Kind: captions
Language: en
one in two adults at some point in their
lifetime are going to develop cancer so
this is a pretty
alarming
rise as you say we all know people uh
who are either suffering from who have
suffered from or who even have died from
cancer you mentioned at the start about
soy I have never covered on this
podcast food and how it can help us with
cancer whether that's for prevention of
cancer or potentially as part of the
treatment regime for cancer so I wonder
if you could speak to a little bit about
food and and how we can think about that
in terms of cancer prevention and
treatment yeah well so there's a whole
field of research that was developed in
the 1970s by a researcher named Michael
Dr Michael sporn from the National
Cancer Institute looking at the
opportunity of intercepting cancer
before it becomes a clinical problem
this is so idea of cancer prevention
originally it was looking at chemicals
that could prevent cancer from starting
at its early stages then it became angio
prevention which is can we interfere
with angiogenesis so the cancers
actually can't grow a blood supply as a
way of controlling it and now we know
that there's plenty of foods that have
been studied um that actually have been
shown to be associated with the reduced
risk of cancer whether it's green tea
whether it's soy whether it's Tomatoes
um whether it's stone fruit you know
peaches and um plums
um there's there's a a plethora in fact
I read about more than 100 different
foods in my book e could be disease that
actually have various abilities to um
impact on androgenesis towards Health
now what I think is really amazing is
how foods can be used during cancer
treatment and the reason that's so
poignant and I think for people
listening who may know somebody
undergoing cancer treatment right now I
mean look you're you're a doctor we're
both doctors
how many times has a patient who has
cancer asked us um very earnestly hey
Doc I've got cancer I'm getting treat
I'm getting my chemo but what should I
be eating is there anything you can
advise me to right that's such a common
question it's a question that almost
every cancer patient asks their doctor
and it's a question that almost no
doctor can answer so the typical
response that a patient gets is
incredibly frustrating and and and
aggravating to them because the doctor
just say yeah you know what either they
say I don't know there's nothing there's
nothing out there because there's no
evidence on food can help or they say
you know go eat whatever you want go eat
some junk food or some fast food because
at least you get some nutrition the most
important thing is you don't lose weight
well actually scientist said both of
those things are not true number one
actually cutting down your caloric
intake during cancer treatment actually
reboots your health defenses to fight
cancer so intermittent fasting and you
know ulating your metabolism by lowering
caloric intake actually is an
anti-cancer strategy number one number
two actually there are certain foods you
can eat that actually can help you fight
cancer and the best most compelling
examples all have to do your health
defenses so um there is the newest form
most profound
form of cancer treatment that's a
biggest advance in a 100 years for
cancer treatment is immunotherapy
and immunotherapy which is used
everywhere UK North America um Russia
China everywhere is a new type of cancer
treatment that doesn't poison the body
like chemotherapy does and it's not even
a targeted therapy that's like a heat
seeking missile you you infuse into the
body immunotherapy is a lot more simple
and more natural in this concept hey
let's just use the body's own immune
system and harness it to be able to
destroy cancer because remember we
talked about this early on like cops on
the beat the immune system conducts
surveillance and takes out the bad guys
the drug dealers on the sitting on a
street corner well what happens if you
had cancer even if it's metastatic and
spread what happens if we allow your own
immune system to do it so this is now
reality immune therapy is being given to
cancer patients um uh and it allows your
immune system to wipe out cancer it is
so dramatic that in about 20% of people
you get a phenomenal response and in a
smaller group of people you can your
immune system can wipe out cancer
completely I give an example of in the
US one of our oldest living presidents
is President Jimmy Carter you know he a
peanut farmer he came from the state of
Georgia when he retired from his
presidency when he finished his
presidency he went back to his Sunny
State and he wanted to build houses in
with this nonprofit this NGO called
Habitat for Humanity they spent a lot of
time Outdoors under the baking sun
building houses for homeless people okay
um and in so doing he got a lot of sun
damage which caused mutations in his
skin which led to skin cancer that
spread to his liver and his brain so he
was in his early 90s when he was
diagnosed with meel metastatic
melanoma because it had spread and
melanoma is such a deadly cancer um most
of his doctors basically said this is
game over so he withdrew from public
life he wrote his own obituary
and it was about to sort of just you
know um make sort of meet his maker and
he be he sort of became he got he became
at peace with himself but then at the
11th hour he enrolled into a clinical
trial of one of these immune therapies
like it's something called a checkpoint
inhibitor and um and he got this
infusion and remarkably at 90 years old
his own immune system reared up on its
hunches and wiped out and did what it
supposed to do it wiped out all the
cancer in his brain in his liver all
over his body and he went from having
metastatic cancer with brain metastasis
that's a game over kind of situation
when you and I are training to actually
having no cancer and he's alive today
with no sign of Cancer happened to my
mother too who had endometrial cancer
cancer in the aligning of the uterus it
spread everywhere and we put her on a
immune therapy same kind as the
president did at PR the former president
and in three treatments only
over the course of n weeks once every
