Dangerous Dieting

Eat to Live: The Revolutionary Formula for Fast and Sustained Weight Loss
by Joel Fuhrman, M.D.

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In addition to undergoing extremely risky surgeries, Americans have been bombarded with a battery of gimmicky diets that promise to combat obesity. Almost all diets are ineffective. They don't work, because no matter how much weight you lose when you are on a diet, you put it right back on when you go off. Measuring portions and trying to eat fewer calories, typically called "dieting," almost never results in permanent weight loss and actually worsens the problem over time. Such "dieting" temporarily slows down your metabolic rate, so often more weight comes back than you lost. You wind up heavier than you were before you started dieting. This leads many to claim, "I've tried everything, and nothing works. It must be genetic. Who wouldn't give up?"

You may already know that the conventional "solution" to being overweight - low-calorie dieting - doesn't work. But you may not know why. It is for this simple yet much overlooked reason: for the vast majority of people, being overweight is not caused by how much they eat but by what they eat. The idea that people get heavy because they consume a high volume of food is a myth. Eating large amounts of the right food is your key to success and is what makes this plan workable for the rest of your life. What makes many people overweight is not that they eat so much more but that they get a higher percentage of their calories from fat and refined carbohydrates, or mostly low-nutrient foods. This low-nutrient diet establishes a favorable cellular environment for disease to flourish.

Regardless of your metabolism or genetics, you can achieve a normal weight once you start a high-nutrient diet style. Since the majority of all Americans are overweight, the problem is not primarily genetic. Though genes are an important ingredient, physical activity and food choices play a far more significant role. In studies on identical twins with the tendency to be overweight, scientists found that physical activity is the strongest environmental determinant of total body and central abdominal fat mass. Even those with a strong family history of obesity effectively lose weight with increased physical activity and appropriate dietary modifications.

Most of the time, the reason people are overweight is too little physical activity, in conjunction with a high-calorie, low-nutrient diet. Eating a diet with plenty of low-fiber, calorie-dense food, such as oil and refined carbohydrates, is the main culprit. As long as you are eating fatty foods and refined carbohydrates, it is impossible to lose weight healthfully. In fact, this vicious combination of a sedentary lifestyle and eating typical "American" food (high-fat, low-fiber) is the primary reason we have such an incredibly overweight population.

Killing the Next Generation

This book may not appeal to many Americans who are in denial about the dangers of their eating habits and those of their children. Many people will do anything to continue their love affair with rich, disease-causing foods and will sacrifice their health in the process. Many American consumers prefer not to know about the dangers of their diet because they don't want to have their pleasures interfered with. This book is not for them.

If you have to give up something you get pleasure from, your subconscious may prefer to ignore solid evidence or defend illogically held views. Many ferociously defend their unhealthy eating practices. Others just claim, "I already eat a healthy diet," when they do not. There is a general resistance to change. It would be much easier if healthful eating practices and the scientific importance of nutritional excellence were instilled in us as children. Unfortunately, children are eating more poorly today than ever before.

Most Americans are not aware that the diet they feed their children guarantees a high cancer probability down the road. They don't even contemplate that eating fast-food meals may be just as risky (or more so) than letting their children smoke cigarettes.

The 1992 Bogalusa Heart Study confirmed the existence of fatty plaques and streaks (the beginning of atherosclerosis) in most children and teenagers! You wouldn't let your children sit around the table smoking cigars and drinking whiskey, because it is not socially acceptable, but it is fine to let them consume cola, fries cooked in trans fat, and a cheeseburger regularly. Many children consume doughnuts, cookies, cupcakes, and candy on a daily basis. It is difficult for parents to understand the insidious, slow destruction of their child's genetic potential and the foundation for serious illness that is being built by the consumption of these foods.

It would be unrealistic to feel optimistic about the health and well-being of the next generation when there is an unprecedented increase in the average weight of children in this country and record levels of childhood obesity. Most ominous were the results reported by the 1992 Bogalusa Heart Study, which studied autopsies performed on children killed in accidental deaths. The study confirmed the existence of fatty plaques and streaks (the beginning of atherosclerosis) in most children and teenagers! These researchers concluded: "These results emphasize the need for preventive cardiology in early life." I guess "preventive cardiology" is a convoluted term that means eating healthfully.

Another recent autopsy study appearing in the New England Journal of Medicine found that more than 85 percent of adults between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-nine already have atherosclerotic changes in their coronary arteries. Fatty streaks and fibrous plaques covered large areas of the coronary arteries. Everyone knows that junk foods are not healthy, but few understand their consequences - serious life-threatening illness. Clearly, the diets we consume as children have a powerful influence on our future health and eventual premature demise. There is considerable data to suggest that childhood diet has a greater impact on the later incidence of certain cancers than does a poor diet later in life.

It is estimated that as many as 25 percent of schoolchildren today are obese. Early obesity sets the stage for adult obesity. An overweight child develops heart disease earlier in life. Mortality data suggests that being overweight during early adult life is more dangerous than a similar degree of heaviness later in adult life.

About the Author

Joel Fuhrman, M.D., is a board-certified family physician who specializes in preventing and reversing disease through nutritional and natural methods. He is the author of Fasting and Eating for Health and a former member of the U.S. World Figure Skating Team. He lives with his wife and four children in Flemington, New Jersey. For more information please visit www.drfuhrman.com