Stay on couch. Go Fat. Lose your mind.
”It breaks my heart to se all these obese kids in the streets”, says Dr Antonio Convit. ”A lot of them will develop diabetes, and their lives will be seriously affected. They will have a very diminished quality of life, and a much shorter one as well”.
Dr Convit knows what he is talking about. He has spent the last eight years studying how the human brain reacts when the body develops diabetes, or during the stages leading to the disease. His full title is as long as it is impressive: M.D., Research Psychiatrist, Nathan Kline Institute, Associate Professor, New York University School of Medicine, Centre for Brain Health.
Dr Antonio Convit is 54 years old and lives in Manhattan, but was born in Venezuela and studied in England as well as the United States. His father is a living legend in South America, still at 93 years publishing more scientific papers every year than his son. The father was nominated for the Nobel Prize in medicine 1988, for his ground-breaking work with leprosy. Dr Convit’s twin brother is a successful plastic surgeon in Washington, DC.
FAT KIDS IN NEW YORK. ”The last couple of years I have been studying a group of obese children in New York”, says Dr Convit. ”Up until 15 years ago, all scientists believed that the brain, which only uses glucose as fodder, got what it needed regardless of diabetes or pre-diabetes. Diabetes affects the body’s ability to use glucose, and the disease has long been known to damage or seriously affect other parts of the body, like eyes or kidneys. But as late as in 1997, grants for research looking into the connection between brain function and diabetes were not seen as important”.
Scientists believed that the brain functioned as usual in diabetes patients. Since then, however, Dr Convit and a few colleagues have presented convincing proof of the opposite. The work of Dr Convit, which concentrates around the cognitive processes of the brain, shows some very disturbing facts.
”We use IQ-tests, memory tests and attention-learning-recalling tests, standardized tests to verify the cognitive level of the test subject”, says Dr Convit. ”We then relate these test results to the glucose-level in the blood, and use MRI-technology to look at the brain integrity. Cross-sectional studies in different groups are made, as well as longitudal studies checking cause and effect”.
Some of these test subjects, kids and adolescents, have been followed during several years. Is it possible to just observe, when you know that many of these young boys and girls will develop serious health problems?
”No, of course not”, says Dr Convit. ”I talk to them, tell them about the risks they run if they don’t do something about their overweight, what they can do to lose weight and lead a healthier life. But it is hard, both because of the biology and the culture, to change”.
”Take the schools for example”, says Dr Convit. ”The first things to go when schools are forced to cut their budget are physical education and the arts – the very two things these kids need more than anything else”.
Statistics are scary, and indicate that the imaginary benefits won by cutting school budgets will come back to haunt politicians for decades to come. The USA has 20 million diabetics, and is quickly approaching ten percent of its population. In some states, a quarter of the inhabitants are obese, and the trend has been going in one direction since the 70’s: fatter and fatter. All these overweight people virtually guarantees more and more cases of diabetes. A total breakdown in healthcare costs is a realistic forecast.
”One diabetic patient costs from 200.000 to 1.000.000 dollars to treat during his or hers lifetime. You do the math”, says Dr Convit.
THE BRAIN GOES WITH THE BODY. But budget worries aside: the effects the disease has on the individual might be even more scary, and until now not widely known. Even most doctors and scientists are not aware of the new findings of Dr Convit and his fellow researchers. And politicians have no clue whatsoever, of course.
”So far, there have been only 25 studies published about the relation between the cognitive processes in the brain and diabetes”, says Dr Convit. ”We need more data, more large-scale studies to convince those who still doubt the results, although all the studies so far point in the same direction”.
And it is a very disturbing direction. An individual, age 40, with diabetes, has the quality of life of a 60-year old. Statistics also show, for example, that young Hispanics who develop diabetes when they are under 21 will in average live 23 years less than non-diabetic Hispanics. And essential brain functions are inferior when you have diabetes, although you might not notice it yourself.
”Our results point to about a 15 percent loss of functions like memory, attention and reasoning”, says Dr Convit. ”Among adult diabetics both their height-adjusted weight (body-mass-index, or BMI) and the haemoglobin A1c (a measure of long-term glucose control) are inversely related to the size of a very important brain area called the hippocampus. The hippocampus is the key to learn and recall new information. So, if you are a diabetic, the heavier you are or the more poorly controlled your glucose is, the more likely you are to have a shrunken hippocampus.”
So, put simply: fat babies becomes fat adolescents that grow into fat adults, who get diabetes and eventually become both sick and dull. What can we do to counter this nightmare scenario?
