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Steve Jobs lived more than 30 years after developing pancreatic cancer thanks to his vegan diet.
That’s the preposterous claim made by Dr. John McDougall in a lecture that has been viewed by more than 52,500 people on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81xnvgOlHaY and widely touted in the vegan community as a scientifically sound example of veganthink.
McDougall speculates that Jobs first developed cancer in his twenties, which might well be the case given that most cancers develop years before diagnosis. But by that line of thinking, anyone diagnosed with cancer who has made it to mid life could be living thirty years past the initial cancer cell divide. Most of those people will have been on Standard American Diets, high in sugar, starch, factory-farmed animal products and all American junk food. Somehow McDougall holds that animal products caused those cancers but Jobs’s nearly lifelong obsession with veganism could only have prolonged his life!
So why did Jobs develop cancer despite what McDougall himself concedes was a “strict vegan diet” with few lapses over his lifetime? McDougall’s position — and he’s sticking to it! — is vegan diets prevent and cure cancer. Therefore, it must have been bad luck — the equivalent of “being struck by lightning” or “hit by a car” — that caused Jobs’s cancer and fueled its progression.
How else to explain the fact that Steve Wozniak (an overweight fast-food junkie), Bill Gates and other computer pioneers are alive despite similar exposure to carcinogenic lead and cadmium from soldering computer parts, long-term bombardment from radiation and EMFs, and other lifestyle risk factors that would have put all of them at increased risk for cancer? The reason those things caused cancer in Jobs but not the others must have been luck of the draw because Jobs’s vegan diet “could only have helped him.”
None of us, of course, can say for certain what caused the pancreatic cancer that led to Steve Jobs’s death, or what, if anything could have saved him. Dietary, lifestyle, environmental and genetic factors all must have come into play. But McDougall’s failure to even consider the role that Jobs’s vegan diet — and frequent fruitarianism — may have played in his death is unhelpful at best and irresponsible at worst.
Shortly after Jobs’s death on October 5, 2011, I read the Walter Isaacson biography Steve Jobs and posted two “iVegetarian” blogs at this website in which I thoroughly documented a longstanding pattern of food fanaticism, eating disorders and mood swings dating back to Jobs’s teenage years.
On the plus side, his diet seems to have been organic and high quality, and at no point, did he appear to have been a junk-food vegan who indulged in all-American junk foods such as soda, chocolate, cookies and crackers.
On the con side, Jobs was a picky eater who moved in and out of fruitarian phases for most of his life, but consistently favored a lot of fruit and fruit juice. The refrigerators at Apple were always well stocked with Odwalla juices, and numerous sources over the years reported him ordering juices frequently at restaurants. Indeed, this was the most consistent part of his diet over his life time.
Fruits and fruit juices are not only high on the glycemic index, but loaded with fructose. In all but small quantities, they greatly stress the liver and pancreas, contribute to diabetes and many other blood sugar disorders, and have been linked to pancreatic cancer. Jobs suffered from a type of pancreatic cancer known as islet cell carcinoma, which originates in the insulin-secreting beta cells.
That the fructose in Jobs’s fruit heavy diet likely contributed to this cancer is supported by research published in the November 2007 issue of American Journal of Clinical Nutrition which concluded there was “evidence for a greater pancreatic cancer risk with a high intake of fruit and juices but not with a high intake of sodas.” In other words, the “healthy” juices regularly drunk by Jobs may have been been even worse than the soft drinks he seems to have rejected.
More recently, in the August 2010 issue of Cancer Research, Dr. Anthony Healy of the Jonsson Cancer Center and Director of the Pituitary Tumor and Neuroendocrine Program at UCLA, proposed that aberrant fructose metabolism—and not just aberrant glucose metabolism—might be involved in the pathogenesis of pancreatic cancer. Seems fructose provides the raw material cancer cells prefer to use to make the DNA they need to divide and proliferate.
Although the UCLA findings are preliminary, based on cell lines, and more suggestive than bulletproof at this stage, the Reuters headline “Cancer Cells Slurp Up Fructose” is fair warning to any of us addicted to fruit and fruit juices. Although the work is widely cited in recommendations to step back on the amount of high fructose corn syrup in modern diets, it suggests the dangers of fruit juice as well.
McDougall read the Isaacson biography and based a lot of his speculation on it. Yet he somehow missed — or chose to ignore — the fact that Jobs’s brand of veganism included massive amounts of fruit juice, with its dangerous load of fructose. Instead, McDougall sees the main flaw in Jobs’s “mostly excellent” diet as eating meat analogue products high in carcinogenic soy protein isolate. In fact, as I discuss extensively in Chapter 16 of The Whole Soy Story: The Dark Side of America’s Favorite Health Food, soy protein isolate and other soy protein products are well-established risk factors for the exocrine type of pancreatic cancer that killed actors Michael Landon, Patrick Swayze and astronaut Sally Ride, but not for the much rarer endocrine type that killed Jobs.
Furthermore, we have little evidence that Jobs ate much soy over his lifetime. In a book full of food references, Isaacson does not mention soy even once. Certainly, the Apple culture was soy friendly with soy milk readily available in vending machines and at coffee stations and with soy meats served up at company cafeterias, but we have no good evidence yet that Jobs favored it. Indeed, it is very likely he rejected it because of his longstanding fascination with the book The Mucusless Diet Healing System by Arnold Ehret (1866-1922). Ehret’s peculiar brand of VeganThink held the human body is an “air-gas engine” that runs well only on fruits, starchless vegetables and edible green leaves. Soy and other legumes, according to this way of thinking, were to be disdained as mucus-producing forbidden foods. Ehret — whose own “air-gas engine” sputtered, stalled and died at age 56, the same age as Jobs — not only condemned protein and fat as “unnatural” but said they could not be used by the body.
Inspired by Ehret’s theories, Jobs appears to have eaten a diet low in both fat and protein for most of his life. And what did he eat instead? Carbs high in fructose, the very type of carbs linked to blood sugar problems and pancreatic cancer.
McDougall also has a strong opinion about Jobs’s earlier trials with painful kidney stones, which he declares were not kidney stones at all, but misdiagnosis of a diseased pancreas. How so? Those organs are located close together in the body, thus easily confused by doctors less wise than himself. His main reason though is kidney stones simply cannot occur to anyone on a vegan diet. As per the VeganThink theory of kidney stone development, the acid load from animal proteins causes loss of bone, leading to dissolved calcium in the blood, overwhelm in the urinary tract, and build up of kidney stones. Jobs did not eat animal products, could not have had acid buildup, therefore could not have developed kidney stones.
A more likely scenario is Jobs’s kidney stones were the predictable result of his high fructose diet. Sugar — including fructose, the fruit sugar vegans believe is super healthy — upsets mineral balance in the body, interferes with calcium and magnesium absorption and can lead to a host of health problems, including kidney stones. Indeed there is so much research linking high consumption of fruit juices by children to higher incidence of kidney stone development in youngsters as early as kindergarten age that the issue has been covered in the New York Times.
VeganThink further fails to recognize how often kidney stones develop from oxalates, which are indigestible compounds found only in plant foods. Oxalates are especially high in vegan staples such as spinach and other dark leafy greens, parsley, beets, carrots, strawberries, nuts, peanuts, soy and chocolate. Isaacson says nothing about Jobs eating nuts, peanuts, soy or chocolate, but a great deal about his love affair with fruits, veggies, salads and juices.
Where else does McDougall go astray? Interpreting reports of Jobs’s skin and eyes turning yellow and orange in his twenties as proof of the obstruction of the bile ducts and the early onset of the deadly pancreatic cancer that veganism somehow kept at bay for an astounding 30 years. The obvious reason — widely acknowledged even in the vegan literature — is excessive carrot juice, which Jobs was well known to have consumed.
In sum, McDougall’s lecture adds up to a whole lot of speculation, assumptions and questionable claims, including the entirely wrongheaded idea that it is the nature of cancer cells to divide and tumors to grow in such an orderly, predictable way that disease progression can be calculated using multiplication tables. Though even his simple math doesn’t compute, most of the YouTube “commentators” have chosen instead to carp on McDougall’s pseudo-French pronunciation of the word centimeters as “sahntomeeters.” I would guess some doctors somewhere say it that way, but this only adds to an overall impression of a pseudo-intellectual dishing out pseudo science.
McDougall starts out by saying he “likes the challenge of learning new things.” He ends by saying that noone — noone — has yet or ever will disprove his theory. VeganThink!
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Thanks to Sylvia Onusic, PhD, for reading and commenting on this article.
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Great job at exposing bogus logic- bordering on insanity. However, I have a couple concerns/questions… you stated “That the fructose in Jobs’s fruit heavy diet likely contributed to this cancer is supported by research published in the November 2007 issue of American Journal of Clinical Nutrition which concluded there was “evidence for a greater pancreatic cancer risk with a high intake of fruit and juices but not with a high intake of sodas.” In other words, the “healthy” juices regularly drunk by Jobs may have been been even worse than the soft drinks he seems to have rejected.”
1. This seems to contradict Chris Masterjohn’s research, which shows fructose is not at all a cause of disease, but rather fructose (as well as ethanol and some fatty acids) reveal a deficiency in phosphatidylcholine in the liver.
2. It also seems like the more popular sodas have more sugar than most fruit juices (even though they are close/overlap sometimes). Yet that statement seems to imply that fruit juices in general have more fructose than soda. This also completely ignores the benefits from the nutrients received from the fruit juices. Try living 30 years after getting cancer on mainly soda 🙂
It seems most likely it was a protein deficiency that killed him, as studies have shown that diets at 20% casein in rat models completely advert the negative effects of fructose on the liver. Was it your intent to attack fructose?
There is no word in the english language for ‘protein deficiency’. When is the last time you have ever heard of anyone dying of protein deficiency…? You cannot avoid protein as long as you eat food. The best quality amino acids coming from plant foods. After all where do you think the animals you consume get theirs from…?
The body has to work extra hard to break down globular protein structures from animal products to get at the amino acids it requires.
Only people who don’t EAT will suffer protein deficiencies…BTW–You are correct about the fructose. Anti fructose proponents fail to make the distinction between naturally occurring fructose from fruit and man-made refined fructose additives…
ever heard of kwashiorkor? It is the medical term for protein deficiency and involves the build up of fluid in the abdomen. It is most prevalent in african areas in children, where the diet is mainly made up of one carbohydrate based staple food such as yams – and yes it can be fatal.
Kwashiorkor is most prevalent in areas where there is FAMINE. It is nearly impossible to to be protein deficient if you are consuming enough calories. It can be fatal alright – as can the starvation that accompanies it. Show me one hospital bed in the US with a patient suffering from Kwashiorkor who hasn’t been dangerously calorie deficient for a significant period of time. It’s so uncommon most people have never heard of it. Protein deficiency is a complete non-issue in this country, including among the strictest whole food vegans.
First of all, this is old but should anyone else read this erroneous post, I want to ensure people don’t stumble on this misinformation. To conflate the digestive and metabolic processes of any other species, genus, or otherwise with that of home sapiens is not only scientifically wrong, it’s downright dangerous. You aren’t a cow, you do not have rumen and the requisite enzymes to digest grass into required nutrients, so you will not live well on a diet of grass. We are also, though seemingly genetically close to apes, not remotely capable of eating a diet similar to that of primates. We aren’t not birds and cannot digest seeds. So yes you can eat foods that have little or no bioavailable proteins for humans. This is a comment so I’ll refrain from writing a book, but please read much more before accepting unscientific assumptions as truth.
Thank u
“We aren’t not birds and cannot digest seeds” What a bizarre statement.
We can most certain digest seeds and in fact do so in vast numbers.
Yes, some seeds (e.g. flax) require us to grind, or at least thoroughly masticate, to break down the hard to digest outer shell, but beyond that, your statement is nonsense.
Please explore other articles on the Weston A Price site. The Ploy of Soy is a good one and caused me to understand why my goats and rabbits were having adverse reactions to soymeal supplements but the chickens were NOT. Birds have body temps of 103-106 F, and when we are warned not to eat wild berries just because we see the wild birds eating them, it is because they are capable of splitting enzymes that would be toxic to mammals. This is in part because of their high body temp. Though many non human mammals have body temps of 101-103. The heat speeds up the metabolism, if you have ever taken chemistry in any form, a LOT of processes are shown to us by heating things. It really showed me how we have to go through amazing complications to do something the cells can easily do a million times a minute (evidence against evolution if you want to speculate).
The Ploy Of Soy points out that molecules like phytic acid block protein assimilation in the gut, and block many minerals being absorbed also, I watched this over two years as my goats developed rickets type symptoms- poor skeletal development in the young, enlarged knees and joints in adults, however the chickens were largely unaffected. I had one (out of 30) chickens develop egg boundedness (the only time I ever saw that), and one hen began to crow (effects of hormonal imbalance I assume- as soy is known for high estrogens. Why crowing with female hormones I haven’t researched that yet.)
But by and large, the birds were showing me that it is in their job description to handle grains and seeds. There are indeed many antinutrients in grains and seeds to protect them from various things such as sprouting until ideal conditions are met- this is why it is better to sprout our grains and sour them a bit before making them into breads etc. By doing that, WE are mimicking what the chicken is able to do with her own digestive system. Also ruminants, though soy is insanely high in phytic acid , other grains are less, and when combined with proper pasture weeds and grasses, are not the staple, just a supplement, and as such, their very factory-like rumen soaks and sours and regurgitates and chews again and uses their 4 chambers in such a way they and their bacteria are able to break those grains down and utilize them. If we want to eat them, we just have to replicate that process. As outlined in Nourishing Traditions.
