New study: 70% of type 2 diabetes cases linked to food choices

High fructose corn syrup is a very American thing. Over 90% of the nutritive sweetener used worldwide is sucrose.

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvey_Washington_Wiley?useski... [2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swill_milk_scandal?useskin=vec...

And by processed foods, I mean foods that are designed to: - Minimize required mastication and digestion time. - Designed to subvert the satiation and cloying defense mechanisms, that tell our body to stop.

1. Mealsquares.com

that is huge... a half kilo apple?!?!

Best evidence right now says to maintain a healthy weight, that eating moderately of meats and fats is fine, that we should eat adequately of plant matter, etc. Limit highly processed foods, or foods comprised of large amounts of highly-processed ingredients. Probably because that tends to equate to large amounts of sugar and/or fat.

If your children are really interested and you think it's not going to lead to an obsession then a continuous glucose monitor can lead to fascinating insights about their individual response to specific foods, combinations thereof, the interaction with exercise, etc. If you really want to explore the rabbit hole there's a community of type 1 diabetic hackers; obviously the etiology and hazards are different but as far as collection and analysis of the data there's a lot of prior art there.

- In lab work, "dry mass" refers to what's left when the water is removed. However, "dried" in food science refers to a product's water activity. Since neither 300g of hydrated or dry mass would seem an excessive amount, specifying "fresh or dried apple" would have been more useful.

- Concentrations and amounts vary per unit and variety, and recommendations vary by the individual. If the overall message is "consume fewer calories, especially calories from these compounds, to lower risks of diabetes and live a longer and healthier life", start with those and list common products that contain them - and that don't.

- A great failure in the US is the erosion of food traditions by "convenience"... and sometimes the interference of laws. People do not generally have the background to interpret the creative vocabulary used on food product labels. Even the FDA has trouble with this[1]. Giving clear examples of meals and recommendations for how to buy and store ingredients is helpful to people who have never consumed anything that was not a manufactured food product.

[1] https://www.fda.gov/food/food-labeling-nutrition

The focus of the cycle of food production is largely economics. I'll leave it at that.

That said, wouldn’t it be better to be doing the opposite of what you’re being told, and cut down on carbs (both simple and complex) to eat more protein and fat which body can use to slow-release blood sugar for a longer duration? (For routine diet I mean - obviously at the onset of an attack you’ll want to consume sugar).

Getting the normal glucose meter was great. The poking of the needle barely causes an effect, and you can get pretty ingrained with numbers. The first couple weeks with the thing I went through tons of tests, before meals, various times after meals, and then if the sugar level was high, meaning over 130 for me, I'd go for a 10 minute walk and could see and feel that the numbers dropped to the low 100s so quickly. At this point I can tell decently well what level my number is.

The glucose monitor with poking stick is really great. Better, faster, cheaper, more trustworthy data than the current continuous monitors out there.

Hypoglycemia actually causes a panic attack, so symptoms are the same.

It means that my body is insulin resistant, and when I eat anything that raises my sugar levels, the body starts pumping out more and more insulin till it reaches a point where the sugar levels fall below normal. So the body is hit by bad effects of high sugar, and then with bad effects of low sugar.

In my case the solution was to avoid sugars and refined carbs in breakfast. As Indians our breakfast contains a lot of carbs.

If I have eggs for breakfast, I can pretty much anything the entire day and not feel it. On the other hand if I have pancakes with syrup, I know I am in for an episode of hypoglycaemia.

Also if I have sugar or refined carbs, having a fibre supplement (psyllium husk) with it helps.

Overall adding more salad and protein is what I would recommend if you also have this.

PS: For diagnosis go to an endocrinologist.

One trippy thing to try is to go on a keto diet. When your body is in ketosis, it stops using glucose as an energy source, so you shouldn't get hypoglycemia. It's actually a strange feeling. In my case, my energy level feels much more constant throughout the day.

For example I walk with a friend in the forest and shortly aware that I don't know where I am will turn into "he'll kill me" freakout... assistance dog would notice if something was off, and he's happily sniffing around and enjoying himself.

I figured this out in my twenties, stopped eating convenience food with sugar (cookies, sweet crackers, instant noodles, breakfast cereals), and instantly felt better.

I eat a high-protein breakfast of multigrain toast, avocado, cottage cheese, red onion and ham.

When you eat decent food with protein and vegetables you won't have cravings any more for sugary rubbish.

I snack on roast nuts (no peanuts), eat slightly more often and, for a pick-me-up in the afternoon, eat a small sandwich/ piece of sushi/ etc.

I am occasional only with desserts, cakes and ice-cream; typically only after dinner. Quality makes a big difference; quality cakes for example are mainly eggs, butter, chocolate and a bit of sugar whereas cheap cakes are sugar sugar sugar, refined flour and artificial flavours. Protein and fat seem to help stabilize the effects of dietary sugar on my blood sugar levels and mood.