three weeks no chemo okay all of the her
her uh 80-year-old immune system wiped
out every bit of cancer in her body and
she's been completely cancer free this
isn't even a cure this is a reset this
is getting back to Baseline restoring
health because that's what your body's
supposed to do this is kind of really
full circle to what we were talking
about at the start of this conversation
isn't it the body's resilience of body's
natural ability
to you know Patrol itself and actually
repair damage and be resilient and it's
it's incredible now that you're talking
about these drugs that are being used to
really help support the immune system
but it but I think I think what you're
coming to is that food can also do that
as well is that right yeah well well no
yeah yes but it's it's sort of the
combination so remember I said that for
this type of immune therapy 20% of
people have these really amazing
responses which means that the majority
don't and for a long time we were
scratching our head saying okay uh
what's going on because there's nothing
more frustrating than a breakthrough
that only works for a small portion of
people we've got to use science to
figure out what makes the difference
well so one of my colleagues Dr laurance
Zogo in Paris she's at the um Institute
Gustaf rusi which is a one of the big
cancer research centers of
Europe looked at 200 patients
with different types of cancer all
getting immune therapy and she looked at
every compared every uh Dimension that
she could between people who responded
and people who did not respond very well
to immunotherapy and you know what she
found the difference was one bacteria in
their gut it wasn't genetics it wasn't
body size wasn't obesity it wasn't
concominant disease it was actually one
bacteria that bacteria is acrania mucin
now this is out of the 39 tril bacteria
in the body this one has been studied
and it's stuck out it's kind of like
finding a fossil in the hillside there's
probably a lot of fossils but they she
found this one this uh bacteria was
present in responders and if you had
this you responded to immune therapy and
had a better outcome for with cancer and
if you didn't have it man your outcome
was not good so how do you get this
bacteria to grow well it turns out it's
all about your diet because there's no
probiotic you can take for acrania
acromania can be grown you can grow
acromania in your gut by having uh by
help by eating foods that help your gut
secrete mucus now that sounds disgusting
to a lot of people that's gross mucousy
gut but in fact our gut naturally
secretes mucus just like our mouth
normally secretes saliva and and this
bacteria acromania it's got a its full
name acromania is just its first name
its last name is muop so acrania muin f
up means it loves to grow a mucus so
when you actually eat foods like
pomegranates uh or pomegranate juice or
Cranberries or conquered grapes or conc
or the juice from these it it prompts
your gut to secrete healthy mucus it's
kind of like fertilizer in the soil your
Garden's going to love to grow better
that acromania growth there um it
actually makes you a responder so that
actually is a difference of how foods
can make the difference in one bacteria
now two we ago a paper a landmark paper
was published in the journal science
which is one of the big credible
scientific journals major scientific
journal this is like an 80 person study
led by MD Anderson Cancer Research
Center in the United States uh with the
national s of health and they looked all
again at melanoma that had spread people
getting immunotherapy and they found
that another bacteria they found the
second bacteria of responders it's
called ruminococcus all right now I I
encourage you listeners not to stress
out about remembering these fancy names
it's kind of like when you go to a a
museum you know go the dinosaur Hall
you're not going to remember the the
Latin names of all the dinosaurs you're
going to remember man that was pretty
cool that big one yeah it's called T-Rex
but you don't need to remember all the
Latin names so um rumin a caucus uh is
is is part of a responder profile for
immunotherapy and what they wanted to
find out is what dietary intake was
correlated with this healthy bacteria
with a good outcome and it was dietary
fiber and what they found is that those
people who ate more dietary fiber had
more room in the caucus and had a better
response so how much fiber they
calculated it they calculated for every
five grams of fiber per day they got a
30% decrease in mortality 30 okay on
immunotherapy now what's five grams of
fiber a day this that's how much you get
5 gram of fiber in an average size pair
that's all you need to eat a day to make
this difference now think about that if
you had melanoma and if you were getting
immunotherapy your doctor's probably not
telling you yet to actually eat fiber
but this is the nature of breaking
research in food as medicine it's not
food versus medicine I'm not on a
Hilltop waving like thing of kale saying
everybody should forget about their
medicines and don't go to your doctor
anymore what I'm saying is that Food
Plus medicine it is another powerful
tool in the toolbox and people with
cancer need to know that yeah they
really do and you remind me of a story
I've heard you share I think in an
interview I saw if yours in the past
where there was a patient who was due to
have some immunotherapy and you checked
out her stool and found out that she had
no aania muciniphila so you Haled things
for 3 weeks you encouraged these kind of
foods that went up and she was responded
perfectly is that an accurate uh
reflection of that story yeah that that
you captured it exactly and and so I
think that you know as we move into the
future we're going to be putting
together this puzzle that you know it's
it's almost like we've seen what we need
to do for years like we intuitively
we've known that foods can uh help us
get better that foods and Medicine have
got to work together there's got you
know why do cancer patients ask that
question because they know inherently
there's got to be something there and
and so one of the things that I'm really
