Let’s Stop Lying About Physical Activity and Obesity
There were many impressive people at the recent Cape Town conference, but to me two people stood out the most. One of them is the British cardiologist Aseem Malhotra. A man who is not the least bit afraid to eloquently tell the truth that most people keep silent about.
Not long ago he wrote in the impactful British Medical Journal that it’s time to bust the myth that saturated fat has anything to do with heart disease. This placed him on the front pages of papers all over the world, but now a lot of people realize that he was right.
Malhotra has not slowed down after this. He is often on TV, expecially in his home country of England and it’s not hard to understand why when you meet him.
The Interview
I managed to get an interview with Dr. Malhotra in South Africa and above you can see a short section. He explains that the common idea about physical activitity as a cure for obesity is something we need to forget – because it’s not true.
In the full 22 minute interview ha talks more about what we should focus on instead of calories, what food can lower risk of heart disease more than statin drugs… and how he lost weight eating 1,000 calories extra of a certain kind of food.
The full interview can be seen on the membership pages (free one month trial):
How to Make Your Food a Powerful Medicine, Not a Slow Poison – Interview with Dr. Malhotra
More
A Calorie Is Not a Calorie – Not Even Close
How to Tailor Your Fitness Routine if You’re Overweight or Suffer from Metabolic Syndrome
What Is More Dangerous – Inactivity, Obesity or Something Else?
a 2nd point that arises: it does seem that the guiding principle of the fitness industry is "burn calories", and that the major antidote then becomes aerobic exercise. this focus brings with it a host of further problems, such as overexercise and its effects on the body, loss of muscle mass after the age of 45, and the great amount of extra time that it takes away from family and other less inwardly-orientated pursuits.
a further problem I see is that aerobics creates an image of frenetic, exhausting exercise which many parts of the population can't relate to, and therefore give up on any form of exercise.
meanwhile, resistance training activities have not traditionally been associated with health, and therefore are monopolised by another extreme group, further discouraging wider participation.
thanks for all your efforts andreas,
Food manufacturers predated the obesity epidemic, which started when government set out moronic guidelines and vilified fat, particularly saturated fat. In response, the food manufacturers followed those guidelines in order to gain the right from - you guessed it - the government to slap the "healthy" label on their food. And this is food that is defatted, which means it tastes like crud. To be able to sell product at all, the manufacturers were forced into complicated and unnatural chemical combinations in order to stick with government dietary guidelines and also make a palatable product.
Until the United States government eschewed scientific data (as it always does) and jumped into the meddling with what people ate game as well as the subsidy of carbs game, manufacturers were able to fry food in lard and carbs weren't made less expensive than they actually are by government farm subsidies. Why can't intelligent people understand this?
Of course manufacturers are going to point the finger at exercise. They've already sunk billions of dollars into R&D for foods that meet government guidelines and doesn't taste like dirt. Billions of dollars, mind, that were required only because government decided to meddle in the human diet. Nobody needed to find alternatives to lard and nobody needed to find a way to find ways to make food taste good with the fat taken out until the monkeys in the American congress came along in the 1970's.
1) it increases insulin sensitivity;
2) certain kinds of excercise increase metabolism and muscle mass;
3) a moderate amount of excercise (45 minutes or so) per day actually helps to CONTROL appetite, by increasing certain kinds of hormones.
Why do you think those guidelines were not funded by the grain industry?
Vegetarian zealousy and money from agrabusiness are the culprits here.
Refined carbohydrates are truly the problem, once I renounced them my weight loss really skyrocketed.
Here is my story:http://marysreviews.weebly.com/
Oh dear you sound just like most Governments, and how has that worked out so far for the general population???
Plus, the scientific evidence is against exercise for weight loss. See, eg:
http://nymag.com/news/sports/38001/
I still believe exercise helps to reduce stress, and provides other benefits, but I no longer believe exercise causes weight loss.
before and it didn"t work.
I spent my entire adult life buying low fat versions of foods, coupled with counting calories/points, until the craving for carbs and debilitating low blood sugars, would send me scurrying to the kitchen to feed my addiction.
I felt deprived and hungry. I could barely walk let alone exercise, due to my weight and inflammatory arthritis. I felt undisciplined, greedy, lazy and ashamed, with a deep sense of hopelessness.
Then something truly wonderful happened. I found Diet Doctor, and have lost 80 pounds in the last 6 months eating delicious food that keeps me satiated. My arthritis is in remission and I feel fantastic. The only exercise I do is walking the dog at a leisurly pace.
Thank you so much for this brilliant site.