”One thing we do not need is to throw a lot of public money at the problem. More money will not solve this”, says Dr Convit. ”Simply putting money in better treating the disease, although important, is not the answer. What is essential is to prevent the development of the disease in the first place. We need to get people off the couch. Our schools need to provide regular exercise for the kids, both for the body and the brain. That means physical education, three times a week or more, and arts classes. We need to educate people about the danger”.
MORE BAD NEWS FOR ASIANS. And some people seem indeed to be more at risk than others. Studies in Japan and Korea shows alarming figures in obesity among children. Asian kids are getting fatter at the same rate as American junk food is getting more popular outside of the U.S. But kids of Asian parents are also more vulnerable than Caucasians.
”Studies show that descendents of Asian immigrants in the US have a higher risk to develop diabetes from obesity”, says Dr Convit. In the US, the risk groups come in the following order (most at risk first):
”No, apart from exercising and losing weight they need to radically change their eating-habits”, says Dr Convit. ”Instead of eating trans-fats (anything crunchy with long shelf-life) they should look for food containing poly-non-saturated fats”. This means:
ALARM CLOCKS SHOULD BE RINGING. Several health scares surround us in the world today, some of them deadly, some less threatening. Avian flu, HIV and aids, malaria, different types of cancer, SARS, epidemic diseases and all the effects of smoking, alcohol abuse, natural disasters and warfare, just to mention a few.
Why should diabetes, and the effect the disease has on the brain, set off any alarm? A look at the numbers, and the trend, answers the question. The maps you see here, from the USA Center for Disease Control, are easy to understand. Statistics from other countries suggest the same: obesity, and the following risk of developing diabetes, is going to be our century’s health challenge in a large part of the world.
Another reason to take note can be this: the trend is possible to reverse, and this without any great cost, or any new medicine. It is a matter of getting doctors, politicians, parents and teachers to understand the threat to us and the generations to come.
And then, to change our behaviour.
Published on-line in OhmyNews June 6, 2006
Dr Convit knows what he is talking about. He has spent the last eight years studying how the human brain reacts when the body develops diabetes, or during the stages leading to the disease. His full title is as long as it is impressive: M.D., Research Psychiatrist, Nathan Kline Institute, Associate Professor, New York University School of Medicine, Centre for Brain Health.Dr Antonio Convit is 54 years old and lives in Manhattan, but was born in Venezuela and studied in England as well as the United States. His father is a living legend in South America, still at 93 years publishing more scientific papers every year than his son. The father was nominated for the Nobel Prize in medicine 1988, for his ground-breaking work with leprosy. Dr Convit’s twin brother is a successful plastic surgeon in Washington, DC.
FAT KIDS IN NEW YORK. ”The last couple of years I have been studying a group of obese children in New York”, says Dr Convit. ”Up until 15 years ago, all scientists believed that the brain, which only uses glucose as fodder, got what it needed regardless of diabetes or pre-diabetes. Diabetes affects the body’s ability to use glucose, and the disease has long been known to damage or seriously affect other parts of the body, like eyes or kidneys. But as late as in 1997, grants for research looking into the connection between brain function and diabetes were not seen as important”.
Scientists believed that the brain functioned as usual in diabetes patients. Since then, however, Dr Convit and a few colleagues have presented convincing proof of the opposite. The work of Dr Convit, which concentrates around the cognitive processes of the brain, shows some very disturbing facts.
”We use IQ-tests, memory tests and attention-learning-recalling tests, standardized tests to verify the cognitive level of the test subject”, says Dr Convit. ”We then relate these test results to the glucose-level in the blood, and use MRI-technology to look at the brain integrity. Cross-sectional studies in different groups are made, as well as longitudal studies checking cause and effect”.
Some of these test subjects, kids and adolescents, have been followed during several years. Is it possible to just observe, when you know that many of these young boys and girls will develop serious health problems?
”No, of course not”, says Dr Convit. ”I talk to them, tell them about the risks they run if they don’t do something about their overweight, what they can do to lose weight and lead a healthier life. But it is hard, both because of the biology and the culture, to change”.
”Take the schools for example”, says Dr Convit. ”The first things to go when schools are forced to cut their budget are physical education and the arts – the very two things these kids need more than anything else”.Statistics are scary, and indicate that the imaginary benefits won by cutting school budgets will come back to haunt politicians for decades to come. The USA has 20 million diabetics, and is quickly approaching ten percent of its population. In some states, a quarter of the inhabitants are obese, and the trend has been going in one direction since the 70’s: fatter and fatter. All these overweight people virtually guarantees more and more cases of diabetes. A total breakdown in healthcare costs is a realistic forecast.