committed to doing you know in my career
is uh trying to up the level that
doctors actually have to be able to take
the latest science and answer those
patient questions like patients don't
really want to know all the mumbo jumbo
the scientific details they're not
equipped in many cases to really go into
that of detail but doctors need to be
sophisticated enough if you can
understand how an immunotherapy Works
which is pretty complicated then you
need to be able to understand how a food
works yeah I mean I think you've done a
wonderful job uh from what I've seen
over the last years of spreading the
word about this your book eats to beat
diseases I think it's a wonderful read
for anyone you know public or doctors to
learn more about what kind of foods can
help them I think there's over 200 Foods
in there that you've detailed is that
yeah that's right over 200 Foods you
know so this whole idea that our body
craves diversity our health defenses
respond to so many different foods so I
basically put together a catalog of more
than 200 foods that activate one or more
or multiple Health defenses and the
wonderful thing and this is really one
of the sort of the take-home messages I
want your viewers and listeners to have
in here that the foods that activate our
health defenses taste great many of them
are part of traditional food cultures
Mediterranean cultures Asian cultures so
you don't have to fear your food anymore
for health we don't have to think about
taking away all the foods that we love
to eat um we can actually lean into the
foods that we love that are healthy for
us and start there and so one of the
things that I do you know I've always
challenged people who go well you know
I've never really liked Dr Lee to eat
healthy so I'm kind of bummed out I give
them a Sharpie and a copy of my book and
I said go to the tables and I said take
five minutes and leave through here and
circle every food that you like that you
like to eat and I've never met anybody
who wouldn't be able to Circle 10 foods
at least and then I and then I I I they
come back to me and I'm like look you've
identified all these circled Foods
activate your health defenses start with
these stick with these and then explore
all these other Foods out out there
that's that's the best way to enrich our
lives and our health at the
yeah and this knowledge you give people
uh Dr Lee is very empowering because it
could be that that person who does that
and circles these Foods goes oh I'm I'm
already having like mushrooms and bees
I'm already eating foods and even that
just reframes it in their mind that
they're already using food as medicine
for their body you mentioned cancer
patients of course of course they want
to know what else they can do uh whether
it's cancer or
anything patients want to feel a of
agency over their health and their life
right so you know no one does well when
they think well I can't do anything I
just need to leave it up to that
treatment or that doctor we all like to
feel that we're sort of playing a role
and participating in our house so I
think your work and research and your
books and these master classes you run
on your website I think are so helpful
at giving people that agency when it
comes to cancer Dr Lee there's a lot now
about sugar and cancer and I think this
is where there's a bit of complexity
around food because some of these foods
of course uh let's say kiwi fruit or you
know pomegranate juice or or the sort of
foods you're talking about of course
some of them can raise our blood sugar
some of them do contain degrees of sugar
I know they come with lots of other
ingredients as well but how can you help
us look at that what's the relationship
between sugar and cancer and then how
does that impact the foods that we
consume yeah it's a great question and I
get asked this a lot
uh what I try to do is to um make people
feel comfortable with the idea that our
body uh needs sugar in fact the organ in
our body that needs the most sugar is
our brain it is it is you know sugars
fuels our metabolism and the key is that
in most people who are able to your body
is able to process
a small amount of sugar without a
problem without any problem whatsoever
and so the
sugars that you might have encounter in
your Whole Foods so fruits and
vegetables um uh those are completely
fine your body should be able to take
care of that it's the the sugars that
are dangerous for diseases and that
sugar that damage your microbiome that
uh spark inflammation that can even
damage your DNA that's the concept of
added sugar so it's a can of soda that's
got 10 tablespoons of added sugar to it
to make it really sweet no body no human
body can can can tolerate that over any
period of time and so what I try to say
is that like it's so easy so tempting
when it comes to something like sugar to
to go for that All or Nothing approach
no our body needs a little sugar your
body can actually handle most sugar when
it comes in a fruit or vegetable it's
just fine added sugar candies cakes
sodas okay um you know those are the
ones that EAS overwhelm you so if you're
sensitive to Sugar just like you've got
diabetes you got to sort of cut down or
cut out those things and be super
mindful uh of of making those type of
choices but fruits and vegetables you
have to look at the human data okay
don't focus on how much sugar is in a
mango mango is pretty sweet fruit take a
look at the human data to show that
people who eat mango um and other
tropical fruits have a much lower
incidence of disease x and y and z
look it it you can't argue with the
science and you can't argue with the
data um sugar itself uh nothing that's
natural is by itself uh inherently evil
and I think that's the thing that I'm
trying to get people to think about with
sugar it's a matter of source it's a
matter of quantity and a matter of
degree today we're going to talk about
the amazing benefits of ginger and
turmeric for longevity and overall
health I love these two Foods Ginger and
turmeric and you can find them in the
fresh produce section of a grocery store
or a Asian market you'll definitely find
them uh or you can go to the middle
