some primates also hunt smaller animals and thus eat the flesh of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish in addition to insects. However, the contribution of non-insect meat to the diet is usually small.
Read more �
Human Evolutionary History with Meat: 200 to 2.6 Million Years Ago
Mammals evolved from ancestral "mammal-like reptiles" (therapsids, then cynodonts) approximately 220 million years ago (Richard Klein. The Human Career. 2009). Roughly 100 million years ago, placental mammals emerged. The earliest placental mammals are thought to have been nocturnal shrew-like beasts that subsisted primarily on insects, similar to modern shrews and moles. Mammalian teeth continued to show features specialized for insect consumption until the rise of the primates.
65 million years ago, coinciding with the evolution of the first fruiting plants, our ancestors took to the trees and became primates. For most of the time between then and now, our ancestors likely ate the prototypical primate diet of fruit, seeds, leaves/stems, and insects (1). Some primates also hunt smaller animals and thus eat the flesh of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish in addition to insects. However, the contribution of non-insect meat to the diet is usually small.
Read more �
Friday, 24 October 2014
Tuesday, 21 October 2014
Is Meat Unhealthy? Part I
Introduction
At Dr. McDougall's Advanced Study Weekend, I had the opportunity to hear a number of researchers and advocates make the case for a "plant-based diet", which is a diet containing little or no animal foods. Many of them voiced the opinion that animal foods contribute substantially to the primary killers in the US, such as heart disease and cancer. Some of the evidence they presented was provocative and compelling, so it stimulated me to take a deeper look and come to my own conclusions.
No matter what the health implications of meat eating turn out to be, I respect vegetarians and vegans. Most of them are conscientious, responsible people who make daily personal sacrifices to try to make the world a better place for all of us.
My Experience with Vegetarian and Vegan Diets
Read more �
At Dr. McDougall's Advanced Study Weekend, I had the opportunity to hear a number of researchers and advocates make the case for a "plant-based diet", which is a diet containing little or no animal foods. Many of them voiced the opinion that animal foods contribute substantially to the primary killers in the US, such as heart disease and cancer. Some of the evidence they presented was provocative and compelling, so it stimulated me to take a deeper look and come to my own conclusions.
No matter what the health implications of meat eating turn out to be, I respect vegetarians and vegans. Most of them are conscientious, responsible people who make daily personal sacrifices to try to make the world a better place for all of us.
My Experience with Vegetarian and Vegan Diets
Read more �
Tuesday, 14 October 2014
Obesity ? Diabetes
A new study adds to the evidence that the prevalence of type 2 diabetes is rapidly increasing in the US, and our national weight problem is largely to blame.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) currently estimates that a jaw-dropping 33 percent of US men, and 39 percent of US women, will develop diabetes at some point in their lives (1). Roughly one out of three people in this country will develop diabetes, and those who don't manage it effectively will suffer debilitating health consequences. Has the risk of developing diabetes always been so high, and if not, why is it increasing?
In the same issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine as the low-carb vs. low-fat study, appears another study that aims to partially address this question (2).
Read more �
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) currently estimates that a jaw-dropping 33 percent of US men, and 39 percent of US women, will develop diabetes at some point in their lives (1). Roughly one out of three people in this country will develop diabetes, and those who don't manage it effectively will suffer debilitating health consequences. Has the risk of developing diabetes always been so high, and if not, why is it increasing?
In the same issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine as the low-carb vs. low-fat study, appears another study that aims to partially address this question (2).
Read more �
Friday, 10 October 2014
Thursday, 9 October 2014
Defending Scholarship
In 1971, Robert Nisbet published The Degradation of the Academic Dogma. Although many parts of the book can be seen as being outdated and ethnocentric, the basic argument still is vital: Universities are about the production and analysis of knowledge, and everything else a university does should be considered secondary. Nisbet adds to this �dogma,� the notion that the university has always been about knowledge for knowledge�s sake, even though it can have profound social and personal effects.
If we look around at the University of California today, and other similar institutions, we can see how this foundation of the modern university has been lost in a sea of competing interests. Some believe that a university should focus on training students for future jobs, while others argue that the main function of the university is personal development. At the same time, many recent university initiatives are directed at developing new technologies or raising funds or contributing to the local and state economy. Many of these goals are worthy, but from Nisbet�s perspective, they should only be indirect results of the central focus on scholarship.