I have rabbits (single stomach, but chew cud by putting their food through twice), chickens (single stomach but very pronounced appendix, and crop and gizzard, and high body heat) and goats (4 stomach chambers), and of course dogs and cats (both single stomached, cats more obligate carnivores), ( horses which I don;t currently have but have had in the past have a very long and much used appendix known as the Cecum, ) and they all have different food needs- Years ago as a teen we fed basic generic cheap dog food, and our poor dogs had “flea allergy”. Years later when I began to feed raw meat, that “allergy” cleared up and they grew their hair back. That was deficiency not allergy, or may be in some cases it’s the same thing. That old generic dog food was devoid of any decent animal product, except maybe feathers and beaks, which they didn’t list. Thankfully now we have many choices, but then, unless we grew our own meat to feed the dogs, or were affluent enough to buy raw meats in the store just for the dogs, there wasn’t much choice. My dogs and cats get raw organs and meats more often and meat based dry food now, and I haven’t had a bald dog since. Yes the different species do need different things, and they function at their best when they get them.
Nice response thank you. High fat carnivore cured my autoimmune issues the dark circles that appeared under my eyes and bleeding/receding gums and tooth pain I developed from the vegan and vegetarian diets. Animal products are by far the least inflammatory and easy to digest food for humans.
Here is the actual post free from Dr. John McDougall. A lot of knowledge and fact not recognised in this post above, very misguided and cherry picked hatred towards a vegan diet. https://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2011nl/nov/jobs.htm
Ever read anything else on this site? Ever read Dr Price’s original study? If you find anything you disagree with as labeled”hate” then sad for you, life must be really rough. BUT if you are really interested in the truth , google “Nutrition and Physical Degeneration by Weston A Price, free PDF” there are a few sites that reprint the book including the Gutenberg site. He didn’t go out to spread “hate” as you insist. He was noticing a sudden change in the health and facial structure of his patients in the 1920’s and 30’s and decided to use his OWN money saved from his own work as a dentist (as opposed to grants from corporations wanting the researcher to sway their arguments), and went out to the world to find pockets of healthy people and took pictures and chronicled their diets (over 9 years) and found the fewest cavities and best health was held by people with high meat/dairy/fats/animal products (80% of calories were from saturated fats), and no adulterated western civilized foods. Some ate grains but they were soaked and soured. Some at NO grains or fruits or vegetables, and called them cow food. Those were the cattle keeping African tribes. And today we are told African descent folks are lactose intolerant. Doesn’t that seem a little odd to you? Price explored Canada, S America, Arabia, Switzerland, New Hebrides, Wales, the Pacific Islands, Australia, Many beautiful brown peoples and called them “superb” . This was also written in a time when Darwinianism was being used as proof of the need for eugenics, Look up Edwin Black’s War Against the Weak for an eye opener on the eugenics history in America. But in his own quiet way, Price was also telling the world other races were superior in development, and whites needed to cool their jets on their misplaced opinions. BUT he mostly was pointing at the food and pointing out the missing factors , the missing vitamins that were causing this poverty of health and sad development in the “civilized”.
Very well said Mark Spencer!
there is only 1% protein in fruits, also there is no casein in vegan diet. Maybe casein saves rats from fructose, but vegan don’t eat casein, they eat fructose, that’s the point.
Breast milk also has 1% of protein
Would be scary to read it if there were no so many people leaving on vegan diets traditionally and long lives. Whatever are the causes of jobs death
Well of course if you are going to count water content. Let’s do something crazy like look at the protein percentage and content of dried fruit and dried breast milk. You know remove the water. The fruit with the absolute highest protein content is figs @ 10% and still does not contain all the EAAs. The vast amount of dried fruit has a protein content of under 2%. In fact as far as I know other than figs the only other dried fruit above 2% is pears which by tge way has one of tge highest fructose to glucose ratios at over 2.1:1 ratio. Breast Milk on the other hand is 10% Protein, 36% Carb, and 54% Fat by weight. But that protein is 100% complete with EAA and all the NEAA. It also has various protein peptides none of which the fruit has.
I do agree our bodies are masters at protein reabsorption and conservation. We do not need nearly as much as something but there is a huge difference between mini AL for survival and optimal for health. Ever seen how thin the bone structure and muscle mass is those cultures that eat very little meat proteins? There is a reason.
As far as fructose content all one has to do is look at the old USDA nutrient contents from 1950 and compare it to today’s fruits and veggies. Not to mention the selective breeding of vegetables to have higher sweetness fructose and to a much less e tent glucose has been happening for many thousands of years.
Moving on to seeds and being digestible unadulterated. Try swallowing some seeds whole and check back with me in a day. Now when is tge last time anyone has seen undigested meat or fat in their excrement ? I am better never. We as humans have one of the out acidic stomach enviornments of any mammal. Only matched by true carrion eaters which are also pure carnivores. We have one of the most adaptive GI systems in nature. It’s one of number of reasons we have had such a good survival rate in nature.
BTW looking at intelligence, high intelligence is almost exclusively linked to species with meat in their diets. Looking back at fossil records and dating nitrogen isotopes our dramatic brain size increase is directly linked to when we started consuming primarily animal tissues. Dolphins and other toothed whales (orcas etc), whales, various primates, ravens, crows, parrots etc all have some sort of animals they consume.
Fructose in terms of nature was meant to be eaten in frequently when in season for that zone. Think of the native fruits say in tge climate across the middle of the USA take the east coast thru the mountain range. There are very few indigenous edible fruits and most like the various wild berries have seasons measured in days before they are consumed. They also the wild types gave extremely low fructose levels compared to any of the developed fruit species. Even blueberries which are highest of berries are only around 3 g / serving for the true wild type.
Consider HFCS is depending on type is between 42%-55% fructose, 34-21% Glucose and 24% water. Yes there are higher HFCS % products. This is where many people that try to claim HFCS is only a small % off sucrose i.e. table sugar are wrong or purposely mislead. Table sugar is dru product HFCS us a liquid. 24% water. Thus the ratio is not 42-55F/45-58G but instead is actually with water removed is actually 55-72% Fructose to 28-45%Glucose HFCS42 is actually 55% Fructose 45% Glucose and HFCS55 which is the one most used I soft drinks (sodas) is 72% Fructose 28% Glucose. You have to remember to remove the 24% water. So as example HFCS55 100 grams -24% water 24 grams = 76 grams of dry sweetner. HFCS has 55% Fructose by weight or 55grams /100grams. So of that 76 grams 55grams is Fructose leaving 21 grams of Glucose. 55 of 76 is 72% Fructose. 21 of 76 is 28% Glucose.
So to be clear HFCS in terms of actual pure sweetner (sugar) is 72% Fructose by weight. That’s a crap ton more than even the HFCS55’s 55% seems to indicate.
But let’s look at fruit juices fructose:glucose ratios. Apple Juice is 75:25 actually exceeding most sodas. Jobs was well known to love Apple juice. Let’s move on to a super popular fruit Bananas are 50:50 as are many grapes. Pears are actually 78:22. Let’s consider some veggies. Tgey have had ever increasing total sugar content for a long time. Red beets carrots and sweet corn are all 50:50. Red Bell Pepper (sweet) are 55:45.
Now this does not look at total sugar content but it gives a good ideal when you start taking juices what the ratios are. 1 cup of app.e juice can take 3-4 large apples. But consider the oxalate and other toxins in leafy greens when people start to juice. Consider how much spinach ir kale does it take to make a cup of juice!?! Many are drinking way more than a cup a day too. That kale spinach apple juice made with a juicer is really a high fructose oxalate toxic drink. Sure uts got tons of vit and minerals you will be lucky to absorb 2-4% of because they have such poor bio-availability and those oxalate bind to calcium in the kidneys rating that allowing it to be reabsorbed.
Look nature never intended humans to eat plant parts other than the fruiting bodies of specific plants. It’s why you never see studies getting tge positive effects from eating the veggie that they do from the Compounds extracted from the plant even when they adjust for content and bio-availability. The various toxins remove the positive advantage. Interestingly this is not the case with animal tissue. It can be broken down and absorbed raw or cooked no toxins to counter. Face it we were designed to eat meat.
One thought that no one has mentioned is what was his frame of mind? Perhaps his thinking killed him. It is documented that cancer and many other illnesses have been cured by changing your thinking which changes your chemistry and you are able to heal yourself. Look up Dr. Joe Dispenza. Peace
He certainly was a wounded soul, very likely narcissist. They are never happy regardless of their success.
Agreed–The frame of mind, or even ‘stress’ levels can cause major load on the adrenals, and thus the body as a whole.
My vegan diet helps me a lot too.
I have been vegan for 1 years now. I have found that vegan is a generic term. Just like Asian, white, black, vegan. You can not use one example to make a conclusion for all. IE Oreos are Vegan, does that make them healthy? Of course not. Fruit helps me refresh and energize. However, I eat it in proportion. I’m not a 30 Bananas a day kind of guy. I eat what I need and then what I want. After bringing all my blood work to a great level and losing 30 lbs. I will never go back.
Very agree, we are in the same page, just today I went to the doctor, I look like 30 years old, I m in fact 53 years old, all my blood work and all that came favorable, I never go back to eat regular food, my husband and my we are Raw Foodist!!!🥒🍇🍓🌸🥝
In 2-4 years you’ll probably change your tune like I did and like Leire Keith did only it took closer to 20 for her. It depends on what your health a nutritional reserves are like. I was falling apart within a couple of years. It took her longer. Before anyone says you must have eaten junk or not done something right, nope. No junk. Tubers, beans, seeds, wide variety of vegetables and fruits. I still eat those but also the things I crave eggs, red meats butter etc. I feel alive instead of death warmed over and I’ll never ever go vegetarian/vegan again. I’ve seen the difference with my own body as guinea pig. I wish I’d never done it. I became anemic, my tests at the doctor were bad. It all straightened out when I stopped that shit pardon my language.
Maybe, Jobs would have not reached 40’s if he wasn’t a vegan.
Or maybe he would have lived well into his 80’s were he a clean-eating omnivore!
“On the con side, Jobs was a picky eater who moved in and out of fruitarian phases for most of his life, but consistently favored a lot of fruit and fruit juice. The refrigerators at Apple were always well stocked with Odwalla juices, and numerous sources over the years reported him ordering juices frequently at restaurants. Indeed, this was the most consistent part of his diet over his life time.
Fruits and fruit juices are not only high on the glycemic index, but loaded with fructose. In all but small quantities, they greatly stress the liver and pancreas, contribute to diabetes and many other blood sugar disorders, and have been linked to pancreatic cancer. Jobs suffered from a type of pancreatic cancer known as islet cell carcinoma, which originates in the insulin-secreting beta cells.”
This was a great article. I’m sorry you had to repeat yourself. It seem crystal clear to me the Jobs died as a direct result of his diet. But most people can’t handle connotative dissonance like that.
I wouldn’t say this was a “great” article…Seems clear to me too that Jobs probably died because of his diet too tho…but what this article doesn’t talk about is the health/unhealthiness of anyone who ate what jobs did but then also added meat and how long they lived or what diseases they had/or if they lived to be 110 years old…or someone who ate a different type of vegan diet like one with appropriate good proportions of whole foods in a plant based diet with fruit and no juice and how healthy or idk i’ve never heard of someone eating a good/human appropriate vegan diet and developing cancer but if one exists/existed i would imagine this site would of found them don’t you? On the other hand everyone i know/have known who has heart problems, cancer, other diet related diseases eats meat and processed foods…so i’m going to draw my conclusion from the majority of people here in the usa especially when compared to people in places that don’t have our diet and realize that processed foods and meat are the problem. Juice is clearly a junk food and has been shown to cause/been the cause of asthma(in myself and others) and drastically raises blood sugar levels that’s easy to prove whereas a whole piece of fruit is OBVIOUSLY different than just the juice alone so not sure why this article trying to suggest they’re the same thing or that they’d act the same way in the body? I mean really it just seems like common sense that juice would be totally different in the body than an entire piece of fruit would come on!! So this article or example can’t be used to dispute a proper diet with no meat and no processed foods! it would be like saying jack died at age 40 because all he ever ate was the fat off all his meat and not the lean muscle part and would only drink grease….
Where I am from my Grandparents and the rest of their generation ate meat, milk and eggs. They also ate plenty of vegetables and fruits, and there were no processed ready meals. That generation still suffered from many co-morbidities. No processed food and plenty of meat, Vegan for me is better!
My great grands ate no processed anything. They were farmers and ate lard and butter and meat and garden veggies and eggs. They lived into their nineties healthily. My grand parents (born in the early 1900s, 1901-1917, my dads parents were older than my moms, 1901 and 1906 when they were born, bought into the idea that was spread by the medical system and advertising that animal fats were bad and replaced with margarine and Wesson and cut down on eggs etc. They didn’t live as long though they still lived into their 80s but they didn’t have as much quality of life as their parents did because a lot of years they were dealing with hardening of the arteries, senility, digestive issues, arthritis, diabetes etc.
Amazing when you do not eat processed carbs and sugars or especially vegetable oils but basic meat off the hoof, eggs and home grown veggies your health is usually very good and long lived. Go figure.
It’s what I tell clients first start by cutting drinks with calories. Switch to water.
Step 2 stop all foods that come in a box or bag.
Step 3 cut out all veggie oils and eliminate all processed food
Step 4 Eat mostly meat use animal fat for cooking. Minimize fruit. Treat it as a desert. If your going to eat leafy green cook them. Veggies should be the fruiting body if eaten and should ideally be cooked as well.