aisle of the grocery store and find them
ground up and dried as spices uh and so
don't be afraid to actually wander to
the middle aisle and go to the spice
section to find Ginger and termeric so
let's talk a little bit about Ginger and
turmeric uh individually first of all
hey there are you ready to use food to
improve your health I Do cover a lot in
my YouTube videos but there's only so
much time to dive deep into how to use
food as medicine that's why I created my
eat to beat disease course in my course
I walk you through how to use everyday
foods that you can find in your grocery
store to boost your body's Health
defenses this is all based on my
research and everything is rooted in
science and I've made it super easy to
follow with practical everyday tips
whether you're trying to prevent disease
or just want to optimize your health for
longevity my eat to beat disease course
gives you all the tools to make it real
and to help you get lasting changes that
will help you live longer and live
better to learn more click the link
below or scan the QR code on the screen
I can't wait to get started together in
my course now back to the video
turmeric actually comes from uh uh
southeast Asia it is a tiny little root
kind of a nub kind of cigar shape but
tiny smaller and uh it's got a little
skin on it if you peel off the skin or
if you break it in half you'll see that
it's bright orange on the inside now
this is a an edible root that can be
used for cooking and stewing uh you
often see this in Southeast Asian
Cuisine uh you can also find it in India
uh cuisine as well uh and turmeric's
actually been used for traditional
healing ayurvedic healing uh traditional
uh medicines for thousands of years uh I
like to think about it as a colorful uh
spice that you can actually use for
cooking as well and what's in turmeric
is something called curcumin now
circumin is a bioactive that does a lot
of really powerful things circumin
lowers inflammation in your body sort of
the OG one of the original
anti-inflammatory subst substances all
right that's what curcumin does um
anti-inflammatory curcumin also can um
cut off the blood supply feeding cancer
so it's anti- angiogenic this is
something that I did work on years ago
uh and to help discover that activity uh
curcumin also is antioxidant so it
actually protects your DNA look we all
have DNA in our body it's our genetic
instructions they make proteins you
don't want them to be damaged because
when your D DNA is damaged it's called a
mutation what does mutation set you up
for cancer so protecting your DNA with
an antioxidant property uh of curcumin
found in turmeric is actually another
benefit the other thing that um turmeric
actually does is it slows down cellular
aging now this is different than
actually reversing aging like you don't
turn into a baby when you have it but it
actually get your cells chilled out a
little bit so you're not as uh your
cells are not speeding up uh and going
towards a more aged uh State all right
so it slows down cellular aging and in
fact it can actually help to slow down
the burning down of your tiir these are
actually the kind of like the fuses at
the end of your DNA uh that burn down as
we age it slows that whole process down
so that's turmeric all right now what
about Ginger another root um really
amazing root uh I love Ginger uh that
you can actually find uh in The Fresh
Market of the grocery store you can find
it dried in the Spice Market uh if you
go to an Asian grocery store you'll
actually see beautiful big chunks of
Ginger uh they're sort of like a like
almost like a cactus a big centerpiece
with lots of little arms sticking out uh
and Ginger is something that's used in
uh Asian cooking cing of All Sorts um if
you've actually been to the sushi bar
you know that Ginger is sliced really
thin and given as a pile uh next to your
sushi uh absolutely delicious uh Ginger
also is used to flavor uh stir fries uh
in Chinese cooking Ginger is used in
Thai food Vietnamese food used in soups
just a beautiful uh um uh really um
delicate but potent uh type of Flavor
now uh what's uh in ginger ginger has a
bioactive called ginger all now Ginger
all has been studied it's
anti-inflammatory it is
anti-oxidant it also cuts off the blood
supply uh to tumors this is something I
worked on uh as well and ginger o also
can actually improve metabolism and help
to lower lipids uh as well and I want to
give you a little Pro tip on Ginger
because
uh when I used to buy Ginger uh I used
to take it back you stick it on the
cutting board and you got to take a
knife hopefully a small knife and just
kind of like scrape off and trim off
that that thin skin layer it took a
while all right then the skin uh was H
you know you don't want to cut too
deeply into the ginger but uh I actually
found a tip that I'm sharing with you
now if you want to really peel Ginger
like a pro here's what you do take take
a tablespoon just one out of your spoon
drawer your silverware drawer all right
and what you do is you hold the spoon in
one hand with the curved side facing the
ginger and you hold that Ginger and you
just scrape it with the spoon scrape
scrap scrape scrape scrape your spoon
will take off that skin just at the skin
level and before it just takes a like a
few seconds you've actually skinned the
entire Ginger without wasting it super
easy and it's a great Pro tip for using
Ginger all right now let's talk about
the benefit of turmeric and ginger
together when it comes to uh longevity
and overall health one of the things
that uh this combination of of turmeric
and ginger uh that I think would be
really good for is joint health now
obviously as we get older our joints
suffer from wear and tear you get
inflammation you get pain
osteoarthritis and it turns out that
Ginger and turmeric when you combine
their anti-inflammatory
properties together can actually be a
balm for inflammation your body and
where what better tissue uh uh to
actually aim at is to actually lower
inflammation in your joints sure you can
take a pill a non-steroidal uh but
actually taking turmeric and ginger
adding into your food is a wonderful way