The problem then is not so much that the university is being taken over by corporate managers or political officials; the problem is that the production and analysis of knowledge has become just one competing interest among others. Basic research and instruction have thus lost their value because they are no longer the guiding priorities. From Nisbet�s perspective, university knowledge can only remain central if it is treated with respect and faith. While this displaced religiosity may be off-putting, the main point is that students and faculty have to believe in the incredible value of knowledge and the disciplinary methodologies that have been established to create and circulate scholarship.
Every time a school celebrates the building of a new stadium or corporate research park, a little part of the university dies. Our schools have lost their way, and so they don�t mind staffing their classes with inexperienced, part-time people or hiring administrators with no academic background. Of course, universities need funds to survive, but when every function is sold to the highest bidder and every learning experience is tested and quantified, there is nothing left to protect or cherish.
In our fight to force our campuses to spend more money on undergraduate instruction, we are trying to return to an emphasis on scholarship and education. No fancy technology or highly paid manager can substitute for the experience in the classroom or lab or library.
Wednesday, 1 October 2014
Metabolic Effects of a Traditional Asian High-carbohydrate Diet
A recent study supports the notion that an 'ancestral diet' focused around high-starch agricultural foods can cultivate leanness and metabolic health.
John McDougall gave Christopher Gardner a hard time at the McDougall Advanced Study Weekend. Dr. Gardner conducts high-profile randomized controlled trials (RCTs) at Stanford to compare the effectiveness of a variety of diets for weight loss, cardiovascular and metabolic health. The "A to Z Study", in which Atkins, Zone, Ornish, and LEARN diets were pitted against one another for one year, is one of his best-known trials (1).
Dr. McDougall asked a simple question: why haven't these trials evaluated the diet that has sustained the large majority of the world's population for the last several thousand years? This is an agriculturalist or horticulturalist diet based around starchy foods such as grains, tubers, legumes, and plantains, and containing little fat or animal foods. Researchers have studied a number of cultures eating this way, and have usually found them to be lean, with good cardiovascular and metabolic health. Why not devote resources to studying this time-tested ancestral diet? I think it's a fair question.
Read more �
John McDougall gave Christopher Gardner a hard time at the McDougall Advanced Study Weekend. Dr. Gardner conducts high-profile randomized controlled trials (RCTs) at Stanford to compare the effectiveness of a variety of diets for weight loss, cardiovascular and metabolic health. The "A to Z Study", in which Atkins, Zone, Ornish, and LEARN diets were pitted against one another for one year, is one of his best-known trials (1).
Dr. McDougall asked a simple question: why haven't these trials evaluated the diet that has sustained the large majority of the world's population for the last several thousand years? This is an agriculturalist or horticulturalist diet based around starchy foods such as grains, tubers, legumes, and plantains, and containing little fat or animal foods. Researchers have studied a number of cultures eating this way, and have usually found them to be lean, with good cardiovascular and metabolic health. Why not devote resources to studying this time-tested ancestral diet? I think it's a fair question.
Read more �
Friday, 26 September 2014
Help Advance Diabetes Research
A University of Virginia researcher named Hannah Menefee contacted me recently to ask for our help. She and her colleagues are conducting a study on how people with type 2 diabetes use Facebook to manage their health, and how that technology can be leveraged to support effective health communication.
If you have type 2 diabetes, and you'd like to participate in the study, please join their Diabetes Management Study Facebook group. There, you'll receive more information about the study, you'll receive a short survey, and you may be invited into one of the study phases.
If you have type 2 diabetes, and you'd like to participate in the study, please join their Diabetes Management Study Facebook group. There, you'll receive more information about the study, you'll receive a short survey, and you may be invited into one of the study phases.
Friday, 19 September 2014
Thursday, 18 September 2014
My AHS14 Talk on Leptin Resistance is Posted
The Ancestral Health Society just posted a video of my recent talk "What Causes Leptin Resistance?" Follow the link below to access it. Enjoy!
What Causes Leptin Resistance?
What Causes Leptin Resistance?
Monday, 8 September 2014
Thoughts on the McDougall Advanced Study Weekend
For those of you who aren't familiar with him, Dr. John McDougall is a doctor and diet/health advocate who recommends a very low fat, high starch, whole food vegan diet to control weight and avoid chronic disease. He's been at it for a long time, and he's a major figure in the "plant-based diet" community (i.e., a diet including little or no animal foods).