IMO by simply cutting out processed foods which includes all veggie oils people’s health would go back to tge early 1900s but with all tge advantages of modern medicine. It would greatly increase length and quality (health) of life.
My grandmother dads side lived to 101. My other grandparents mothers side lived to 94 and 96.
Great article? Mentioning Michael Landon and Patrick Swayze died of pancreatic cancer yet never mentioning their heavy smoking-#1 cause of pancreatic cancer? Maybe Dr. McDougall’s article wasn’t that great, but this one is not so great either. What’s the old cliche, “two wrongs don’t make a right”….
My vegan grandma lived to be a healthy and independent 97. Go figure. Not a single surgery in her life, never a stitch of make-up.
maybe she ate more salads than fruits
All the resarch discusses the poentially beneficial effect of consumption of fruits and vegetables on Pancreatic cancer.
The author has confused the effect of high fructose consumption from corn syrup in sugary sodas–not the fructose from fruit–on pancreatic cancer.
Check the research please.
D All fad diets steer you in the direction of not listening to your body. Some days you may need more fat than others and other days you might need more protein than usual. When you are truly present you ask” what is it body that you need today? A deep craving after craving is a sign to eat some non starchy veggies and portion control. Once you are connected to your body you know. It just takes practice. Hmm….i want to eat this whole bag of gmo free corn chips……ask your body and i am sure it will tell you to share that bag.
Tim, that’s funny, because I’ve been following a whole foods plant based diet based largely on what Dr. McDougall suggests and I haven’t spent a red cent on any product or offering of his. Everything anyone would need to know if they were interested in his diet is on his website (free!), in his youtube videos (free!) and in books you can easily borrow from the library (free!). While people can buy products from his company or go to his weekend seminars or whatever, many of us who follow his nutritional advice do neither and we still have all the information we need. I think it’s disingenuous for you to paint him as someone just looking to make a buck, whether or not you agree with him.
Listen up Sally Fallon … you people need to learn how to READ over at WP. Put DOWN the bacon, lick your fingers and read. They are talking about HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP which is NOT NOT NOT fruit. This is DIRECTLY from this article you are quoting.
“In fruit, it serves as a marker for foods that are nutritionally rich. ” !!!!!!!<<< READ THAT and say it aloud to yourselves if you can all stop eating long enough.
However, in soft drinks and other “sweets,” fructose serves to reward sweet taste that provides “calories,” often without much else in the way of nutrition. Second, the intake of soft drinks containing high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) or sucrose has risen in parallel with the epidemic of obesity.
Most fructose in the American diet comes not from fresh fruit, but from HFCS or sucrose (sugar) that is found in soft drinks and sweets, which typically have few other nutrients (2). Soft drink consumption, which provides most of this fructose, has increased dramatically in the past 6 decades, rising from a per-person consumption of 90 servings/y (≈2 servings/wk) in 1942 to that of 600 servings/y (≈2 servings/d) in 2000 (5). More than 50% of preschool children consume some calorie-sweetened beverages (6). Children of this age would not normally be exposed to fructose, let alone in these high amounts. Because both HFCS and sucrose are “delivery vehicles for fructose,” the load of fructose has increased in parallel with the use of sugar.
You people are SICK for not only completely eliminating the fact they are NOT talking about fruit itself but LYING by saying they ARE speaking of FRUIT. SICK, twisted, demented people.
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/86/4/895.full
Exactly!! Kudos to you! The author of this article is clearly bought & paid for. :-/
Well said. Thank you for countering this reptoid drivel.
Thank you
The fructose in fruit and HFC is chemically identical. While it is easy to recognize that soda consumption is inherently worse than fruit consumption, it does not at all imply that excessive fruit consumption is healthy.
Fructose intact has been linked to a variety of health impacts, first and foremost pancreatic issues.
No one should be drinking large amounts of soda. At the same time, no one should be drinking large amounts of apple juice. The deleterious impact on the body is the same, regardless of the other beneficial nutrients in the juice.
Fructose/sucrose/saccharose……my head explodes. Everything needs to be explained just simply.
Wow you are very good at calling people names and sling insults. I’ll put down my bacon and stop licking my fingers when you put down the cucumber or corn cob. See its not nice to attack people personally is it?
Fruit gives you cancer? Seriously???
Why do vegans wrinkle young, have dark circles under their eyes, dry skin and loose facial skin, like aging too fast?
why do vegan babies fail at this diet, the younger they start the worse.
Vegans wrinkle young? Now why don’t you step out and take a look at people who come from communities that have never eaten meat at least in the last 1000 years? Find out for yourself. How sad..what a pity!
Why are vegans so defensive, not to mention illogical, and in such a nasty, hateful way? I’ve heard about hate mail directed toward well known vegans who were silly enough to let people know they were stepping up and eating some eggs (to save their freaking life). The vegan thing, not at all based on science, seems more like a religion now, a rigid identity to be defended at all costs.
Az, I couldn’t agree more!! Well said.
seriously? my daugther is vegan since she left breastfeeding ans she is very healthy and inteligent, she is never sick, unless her carnivorous cousins.
I am vegan since eigth years ago or so (eating very few meat many years before that) and I look like 15 years less tan my cronological age.
Same with my wife and other vegan people I know.
“A vegan woman from Florida was sentenced to life in prison on Monday for the starvation death of her 18-month-old son.
Sheila O’Leary, 38, had her family follow a strict vegan diet, according to NBC News. O’Leary said that her family adheres to a strict diet of raw fruits and vegetables. Her husband – Ryan Patrick O’Leary – told investigators that his infant son also received breast milk.” Aug 29, 2022
I fed my daughter tons of organic fruits and veg as soon from the time she was a baby. The type of diet makes no difference if they were starving this poor baby.
Didn’t they prove in court that the child that died had a genetic disorder that no one knew about? I think those are the parents who aren’t charged anymore.
I love how this article mentions the fact that Arnold Ehret died in his 50’s but fails to mention how, leaving the reader to assume his death was diet related. He died from an injury!! This article is unbelievable at best and extremely sad at worst!!
I thought the same. This glaring omission caused me to question the objectivity of this article.
Luke. Thanks for your comment about Ehret not dying because of his diet. He died on his way to a talk he was giving and he had on new shoes-in Los Angeles-and he slipped on the wet sidewalk and hit his head!
One additonal comment I would like to make is there is a kid-Cappi Osborne-who lives in Australia who has been a raw fruit and vegetable eater his entire 12 years and he is a fine specimen of a thriving and vital human being. Have a look. He’s on utube. We have become such eating machines here in the US because corporations want us to eat all the time and to eat EVERYTHING! Most people know very little about true nutrition. I don’t even know if Ehret is right but it seems that a lot of the things he said are coming to be true.
“Most people know very little about true nutrition” with your comment you are one of them… and if 56years old guy can kill himself like Ehret did i will find him hardly an example of healthy human… 56 years old that fail to walk so miserably… seriously
So your blaming the man for getting a head injury on what his fast walk, slow walk, eating habits? I have seen it all for today.
It was certainly not proof of high intelligence on his part. It was a a very foggy morning had just stop raining. If anyone’s knows what the streets were like in tge 20s in NY they were covered in oil from the automobiles that most spewed and leaked oil. He decides to basically do a very high speed power walk on wet oily slippery street in heavy fog. What do you know heralds down and hits his head. Sounds like a darwin award.
Interestingly was it not many in the vegetarian community who claimed the reason Atkins died from his fall which he hit his head was because of his keto diet? I think I still have articles saved that were blogged by vegetarian making wild conjecture and fantasy land type assumption to fit with it going diet related.. Rather how he too fell on a NY sidewall but it was winter and ice covered. He was in his 70s and according to family and his person physicianin perfect health. Had just had his yearly physical 2 months earlier.
Cappi Osborne’s mom (Anne) looks way older than her biological age. I was shocked she was in her early 50s. She easily looks 10-15 years older. All that fructose really does age you.
Yes and George Burns smoked his entire life and lived to 100 I good health. Your
point us? Its like saying people that eat bananas tend to fall down stairs. Thus bananas cause people to fall down stairs.
There is a reason epidemiology is only useful when you look at huge populations and is never suppose to be used to make conclusions but to ask more specific questions and research those. It is one of the most incorrectly used and manipulated fields of study there us. By manipulated I mean the conclusions drawn not the raw data
Agree. The omission of this fact left me with more questions about the author’s prioritizing being right over being accurate.
Lol maybe the sugar from his fruit diet made him shaky and caused him to fall!!!!!! lolololololol
Arnold Ehret dye because a accident, He falled on the street and break is head, not because is regime at all, this is false.
Very likely he was assasinated.
I had the exact same injury as Ehret, and was initially partially paralyzed. I had countless neurological problems, and also lost my memory, vision, hearing, and speech.
I was dependent on caregivers for food at first, but after a year I basically followed Ehret’s philosophy and healed miraculously. I drank only watermelon juice for 2 months, and almost all of my neurological issues went away. I then water fasted for 3 weeks, and no longer had difficulty with balance or walking.
I now haven’t been sick in any way for over a decade, and all of my chronic diseases are also gone. I still fruit feast a few times per year, and rebuild on veggies for a short while afterwards. Family and friends have joined me, and it seems to also reverse most of the incurable conditions that conventional medicine is so terrible solving.
Yet here’s some lying author warning people against this solution using misleading details about a single patient, as though it’s in any way representative of the other 4 billion people on the planet expected to suffer and die from cancer. Maybe such depraved Idiocracy is how such a rare disease turned into the plague of the 20th century.
This is such a sad article of the WAPF! It is so obvious that the agriculture is behind this organisation trying to tell the people to consume as many animal based products as possible in order to boost their sales. I was on this from WAPF promoted GAPS diet, which says to consume as much meat and animal fat as possible. After 6 months I was highly acidic, had muscle pain, massive hair loss and was bloated, constipated, smelly, etc. Oh and not to mention my absolutely low level of energy. I sometimes struggled to take the stairs (and I am not old). I stopped with this meat nonsense straight away, now being on a plant based diet with lots of healthy juicy fruits, vegetables, green juices and tons of greens, I have reversed everything. Have shiny hair, fresh glowing skin, good mood, excellent sleep, grea digestion. I feel great, especially knowing that I am not responsible for torturing animals.
Awesome! I eat a plant-based diet as well. I started for ethical reasons, but continue doing it because I just feel so much better on it. Happy to hear you feel better, too!
Was diagnosed with diabetes about two years ago and after finding dr mcdougal on utube became vegan. within months had an Hba1c of 5,5 from 9.5 and never took my prescribed pills since that. had an Hba1c test a week ago and it is 5 now. now i dont know much about medicine nor did i attend medical school but that seems to be an impressive result to me.
GMOs can also explain this…
Do you understand what a GMO is? A genetically modified organism is one that has been changed genetically somehow, whether it’s thru selective breeding, in a science lab, or from radiation or other methods and just about all or maybe even all the food we eat today even before we took it into a lab we have altered just even out in the fields by killing off certain plats and leaving other ones and giving some plants radiation so see if it produced a more desirable plant…js how can we label ANYTHING as “non gmo” is what i’d like to know! Just evolution and an organism’s environment genetically change it! You leave a newborn in a dark room for the first 4 years of it’s life and you’ll have changed/modified it’s genes so that it will be blind the rest of it’s life because they didn’t have the proper environment for the visual circuits to develop! So i can imagine your comment is trying to suggest that some specific kind of a food that’s been tinkered with in a science lab that might or might not be safe/healthier/disease causing/etc is what could also “explain” this but what you’re comment is saying to me is that jobs changed the genes of his pancreas by consuming too much juice whether it was a “non” gmo juice or a gmo one or an “organic” one is probably irrelevant and confusing to the mass public, like someone might conclude from your statement oh jobs drank gmo juices so as long as i drink non gmo juice i’ll be healthy-no! no juice!! you wouldn’t expect a person to just drink grease and eat fat off meats instead of eating the entire piece of meat with the muscle right?!
Diabetes is caused by FAT. Too much fat weakening the gland and literally globbing up the organ. Too much IGF1 causes hormonal distress, fibrosis, calcification to buffer acid aka stiffness, lipofuscin, uric acid, colon degradation, kidney disease, and hair loss. All these bald 50 year olds on YouTube tricking people into doing keto is horrendous. You don’t cure diabetes by going high fat/protein. That’s just masking it by not using it, suppression. That’s why carnivores blow up and freak out when they have one blueberry. Weakened glands, no enzymes, or bacteria to process the sugar anymore.
If his Apple fridge was regularly stocked with Coca Cola owned Odwalla then that explains why he got cancer. Odwalla is far from organic and is loaded with artificial ingredients, pesticides, and GMOs.
This is a smart and worthy point to consider. Add to that -that those juices would also be cooked juices – NOT naturally RAW, and also in plastic containers.
Now, I don’t know if they heat the juice and put hot juice into the bottle as part of the “canning” process, as is the case with the usual canning process, but if they do, that’s anther thing to consider. …
Putting hot juices into plastic containers would further be toxic in that even moreso would the plastic, carcinogenic chemicals be leaching into the juice big time.
Consider that possibly the plastic entering the pancreas *with* the *cooked, processed* fruit juice could be the problem/ part of the problem? -Definitely a factor to consider anyway.
Also, I’ll add that God is still God and regardless of whichever diet we choose, ultimately He decides how and when we die. However, it is still ideal that we choose to eat in a way that makes us feel and operate our best, of course, but will not make us necessarily live a long life. It makes it MORE likely, yes. But there are no guarantees. There are people that somehow manage to live long on a terrible junk food diet and others that live short on a very healthy vegan diet. And vs versa, of course. It comes down to God’s will, GENES, and quite likely many other unknown factors that only God truly knows.
