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Is Refrigeration Destroying our Health?

There is evidence that refrigeration may contribute strongly to the destruction of glyconutrients in green leaf vegetables.

Glyconutrients contain special sugars which are necessary for many functions inside and between cells (besides burning for energy). There are 8 or more of these necessary sugars and the body can manufacture them by endogenous synthesis provided it is healthy and stress-free.

Along with endogenous synthesis, glyconutrients from food or supplements contribute strongly to provision of the necessary sugars for glycosylation. Glycosylation is the process of attachment of the necessary sugars to proteins. It has been estimated that 60% of protein in the body is glycoprotein. Glycoproteins are the medium by which cells communicate with each other.

Effective communication between cells is essential for effective information processing in the immune system, for effective anti-adhesion of pathogens, for effective adhesion of hormones, for effective function of tissues, for effective structure of tissues, for effective repair of tissues, and for effective expression of genes.

It is interesting to note that many diseases such as auto immune diseases and cancers have become much more prevalent in conjunction with the widespread introduction of refrigeration in the twentieth century.

Sucrose is not one of the necessary sugars for glycosylation of proteins. When plants are exposed to cold they change their carbohydrate metabolism to create lots of sucrose in order to survive freezing. This is evidenced by the following quotations from scientific journals.

Thus, development of Arabidopsis leaves at 5 degrees C resulted in metabolic changes that enabled them to produce and accumulate large soluble sugar pools without any associated suppression of photosynthesis or photosynthetic gene expression. These changes were also associated with enhanced freezing tolerance. We suggest that this reprogramming of carbohydrate metabolism associated with development at low temperature is essential to the development of full freezing tolerance and for winter survival of over-wintering herbaceous annuals. (extract from abstract)

(Development of Arabidopsis thaliana leaves at low temperatures releases the suppression of photosynthesis and photosynthetic gene expression despite the accumulation of soluble carbohydrates. Strand A, Hurry V, Gustafsson P, Gardestrom P. Department of Plant Physiology, University of Umea, Sweden. Plant J. 1997 Sep;12(3):605-14.)

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Quotations from another article follows:

There was a shift in the partitioning of carbon from starch and toward sucrose (Suc) in leaves that developed at 5°C. (extract from abstract)

Leaves of Arabidopsis that develop at 5°C greatly increase their expression of SPS and cFBPase in the Suc-synthesis pathway in the cytosol but not in the starch-synthesis pathway in the plastid (Strand et al., 1997). Marked increases in the SPS activity have also been reported for spinach (Guy et al., 1992; Holaday et al., 1992), for winter cultivars of oilseed rape and wheat (Hurry et al., 1995b), and rye (Hurry et al., 1994) after prolonged exposure to cold. The increased expression and activity of Suc-synthesis enzymes correlates with an accumulation of sugars in leaves at low temperature. It has been proposed that high sugar levels might be important for cryoprotection (Santarius, 1982; Anchordoguy et al., 1987; Carpenter and Crowe, 1988). However, there is no direct evidence that the increased sugar levels are due to increased synthesis and not just to a passive response to the inhibition of growth and phloem transport. It is also not clear whether the increased activities of the enzymes leading to Suc merely counteract the direct inhibitory effect of low temperature (see above) or whether they actually lead to increased Suc synthesis.

Higher levels of sugars, especially Suc, may be necessary in the cytoplasm not only to maintain export and provide cryoprotection but possibly also to help mechanize a selective increase in the cytoplasmic volume. Investigations of plants with altered levels of sugars will test these ideas.

(Acclimation of Arabidopsis Leaves Developing at Low Temperatures. Increasing Cytoplasmic Volume Accompanies Increased Activities of Enzymes in the Calvin Cycle and in the Sucrose-Biosynthesis Pathway. Åsa Strand*, Vaughan Hurry, Stefan Henkes, Norman Huner, Petter Gustafsson, Per Gardeström, and Mark Stitt. Plant Physiol. (1999) 119: 1387-1398)

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Sucrose solutions are used to reduce damage to freezing tissue resulting from ice crystal formation.

The simplest solution for preventing freezing damage in routine histological specimens, which are to be sectioned in a cryostat, is probably to cryoprotect the fixed material before plunging in liquid nitrogen. Tokuyasu has shown that sucrose solutions that are over 1.6 M can be frozen by immersion in liquid nitrogen without ice crystal damage. (http://www.biotech.ufl.edu/EM/data/freeze.html)

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Glyconutrients are non-starch polysaccharides - they usually contain more than ten of the necessary sugar molecules; for example xylose, arabinose and mannose. Like starch these can be broken down and converted to sucrose. In view of the importance of freeze-tolerance to plants this seems likely to occur and should be investigated as a matter of urgency.