”One diabetic patient costs from 200.000 to 1.000.000 dollars to treat during his or hers lifetime. You do the math”, says Dr Convit.
THE BRAIN GOES WITH THE BODY. But budget worries aside: the effects the disease has on the individual might be even more scary, and until now not widely known. Even most doctors and scientists are not aware of the new findings of Dr Convit and his fellow researchers. And politicians have no clue whatsoever, of course.
”So far, there have been only 25 studies published about the relation between the cognitive processes in the brain and diabetes”, says Dr Convit. ”We need more data, more large-scale studies to convince those who still doubt the results, although all the studies so far point in the same direction”.
And it is a very disturbing direction. An individual, age 40, with diabetes, has the quality of life of a 60-year old. Statistics also show, for example, that young Hispanics who develop diabetes when they are under 21 will in average live 23 years less than non-diabetic Hispanics. And essential brain functions are inferior when you have diabetes, although you might not notice it yourself.
”Our results point to about a 15 percent loss of functions like memory, attention and reasoning”, says Dr Convit. ”Among adult diabetics both their height-adjusted weight (body-mass-index, or BMI) and the haemoglobin A1c (a measure of long-term glucose control) are inversely related to the size of a very important brain area called the hippocampus. The hippocampus is the key to learn and recall new information. So, if you are a diabetic, the heavier you are or the more poorly controlled your glucose is, the more likely you are to have a shrunken hippocampus.”
So, put simply: fat babies becomes fat adolescents that grow into fat adults, who get diabetes and eventually become both sick and dull. What can we do to counter this nightmare scenario?”One thing we do not need is to throw a lot of public money at the problem. More money will not solve this”, says Dr Convit. ”Simply putting money in better treating the disease, although important, is not the answer. What is essential is to prevent the development of the disease in the first place. We need to get people off the couch. Our schools need to provide regular exercise for the kids, both for the body and the brain. That means physical education, three times a week or more, and arts classes. We need to educate people about the danger”.
MORE BAD NEWS FOR ASIANS. And some people seem indeed to be more at risk than others. Studies in Japan and Korea shows alarming figures in obesity among children. Asian kids are getting fatter at the same rate as American junk food is getting more popular outside of the U.S. But kids of Asian parents are also more vulnerable than Caucasians.
”Studies show that descendents of Asian immigrants in the US have a higher risk to develop diabetes from obesity”, says Dr Convit. In the US, the risk groups come in the following order (most at risk first):
1. American IndiansFat Asians run a higher risk to develop diabetes than fat, white Americans. Since the genetics are the same regardless of geography, overweight Asians kids in their home countries share the high risk of developing diabetes with their American cousins. The cost in human suffering as well as cost of treatment could be very, very high. Is it enough to skip the Pizza Hut and KFC-meals?
2. Asians
3. Hispanics
4. African Americans
5. Caucasians
”No, apart from exercising and losing weight they need to radically change their eating-habits”, says Dr Convit. ”Instead of eating trans-fats (anything crunchy with long shelf-life) they should look for food containing poly-non-saturated fats”. This means:
1. Almost all fishThe thing is not to ”stop eating fat”. Good fat raises your HDL, the good cholesterol in the blood, and diminishes the bad cholesterol. That is also why most medication misses the target; it only lowers the bad cholesterol but does not raise the good.
2. All vegetable fats, such as avocado
3. Almond, walnuts, peanuts
4. Olive oil, grape seed oil, canola oil
5. Good, dark chocolate
ALARM CLOCKS SHOULD BE RINGING. Several health scares surround us in the world today, some of them deadly, some less threatening. Avian flu, HIV and aids, malaria, different types of cancer, SARS, epidemic diseases and all the effects of smoking, alcohol abuse, natural disasters and warfare, just to mention a few.
Why should diabetes, and the effect the disease has on the brain, set off any alarm? A look at the numbers, and the trend, answers the question. The maps you see here, from the USA Center for Disease Control, are easy to understand. Statistics from other countries suggest the same: obesity, and the following risk of developing diabetes, is going to be our century’s health challenge in a large part of the world.Another reason to take note can be this: the trend is possible to reverse, and this without any great cost, or any new medicine. It is a matter of getting doctors, politicians, parents and teachers to understand the threat to us and the generations to come.
And then, to change our behaviour.
Published on-line in OhmyNews June 6, 2006
posted by Pelle at Monday, June 19, 2006
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