Still, I say we continue doing our best to eat as healthy as possible, while still having balance and considering our own unique dietary needs, according to what works best for US.
Personally, I’ve been *mostly* high fruit, low fat raw for 3 months, have been losing weight and feeling better for the most part. I will continually tweak my diet as needed, listen to my body, combined with knowledge, wisdom, and continual learning, in a non legalistic way, open to any need for modifications.
Now. .to look up Cappi Osborne on Youtube! ???
Great discussion! Thank you.
Kaayla,
Let’s debunk this one by one
“McDougall’s position — and he’s sticking to it! — is vegan diets prevent and cure cancer – can you prove otherwise, using research not funded by dairy companies?”
Therefore, it must have been bad luck — the equivalent of “being struck by lightning” or “hit by a car” – that caused Jobs’s cancer and fueled its progression. – Ever read http://www.amazon.com/Dying-To-Be-Me-Journey/dp/1401940676? You can be on the Weston Price Diet and still get sick.
How else to explain the fact that Steve Wozniak (an overweight fast-food junkie), Bill Gates and other computer pioneers are alive despite similar exposure to carcinogenic lead and cadmium from soldering computer parts, long-term bombardment from radiation and EMFs, and other lifestyle risk factors that would have put all of them at increased risk for cancer?
– How do you explain death of Stephen Byrnes (member of your foundation, animal food advocate and he died from a stroke 😉
Indeed there is so much research linking high consumption of fruit juices by children to higher incidence of kidney stone development in youngsters as early as kindergarten age that the issue has been covered in the New York Times. – Pls link to that research. Were the children only drinking fruit juices or were they drinking fruit juices and consuming animal protein? Were they vegan on all natural foods? And why are you quoting NYT but not other sources of scientific publication/research?
I would really like to see the medical evidence that she really had “end-stage cancer” in the first place (about author of the book Dying-To-Be-Me)
I don’t trust her that she really had “end-stage cancer” in the first place (about author of the book Dying-To-Be-Me)
Thanks. Great job.
Adding to the above, degrees and all that aside, Kaayla, I’m curious, if you practise what you preach, what do you look like? 😉 Are you aging well? Most vegans like Kathy Freston, Mimi Kirk, Kris Carr look pretty darn lean, energetic and with glowing skin. What about you?
Just googled Kathy Freston, she’s lean for sure, but energetic with glowing skin? Meh, her face looks plastic
In case anyone is interested in reading the cited November 2007 article from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, which is titled, “Dietary glycemic load, added sugars, and carbohydrates as risk
factors for pancreatic cancer: the Multiethnic Cohort Study,” please see below.
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/86/5/1495.full.pdf+html
Several points are worth noting, which lead me to believe that Kaayla’s conclusions from this paper are overblown, wildly extrapolated, and misguiding the public. Most notably:
1. The main outcome measure in this retrospective cohort study is “exocrine pancreatic cancer” of any type. Over 95% of these cancers are adenocarcinomas and not the rare islet cell carcinoma with which Jobs was diagnosed; therefore, there is not, as the author of this Weston A. Price article suggests, a direct causal link or even correlation found between sugar and islet cell carcinoma specifically.
2…which brings me to my next point: this study examines sugar in general, and does not isolate whole fruit consumption from added fructose/sucrose consumption. Furthermore, the “Food Frequency Questionnaire” utilized in this study examines primarily “sugars used as ingredients in processed and prepared foods, such as breads, cakes, soft drinks, jam, and ice cream, and sugars eaten
separately or added to foods at the table.”
3. “Fruit” is lumped into a category which includes processed, canned, and cooked fruits, which are often laden with added sugars and syrups. This is by no means equivalent to whole, fresh fruits in their natural form.
4. Myriad studies on the connection between diet and pancreatic cancer show an inverse relationship between whole, fresh fruit consumption and pancreatic cancer. In other words, there’s actually a strong relationship between fruit consumption and DECREASED risk of pancreatic cancer (as well as many other cancers): http://cebp.aacrjournals.org/content/14/9/2093.short ; http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/124/6/894.short ; http://cebp.aacrjournals.org/content/15/2/301.short ; http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/176/5/373.full
Please be more thorough before jumping to erroneous conclusions and posting pseudoscience. Fruits and vegetables decrease disease risk; end of story.
Regards,
Caroline
Sure, deviating from the standard American diet by adding fruits and vegetables has a positive effect. But that is totally different from drinking lots of fruit juice. With no fiber to slowly release the fructose, it has a high glycemic load.
Also, vegetarian diets cause low stomach acid. Without enough stomach acid, you can’t absorb vitamin B12, folic acid, calcium, iron, magnesium, chromium and other trace minerals.
For instance, most metals have an oxide layer on them in nature. Magnesium oxide would need to be in an acidic environment for a short while to eat away the oxide layer. At that point, the magnesium is water soluble and can be absorbed through the walls of the intestines. But, in a short while it will start to oxidize again.
So, going from a SAD diet to vegetarian is great at first, really cleans you out. But over time, most will suffer from mineral deficiencies. Sorry. There are ways around that. Put lemon juice on your salads or sip some watered down apple cider vinegar after meals, etc. Or take stomach acid pills.
Interesting. Except I’d wonder if you’re not completely wrong. I’m prescribed acid reducing pills to counter my GERD symptoms. I was eating the standard diet most of us eat. Once I went vegan, my symptoms went away. The body is an amazing machine that will take care of itself itself. Imagine putting sugar in a gas tank and wondering why the car is having issues. Same with our bodies. And please link the study that shows a whole food, plant based diet causes mineral deficiencies. This is hogwash. Many people eat “vegetarian” or even “vegan”, but still consume processed junk. Jobs is a good example. Whole food diet is not the same.
Sorry Caroline, this is not the end of the story. You need to follow your own suggestion to be more thorough before jumping to erroneous conclusions. I checked out the links posted and apparently you didn’t read them yourself. The first link was not a real study. They interviewed people on what they ate. Very subjective, so they don’t even know what they really ate.
For the second link, it didn’t state anything about how they determined what they ate.
The third link actually states, “High consumption of fruits and vegetables has been associated with a lower risk of pancreatic cancer in many case-control studies. However, cohort studies on this relationship are limited and do not support an association.”
The last one actually states, “In summary, our results do not provide evidence that fruit and vegetable consumption during adulthood is associated with a decreased risk of pancreatic cancer overall. We observed some positive associations, which may have been due to chance but for which potential mechanisms might be explored in experimental research. Diets rich in fruits and vegetables remain important given the benefits that have been observed for other health outcomes, including cardiovascular disease (81), obesity avoidance (4), and some other cancers (7).”
Did you really read these at all?
Shouldn’t someone refer to the Bible? Adam lived 930 years. Reading the Bible one person realize the spot had oil and made over a billion dollars. But my point is they eat vegan. Maybe raw eggs. But the Garden of Eden was surrounded by mountain and 4 rivers. God flooded the rivers and metallic minerals that the plants consumed these minerals and transformed them into plant derived minerals and they ate. Juices are sugar is the word I will use. Cancer loves sugar. My thoughts from a 5-time cancer survivor that wonders why he is still here but by the fact I have never used chemotherapy or radiation because cancer is easier to kill with non-invasive herbs and supplements. What killed Steve
Jobs was extremely mineral deficient, sugar fed his cancer, and soy finished him off. Juices turn into sugar regardless if they are veg or fruit. I don’t care what type of food your eating it is extremely mineral deficient. The only source in the world that God created is in Utah. 500 years worth. Magic.
Think stones are caused from hydrogenized oils. From oil sources like Crisco oil which was designed for Russian submarines.
The Gerson Therapy is great but they only have a 50% survival rate. If you not working with a 95% survival rate than more than likely you are not going to make it. One step forward and one step backward. BibleStudy247.org
THANK you Carolyn! Well done! Amen! ?????
Yes and Jobs drank a ton of fruit juice not just whole fruit. It was well known he drank a crap ton of fruit juice. People act like just because fruit juice has very good micronutrients in it that it somehow changes the effect of what is a crap ton of fructose many times more than a soda.
There is 34 grams of sugar is 12 oz of apple juice which has a fructose to glucose ratios of 75:25. A Classic Coke 12oz can is what 35 or 39 gr sugar ratio is 72:28 fructose:glucose. In terms of fructose content they are basically the same. Sure you get some vit in the juice but you are still getting the same hf sugars as soda. Think about it that’s like what just shy of 10 tsp of sugar with is mostly fructose and apple juice is considered healthy!?! WTF!
I’m no fan of Arnold Ehret’s theories, but it might have been more honest to disclose that he died from a fractured skull incurred in a fall.
People like her bitch about these vegan doctors cherry picking data, yet she is doing exactly the same thing herself. To a worse degree, in my opinion.
Yes, I would imagine huge amounts of fruit juice can be kind of bad for you, but to use this as some kind of proof that a vegan whole foods diet is unhealthy is laughable.
Even most vegans that know anything about nutrition advocate eating while fruits rather than lots of juices and smoothies.
A varied diet of whole fruits, vegetable, grains, nuts and pulses etc is the most healthy diet you can have. You just have to do your research into what foods contain what minerals and vitamins and eat a varied diet.
I think that yes, there are certain vegan diets that are unhealthy. I, personally wouldn’t advocate ONLY eating raw foods, or ONLY eating fruits. Just do your research and use your common sense.
Lets be 100% honest here: both views are actually true in Mr Jobs case.
Yes, he was most problably loaded with fructose. However, juices are NOT inherent component of veg. diet. In other words, you can be a vegeterian and dont drink any juices. Next, fruits today contain MUCH more fructose than even 100 years ago.
So Mr. Ehret diet (at his time) was less sugary. Of course, he could make a mistake of eating too much fruits in relation to vegetables.
Nobody mentions how Steve Jobs was deficient in healthy sleep and rest. What was his stress load. He was probably deficient in melatonin, HGH and glutathione.
So its not only bad diet.
By the way, Ehret was right in terms of too much of wrong kinds of fat. Animal fats in a form of meat or milk come with big amounts of protein. These proteins are the huge problem, not the fat itself. Their acidity calcifies arteries.
By the way, yin foods like sugar and alcohol also calcify.
Bottom line:
heavy fruit eating: calcifies
heavy meat eating: calcifies.
What is the optimal diet:
1. Cooked vegetables, esp. roots.
2. Some (not a LOT!) fat from: coconut, olive oil, a little nuts, some butter, yogurt, kefir.
3. A fish, lamb or shrimps once a week or once a month. For B12, zinc, selenium.
4. Phytic acid and gluten are a problem. But oats, white rice, quinoa are generally OK in this department.
The secret is to limit harmful things. The most harmful are obviously EXCESS animal protein, excess fructose, excess copper (dont go nuts on nuts and fruits!), excess phytic acid, solanins, lectins, oxalates.
I guess all health experts would agree that most beneficial for us are foods like: carrots, ginger, turmeric, garlic, onions, radishes, cucumbers, bamboo, cauliflower, celery, barleygrass, kelp, sprouts.
But they are cheap, not much profit promoting these!
Yes yes to the comment by Polish as being the smartest and fairest. No zealotry/bias, just good common sense.
I learn a lot from the precious debates of the above experts. I appreciate it very much. May I add a comment?
I have been a fruitarian for over twenty years. Fruits account for 50 % of my diet. The remaining 30 % is raw food such as sweet potatoes and chestnuts. I also consume meat and fish, but not so often. I have been very healthy, never taken medicine though I occasionally had a light cold. According to the recent medical checkup, my bilogical age is ten years below my chronological age.
I feel upset about Steve Jobs’s premature death because my diet is too similar to his. I’m afraid his death may be attributed to other factors than his diet.
If you eat meat and fish you are not a fruitarian.
A fruitarian eats only fruit!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Exactly John!
I agree with Anonymous. I think it was the Odwalla juice that contributed to his cancer, not fruit. Odwalla is not natural. Same with other pre-made fruit juices. Only juices straight from the fruit not mixed with harmful chemicals are good for you. Also, canned fruits and processed fruits should not be considered one in the same with raw whole fruits. Canned and processed fruits have added artificial sugars, preservatives, and chemicals. I see nothing wrong with the natural fructose in fruits.
Oxalic acid found in dark hard bitter leafy greens. Only eat tender leafy greens as lettuce. 80/10/10 only 10% overt fat important. Whole raw fresh ripe wild fruits important. No juices– the pulp essential as fiber simple sugar regulation. No starches, tubers, or cooked food- each toxic and indigestible assimilation. Natural hygiene important extended supervised water fast 7+ days if sick/diseased. Refeeding with high water content fruits, shoots, and tender leafy greens as frugivores for about 60 million years 99.6% identical to bonobos.
If not clear, no refined oxidized foods.
He’s more of a flexitarian from what his comment suggests.
There is a lot of conjecture and “corporate medicine think” in your article. Kaayla Daniel. Show me some studies that corroborate your thinking about specific cell type pancreatic cancer. Maybe you are just as ignorant of Vegan as John McDougall is of cancer onset versus insult? http://nutritionfacts.org/video/how-much-fruit-is-too-much/ I refer you to some new research. It’s more than likely that you and McDougall are both wrong. Such is the fact with “dogma science.”‘
wow talk about the “attack of the plant eaters”, but sugar is a definite no no, still occasional use is probably ok. Vegetarian protein is higher quality than animal protein, that is wrong, but we surely don’t need a lot 15-20% of our calories from protein, getting fats in your diet is ok too, we need fats for some of our vitamins, and it is quite natural for us to eat natural fats, oils are a modern invention. Vegetables are great too lots of nutrition there, vitamins and minerals, along with the odd piece of whole fruit. Drink mainly good water, even then you can still get sickness and disease, but I believe that it is less likely if you eat the way I have suggested, as well as some daily physical exercise. get 8 hours of sleep, and don’t stress, enjoy your life. Cheers.