to get uh some of this uh uh all their
bioactives in to be able to help that
vulnerability of Aging which is really
joint pain and Joint compromise
okay the uh other thing that I think
that turmeric and Jer great for think
about it brain health now when we
actually are aging one of the things
that we really want to avoid is dulling
of the brain cognitive uh deficits you
know where's my keys now I can't
remember what did you just say um what's
my name you want to avoid that so turns
out that uh it's thought that
inflammation plays a role uh brain
inflammation
plays a role so both turmeric and ginger
have these wonderful properties that can
actually be anti-inflammatory in nature
the other thing uh that uh occurs we
think is that oxidative stress in the
brain um is Damages neurons the nerves
in your brain and so the antioxidant
properties of both Ginger and turmeric
um are uh really really uh great uh to
be able to help as part of an overall
lifestyle uh uh plan to be able to uh
calm down uh your uh uh inflammation uh
and oxidative stress uh in your brain as
we age so for better cognitive Health
all right the other thing uh that was is
uh tumeric andine good for is
cardiovascular health all right now
again inflammation uh in your within
your blood vessels your arteries that's
a setup for
atherosclerosis uh which is is uh
building up of crap on the lining okay
this is sort of lipids and other
inflammatory proteins um it forms a
crust on inside your blood vessels when
you hear about somebody having a heart
attack with blockages that's really
because the the crust that you formed
the gunk has formed inside your blood
vessel and because of damaged blood
vessels to that inter lining the
endothelial lining of your blood vessels
so uh anything that's
anti-inflammatory uh actually can help
uh count
uh those effects of that that can that
can cause cardiovascular disease that's
the accumulation of of Gunk material
lipids uh that caused by inflammation
that can actually cause blockages
narrowing and blockages whether it's in
a heart which sets you up for heart
attack in the brain sets you up for
vascular dementia as well as stroke uh
in your neck the cored arteries and in
your legs you can cause Peripheral
arterial disease now this is actually a
silent
kind of heart disease except it's not in
your heart it's in your legs and your
your the gunk accumulates to the point
where you actually can't even walk 100
feet before well if your blood vessels
are very narrow so the muscles of your
leg aren't getting enough oxygen so you
seize up and cramp and this is actually
when this actually happens you could be
walking down the parking lot just 100
feet then you got to stop and rest all
right you need to your muscles need to
completely stop their work so they can
Achi uh load up again get rid of the
lactic acid and get more oxygen or
walking in a shopping center or shopping
mall you know you just walk a few stores
length and then you cramp up that is
actually Peripheral arterial disease so
Ginger and turmeric with their
anti-inflammatory effects help to
protect blood vessels but the gingerol
if Ginger and the curcumin uh of
turmeric also directly
groom the health of the lining of the
blood vessels the
endothelial uh cells that inner lining
okay and so they also directly help uh
uh vascular Health the health of your
blood vessels you get better blood flow
better blood flow better heart function
better blood flow better brain function
and by the way this also applies to your
legs uh applies to all your organs it
applies also to our rectile uh function
as well you want good blood flow in
every part of your body so when it comes
to uh brain health cardiovascular health
when it comes to joint health uh
termeric and ginger uh are uh really
really useful foods to be used as part
of the tool in the toolbox the food as
medicine but every bit as importantly uh
I want to let you know that Ginger and
turmi are great foods to cook with
whether they're dried form or they're in
the fresh form and look if you don't
know how to use uh these ingredients
it's so simple uh type in ginger and
turmeric go on to Google uh hit search
uh recipe hit search uh punch up video
and watch somebody teach you uh some of
the recipes that they love to make to
create a tasty uh dish uh you created
using uh the healthy ingredients of
turmeric and ginger there is a new type
of medicine that's not chemo that if you
they're called anti-angiogenesis so they
cut off the blood supply feeding the big
ancers by the time so here's a research
experiment that was done a couple of
decades ago in a lab that I worked in if
you grew tiny little cancer cells and up
to the size of the tip of a ballpoint
pen that's about three millimeters in
diameter and you kind of floated them in
uh a broth and didn't allow them to
touch blood vessels they would just stay
there at that size almost indefinitely
okay and in our body that's the size
that the immune system would Wing by and
take out
the moment you allow blood vessels to
grow into that microscopic mass that
tumor will grow
16,000 times in two weeks it'll explode
this is like a trigger get pulled in
order to have cancers grow up and for
that reason biotech companies started to
develop
anti-angiogenic drugs to treat cancer by
cutting off the blood supply so there
are about a dozen anti-angiogenic drugs
that have changed the game for treating
kidney cancer and liver cancer and lung
cancer and even brain cancer all right
so we know that we can actually do this
uh with drugs the question is can we do
it with food not so much when cancer is
out of the barn horses out of the barn
what about prevention what are foods
that can prevent cancer well it turns
out that two apples a day actually can
lower the rate of of lung cancer wow and
colon cancer
why because there are natural substances
in apples like quatin that's one of the
natural chemicals that actually are
naturally
anti-angiogenic green tea actually has
been low lower risk of coloral cancer
okay uh particularly in women and and
what's in in a cup of green tea are
these polyphenols EG CG and when you
drink it it gets in your bloodstream why