My personal experience, YMMV.

The glycemic index (GI) relates to the effect food has on the glucose levels after consumption: high is more severe than low. Vegetables have a low index and sugary foods a high one. Surprisingly white bread and cornflakes also have a high index, and other foods we would not describe as sugary.

Maybe the 'bad food' turns out to have a high index.

Now, I’m in better shape and can eat some carbs, but only in relatively small amounts. If I eat fruit, I’ll usually go for a walk immediately, so I don’t get as much of a spike.

It’s also worth noting that I have PTSD, which is strongly linked with endocrine dysregulation, so maybe that’s some of the underlying cause.

The result of all this is that my glucose is now very steady and I’m not having the drops while I sleep. Of course, no doctor advised me to do any of this. This is all n=1 “nonsense” that “evidence based” medicine would ignore.

Skip breakfast and lunch. Have a single meal a day and use the time you saved from skipping the other meals to prepare something nutritious and delicious.

It’s so easy that people have been doing it for thousands of years. Except now it’s even easier because you don’t have to stalk a gazelle or wake up at dawn to weed a garden.

“Our study suggests poor carbohydrate quality is a leading driver of diet-attributable type 2 diabetes globally, and with important variation by nation and over time,” says senior author Dariush Mozaffarian, Jean Mayer Professor of Nutrition and dean for policy at the Friedman School. “These new findings reveal critical areas for national and global focus to improve nutrition and reduce devastating burdens of diabetes.”

Type 2 diabetes is characterized by the resistance of the body’s cells to insulin. Of the 184 countries included in the Nature Medicine study, all saw an increase in type 2 diabetes cases between 1990 and 2018, representing a growing burden on individuals, families, and healthcare systems.

The research team based their model on information from the Global Dietary Database, along with population demographics from multiple sources, global type 2 diabetes incidence estimates, and data on how food choices impact people living with obesity and type 2 diabetes from multiple published papers.

The analysis revealed that poor diet is causing a larger proportion of total type 2 diabetes incidence in men versus women, in younger versus older adults, and in urban versus rural residents at the global level.

Regionally, Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia —particularly in Poland and Russia, where diets tend to be rich in red meat, processed meat, and potatoes —had the greatest number of type 2 diabetes cases linked to diet. Incidence was also high in Latin America and the Caribbean, especially in Colombia and Mexico, which was credited to high consumption of sugary drinks, processed meat, and low intake of whole grains."

This is an unwinnable conflict between population medicine and policy and individual choice.

Processed meats contain a LOT of salt. Salt doesn't cause diabetes, but it does cause water retention and high blood pressure, so is bad for people with diabetes.

As for sugar, they are on the list of foods they examined. What they found is that we're eating more French fries, so that turns out to be a bigger factor in practice.

Any study like this needs to have an explanation for the recentness of obesity and diabetes epidemics.

https://youtu.be/X5GIExMa4rM

This is the video I got it from. I'm in no way an expert on this topic so take it with a bit of salt

The kidneys turn salt into fructose as far as I know. When u're diabetic and you consume salt it's much better to have it in liquid form. I don't think the reasons are known, but it doesn't raise the serum sodium as much.

Now however, once you get fat and specially fat over the stomach then even high quality carbohydrates can cause high blood sugar which is the definition of diabetes.. so what happens is that low quality carbs plus processed meat leads to being overweight and having a fat stomach, which causes insulin resistance and decreased output from the pancreas.. once you get in this condition however adding whole grains does not help at that point, in fact it adds to your high blood sugar and in fact eating high quality grains at that point, once you have a fat stomach, leads to high blood sugar which is the definition of diabetes

... In other words, once you have fat over the stomach in great quantities, if you eat whole grains, fruits and beans and so forth at that point, that will cause diabetes, diabetes being high blood sugar.. you want to eat the high quality carbs, fruit, and beans before you get fat.. if you eat it after you get fat you will develop diabetes because high quality carbs, fruit, beans etc will give you high blood sugar if you have fat over the stomach

Switched to a keto two months ago and everything has improved. Blood sugar always 90 or less, cholesterol 180, LDL down about 30%.

TBH, they should probably break down East Asia into China, the rest of East Asia, and SEA. That's a huge lump of very wildly varying peoples.

I think this is a source of confusion because people develop it even though they became overweight on relatively healthy food. Or, at the very least, what they consider to be healthy food.

As for this study it seems to indicate to me that certain foods are much easier to get obese with, so they’re linked to the disease.

When you consider carbohydrate quality, a major difference between high and low quality sources is that the higher quality ones are harder to eat more of. That by default is a great protection from obesity. Foods which are harder to eat are almost always better for us if we struggle with portioning.

Take raw carrots for example. You would struggle to become obese by eating raw carrots. On the other hand, you can casually drink like 4 carrots worth of calories in a few minutes via soda. And not feel full at all.