I think what everyone is forgetting was that Steve Jobs did not call himself a Vegan. He called himself a “Fruititarian” because ALL he would eat was fruit for many years. Even after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer he would only eat fruit. He felt if people could only eat vegetables he would try eating fruit. It was more appealing to him. The stress that would put on the pancreas was immediately apparent to me as a pharmacist when I read his biography. Who is to say that actually caused pancreatic cancer but it certainly couldn’t have been beneficial to his pancreas.
After so many comments i still don’t get the point.How can an alkaline diet contribute to cancer?How is it possible,when Oto Warburg had a Nobel price in 1930 for his discoveries in cancer metabolism which show cancer can survive only in acidic environment.I am nutritionist myself,but the death of Jobs confuses me much ,and i am obsess to discover the truth.
my grandma here in Greece turns 85 this year..wanna know what she eats? salads,apples,legumes and white bread,2 greek coffees 1 in the morning and another one (if) at afternoon..thats it..no animal foods, no deficiency..pretty good for a lady which sings with an (x), dont you think? and we, with our vast knowledge,die from all types of cancers (yes i blame our lifestyle of excess night shifts and emfs poisoning and air pollution as well..live simply,go to your village every weekend, eat simple,vegan and a few bites less…..
Not sure if the Doctor knows this but fructose is directly linked to pancreatic cancer. Scientists have performed trials where fructose is directly fed to pancreatic tumors and they were found to rapidly divide and multiply.
Fruit (surprise surprise) contains fructose (some fruits more than others like apples) are much higher in fructose.
What killed Steve Jobs was his diet. It wasn’t lack of protein, it was an excess of fructose. That gave him his pancreatic cancer, and it also caused it to proliferate.
What an ‘I know it all’ poorly informed person this ‘naughty nutritionist’ is. This is the problem with many in the West. They think they know everything and that all the others are foolish and ‘under developed’! Please go and check out communities of people that, due to traditions, have never eaten meat in the last couple of millennia. Vegetarianism followed by Veganism are nothing but evolution in human diet. Until things go well, this is how people like the ‘naughty nutritionist’ think and talk. Once they are, God forbid, struck by some progressive or terminal illness, they too will consider looking east for ‘traditional’ advice.
Hey, why don’t you check out your teeth and claws! Would you be able to pounce upon a cow, kill it with your bear hands, bite into it and eat it raw? Well, if you can, then you are a time traveller that has travelled to our times from some prehistoric age!
Eating meat has remained in human culture despite evolution and this is mainly because of climatic conditions in different countries where meat is cheaper than vegetables. Eating meat and BELIEVING that it is better for humans is a result of mental conditioning. The belief that meat tastes better is absurd and that is also part of mental conditioning. There are some religions that say that God made animals in order for man to eat – what? How lucky we are that there is no other species ( at least for now), which is superior to humans in being destructive.
Amen.
I came upon this site when I wondered if there was a definitive explanation as to what caused Steve Jobs death. I’d heard about his excessive intake of fruit but knew nothing more.
I’m not a vegan nor a vegetarian. I believe in moderation in all things.
The only thing I can say for sure after reading this is vegans and vegetarians seem to be a combative, argumentative, unhappy bunch. What a depressing experience reading all this. That’s all I learned.
The inevitable B12 deficiency makes them short-tempered and combative.
Reading the comments is like a Mac vs PC debate…
😀
I am healing advanced neuro-lyme disease and co-infections with healthy raw foodsand herbs almost fruitarian.
All I know is that nothing else worked for me and that this diet makes my blood restuls sooo much better and my health and peace finally almost normal.
That is my experience.
He never says that a vegan diet cures cancer. He simply believes that a vegan diet does not cause cancer. Maybe you should watch the video again. There are numerous inconsistency’s in your blog post.
Thank you for pointing that out. Hope more people realize that. Steve Jobs deserved a better finish. People using him to make the world even sicker is disgusting. Veganism made him live 30 years longer, that’s truly a beautiful thing, however the only thing the mainstream media and medical industry and governments of the world want is more money, sickness, and evil.
P.S.- I borrowed the links from this article such as Dr. John McDougall’s lecture that has been viewed by more than 52,500 people on YouTube and I promoted it to yet another twelve million viewers. Hope that makes Steve Jobs happy and shows more honor to his name and belief in healthy eating than what this article has done. God have mercy on America, because He sure isn’t blessing it, China and Russia are hundreds times bigger than America now, whose receiving God’s blessings now! Yikes!
Thank you for this careful explanation of fructose and its risks. I’m glad that I gave up fruit juices several years ago along with all other sweetened drinks. It may not save me from cancer, but it may, and as much as I love the taste of Juicy Juice it’s not worth the risk to me.
“..by that line of thinking.” Really? What line of thinking are you referring too? The size of the tumor, the growth pattern and speed at which that kind of cancer usually grows and spreads? You mean the well published findings by the scientists who teach at America’s top Medical Schools and write the text books and whose names are all over the most well established medical journals of the western world and globally concerning the size and growth rates of these tumors? That line of thinking? Your opinions are great, well polished, but I’ll stick to the science thank you. Steve Jobs has cancer for 30 years according to the science. Your opinion does nothing but to smear science in general, or rather, reality. Enjoy living in a sick world. People like you keep it that way. Oh and… obrigado por fazer este artigo disponível em português também, como se o Brasil e Portugal ainda não estão empobrecidos, doente o suficiente. Obrigado por tentar fazer do mundo um lugar melhor para todos e não apenas os médicos ricos e governos corruptos.
Regarding Steve Jobs death and John MacDougal. He NEVER said it was a result of the diet, Never! His doctor said that and his wife started putting animal proteins into their meals. Please don’t talk about what you have not thoroughly researched or read with your own eyes and/or heard with your own ears IN CONTEXT.
He said that it was the chemicals and metals in the early internet days. PLEASE Do Not spread lies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81xnvgOlHaY
REST IN PEACE STEVE JOBS.
Pancreatic cancer is caused from fructose or fructose aids in the proliferation of it, that is a concrete fact. Jobs diet killed him, too much fruit = too much fructose. This fact cannot be disclaimed.
Scientists have already found in controlled tests that feeding fructose to pancreatic cancer cells causes them to divide proliferate.
I have recently read that men who are on a vegan diet have MUCH less prostate cancer. Check it out for yourself. As for Steve Jobs, it requires careful reading and research into the possible cause of his pancreatic cancer. High fructose intake……could it not develop into diabetes also?
As for being vegetarian or vegan…..well for those of you that believe in the Biblical account of the Great Flood. Man did not eat meat before the flood. They lived as long as 900 years plus. God allowed them to eat meat after the flood due to lack of vegetation (at first). The life span dropped very dramatically. Read about it in the book of Genesis.
One of the reasons for a meatless diet is that the animal kingdom is much more diseased now. Cancer is a virus, so if you eat meat esp. with the blood, you are getting viruses directly into your body. That is much more dangerous than some of the other carcinogens. Meat eating increases your chance of getting cancer by 9 times. Another reason for Kosher meat.
God told the people of Israel not to eat meat with blood or fat in it as a health precaution (no, I,m not Jewish). The diet books by E.G. White will be very informative in understanding the reason for getting back to the original diet that God had for us. Be Blessed!
need more info
I just wanted to say that health is about body/spirit/mind…. So diet is only part of. The emotional life of someone affects their health as well. Jobs was a highly stressed person with an angry disposition, that also could be what killed him. To say that a fruit diet which is really the natural diet of humans, is bad…that is preposterous!
Although I am not personally a fan of juices and think it is healthier to eat the fruits whole or in smoothies.
Always consider the source. If an author fails to report ethically, it calls to question the entire piece.
Ehret did not ‘sputter out and die..’. He slipped in the rain and fractured his skull.
You should be ashamed for twisting a death into propaganda and supporting details.
Yes, precisely. This was exactly what I was going to point out, too. Knowing the unethical reporting that states that Ehret died as a result of his diet when he did, in fact, die as the result of a fractured skull, makes me disbelieve the entire article. There were even some who believed Ehret may have been murdered because he posed such a threat to the established medical authority.
I really do not understand how cab a fruit juice contributes of for cancer! Can anybody define the cause of cancer?its still mystery…. I believe its because of his diet he extend his life span upto 30,years after been diagnose . ..jobs must not be silly guy to just eat anything without knowledge. Everybody has a different body types ….one works one does not…!fruits diet cannot inhibit Cancer….
Fruits have higher levels of arsenic
Commercial fruit juices have no nutrients and even heavier loads of arsenic
Arsenic contributes to cancer
And also juices substitute juice for vegetable dyes and more high fructose corn syrup for the fact they are already heavily diluted and made from concentrates which are just sugar concoctions
Odwalla juices referenced in the article are made “FROM CONCENTRATE.”
“From-concentrate” means that the fruit is squeezed and its water extracted using HEAT and pressure. This produces a “concentrated” form, like what you’ll find in the frozen-food aisle. Later, the water gets added back in—and then the juice is pasteurized and packaged.”
We humans are f*cking idiots if we think we know better than nature how to produce life-giving food.
We basically kill living food dead with our processes and wonder why the food makes us dead, rather than alive anymore.. “You are what you eat.”
Sad. Let’s wake TF up, people and eat more real, whole, living foods!
I looked it up–appears to be true: in Genesis, the first book of the Judeo/Christian bible, for humans God does indeed create plants for food. Humans are to have ‘dominion’ over animals and eat plants. Interesting! I suppose a look at other faith stories would be a good study. Hindus are vegetarian… seems to be some agreement in ancient tales of humanity?
Something we tend to forget is that the causation of all forms of cancer is usually multi-factorial. What does this mean? It implies that labelling Steve Job’s cancer cause to one single causative factor is at best misleading and at worst conjectural.
The human body is so complex that what works for one individual may as well be near lethal in another. Think nuts allergy!
It is clear Steve tried to live a healthy lifestyle but somewhere along the line, his plan hasn’t worked out as he anticipated which was a sad end to his remarkable life. I should add that consuming lots of fruit juices is not quite the same as eating whole fruit.
Whether Steve adopting eating whole fruits in place of commercial fruit juices that have a high glycaemic index with little or no supoortive micronutrients in them would have made him have a different outcome is anyone’s guess.
But it makes sense to make that distinction at the very least.
My brother was a life long vegan with a diet including mostly green leafy kale, beans, rice, veges, soy cheese, and did not eat much fatty substances at all, unless you count the fat in veges and fruit and soy cheese. He also had Hepatitis B chronic. He was diagnosed with duodenal cancer at age 40. I believe it was a genetic problem as well as a lifestyle problem as my mother had breast cancer at an early age, as did her mother. High carb diet is not the answer. A balanced diet is the best way to get your necessary nutrients. Protein is the building block of life. Without a good source of protein (meat) consumed every day in an adequate amount, cancer cells can and possibly in the right biochemical and genetic environment, will most definitely proliferate.
I heard an ND biochemist I interviewed say we know less about biochemistry than we do the brain. The genetic test I did said low carb mod fat mod protein, low meat, primarily fish, and specific veg to offset my genetic absence of glutathione. If fruit was an issue it would have finished him off quickly , not 30 years later. I do think fruitarian for life is woefully inadequate with modern soil depletion unless one can grow their own biodynamic fruit.. sugar, ALL sugar is cleansing. If one detoxes faster than their unhealthy body can expunge its quite dangerous but symptoms would be immediate, not 30 years later. even if it was 30 years later what nutrients was he lacking at time of death, what did his labs look like for 30 years . Dr Hamer when working with breast cancer patients who opt to heal naturally, adds in lots of protein at the end stage of healing when the breast is rebuilding , his view maintains that protein is imperative for rebuilding. Also want to add that many have kept their cancer at bay or put it in remission with high fat ketogenic. It appears with my thousands of hours of loose research that diet is cancer type specific and also contingent on persons genetics, epigenetics, medical history, current medical states, environment, biochemistry, molecular biology.. Good luck deciding on any one approach for one person.. I would think the safest diet perhaps could be a veg diet during initial heaiing phase.. I am all for balanced diet minimal meat primarily wild caught cold water fish. Although the new rage seems to be high dha diet .. I did see that about 22 percent of the population is able to convert omegas from plant sources to dha, it is snp dependant, which of course is also influenced by environement.. so nothing is clear.. except perhaps that humans lived at the equator in warm areas initially .. super confusing to me
The desperate squealing of indignant vegans, struggling with their dissonance, is the best part of this excellent article!
Keep up the good work 🙂
It’s interesting that carnivores hate vegans. Freud would say it’s because it helps you to deal with your subliminal guilt. “Me thinks thou dost protest too much”…
All this banter about diet is useless. Vegan does not translate to healthy only compassionate but we don’t need to eat each other to be healthful either. Juices are not food and should only be taken as a periodic “injection” of nutrients or part of a healing protocol. They have been stripped of the necessary ingredients which protect us from the “sugar” load. Now to the heart of the matter. The diet was not what caused his illness. It was his state of being. The western world always wants to blame a physical factor. What was his mental state? Was he happy, content, joyful, neurotic, dissatisfied, self loathing? In traditional Chinese medicine an imbalance in the pancreas is directly related to being unbalanced. Was he balanced? This may explain the outward manifestation of eating mainly fruit and juice which then manifested in the physical imbalance. That is where the conversation begins. Not the fruit! So silly of some people to claim fruit as unhealthy. Water will kill us if we drink to much (especially the tap water which we pay people to dump fertilizer byproducts in to protect our teeth)
Being a whole food vegan one can plan a diverse array of foods as to purposely maintain balance even throwing in some junk non-foods for good measure. Balance is the key.
