Category: Nutrition

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Why good food is good for you

I don’t know about you, but I do sometimes wonder why (or do I mean how?) good foods are good for you. I know that they contain more things like anti-oxidants and vitamin precursors and vitamins and minerals, but I don’t have a very clear idea of how those things work their magic, if indeed they do. And then I was watching a Tedtalk by a chap called William Li, a doctor with a special interest in cancer.

He was talking about blood vessels and the extremely delicate balance that regulates the life and death of blood vessels in the body, and I realized that I could remember almost nothing about angiogenesis and the hormones that control it. Once I did. Then Li slipped into cancers, and showed that tumours depend for their survival on their blood supply. Cut it off, and tumours shrink. In fact, he said, we probably have loads of mini tumours popping up all the time, less than the size of the tip of a ball-point pen, but in the absence of a blood supply, they just wither and die. Fascinating, so there are fancy drugs that block the growth of blood vessels — antiangiogenesis drugs — and that offer a new approach to treating cancer. And those same drugs can treat obesity in mice genetically predisposed to eat until they become, in Li’s words, “furry tennis balls”.

And then he moved smoothly into diet. And lo, there were lots of foods, many of them them fruits and vegetables, that seemed to have potent anti-angiogenic activity in lab tests. Some of them, combined, are more potent than either on its own or both together. He listed a bunch of foods, and then something that made me perk up even more.

“For each food type, we believe there is different potencies within different strains and varietals. And we want to measure this because, well, while you’re eating a strawberry or drinking tea, why not select the one that’s most potent for preventing cancer?”

Wow. A man who starts from the assumption that not all varieties are equal. While I am not too happy with the continuing medicalization of nutrition and diet, treating good food as no more than a series of active ingredients, I am glad that at least someone in the medical establishment is taking agricultural biodiversity seriously. Li’s bottom line:

Everyone could benefit from a diet based on local, sustainable, antiangiogenic crops.

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Nibbles: Hunter gatherers, Amaranthus and corn in Mexico, Protected areas and poverty, African ag, Pollan, Aquaculture in Laos, Range, Rainforest

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Nibbles: Land lease, Maasai flexibility, Small farms, Coffee, coffee, coffee, Climate change, Sahelian trees, Food as drugs, Field genebanks, Chinese medicinals, Bolivian NTFP, Invasives

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Nibbles: Potato chemistry, Millennium Seed Bank, Sacred sites, Japanese festivals

  • Measuring micronutrients and stuff in potatoes.
  • Kew wants you to adopt a seed, save a species. Easy as that.
  • Maybe religion can do some good in the world after all? Allow me to be skeptical.
  • Wait, can I change my mind? The wonderfulness that is Japanese penis festivals. Well, they mainly take place in the spring. Agrobiodiversity mainly grows in the spring. There is a connection, surely.
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Birds not so smart after all?

Hold the phone! A press release informs us that over two winters, using two different varieties of wheat, garden birds and lab canaries preferred conventional over organic grain. And the reason seems to be that the conventional grain contained 10% more protein. Very smart! But before word goes out to the birds of the world, consider what else the press release says:

This study is only looking at one aspect of the organic food debate – it does not take into account the long-term health implications of using chemical fertilizers and pesticides, or the often negative environmental impact of conventional farming; for example, other work has shown that pesticides can strongly reduce availability of seeds for birds. But it does raise questions about the nutritional benefits of organic food and what consumers are being led to believe.

Because consumers in the UK are choosing organic for its higher protein levels? Because they’re short of protein? More to the point, has anyone asked the birds to consider the long-term consequences of their choices, like the reduced availability of seeds, or nesting spots, or insects for their insectivorous feathered friends?

And, let’s not forget, increased levels of carbon dioxide are reducing protein levels in wheat. Another good reason to grow conventionally, whatever that means.

“Gary says: [A]ll you will get from political advocates is disinformation and misinformation intended to advance their agenda.”