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FEATURES
- Type 2 Diabetes Dr. Ann Childers on understanding and managing this condition
- Couch Potato or Marathon Runner? Dr. Tom Cowan discusses the basics of metabolism and strategies for weight loss
- Thoughts on Weight Loss Sally Fallon Morell provides a practical plan for losing weight and keeping it off
- Yes We Can! Hilda Gore celebrates the Wise Traditions diet
- Traditional Foods in Costa Rica Gina Baker discovers that centenarians love their lard!
DEPARTMENTS
- President’s Message: The appalling modern treatment of diabetes
- Letters: Letters to the Editor of Wise Traditions
- Caustic Commentary: Sally Fallon Morell takes on the Diet Dictocrats
- Reading Between the Lines Merinda Teller talks about MSG
- The Wise Traditions Pantry Maureen Diaz on the wisely stocked kitchen
- Farm and Ranch: Senator Frank Niceley on restoring the family farm
- Homeopathy Journal Cilla Whatcott on homeopathy in India
- Technology As Servant John Moody has insight on moving heavy loads without expensive equipment
- WAPF Podcast Interview Hilda Gore interviews Daphne Olivier on diabetes treatment
- All Thumbs Book Reviews
- Tim’s DVD Reviews
- Food Features
- Legislative Updates Judith McGeary on ag and food laws
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A Campaign for Real Milk:
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Healthy Baby Gallery: More Wise Traditions babies!
President’s Message
by Sally Fallon Morell
No medical condition receives more appalling treatment than diabetes. The conventional advice to the diabetic, whether type 1 or type 2, focuses on avoidance of animal fats and animal foods in favor of a high-carbohydrate, plant-based diet.
Since the invention of insulin in the 1920s, the type 1 diabetic has received the assurance that he can consume all the carbs he wants, as his insulin prescription will take care of the insulin he does not produce; metformin, the drug of choice for type 2 diabetics, in use in the U.S. since 1955, opens the door for the patient to receive the same bad advice: avoid saturated animal fat and eat a high-carb, plant-based diet.
The rationale for this regime—that the diabetic is prone to heart disease and therefore needs a diet low in cholesterol and saturated fat—ignores one basic fact: we need insulin to process carbohydrates but none to process fats. Before the introduction of insulin as a drug, the only treatment available to the diabetic was a very high-fat, low-carb diet, a diet on which many diabetics did very well.
How many diabetics could be saved from drug treatment and the devastating side effects of the disease and its therapy—including acute hypoglycemia, weight gain, kidney failure, blindness due to retina problems and amputation due to the inability to heal—if only they received more rational and logical advice! In fact, in the early stages of the disease, many diabetics have—and could—avoid years of misery simply by cutting out all simple carbs and using plenty of butter and other animal fats.
To compound the problem, very few practitioners pay any attention to the increased nutrient needs of the diabetic, starting with vitamin A. The main side effects of diabetes—in the kidney and retina, and in the inability to overcome infection—are all signs of vitamin A deficiency. Vitamin D supports the production of insulin; vitamins B6 and B12 are critical to pancreatic function and the maintenance of normal blood sugar levels, as is vitamin C.
The diabetic needs plenty of butter and other animal fats, cod liver oil, egg yolks, whole raw milk and cheese, raw animal protein (for B6), fatty meats, liver and other organ meats; instead he gets white bread, breakfast cereals, commercial ice cream, donuts and pastries as treats to go with his lowfat diet of vegetables and beans. Diet concoctions aimed at the diabetic contain the artificial sweetener aspartame, which provokes a stress response and plays havoc with insulin levels.
We hope that this issue will bring clarity to the disease of diabetes and its sister condition, weight gain. Both conditions are fundamentally problems of malnutrition, and can find resolution only with a nutrient-dense diet.
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Thank you, thank you, thank you. It’s about time someone told us the truth and stops the “60 grams of whole grain/per meal” falsehood that I was lead into when first diagnosed. Today I am struggling to get the excess weight off and stop the upward blood sugar spiral. However, now I am addicted to carbs and breaking any addiction is absolutely the hardest thing in the world to do. I have stopped all diabetic medication and am trying very hard to stop the carbs and break the addiction.
Good luck Mary. May you enjoy many skinny years!
I totally agree with this and I was personally appalled when my diabetic mother had to be hospitalized for a week on a non diabetic issue. The “dietician” was serving foods that would obviously spike blood sugar and they give her huge doses of insulin because her “sugar was high”. My mother said her sugar is always high when she is in the hospital. I am sure it is when they serve you at one meal the equivalent of hamburger helper (full of pasta made with highly processed flour) and chicken noodle soup and a muffin. Her condiments were margarine and sweet and low for her coffee. I complained and they gave her a better meal once and then went right back to what I call the diet of death. APPALLING