because the blood vessels are carrying
it and now your blood vessels loaded
with this cancer starving stuff these
little tumors don't have a chance wow
yeah okay is it the same as eating two
apples a day and and uh you know eating
these specific Foods as it would be just
putting all those ingredients in a
supplement and taking the supplement
would would that work just as well to
have like the Super Supplement that is
just the the killer of all cancer and
diseases you know of all these different
nutrients well look I I'm a researcher
and so and I've been with drug
development and so if it were that easy
it would have been done a while ago but
I can tell you that the whole what I
tell people is that the whole food is
always going to be a little bit better
for the following reason number one uh
for a supplement you reduce it to a
couple of different elements you know
that that you try of pack into a capsule
the whole food man it's got hundreds if
not thousands of natural goodies and
chemicals including like an Apple's got
the skin it's got ursolic acid it's got
fiber which feature gut microbiome it's
gut cor which cuts out the blood supply
so you're getting all that in there um
compared to just one thing you try to
pack into a little capsule that said
supplements are useful and I'm I'm
involved with you know designing and
developing supplements as well what we
want to do supplements uh the term means
topping
off right so you're supplementing you're
not replacing and this is what you know
like what you were just asking Lewis is
so important like can we just not bother
eating and just have a supplement no man
like you should be eating because you
enjoy food it's good for us it brings
people together it tells us something
about our Traditions our culture our
family our community everybody's from
someplace there's everybody's got
something that they love to eat and and
of that list there's some good stuff in
it and so we should really lean forward
so that's the other thing that's a
little bit different from me that
compared to a lot of other doctors that
tell people what not to eat I try to
tell people what you should add to your
life not that what you should take away
plenty of people can tell you what to
take away I'm telling you what to add
and and we should add foods that
activate your health defenses and
supplements can be useful to top things
off got it I've been told uh many times
that inflammation is the is also a big I
guess warning sign for diseases and
Cancers and the more inflammation the
more your body is less capable of
Defending itself and its immune system
is weaker is what I've been told um what
would you say are the best ways to
reduce inflammation in the body quickly
is it through food is it through
medicine is it through fasting is it
through you know less you know more
sleep is it through better environment
what would you say is the so you know a
lot of people I think um when they hear
about inflammation they think of it as a
bad guy and what I want to tell you is
that inflammation is normal and it's
just part of our immune system so when
you actually have a bacteria or virus
invad in your body uh let's say you get
get a cold your immune system uh sets up
a little bit of inflammation in your
nose okay which is why we have a stuffy
nose a runny nose and then it takes it
tackles The Invader right then and there
and then hopefully that's all that's all
matters and by the way another sure son
of inflammation is if you um cut
yourself uh in a kitchen and you see
that little cut will pretty quickly
swell up turn red and swell up
inflammation that's your immune system
trying to tackle all the bacteria that
might be trying to get into their skin
inflammation is good but it goes up to
protect you and then it comes right down
I think about I call it like a like the
volume switch in a car radio right you
get in a car you want to hear some tunes
got to turn it on but what the problem
with inflammation is when it doesn't go
back down it keeps on going more more
more it's chronic and it keeps on going
up and that's like getting in your car
and having somebody a passenger turn up
that volume and keep cranking that
volume and you're like hey man turn that
thing down right doesn't go down and you
just can't go on right and that's what
happens inside your body so what's what
are some of the different ways to
actually deal with that well the first
thing to do is think about lifestyle
because we can actually give
anti-inflammatories I could tell you to
go out to take some moin time mol
whatever that'll take down your
inflammation but actually there are ways
of actually doing if you actually just
um if you stopped and just calmed
yourself and took some Brea did some
breaths and start to meditate your
inflam your body's inflammation will
start to calm down okay if you actually
got a good night's
sleep your body will start to the
inflammation will uh start to calm down
it's it's kind of like you know
everything is going crazy just let
everything let the things settle a
little bit so that's their inflammation
settling down now there are foods that
have a lot of anti-inflammatory
properties that can be very helpful so
for example cranberries um have a lot of
anti-inflammatory polyphenols um
chocolate even also has
anti-inflammatory properties vitamin C
is pretty
anti-inflammatory strawberries guava red
bell peppers all really good uh really
good um and uh uh and you know I think
that the other thing to think about is
uh lots of fruits and veget lots of
fruits in particular have
anti-inflammatory uh properties so the
key about inflammation is that you don't
want to get rid of it altogether okay
okay like if you if you got pumped up on
steroids it would shut down your
inflammation you might get infected
because you don't have any inflammation
you want your body to get its set point
you want to get back to balance
so I think that you know there's
lifestyle there's uh diet hey I want to
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foods you can choose there's sleep all
these things can actually help to calm
inflammation it's a not a single on and
