The high carbohydrate / low fat diet of the past fifty years has left us with a massive ongoing epidemic of obesity and type-2 diabetes yet those agencies responsible for this incredible nutritional "faux pas" are still denying their role.
Instead of admitting they have made a gross error in judgment these past many decades, they have taken the position of sniping at every attempt being made by responsible leaders to get this country's diet back on track and have become the principle perpetrators of the myth that carbohydrate restriction is harmful.
On the one hand, doctors were taught in biochemistry that consumption of fat and protein placed minimal demands on the pancreas for insulin production yet at the same time and in the very same educational institutions they were instructed to use the standard diabetic diet with its emphasis on ample carbohydrates in the form of bread, potatoes, pasta and rice.
All of these refined carbohydrates placed heavy demands on insulin secretion. Even today, some fifty years later, I can vividly recall my surprise at these conflicting lectures but as a fledgling doctor could not even conceive the thought of challenging traditional medical concepts. Now there is a growing trend among diabetes specialists to restrict carbohydrates in their patients' diet because it works. Not only does it work but it works far better than fifty years of traditional diabetes treatment.
When I read of the accomplishments of such medical scientists as Bernstein, himself a juvenile diabetic, who as a young non-professional had to take his diabetes treatment into his own hands to save his life, I am filled with shame at how inadequate treatment standards have been.
Bernstein later went to medical school in mid-life; primarily so that having an MD his studies could be published in medical journals and he could better inform other doctors. This is a sad commentary of the reality of challenging orthodoxy.
As you review these diets you will observe how very basic they are, even primitive, for to eat in this manner is to regress, nutritionally speaking, 10,000 years to the time before our encounter with agriculture and the preponderance of carbohydrate in our diet.
We humans think of ourselves as highly evolved - the epitome of the evolutionary process yet our metabolic system is unchanged from our primitive ancestors. A carbohydrate restrictive diet is natural for us, the one to which we are best adapted physiologically.
The present Food Pyramid is outdated and Joel Kauffman has done an excellent review of the reasons why. No more than 40-50% of our daily caloric intake should be from carbohydrates and it should be from the complex variety and for fats we must return to the natural fats that were the foundation of the American diet five decades ago.
We also should remember that our strongest antagonists in what I chose to call "back to basics" diet will be the food industry for there is relatively little profit in basic foods. I fondly remember the words of Doctor Paul Dudley White, cardiologist to the presidents back in the mid-fifties. When pressed to support the politically motivated "prudent" diet of fat and cholesterol restriction replied, "See here, I began my practice as a cardiologist in 1921 and never saw a myocardial infarction patient until 1928. Back in the MI-free days before 1920, the fats were butter, whole milk and lard, and I think we would all benefit from the kind of diet that we had when no one had ever heard of corn oil."
Today most people have forgotten all about Dr. Dudley White and his prophetic words of advice. If Dudley White had been in control of our dietary destiny then, cardiovascular disease would probably not be the immense problem it is today.
Duane Graveline MD MPH
Former USAF Flight Surgeon
Former NASA Astronaut
Retired Family Doctor