Dr. McDougall invited me to participate in his 3-day Advanced Study Weekend retreat in Santa Rosa, CA. My job was to give my talk on insulin and obesity, and participate in a panel discussion/debate with Dr. McDougall in which we sorted through issues related to low-carb, Paleo, and the health implications of eating animal foods. I was glad to receive the invitation, because I don't see myself as a diet partisan, and I believe that my evidence-based information is applicable to a variety of diet styles. I saw the Weekend as an opportunity to extend my thoughts to a new community, challenge myself, and maybe even learn a thing or two. It was particularly interesting to compare and contrast the Advanced Study Weekend with the Ancestral Health Symposium, which is more Paleo- and low-carb-friendly.
General Observations
The attendees were a lot older than AHS attendees. I estimate that most of them were in their 60s, although there were some young people in attendance.
I don't place too much emphasis on peoples' personal appearance at conferences like this. You don't know what a person's background, genetics, or personal struggles may be, you don't know how closely they adhere to the program, and you don't know to what degree a group of people might be self-selected for particular traits*. But I will note that Dr. McDougall, his family, and many of the other starch-based/plant-based diet advocates tended to be extremely lean with low fat and muscle mass. They also tended to have a healthy and energetic appearance and demeanor. As I would expect, decades of exceptionally high starch intake hasn't made them obese or obviously ill.
Read more �
Dr. McDougall invited me to participate in his 3-day Advanced Study Weekend retreat in Santa Rosa, CA. My job was to give my talk on insulin and obesity, and participate in a panel discussion/debate with Dr. McDougall in which we sorted through issues related to low-carb, Paleo, and the health implications of eating animal foods. I was glad to receive the invitation, because I don't see myself as a diet partisan, and I believe that my evidence-based information is applicable to a variety of diet styles. I saw the Weekend as an opportunity to extend my thoughts to a new community, challenge myself, and maybe even learn a thing or two. It was particularly interesting to compare and contrast the Advanced Study Weekend with the Ancestral Health Symposium, which is more Paleo- and low-carb-friendly.
General Observations
The attendees were a lot older than AHS attendees. I estimate that most of them were in their 60s, although there were some young people in attendance.
I don't place too much emphasis on peoples' personal appearance at conferences like this. You don't know what a person's background, genetics, or personal struggles may be, you don't know how closely they adhere to the program, and you don't know to what degree a group of people might be self-selected for particular traits*. But I will note that Dr. McDougall, his family, and many of the other starch-based/plant-based diet advocates tended to be extremely lean with low fat and muscle mass. They also tended to have a healthy and energetic appearance and demeanor. As I would expect, decades of exceptionally high starch intake hasn't made them obese or obviously ill.
Read more �
The UC Campus Funding Imbalance
Two years ago, the UC system changed the way it distributes state funds and tuition revenue to the campuses. In the past, all tuition dollars and state dollars were sent to the Office of the President and redistributed according to unknown formulas. After a state audit showed that some campuses were being hurt by this process, the UC decided to let the campuses keep their own tuition dollars, and state dollars were redistributed through a method called �rebenching� to help out the campuses that were historically underfunded. However, the statistics below will show that the problems have only gotten worse for the underfunded campuses.
Looking at the most recent enrollment statistics, we can multiply the number of non-resident students by $26,000 to see how much extra tuition each campus will generate next year (each non-resident student pays an additional $23,000, and they do not receive tuition discounts, which average 30% for in-state students). For each campus, I have listed the number of non-resident students, the additional tuition dollars non-resident students generate, the amount of funds each campus will get this year through rebenching, the combination of additional non-resident tuition dollars and rebenching funds, and the amount the state auditor said each campus was overfunded or underfunded in 2009-10 before the change to the new system (Merced and UCSF are excluded for historical reasons):
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One way of interpreting this data is combine all of the numbers to get a general sense of the funding distribution before and after the non-resident tuition gold rush. For example, in 2009-10, if each campus received the same state and tuition dollars per student, UCSB would have received an additional $94 million dollars and UCLA would have gotten $99 million less. To help rectify this situation, the rebenching gives UCSB close to $9 million in 2014-15 , and UCLA does not get any additional funding, but UCLA remains $184 million ahead, and this figure takes into account enrollment differences. If we then add non-resident tuition to the mix, UCSB remains $210 million behind UCLA, and this is after years of imbalances.
It should be clear that the UC system needs to rethink its enrollment and funding model. As the state auditor argued, the campuses that have been historically underfunded are the same campuses with the highest level of under-represented minority students. The result is that as these students pay more for their education, they are being systematically underfunded. UC should move to a transparent revenue sharing model for non-resident tuition.