I know many people who healed on fasting. I healed also a condition that medical word doesn’t know how to fix on eating nothing but fruits and veggies. Dr Morse naturopath in Florida heals people on fruit diets with herbs. He heals people with cancer. However, not everyone will heal from cancer on raw diet or from a condition that medical world does not know how to fix. Unfortunately, stress causes a great deal on our bodies and this article forgets to mention it. Usually, when you get a bad condition, the best naturopath tells you to stop working, take herbs, go on a raw food diet, meditate and eliminate from your life what is causing you to be sick, such as stress. Steve Jobs should have stepped down totally from his position and do everything possible to heal on a raw food diet, with fasting, (dry fasting is another good one).
Dear all herbivores omnivores carnivores my eyes get sore reading your attacks.You are all jumping on each other,without addressing real problem in regard to human health.What I’m going to explain is deadly to plants animals and humans,but never talked about.Fungus,better known as Candida in Humans,is Mother of all diseases.If we do not eat or drink anything we still inhale Fungus with every breath we take.That fungus is in every cell of our body in waiting,to be enriched with Fungal foods we eat or Fungal environment we live or work.Once enriched then we get all these fancy diagnostic names diseases which could be summed up in one word CANDIDA.There is no cure or operation for Candida only control for life.Whole World is infected without even knowing,including your Doctor.Once infected person becomes addicted to Fungal Foods,or Foods which will fuel candida.Any exercise one does while infected doubles body destruction and speeds up disease.Let your non Fungal Food be your exercise.But of course one should understand Food,how it is grown or fed in case of Poultry and their Eggs,including farming Fish and Prawns.Antibiotics are derived from Fungus found in soil,then lab cultivated.Fungus is not only Cancer,but also myriad of diseases.Most animal Food is Medicated.Before Vegans jump,there is news for you too.Antibiotics are used to grow Vegetables,and other Neurotoxic Chemicals to speed up growth and make it big.As for organic,I have seen organic clouds in the sky loaded with chem trails,Toxsins from Volcanic eruptions mixed with man made pollution shifting nervously looking for organic farm to drop its toxic rain.As for drinking juices,go easy on them not only they overload your Liver,they will overload body with Phosphorus.Then Phosphorus will push calcium from the body,you may get that sexy word Osteo which is actually Scurvy,also caused by Candida.Remember Fungus kills Plants Animals and Humans,even destroys Concrete. Every different Fungi prefers different body part.Same like Mushrooms different rotten Wood different Mushrooms as they love Phosphorus.I call Cancer Human body Mushrooms and Truffles. Feel free you don’t have to agree with me.Giving you a clue,one of Scientist working for big Water supply said Candida infected Person does not digest ferments,nutrients destroyed,creates ethanol and rot,and that rot is delivered to body cells as food and still ferments,whole body gets inflamed,this is how you get flu.
Would appreciate more knowledge on this subject
Correction please.Scientist working for big Water supply said that Water dams during rain and floods brings in dead Animals decayed debris,we have to treat Water with Chemicals or people will get cancer.
Did Mary Enig die from a stroke? If Jobs’s diet killed him, did this high fat, meat, animal product diet that this site promotes, that Enig supported cause her stroke?
MARIA Mary Enig died from stroke which is not caused by fat.Stroke has 2 types which is wrong by medical science.Stroke by blood cloth or stroke by burst capillary in brain which I would call aneurysm.Both of them are caused by same culprit Candida.Candida does not digest it ferments,all nutrients destroyed,whats left is ethanol and rot,that rot is then delivered to our body cells as food,and still ferments,that’s how you get flu,whole body inflamed and aching. cells lose connectivity and pliability,they not strong and flexible,then hernia happen blood vessels burst,dislocation of joins,list goes on for ever.Candida also renders nerve impulses inactive especially involuntary nerves,burns up magnesium and other minerals and vitamins responsible for neuro transmission.These nerves are responsible for whole body function,without our knowledge.Our blood have 13 components or so ,as every day they discover more.One of key component is thrombin which is responsible for blood viscosity,as our skin is like mesh under microscope.So blood should be not too thick heart wont be able to pump it,on other side it should not be too thin or we will bleed trough skin.When these nerves are affected by fungal infection they can not regulate thrombin eithter too much of it ,could cause thrombosis,blood clotthing,or too little haemophilia. So thrombin is like hardener in glue too much glue will crack too little glue wont stick.I live all my life on saturated fats especially pork fat.Make my own sausages with plenty pork back fat smoke them and freeze them,so fungus have no chance.After 4 weeks frozen precaution for trichinella spiralis or any other worm I eat them raw.Any fat after grilling meat I mix with my food,use plenty of Himalayan salt ,plenty of Merlot and Chardonay,and every morning oats saturated with cold pressed olive oil.Drink Wormwood with Chardonay.I’m old as Methuselah not on any medication. Healthy living is not about meat or no meat salt or no salt acid or no acid,it is all about fungus.Nobody dies from old age they are all killed by fungus known as pneumococcal pneumonia,unless fungus gets them on other parts of the body like cancer,but never diagnosed as such.Did you ever heard that somebody died from candida,and it is biggest killer of plants animals and humans,as I mentioned in my previous post.There is no cure for Candida just control for life.No wonder it is medical best kept secret.
My mother had a massive hemorrhagic stroke. It wasn’t candida. It was her chain smoking, poor diet, and the high stress of finding out my dad had stage 4 pancreatic cancer. She is alive today, but severely brain and body damaged requiring 24 hour care. He died three months later. He, too, was a smoker, diabetic, high blood pressure, and ate out almost every meal. It’s pretty obvious to me what the causes of their downfall were.
Hi there.
I can’t drink milk. My body swells and I have panic attacks. So, I eat more fruits, vegetables, and some protein/fats. I think what it often not respected, is that we are all different. One person can thrive in one way, while another cannot. Arguing about it makes no sense, unless you’re looking to profit. Eat what makes you feel healthy, vibrant,
and alive, within reason. Don’t explain your reasons, just live!
We are all humans and we all have the same natural diets. This is how it works with every species. Are there lions that should live on grass or cows that need meat?
The only differences that we have is our health and addictions. Some people have a body that’s too weak to clean out milk and thus they can drink milk and only become chronically ill from it on the long term. Some people have a healthier stronger body that will immediately clean out milk and thus those people will experience acute symptoms when drinking milk. Your body is apparently too strong and healthy to drink milk without detoxing symptoms. That’s all there is to it.
Just consider this, do people who are addicted to smoking need cigarettes because we’re all different? No, they need it because they have developed an unhealthy addiction. No one with a healthy body likes cigarettes. Food can be addictive in the same way.
So much BS and so much nonsense in the article and comments, no matter how smart all these gazillion words sound. Really, too much classic scientific education and ZERO common sense. Watch one video of Dr. Robert Morse “The Great Lymphatic System” and you will understand why his patients get rid of any cancer or any “disease” in matter of few months. You do not need any education to understand the common sense. Just a little faith to keep watching the video.
“Ehret — whose own “air-gas engine” sputtered, stalled and died at age 56, the same age as Jobs”
Ehret died of a head injury, not a disease. Not sure what kind of correlation the author is trying to make.
I love Paul Harvey’s comment from so many years ago….”When the experts disagree, the ignorant are free to choose.” Works for me… I’m going to make a delicious, juicy hamburger now with lots of veggies. My mother believed in all things in moderation. Stress is worse….. Stop thinking and go enjoy yourself! Thank You !
Arnold Ehret died at age 56 from an accidental fall not due to ill health as this article appears to imply.
It was the fructose! Pretty simple. Was he on the spectrum restricting his diet to limited types of foods? Drinking juice is not a lot different than soda – you get rid of the fiber and consume loads of fructose. His gut health and his liver was probably trashed – and add the SMOKING (marijuana) and here you go…
It’s amusing to read many of the posts by vegetarians. I swear it sounds more like a religion or cult of personality than a diet choice with the way you try to defend it.
How many of you without going to look it up even know how cancer cells work. How they differ in metabolism to normal cells. What energy substrate is needed for their growth and proliferate?
Try starting with looking up normal cell metabolism specifically glycogenolysis, citric acid cycle. Then do a search on the Warburg Effect and the Crabtree Effect. Oh here let me just give a crib notes version of primary recellular respiration and that of malignant cells.
The basic metabolic pathways are glycolysis, Oxidation of Pyruvate, Citric Acid Cycle, Pentose Phosphate Pathway, Glycogen metabolism (glycogenolysis, glycogenesis) and Gluconeogenesis.
Glycolysis is a universal pathway for catabolism of glucose in animals and plants. It occurs in all cells of our body. The process (glycolysis) convert one molecule of glucose to two molecules of pyruvic acid, and the energy released is conserved in the form of ATP and reducing equivalent NADH. The main function or aim of glycolysis is to provide energy and intermediates for other metabolic pathways. The major sources of glucose for glycolysis are dietary carbohydrates and cellular glycogen. Glucose undergoes glycolysis by a sequence of 10 cytosolic reactions, seven of which are reversible while three are irreversible. The first five reactions constitute the “investment” phase since they use ATP, while the last five reactions constitute the “pay-off” phase and yield ATP. In glycolysis (normal cells), which happens in the cytoplasm, one glucose molecule yields 2 ATPs and 2 NADH molecules (NADH is another energy-carrying molecule), and two pyruvates. If oxygen is present, the two pyruvates, with help from the pyruvate dehydrogenase enzyme complex, is converted to two Acetyl-CoA molecules. The acetyl-CoAs enter the mitochondrion where it fuels the citric acid cycle. Each acetyl-CoA molecule goes through the citric acid cycle. Therefore, from one glucose, the yield is 6 NADH molecules, two FADH2 molecules, and two ATP molecules. The 6 NADH +2 FADH, plus the NADH produced in glycolysis and at the PDH complex, now enter the “electron transport system” (ETS). This is where the efficient production of ATP occurs: The ETS is a multi-stage process, called oxidative phosphorylation or cellular respiration, which, with the help of ATP synthase has the following yield: This summary gives a theoretical yield of 40 ATP per glucose. 32–38 ATPs are generated depending on the enzymes an individual’s DNA codes for. Cancer cells typically “switch” from “cellular respiration” to the very inefficient glycolysis for their ATP needs, a phenomenon described by Otto Warburg in 1924. The amazing thing is that tumors, which are highly energy demanding tissues, switch to a very inefficient energy producing pathway. They make up for this energy demand by going through glycolysis faster than necessary in normal cells.
It was observed that, for normal cells, the presence of glucose slightly increased respiration or had no effect on oxygen consumption. On the contrary, glucose decreased oxygen uptake by cancer cells. This respiratory inhibition is known the Crabtree effect. It is now known that this metabolic transformation of cancer cells is not a specific feature of carcinogenesis, but appears to be a requirement of rapidly dividing cells such as proliferating hematopoietic progenitor cells, spermatozoa, intestinal mucosal cells, renal cells, and embryonic stem (ES) cells. This phenomenon is also reported in bacteria and yeast. Apart from rapid proliferation, an important characteristic shared by all these cells, as will be expected from respiratory impairment, is increased glycolysis. Another observation of the Crabtree effect is the initial increase in respiration following the provision of glucose. Indeed, it appears that other hexoses can induce this effect in cancer cells as well. Several explanations have been provided based of the Crabtree effect, although the molecular mechanism is not fully understood. The mechanisms are as follows: Competition for available ADP + Pi between oxidative phosphorylation and glycolysis can cause respiratory abnormalities by increased glucose availability. Increased lactate production with decreasing cytosolic pH and inhibition of oxidative enzymes. Disruption of coupled respiration by calcium; increased mitochondrial calcium levels by glucose caused an increased association of the inhibitory subunits of F1F0 to the ATP synthase to inhibit coupled respiration. Glucose metabolism increases reactive oxygen species production that damages mitochondrial membranes and depresses respiration.
The Crabtree effect might be regulated by several mechanisms in cancer cells, involving changes in ATP/ADP ratio, Pi, glucose-6-phosphate, cytosolic pH among others. Irrespective of the mechanism, cancer cells are glycolytic and this is associated with partial mitochondrial impairment (i.e., suppressed respiration, less oxygen consumption, and low ATP production). Series of reactions that produce pyruvate is known as glycolysis. Under anaerobic conditions, glycolysis produces minimal energy in the form of ATP. This mode of glycolysis is not coupled to the TCA cycle and oxidative phosphorylation. However, under aerobic conditions, glycolysis, TCA cycle activity, and oxidative phosphorylation generate considerable energy for cellular functions. Glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) and the mitochondrial phosphate carrier (PiC) compete for the free cytoplasmic inorganic phosphate pool (Pi). A similar competition for free ADP occurs between the mitochondrial adenine nucleotide translocase (ANT) and two of the glycolysis enzymes: Phosphoglycerate kinase (PGK) and pyruvate kinase (PK). Fructose 1,6-biphosphate inhibits the mitochondrial respiratory complexes III and IV. Increased calcium (Ca2+) accumulation in the mitochondrial matrix lead to the inhibition of the ATP synthase.