Conclusion

If refrigeration is contributing to the loss of glyconutrients from plants and contributing strongly to increasing rates of cancer, autoimmune, and other diseases, massive action must be taken.

1. It is necessary for people who do not have access to unrefrigerated, fresh fruit and vegetables to take glyconutrient supplements.

2. The structure of supply of fruit and vegetables must be encouraged to evolve in order to provide delivery of fresh fruit and vegetables without refrigeration.

Sapoty Brook, Dec. 2005.

03 Mar 2006   A Letter to a Student:

A student named Christina asked me what are the problems with a raw food diet.

Hi Christina,

The Problems with the Raw Food Diet that come to my mind right now are:

1. It is difficult for people who have been brought up on a cooked food diet to eat a stable long-term raw diet because they have to go against lots of childhood conditioning. Most people have enough personal problems without having to take on a whole new set of psychological goals and they prefer to seek comfort in the food of their childhood.

2. It is also difficult for most people because they are living amongst a whole society that revolves around cooking: advertising, packaged food, restaurants, social gatherings, you name it! Most people have not got the fortitude to be different and stand against the masses for what they believe is right. Most people are just struggling to be accepted by their peers and elders.

3. It is also difficult for most people because they are addicted to the sugar rush of high GI foods such as bread, cereal, biscuits, cakes, etc.

4. It is confronting for many people who have learnt how to cook, and pride themselves on their ability to prepare beautiful looking and smelling meals of destroyed food.

5. It is disturbing for overweight people because they often cannot attract enough attention and physical pleasure from other people so they have a higher need to seek pleasure in eating, and overeating, high GI foods, which then increases their weight. (This need to excessively seek pleasure in eating can also result from living in denatured, unaesthetic, and alienating city environments.)

6. It is demanding for people who were not breast fed until they voluntarily gave it up, because they have a deep sense of oral and sensual deprivation and use food to try to satisfy it.

7. It is perplexing for people who do not understand pre-history, biology, and evolution because they find it hard to accept that humans have only conducted agriculture and eaten cooked grain-based diets for a small part of their time on Earth. Religions teach that bread is the staff of life.

8. It is difficult for a person to learn how to eat raw food in a way that will not create cravings or deficiencies because there are not enough people who really know how to do it properly and the information on how to do it is buried amongst a load of fanciful mystical bullshit. People have a strong need to mystify things they don't really understand. People attempting a raw food diet without training often go low in kilojoules, sodium, calcium, iron, EFA's etc because they do not know how to do it right.

9. It is challenging for boys and men to eat a fruit based (50-70%) diet because of the macho culture that believes eating fruit is "sissy" and salads are "rabbit food". Expressions like "He is a fruit cake", "He is going bananas", "He is a nut case", "He is a bit of a vegetable", and "She is a sweetie", "She is a real peach" all serve to turn many insecure or homophobic men off eating raw food with the association with homosexuality, weakness, and femininity (and insanity).

10. Many people have learned to get their stimulation from alcohol, cigarettes, coffee and tea, to which they are physically addicted. They need this strong stimulation because they eat a heavy grain/meat based diet which drags them down emotionally and physically. These people find it very difficult to transition to a raw diet because eating a good raw diet provides lots of stimulation. Because they are still having their original stimulants, they get over stimulated and cannot handle it. So a transition to raw requires drastic reduction of addictive stimulants as well as stodgy foods simultaneously.

So the problem with the raw diet is that it is too difficult for most people to achieve.

There is also the problem that many people who turn to a raw food diet are also motivated by the "thou shalt not kill animals" belief system. This brings the key long-term serious health issue of low vitamin B12. These people bring the raw food diet into disrepute because they cause themselves harm. There is less (but increasing) support in the raw food movement for people who want to eat 150 g of flesh (raw or cooked) once a week to keep their B12 level in the healthy range.

All foods, including fruit, veggies, and nuts, are becoming increasingly deficient in vitamins and minerals because our sewage and kitchen scraps are not being composted and returned to the soil the food was harvested from. So this a problem with with the raw food diet as well as every other diet.

All foods, especially non-organically grown foods, are becoming increasingly polluted by toxic chemicals which are spreading around the planet. This is less of a problem for people who eat less animal foods because animals tend to concentrate those toxins in their bodies. But it is still a problem even for raw food eaters.

All foods which are green harvested and/or refrigerated are likely to be deficient in glyconutrients. This can contribute to poorly glycosylated proteins in the body and a subsequent reduction of functionality of all body systems.