off switch I'm curious what would you
say are the the most harmful foods then
if you said here are three foods that we
should be eliminating what would be
those most harmful foods that cause the
spike and inflammation consistently and
causes a lot of these other diseases and
cancerous uh cells to occur right well
I'll tell you three foods that actually
harm the body's Health defenses and
including the immune system by
ratcheting it up inflammation and then
lowering the defensive properties but
also harm to your DNA also harm your
microbiome also blunt and stun your stem
cells and also wreck your body's ability
to control his blood supply so it's a
lot worse than simply uh causeing
triggering inflammation and by the way
that's the whole point right like we try
to take the Silver Bullet approach to
everything let's match this with's match
what I'm telling you is that the body is
a system yes so either you introduce
something good to it and you'll probably
light up a lot of good systems and if
you put something bad to it you'll
probably trash a lot of it right okay so
so uh what are some three foods that
actually we know that can Trash your
body's Health defenses one is soda so
sugar sweetened beverages like soda all
right so you know the favorite ones it's
tough right because I wish I could go
back to my younger self and say put down
the Dr PE eight cans of Dr Pepper a day
you know when you're like eight years
old man well and I'm telling you like
this is one thing that um I always try
to coach people on if you really really
love soda
okay try to come off it you know just by
going down one can a day because most
people drink multiple cans go down one
can a day and get to as low as you can
because the added sugar actually
overloads your body your body's ability
to be able to handle the sugar and then
it makes you inflamed just by the nature
of the sugar eventually I cut out I cut
out soda years ago I mean maybe I have
it once in a couple months or something
for like a treat but yeah it used to be
almost an addiction probably for how
much I drank it growing up as a kid in
the Summers you're just drinking it
non-stop like water um but then when I
learned about nutrition more when I was
playing sports and realizing this is
making me tired it's not quenching my
thirst that's when I said okay I need
more of a Competitive Edge and kind of
got it cut it out of my life so not only
not only does it does soda actually the
sugar and soda cause inflammation it
really wrecks your microbiome your gut
bacteria as well your gut bacteria just
can't tolerate that much sugar okay um
uh and then guess what uh and then you
know you say well wait a minute uh
that's why we have
diet soda right turns out that those
artificial sweeteners and soda screw
your microbiome your gut bacteria even
more o more than regular can of soda
more more than a regular can OFA come on
so if it says zero sugar and it's a soda
or a pop you're saying that could be
more harmful than just for your for your
gut microbiome got right CU because a
zero sugar is actually to prevent you
know um glucose spikes in your body but
in point of fact it actually wrecks your
gut microbiome and remember what I told
you that microbiome communicates your
brain communicates your immune system
communicates your healing systems that
is not a system you want to screw with
and so that's why you know I try to tell
people um you really got to watch out
for those uh artificial sweeteners uh
they are they they they do some bad
things so that's one thing so what what
are the best before we go to the next
thing what are the best sweeteners we
should be looking for when we're adding
something into food or we see it on the
packaging well natural sugars um in
fruits and vegetables people go well I
don't want any sugar then but what about
in a peach there's nothing better than a
summer Peach to me and that natural
sugar is okay because when you eat the
peach you're not just getting the sugar
you're also getting all these other
bioactives and the fiber and everything
else hundreds the hundreds of thousands
of of natural chemicals that are good
for you from Mother Nature's kind of
Pharmacy with an F okay so that's
different than just you know having
sugar in a glass corn syrup right High
frued corn syrup not not good for you um
maple syrup a good way to sweeten okay
honey is also a good way way to uh
sweeten as well monk fruit is actually a
really really sweet uh tasting uh gourd
actually a shell um that is also a
decent sweetener Stevia actually pretty
powerful sweetener um I've been doing
some research on I haven't been to find
anything wrong with it but but for
people that are looking at Stevia be
very careful pick up that package and
look at the side of the box and what you
and read what's on there because a lot
of things that are called Stevia
actually have a lot of other things
added to it okay so you want to get the
P stuff I always told if it's in a box
look at what's inside it before you buy
it with this process happening with them
just pulling in more and more fuel and
growing in size are there foods that can
actually restrict these fat cells from
growing slash cut off their nutrient
Supply so they won't continue to get as
big yeah before we talk about fuels let
me just sort of foods let me just say
that actually our body has its own kind
of like regulatory switch so so here's
the thing uh we talked about insulin uh
that rises in the body as a response to
eating basically food's coming in energy
is coming in your body senses it it
makes this hormone um uh insulin and
Insulin actually helps to draw that
energy into regular cells as well as
store store it into fat now here's
something really important about normal
healthy fat now I'm going to talk a
little bit more about normal healthy
because understanding the normal allows
us to understand the abnormal you just
jump to kind of like the the demon all
right then you miss the good guy part of
it right this is this like uh you know
kind of like uh it's not black and white
um there's a transition where fat is
good until there's too much of it and
then and then it actually becomes
harmful and what we want to do is