Fast-growing cancer cells will require more energy than normal cells, it is ironic to realize that, in contrast to normal cells, cancer cells use a primitive inefficient reaction, aerobic glycolysis, to generate considerable amounts of their energy. A possible reason for this bioenergetic alteration is the requirement to produce other metabolic end products to support their rapid growth and proliferation under low oxygen tension, and the possible adaptation to evade death in toxic environments or because of cytotoxic agents. Probably the most important treatise ever provided for mitochondrial dysfunction and its possible causative role of cancer is that provided several decades ago by the Nobel Laureate and Biochemist, Otto Warburg. In his series of experiments on respiration and metabolism of cancer cells, coupled with his in-depth analysis of reported works from other investigators at the time, by an approach reminiscent of what Watson and Crick employed in deciphering the DNA double helical structure, Otto Warburg could unwaveringly hypothesize that neoplastic transformation originated because of irreversible damage to mitochondrial respiration. Cancer cells are, therefore, compelled to rely on the inefficient glycolytic mode of ATP synthesis (2 ATPs/glucose), rather than respiration that produces substantially more ATP/glucose (approximately 36 ATPs/glucose). Warburg observed that, in conditions of normal oxygen tension, normal cells produced most of their energy via mitochondrial respiration. In contrast, over 50% of cancer cell energy was generated in the cytosol via glycolysis, with the remainder from the mitochondrial respiratory chain. This bioenergetically inefficient glycolytic reliance of cancer cells for most of their energy production is not primarily due to lack of oxygen, because it operates even in the presence of adequate oxygenation. The bioenergetically inferior nature of glycolysis implies that cancer cells must adopt a mode of increased glucose import to meet their energy demands. The mechanisms of aerobic glycolysis (Warburg effect) of cancer cells. Glucose transporters (Glut1 and Glut3) in the plasma membrane are overexpressed. Hexokinase isoform II (HK II) interacts with mitochondria through the voltage-dependent anionic channel (VDAC). Phosphofructokinase (PFK) is overactive because the predominance of its L- and P-isoforms. An overexpressed PFKB3 maintains higher levels of fructose 2,6-biphosphate that further activate PFK. The M2 isoform of pyruvate kinase (PK) regulates the glycolytic flux and promotes metabolite accumulation to fulfill the biosynthetic needs of the cell. The M-isoform of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) is overexpressed. Pyruvate transport into the mitochondrial matrix through its specific carrier (PC) is decreased. Pyruvate dehydrogenase complex is inhibited in a phosphorylation-dependent mechanism mediated by an over-expressed pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase (PDHK). Mutations in succinate dehydrogenase (SDH) impair its activity. The levels of the mitochondrial respiratory complexes I, III and IV are decreased. Mitochondria ATP synthase activity is restricted by the overexpression of its inhibitory subunit.
Cancer cells exhibit aerobic glycolysis. This means that cancer cells derive most of their energy from glycolysis that is glucose is converted to lactate for energy followed by lactate fermentation, even when oxygen is available. This is termed the Warburg effect. This produces far less energy than oxidative phosphorylation and as cancer cells require a lot of energy to grow this seems paradoxical. The Warburg effect may be beneficial to cancer cells however because it provides precursors for many biosynthetic pathways. These precursors include amino acid precursors and NADPH and ribose sugars for DNA and RNA synthesis. The Warburg effect may be caused by impaired oxygen sensing in cancer cells or by the Myc transcription factor which is unregulated in cancer cells. Myc bypasses the normal oxygen sensing mechanism and results in activation of transcription of glycolytic enzymes. Glycolytic enzymes such as GLUT1, lactate dehydrogenase, pyruvate kinase and the lactate exporter are unregulated in cancer cells whilst pyruvate dehydrogenase is inhibited leading to increased glycolytic flux and impaired ability of pyruvate to enter oxidative phosphorylation.
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Figures (2)
Fig.1. Schematic diagram of aerobic glycolysis in cancer cell compared with normal cell
Fig.2. Glycolysis in tumor cell
Journal of Oncological Sciences
Journal of Oncological Sciences
Volume 3, Issue 2, July 2017, Pages 45-51
Journal of Oncological Sciences
Biology of glucose metabolization in cancer cells
Author links open overlay panelAdewale Fadaka, Basiru Ajiboye, Oluwafemi Ojo, Olusola Adewale, Israel Olayide, Rosemary Emuowhochere
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https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jons.2017.06.002
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Abstract
Cancer is a disease at the cellular level involving heritable disorders in cellular control mechanism. Cancer cells also need to adapt their metabolism to survive and multiply under the metabolically compromised conditions provided by the tumor microenvironment. Tumor cells alter their metabolism to maintain unregulated cellular proliferation and survival, but this transformation leaves them reliant on constant supply of nutrients and energy. They alter their metabolism to support their rapid proliferation and expansion across the body. After the discovery of based on the altered cancer cell metabolism in 1930, loads of studies have shed light on several aspects of cancer metabolism with a common goal to find new ways for effectively eliminating tumor cells by targeting their energy metabolism. Research has directed most of its resources to elucidate the causes, prevention and possible cure for cancer, yet the process has been elusive claiming human lives more than ever. This disease is a manifestation of etiological and pathological disturbances of mechanisms that control cell division, differentiation and metabolism. 50% of all human tumors carry genetic alterations that lead to the inactivation of some tumor suppressor proteins. Cancer cells are shown to experience characteristic changes in their metabolic programs, including increased uptake of glucose, enhanced rates of glutaminolysis and fatty acids synthesis, suggesting that metabolic shifts supports tumor cells growth and survival. In this review, we summarized the major concepts of glucose metabolization and explore the molecular basis of aerobic glycolysis of cancer cells.
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Keywords
CancerGlucoseGlycolysisHypoxiaWarburg
1. Introduction
There has been an enigmatic search of information on the mechanism of cancer related metabolic adaptations, and this has resulted in accumulated evidences suggesting considerable association between several pathways in human metabolism and malignant transformation.1, 2, 3 Carcinogenesis is a complex, multistep process requiring the elimination of several cell-imposed barriers such as anti-proliferative responses, programmed cell death-inducing mechanisms, and senescence. This occurs mostly through genetic alterations in oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes.4 In other for the body to prevent the growth of tumor, there is chronic activation of the immune system. These two processes (tumor growth and immune system activation) are responsible for an increased energy usage and thus for continuous consumption of energetic substrates, such as carbohydrate.5 In fact, the oxidation of glucose into CO2 and H2O through the citric acid cycle is a well-known major source of energy and plays a key role in the biosynthesis of ATP, constituent of DNA, RNA and phospholipids. Glucose is also necessary for the pentose phosphate pathway and the synthesis of reducing compounds such as NADPH. Energy metabolism in advanced tumor cells is severely compromised by the occurrence during the disease progression of symptoms such as nausea anorexia, and vomiting, which does not allow normal nutrition and therefore, a regular supply of carbohydrates, proteins, amino acids and vitamins. Reduced oral intake resulting from anorexia or obstruction of the gastrointestinal tract plays a crucial role in the development of the cancer cachexia syndrome. In addition to the reduced food intake, important changes of energy metabolism and biochemical/metabolic abnormalities in carbohydrate, protein and lipid biochemistry and metabolism have been observed, which may account for cancer-related anorexia/cachexia syndrome.6 Altered energy metabolism consisting of increased resting energy expenditure associated with increased metabolism of sugar, lipid and protein metabolism are typical of cancer cells. These changes are a consequence of alterations in intermediary metabolism (carbohydrate, protein, and lipids) associated with cancer. Also, activation of oncogenes and deactivation of tumor suppressor genes, have been associated to cancer-associated metabolic remodeling of epigenetic marks.7
2. Overview of carbohydrate metabolism in normal cell
Carbohydrates constitute a major part of our diet and our food is the ultimate source of all the sugars that enter our metabolic pathways. About two-thirds of dietary carbohydrate is the plant polysaccharide. Disaccharides such as lactose and sucrose and some other polysaccharides like cellulose are also a part of our food, but our intake of free monosaccharide like glucose, fructose and galactose is relatively reduced.8
Carbohydrate metabolism starts with digestion in the small intestine when monosaccharides are absorbed into the blood stream. Blood sugar concentrations are controlled by three hormones: insulin, glucagon, and epinephrine. If the concentration of glucose in the blood is increased insulin is released from the pancreas. Insulin stimulates the transfer of glucose into the cells in the liver and muscles, in the liver and muscles most of the glucose is converted to glycogen, a process known as glycogenesis. Glycogen is stored in the liver and muscle. The breakdown of glycogen to glucose is called glycogenolysis. The metabolites from glycolysis form links with protein, lipid and nucleic acid. Glucose is the central molecule in carbohydrate breakdown and synthesis. All major pathways of carbohydrate metabolism are connected to conversions of glucose, since glucose is the main sugar in the blood and the main energy fuel in the body. The metabolic pathways are glycolysis, Oxidation of Pyruvate, Citric Acid Cycle, Pentose Phosphate Pathway, Glycogen metabolism (glycogenolysis, glycogenesis) and Gluconeogenesis.
2.1. Glycolysis (Embden-Meyerhoff pathway) in normal cells
Glycolysis is a universal pathway for catabolism of glucose in animals and plants. It occurs in all cells of our body. The process (glycolysis) convert one molecule of glucose to two molecules of pyruvic acid, and the energy released is conserved in the form of ATP and reducing equivalent NADH. The main function or aim of glycolysis is to provide energy and intermediates for other metabolic pathways. The major sources of glucose for glycolysis are dietary carbohydrates and cellular glycogen. Glucose undergoes glycolysis by a sequence of 10 cytosolic reactions, seven of which are reversible while three are irreversible. The first five reactions constitute the “investment” phase since they use ATP, while the last five reactions constitute the “pay-off” phase and yield ATP. In glycolysis (normal cells), which happens in the cytoplasm, one glucose molecule yields 2 ATPs and 2 NADH molecules (NADH is another energy-carrying molecule), and two pyruvates. If oxygen is present, the two pyruvates, with help from the pyruvate dehydrogenase enzyme complex, is converted to two Acetyl-CoA molecules. The acetyl-CoAs enter the mitochondrion where it fuels the citric acid cycle. Each acetyl-CoA molecule goes through the citric acid cycle. Therefore, from one glucose, the yield is 6 NADH molecules, two FADH2 molecules, and two ATP molecules. The 6 NADH +2 FADH, plus the NADH produced in glycolysis and at the PDH complex, now enter the “electron transport system” (ETS). This is where the efficient production of ATP occurs: The ETS is a multi-stage process, called oxidative phosphorylation or cellular respiration, which, with the help of ATP synthase has the following yield: This summary gives a theoretical yield of 40 ATP per glucose. 32–38 ATPs are generated depending on the enzymes an individual’s DNA codes for. Cancer cells typically “switch” from “cellular respiration” to the very inefficient glycolysis for their ATP needs, a phenomenon described by Otto Warburg in 1924. The amazing thing is that tumors, which are highly energy demanding tissues, switch to a very inefficient energy producing pathway. They make up for this energy demand by going through glycolysis faster than necessary in normal cells.
2.2. Metabolizing pathways in cancer
Cancer is a disease condition arising from uncontrolled division of cells in the body to form lumps of tissues called tumors. There are many different types of cell in the body, and many different types of cancer which arise from different types of cell. Some are more easily treated than others, particularly if diagnosed at an early stage, some have a better outlook (prognosis) than others.9 These cells may invade or spread to other parts of the body where they can go on proliferating and causing unhealthy condition to the system. Those cells with minimum uncontrolled growth and do not invade other cells are said to be benign while cells that grow and divide rapidly and as well invade other tissues are said to be malignant.
Normally, cells are expected to grow, divide and then die. In a situation where the deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) of a cell is damaged by some factors, known as risk factors, and the cell cannot repair the damaged DNA, then it may not be able to control the normal programmed cell growth. This results to development of cancer. In each case, it is important to know exactly what type of cancer has developed, how large it has become, whether it has spread, and how well it usually responds to treatment. Cancer results from the development of abnormal properties in normal cells that enable them to grow excessively and spread to other locations. This abnormal development can be caused by mutations that occur from factors such as paints, chemicals, radiation, ultraviolet light and chromosome replication errors.10 These mutagens alter DNA by changing nucleotide bases and can even change the shape of DNA. The altered DNA produces errors in DNA replication, as well as errors in protein synthesis. These changes influence cell growth, cell division, and aging. Viruses such as Human papilloma virus can cause cancer by altering cell genes though a class of cancer. Cancer viruses change cells by integrating their genetic material with the host cell’s DNA.