Some special foods may need to be added to a raw food diet to provide adequate supplies of plant hormones. Cooked food diets are also usually low in plant hormones, which are the building blocks of human hormones.

I hope that helps.

Your fruitfully,
Sapoty Brook

Cracking the Century
06 June 2006 (666 watch out!)

There was an interesting program on ABC Radio National titled 'Cracking the century' - Healthy ageing part one.

The comment that stood out for me was when the interviewer asked 105 years old Suzie Scullard about her diet:

Suzie Scullard: Most things, I like vegetables, not too much meat, I like fruit, any fruit I like.

The interviewer passed straight on to other questions... does not compute, therefore ignore?

Here are a couple of other interesting comments:

Tom Perls: [Regarding psychological traits of centenarians]... they tend to score low so far in the sample we have of really only 30 people, so we really have to expand this. But people who score low in neuroticism means that they tend not to dwell on things, they tend not to internalise things that might be stressful, rather they are able to let go. It doesn't seem so much important of whether they've been exposed to a lot of stress that matters but how they manage the stress.

Tom Perls: [Regarding why seven times more women reach the century] ....I think one of the possibilities, a little controversial and a little bit out there is that women menstruate compared to men for 30/40 years and the result is that they become iron deficient. And it turns out in the basic biology of ageing that iron is critical for our cells' ability to produce these very nasty molecules called free radicals, they are very highly reactive, they glum into our cell membranes and our chromosomes and DNA and render them less able to function. And may play a very important role in the basic biology of ageing.

Well it just may be that by having less iron you may produce fewer of these free radicals. It's a pretty simplistic theory but there've been studies of populations that are either vegetarian or don't eat red meat, which is really the source of iron on our diet, and lo and behold they've about a 20% reduced risk for vascular disease. And there's been some studies of men who donate blood, kind of our way of menstruating, who donate blood on a regular basis become iron deficient and lo and behold they have a 20% reduced risk of vascular disease as well. So I think it's a pretty interesting theory and one that we have yet to investigate a bit further.

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/healthreport/stories/2006/1624896.htm#

Gorillas take up Cookilling!

Its your turn to wash up darling.

The Quick Food Movement

The Slow Food Movement has got it all wrong! Killing food, mangling molecules, as profoundly as possible by cooking for hours is not my idea of healthy. We all love spending hours chopping, mixing, grinding, blending, pouring, and washing, rinsing, drying, stowing. Yeah, right. This ideology comes out of a twentieth century paradigm where CO2 and H2O were not an issue.

Hey how about the rest of us who eat to live! We don't want to spend hours in a kitchen. We want to get on with life: create, design, build, play, explore, buy, sell, serve, work, exercise, sleep, and make love. The time has come for us Quick Foodies to stand up and be counted!

You are eligible to call yourself a quick foodie if:

1. You value time and want to spend your time living; not cooking, eating, and cleaning up.

2. You stay away from kitchens as much as possible and consider they should be transformed into a spare room.

3. You know that 70% of disease is caused by bad food choices and try to eat food as it comes in nature with minimal interference: predominantly raw.

4. You minimise your use of cutlery and crockery and dishwashing and know that a lettuce leaf makes an excellent edible plate.

5. You like a meal in a peel and know that the best carbs come with fibre in fruit, not w-holy grain.

6. You like to use nature's resources efficiently and get your protein predominantly from vegetables, nuts, and seeds.

7. You know that traditional medicine is just that: traditional, archaic, largely superstitious, and clueless when it comes to raw food.

8. You know that modern medicine is not a science, it is an industry, it often creates more disease than it cures; and you prefer diagnosis to prescription, and prevention to disease.

9. You acknowledge that you are a member of the primate family and that any cultural pretence, including cooking, is irrelevant if it is anti-survival.

A weed that covers huge areas of Australia has increasingly addicted
so many people that it is almost impossible to find anyone whose life
has not been affected by it.

This weed originated in Papua New Guinea and  has insidiously invaded
the entire world with it's addictive poisoning. More people are dying
from this addiction than any other. Watch out, you could be it's next
victim!

The symptoms of poisoning are initially subtle: a tendency to
accumulate fat around the waist, energy swings, and over-eating.
Meanwhile layers of goo are being deposited in your arteries. A few
years down the track, and death or disability can strike at any
moment. That's when a chunk of goo blocks the blood supply to your
heart, brain, kidney, or elsewhere.

We must rid ourselves and our community of this deadly drug. We must
stop the dealers spiking our food with it, and the growers spreading
their seeds of destruction. We must take back our health and rid the
world of sucrose cane!