Doctorshealthsystems

What effect does fibre have on the G.I. value?

Dietary fibre is not one chemical constituent like fat and protein. It is composed of many different sorts of molecules. Fibre can be divided into soluble and insoluble types.

Soluble fibre tends to be viscous (thick and jelly-like) and will slow down digestion for this reason. Foods with more soluble fibre, like oats and legumes, therefore have low G.I. factors.

Insoluble fibre is not viscous and doesn’t slow digestion. Wholemeal bread and white bread have similar G.I. factors. Brown pasta and brown rice have similar values to their white counterparts. Sometimes insoluble fibre acts as a physical barrier which prevents the enzymes from attacking the starch. Whole (intact) grains of wheat, rye and barley have lower G.I. factors than cracked grains.

Bread has a G.I. of around 70 and lentils of around 29. Can I eat twice as much of the low G.I. food as the high G.I. food?

Yes, your blood sugar levels should be approximately the same after two serves of lentils or pasta compared with one serve of bread or potatoes. But, you will have eaten twice as many kilojoules (Calories). In practice, you will find that it is very difficult to eat a double serve of foods like lentils and pasta because they are very satiating and fill you up. If you can eat twice as much, it may be a good thing, because you are unlikely to have room for high-fat and less nutritious foods!

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Diet. Individuals on a high-fat diet have been shown to lose less fat in response to exercise than those on a high-carbohydrate diet.10 High intakes of dietary fat lead to a greater energy surplus which is then stored in depot fat cells, while blood fats and glycogen are utilised for energy. The benefits of exercise are thus at least partially negated by the effects of excess energy in the form of fat. Yet while this is known, it is often difficult to verify.

Recent research using radioactive isotopes has shown that people under-estimate the amount of energy consumed in their diet by around 30 per cent, and over-estimate the amount of exercise they carry out by about 40 per cent. The under-estimate of food intake is reportedly higher in women than in men and there are indications that women may unconsciously eat more after exercise, whether as a means of defence against fat loss or a reward for having carried out exercise. Particular attention therefore needs to be paid not only to the fat content of the diet as a whole, but to the compensatory energy intake following exercise in some women. It’s not dear whether different types of exercise have different effects on this level of compensatory eating.

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Fat, as we’ve seen, is vital for existence. However, as is often the case, too much of a good thing can be dangerous. Health experts have long known the problems of overfatness, but it has often been under-rated as a primary health risk, partly because BMI is only a blunt measure of fatness. Fat distribution as well as total fatness is of critical importance. European researchers have known this for some time since the famous French endocrinologist Jean Vague published it in 1956. More recently, North American and European researchers have gone back and re-examined the epidemiological data using measures of fat distribution such as

waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) instead of weight, and found that abdominal fatness (i.e. a ‘pot belly’) is just as powerful and important a primary risk factor in determining ill-health as other risk factors such as high cholesterol, high blood pressure and smoking in causing problems such as heart disease, late onset or non insulin dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) and some forms of cancer.

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Several studies indicate that a deficiency of the trace mineral zinc may be associated with poor sexual performance due to retarded genital development or hypogonadism. Medical researchers have found that in Iran and Egypt, where many people live on zinc-deficient diets, many boys suffer from the retarded development and growth of the gonads—the sex organs. When the diet is supplemented with zinc, they rapidly mature sexually.

Zinc has also been found to play a vital role in the health of the prostate. There is a very high concentration of zinc in the sperm, the seminal fluid, and in the prostate itself—more than in any other part of the body. A deficiency of zinc causes enlargement of the prostate and other unhealthy changes in this vital sex gland. Thus, zinc is definitely related to man’s sexual performance and potential. This is especially important to men past middle age, when prostate troubles usually start.

Is it possible to have deficiency of zinc if you eat a normal well-balanced diet? Yes, more likely than not, your diet is deficient in it. First, the soil of 32 of our 50 states is deficient in zinc, and the nutritive elements in your food can come only from the soil. Then, zinc is taken out of our foods by refining and processing, especially when bran and germ are removed from the grains. Foods rich in zinc are oysters (long believed by folklore to be a source of virility), herring, wheat bran and wheat germ, brewer’s yeast, onions, and eggs. Sunflower and pumpkin seeds are an excellent source of zinc, also.

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Are Waerland’s wife Ebba Waerland is an accomplished practitioner in the application of Waerland therapies in the treatment of many diseases. In her book, Naturlakekonstens Bokf she describes dietetic Waerland therapies which she has applied in many clinics in Germany and Sweden in the treatment of multiple sclerosis. They are also described in an English language book by Are Waerland, Health Is Your Birthright.

First, Waerland and Evers agree completely as to the cause of multiple sclerosis: a diet of denatured foods which is lacking in important nutritive elements and which causes metabolic disorder and poisons the system. Their general dietetic measures are similiar as well. Ebba Waerland recommends complete removal of all processed, refined, and devitilized foods, as well as sugar, tobacco, alcohol, salt, coffee, tea, spices and other foodless products.

The Waerland therapy for multiple sclerosis

Treatment begins with a short fast of not over five days’ duration, with vegetable and fruit juices. After fasting, a strict alkaline diet is prescribed for at least two weeks. This diet consists of two meals a day of raw fruits and vegetables with the addition of sprouted wheat* and 1 slice of whole meal bread; one meal is a vegetable meal, the other a fruit meal. This is followed by the standard Waerland diet with the addition of sprouted wheat. Only unpasteurized, raw milk is permitted. Bread consumption is limited to one or two slices of sour-dough bread a day. Cold-pressed oils are used instead of butter. No cheese, except whey cheese and homemade cottage cheese, is allowed. Brewer’s yeast is recommended as a food supplement.

In addition to the diet, other biological means of detoxifying the system advocated by Ebba Waerland are increasing the blood circulation by massage, exercises, and special hydrotherapeutic treatments.

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