2.2.1. The Crabtree effect
Crabtree made an observation on the utility of carbohydrates by cancer cells.11 It was observed that, for normal cells, the presence of glucose slightly increased respiration or had no effect on oxygen consumption. On the contrary, glucose decreased oxygen uptake by cancer cells. This respiratory inhibition is known the Crabtree effect. It is now known that this metabolic transformation of cancer cells is not a specific feature of carcinogenesis, but appears to be a requirement of rapidly dividing cells such as proliferating hematopoietic progenitor cells, spermatozoa, intestinal mucosal cells, renal cells, and embryonic stem (ES) cells.12 This phenomenon is also reported in bacteria and yeast. Apart from rapid proliferation, an important characteristic shared by all these cells, as will be expected from respiratory impairment, is increased glycolysis. Another observation of the Crabtree effect is the initial increase in respiration following the provision of glucose. Indeed, it appears that other hexoses can induce this effect in cancer cells as well. Several explanations have been provided based of the Crabtree effect, although the molecular mechanism is not fully understood. The mechanisms are as follows: (1) Competition for available ADP + Pi between oxidative phosphorylation and glycolysis can cause respiratory abnormalities by increased glucose availability.13 (2) Increased lactate production with decreasing cytosolic pH and inhibition of oxidative enzymes. (3) Disruption of coupled respiration by calcium; increased mitochondrial calcium levels by glucose caused an increased association of the inhibitory subunits of F1F0 to the ATP synthase to inhibit coupled respiration.12 (4) Glucose metabolism increases reactive oxygen species production that damages mitochondrial membranes and depresses respiration (Fig. 2).14 (5) The Crabtree effect might be regulated by several mechanisms in cancer cells, involving changes in ATP/ADP ratio, Pi, glucose-6-phosphate, cytosolic pH among others.15 Irrespective of the mechanism, cancer cells are glycolytic and this is associated with partial mitochondrial impairment (i.e., suppressed respiration, less oxygen consumption, and low ATP production). Series of reactions that produce pyruvate is known as glycolysis. Under anaerobic conditions, glycolysis produces minimal energy in the form of ATP. This mode of glycolysis is not coupled to the TCA cycle and oxidative phosphorylation. However, under aerobic conditions, glycolysis, TCA cycle activity, and oxidative phosphorylation generate considerable energy for cellular functions. Glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) and the mitochondrial phosphate carrier (PiC) compete for the free cytoplasmic inorganic phosphate pool (Pi). A similar competition for free ADP occurs between the mitochondrial adenine nucleotide translocase (ANT) and two of the glycolysis enzymes: Phosphoglycerate kinase (PGK) and pyruvate kinase (PK). Fructose 1,6-biphosphate inhibits the mitochondrial respiratory complexes III and IV. Increased calcium (Ca2+) accumulation in the mitochondrial matrix lead to the inhibition of the ATP synthase.16
2.2.2. The Warburg phenomenon
While it can be conceived that fast-growing cancer cells will require more energy than normal cells, it is ironic to realize that, in contrast to normal cells, cancer cells use a primitive inefficient reaction, aerobic glycolysis, to generate considerable amounts of their energy. A possible reason for this bioenergetic alteration is the requirement to produce other metabolic end products to support their rapid growth and proliferation under low oxygen tension, and the possible adaptation to evade death in toxic environments or because of cytotoxic agents. Probably the most important treatise ever provided for mitochondrial dysfunction and its possible causative role of cancer is that provided several decades ago by the Nobel Laureate and Biochemist, Otto Warburg. In his series of experiments on respiration and metabolism of cancer cells, coupled with his in-depth analysis of reported works from other investigators at the time, by an approach reminiscent of what Watson and Crick employed in deciphering the DNA double helical structure, Otto Warburg could unwaveringly hypothesize that neoplastic transformation originated because of irreversible damage to mitochondrial respiration. Cancer cells are, therefore, compelled to rely on the inefficient glycolytic mode of ATP synthesis (2 ATPs/glucose), rather than respiration that produces substantially more ATP/glucose (approximately 36 ATPs/glucose). Warburg observed that, in conditions of normal oxygen tension, normal cells produced most of their energy via mitochondrial respiration. In contrast, over 50% of cancer cell energy was generated in the cytosol via glycolysis, with the remainder from the mitochondrial respiratory chain. This bioenergetically inefficient glycolytic reliance of cancer cells for most of their energy production is not primarily due to lack of oxygen, because it operates even in the presence of adequate oxygenation. The bioenergetically inferior nature of glycolysis implies that cancer cells must adopt a mode of increased glucose import to meet their energy demands. The mechanisms of aerobic glycolysis (Warburg effect) of cancer cells. Glucose transporters (Glut1 and Glut3) in the plasma membrane are overexpressed. Hexokinase isoform II (HK II) interacts with mitochondria through the voltage-dependent anionic channel (VDAC). Phosphofructokinase (PFK) is overactive because the predominance of its L- and P-isoforms. An overexpressed PFKB3 maintains higher levels of fructose 2,6-biphosphate that further activate PFK. The M2 isoform of pyruvate kinase (PK) regulates the glycolytic flux and promotes metabolite accumulation to fulfill the biosynthetic needs of the cell. The M-isoform of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) is overexpressed. Pyruvate transport into the mitochondrial matrix through its specific carrier (PC) is decreased. Pyruvate dehydrogenase complex is inhibited in a phosphorylation-dependent mechanism mediated by an over-expressed pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase (PDHK). Mutations in succinate dehydrogenase (SDH) impair its activity. The levels of the mitochondrial respiratory complexes I, III and IV are decreased. Mitochondria ATP synthase activity is restricted by the overexpression of its inhibitory subunit.16
2.2.3. Differences between cancer cells and normal cells
Cancer cells differ from normal cells in many ways that allow them to grow out of control and become invasive. One important difference is that cancer cells are less specialized than normal cells.17 This is one reason that, unlike normal cells, cancer cells continue to divide uncontrollably. In addition, cancer cells can ignore signals that normally tell cells to stop dividing or that begin a process known as programmed cell death, or apoptosis, which the body uses to get rid of unneeded cells by producing large quantity of CD47. Cancer cells may be able to influence the normal cells, molecules and blood vessels that surround and feed a tumor (an area known as the micro-environment).10 For example, cancer cells can induce nearby normal cells to form blood vessels that supply tumors with oxygen and nutrients, which they need to grow (Fig. 1). Cancer cells are also often able to evade the immune system, a network of organs, tissues, and specialized cells that protects the body from infections and other conditions. Although the immune system normally removes damaged or abnormal cells from the body, some cancer cells can “hide” from the immune system.18 Cancer cells exhibit aerobic glycolysis. This means that cancer cells derive most of their energy from glycolysis that is glucose is converted to lactate for energy followed by lactate fermentation, even when oxygen is available. This is termed the Warburg effect. This produces far less energy than oxidative phosphorylation and as cancer cells require a lot of energy to grow this seems paradoxical. The Warburg effect may be beneficial to cancer cells however because it provides precursors for many biosynthetic pathways. These precursors include amino acid precursors and NADPH and ribose sugars for DNA and RNA synthesis. The Warburg effect may be caused by impaired oxygen sensing in cancer cells or by the Myc transcription factor which is unregulated in cancer cells. Myc bypasses the normal oxygen sensing mechanism and results in activation of transcription of glycolytic enzymes. Glycolytic enzymes such as GLUT1, lactate dehydrogenase, pyruvate kinase and the lactate exporter are unregulated in cancer cells whilst pyruvate dehydrogenase is inhibited leading to increased glycolytic flux and impaired ability of pyruvate to enter oxidative phosphorylation.
Fig. 1
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Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of aerobic glycolysis in cancer cell compared with normal cell.
Fig. 2
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Fig. 2. Glycolysis in tumor cell. (Allosteric regulations of glycolysis confer metabolic plasticity with respect to local pO2).
3. The effects of hypoxia on glucose utilization in tumors
The availability of growth regulating factors control normal cell proliferation in tissues and by the interaction with surrounding cells. Nutrients and oxygen availability, necessary for cell proliferation and metabolism, largely depends on blood supply. Initial tumor growth occurs in the absence of formation of new blood vessels. Tumor cells bypass environmental growth-controlling constraints (Fig. 2). This is achieved by acquiring the ability to proliferate independently of growth signals, though, for example, mutations in receptor-associated signaling molecules, and by becoming insensitive to antigrowth stimuli, such as those mediated by cell-to-cell contacts. In the early carcinogenesis phase, uncontrolled cell proliferation moves tumor cells away from blood vessels and, therefore, from oxygen and nutrient supply. The only way oxygen and glucose can reach the inner cells of a non-vascularized tumor is by diffusion across the basement membrane and through the peripheral tumor-cell layers. However, partial oxygen pressure drops to very low values 100 mm away from blood vessels.
The main metabolic pathways that contribute to malignancy and offer potential drug targets are illustrated. Metabolic enzymes that have been associated with tumor initiation and growth are marked in red. GLUT1, glucose transporter; HK, hexokinase; 6PGD, 6-Phosphogluconate dehydrogenase; PFKFB 3,6-phosphofructo-2-kinase; GAPDH, Glyceraldehyde3-phosphatedehydrogenase; PHGDH, phosphoglycerate dehydrogenase; PGAM1, Phosphoglyceratemutase1; PKM, Pyruvate kinase; LDHA, lactated hydrogenase A; MCT, Monocarboxylate transporter; PDH, Pyruvate dehydrogenase; CPT1, Carnitine palmitoyl transferase I; FASN, fatty acid synthase; RNR, ribonucleotide reductase; FH, fumarate hydratase; SDH, succinate dehydrogenase; IDH, isocitrate dehydrogenase; GLUD, glutamate dehydrogenase; GLS1, glutaminase1; ASCT2, Amino-acid transporter2; ACLY, ATP citrate lyase; ACC, acetyl-CoAcarboxylase; ACSS2, Acetyl CoA synthetase 2; DHFR, DHF reductase; TYMS, thymidylate synthase; HMGCR, HMG-CoA reductase; CK, choline kinase; G6P, glucose-6-phosphate; F6P, fructose-6-phosphate; PRPP, 5-phospho-alpha-d-ribose1-diphosphate; IMP, inosine monophosphate; UMP, uridine monophosphate; dNTP, deoxynucleotide triphosphate; G3P, glyceraldehyde3-phosphate; 3PG, 3-phosphoglycerate; 2PG, 2-phosphoglycerate; PEP, phosphoenol pyruvate; OAA, Oxaloacetate; AKG, a-ketoglutarate; HMG-CoA, 3-hydroxy-3-methyl-glutaryl coenzymeA; THF, tetrahydrofolate; 5, 10mTHF, 5, 10-methylenetetrahydrofolate; DHF, dihydrofolate. Hypoxia and glucose shortage are rapidly generated in the inner mass of a growing tumor. Paradoxically, however, it is known since the 1920s.20 that tumor cells have a much higher rate of glucose consumption through a glycolysis pathway that prevent pyruvate from entering the Krebs cycle and converts pyruvate to lactate: the so-called Warburg effect. In fact, many tumors use this glucose to lactate pathway even in the presence of oxygen, and therefore, the term aerobic glycolysis is often used as a substitute to the Warburg effect. It is important to note that the glycolytic switch occurring in cancer cells is not necessarily accompanied by a reduction in oxidative phosphorylation. Nowadays, the augmented glycolytic activity of tumors is clinically exploited by positron emission tomography for the identification of metastatic lesions. This technique takes advantage of the increased ability of tumor cells to take up and metabolize glucose compared with normal tissues. It can therefore be stated that hypoxia is what drives tumor cells to fuel glucose in a non-oxidative ‘glucose to lactate’ pathway. However, it is currently believed that the glycolytic switch is acquired very early in carcinogenesis even before tumors experience hypoxia. Consequently, the fact that, even in normoxic conditions, many tumors use aerobic glycolysis for their metabolic requirements indicates that the Warburg effect has functions that are not solely limited to hypoxia adaptation.
For anyone withsome biochem or microbiology will recognize a repeating theme. The glycolytic pathway is the fuel source for malignant cells. The positive is these cells do not have the adaptive metabolism of normal cells. Normal cells have the ability to use ketones or beta-hydroxy-buyrate as a primary fuel source. Cancer cells do not. Cancer cells always need some glucose/glycogen source or they become arrested.
The point being the last thing you want to do in terms of diet when you have cancer is consume sugars. In fact a ketogenic diet and fasting have proved positive in every solid study they have been tested. So regardless how Jobs got his cancer the fact is consuming a high carb diet is the last thing you would want if you understand how cancer cells energy metabolism and proliferation works.
It’s also way it absolutely dumbfounded and Infuriates me how oncologists and radiation specialists are taught next to nothing about nutrition in the focus of cancer. They litterally offer and recommend chemo patient eat cookies and OJ after their treatments. It’s the absolute worst thing they could be ingesting for nutrients. But then as far as tgey are concerned it’s all about genes and the use of highly toxic compunds and who cares about the foods tgey are ingesting all day every day. People need to see food as nature’s meds.
The first thing Jovs should have done was to cut all fruit and starchy carbs. He honestly would have done best with a healthy choices ketogenic diet. Before any target radiation or surgical procedures to fast for at least 2 wks. While normal cells can go into a low energy or almost a dormant state cancer cells must constantly proliferate and use immense amounts of energy. They also without glucose can not use ketones and even in low glucose can not use ketones effectively. It has a dramatic effect on cancer cell proliferation and significantly weakens the cells. Making them much more sensitive to various treatment agents and procedures.
Fact is if anyone lived long enough they would eventually have cancer. Mutation is a fact of cellular life.All we can do is minimize it.
But when it comes to cancer cells make no mistake about it glucose/fructose is the enemy. Minimizing it at all cost should be the very first step. Better before you have cancer.
Let’s also be clear about studies looking at tge p,yes of vegan diets. Just about anything is better than a typical western diet. Of course they see positives. Western diets are basically long term chronic poisoning of the body. Also ge very careful of reading research where they use high fat or meat diets especially with lab animals. Almost exclusively those high fat diets also use high amounts of nearly pure sugar mixtures as the carb source. But compare research that actually uses health very low carb >5% diet sources with high fat and med protein. You might notice significantly different outcomes. Also always look at who the research was funded by and if you do not recognize the fundrr looking them up. Many food industry giants use spin offs for their research funding channels.
Steve Jobs DID NOT live w Pancreatic Cancer for 30 yrs. more like 7. But maybe U count in ‘dog years’?