respect our fat and tame it not vilify
it and not try to cut it out suck it out
you know and poison it so nor noral fat
I mentioned is an organ and that organ
it's an endocrine organ it's actually
like a thyroid like a pancreas like an
adrenal gland and this is quite amazing
to think about fat as an actual organ
and it releases about 13 different
hormones all right hormones are just
proteins that are made released by an
organ go into the bloodstream and they
go elsewhere in the body to help to
control different kinds of function so
one of the things that fat does as an
organ it releases leptin leptin is sort
of an appetite regulator turns up and
turns down your appetite depending on
the number about the volume so controls
your behavior okay and the reason I'm
mentioning this is that you know what
when the leptin's high and it turns down
your appetite you don't want to eat so
much guess what less fuel less need to
keep storing that stuff in number one
number two it produces a super powerful
hormone called
adiponectin now many people may not know
this term adiponectin but if I were to
draw your blood Sean take it to a lab
ordinary Hospital lab and measure all
the hormones in your body your adipic
nectin levels and Mine by the way would
be 1,000 times higher than any other hor
uh hormone in your body higher than your
thyroid higher than your testosterone
higher than any other organ and the
reason is a dipo nectin is what allows
insulin to pull that energy in to your
cells it's another hormone made by fat
by good healthy fat we need that fat to
make to get our energy our Basic Energy
all right now there's one more hormone I
want to talk about it's called resistan
made by fat and resistan basically is
the break to the gas pedal of a dionin
so if a dionin at a thousand times
higher than any other hormone in your
body helps insulin pull fuel into your
body into your cells resistant is the
break to basically say oh whoa that's a
little let's slow down a little bit
normal balance right so the life is all
about balance a dipine and resistant
leptin these are just three of the
hormones in normal healthy fat here's
the thing when you've got too much uh uh
fuel that needs to be packed up and
those fat cells get hundreds of times
bigger and then they replicate and stem
cells make more and more fat and they
get bigger and they get hypoxic in the
middle and they start dying because they
can't get enough blood supply what
happens that inflammation
actually derails your normal Fat's
ability to produce these or these
hormones leptin gets screwed up now you
you don't know if you're hungry or not
you can keep on eating it's worse okay
now you can keep on loading more fuel
you're a dipine nectin gets screwed up
so now even though you're eating and
you've got all this energy now your body
can't pull it into the cells doesn't
even store it very well and then the
resistant goes Haywire so basically it
doesn't know that you should slow it
down or speed it up and so basically
it's kind of like uh uh over um as as
excess fat grows it's basically like
creating chaos and air traffic control
nobody knows where to land the planes
and so this causes even more chaos so
the important thing is how do we
actually tame that excess fat and so the
body can do some of it by itself like
our our body is hardwired to know how to
Tain fat to some extent not if it goes
too crazy but secondly and this is sort
of like the surprise is that there are
certain foods that can do it as well but
the how your body does it is actually
incredibly important because when we're
not
eating okay fasting when we're not
eating like when we're sleeping all
right insulin goes down and our body
basically says oh when the insulin's
down we can burn fuel when insulin's up
can't burn the fuel can't tap into those
fat uh cells fuel cells when insulin's
down like when we're sleeping it goes
all right not eating we need to pull
into we need to draw into our fuel cells
let's pull some energy out and it starts
to actually burn extra fuel by burning
extra fat so when we're sleeping our
body's hardwired as our metabolism is
hardwired to start burning down extra
Fuel and this is really kind of the
basis of thinking about intermittent
fasting uh you timed eating uh you know
the longer we give our body's natural
metabolism our hard wirring to burn that
fuel the better it is now it turns out
that certain foods and this is the big
surprise that I write about eat to be
your diet certain foods can amplify that
effect not just when you're sleeping but
even when you're eating so it's an
override you can actually use food to
override that system so even though your
body is not supposed to be burning that
energy it goes let's just let's go ahead
and burn some energy anyway it's
fascinating fascinating one of the
things that I love about your work and
your book is that you're reframing food
as well because a lot of times we see
food as an enemy and you're saying food
is not the enemy it's actually the
solution you know um food is a big
contributor to so many of our problems
if we're talking about obesity if we're
talking about excess fat gain and it's
also the solution right and so choosing
intelligent Foods because that's the
thing these Foods it's not just food
it's information and there's an
intelligence underlying all of this
stuff and how it's influencing our
metabolism so at this point let's get
into and circling back to my initial
question when talking about the growth
of our fat cells in angiogenesis the
creation of those new blood vessels
let's talk about first in this fat loss
equation what are some foods that have
anti-angiogenic
properties that can help to cut off that
nutrient Supply to fat cells well this
actually goes all the way back to my
research in the uh late 1980s I was
super interested in finding ways to
fight cancer by cutting off the blood
supply so I worked in a lab and we were
we were looking at uh before
Pharmaceuticals were developed
biopharmaceuticals were developed for
this area we were looking for natural
sources and the and um and we're looking
for anything in nature that could give
us a clue uh of