EAT LESS, BUY A BULLWORKER AND LIVE TO BE 120.
In days of old, the phrase "prevention is better than cure" was often heard as a popular retort in respect of general health matters. Nowadays, it is often the opposite as we consciously choose to ignore everything and just expect (or hope) for a cure to be available over the shelf, if or when we eventually succumb to modern disease or disorder. The question though is can we really be blamed?
After all, we rarely live a month without a new pronouncement about how we can help ourselves avoid heart disease, diabetes or cancer, which are now formally predicted as being the fate of the majority of the population. But then, almost as though retaliatory, the results of different research are reported which completely contradict the former information which we have barely had time to digest.
DIGITAL RADIATION
For example, in 2001 there was a major scare announcement by some parties, that radiation from mobile phones was a serious threat to human health. This certainly attracted my attention, as I was one of those individuals who complained of headaches when using my digital phone, which I had not experienced when using an analogue model.
While this went on, perhaps stimulated from the banner waving protests of people living near mobile phone masts, the mobile phone companies themselves categorically stated that there was no discernible threat whatsoever to human health from the use of their digital products, and any radiation which did exist was minuscule.
Stangely though, soon after that, the same companies began bringing out new shield covers described as "designed to significantly reduce radiation emissions". But hang on a minute, how can they reduce something they have just recently denied exists? And does anybody know what the conclusion was?
RED WINE
France is noted for possibly the fattiest and sauciest diet in the world, but is reported as having the lowest proportional incidence of heart disease. Dr. R. Corder, of the William Harvey Research Institute of London, recently reported his discovery that red wine contains polyphenols in abundance which, he says, block the production of the protein endothelin which is linked to heart disease. In plain English, red wine is said to keep the arteries open, by preventing them from becoming blocked. Thus, the bad elements of diet are apparently counteracted by the antioxidant properties of a regular daily intake of red wine. No such benefits, apparently.arise from white wines. The other good news is that benefits were equal from red wines at the cheap end right up to the top end of the price scale.
So we're doing well to make regular friends with a bottle of Red in front of a good movie then? Ah - but according to research published from a team from the Royal Free and University College Medical School of London, whilst agreeing that a couple of glasses a day, and no more, should indeed reduce heart disease, red wine drinkers are no less likely to die of cardiovascular disease, and are 40% more likely to die of other diseases such as cancer!
There again, according to Researchers from the Diamond Headache Clinic in Chicago, not only does a cup of tea reduce or eliminate headaches more effectively than aspirin, but they also say that the antioxidants ingested from regular tea drinking are also linked to a reduced risk of coronary heart disease together with a beneficial effect on cholesterol and high blood pressure. So forget the wine, just keep putting the kettle on, so long as you don't read the other research which tells us that all caffeine, whether from coffee or tea, increases our risk of heart attack!
FOOD
But perhaps the greatest confusion we must suffer is the never ending reports of how bad our food is, largely down to the way in which it is processed, and bundled with cocktails of chemicals, preservatives, salt, sugar, fat and hydronation of natural fats into carcinogenic properties.
Yet, with 80% of the UK's entire food supply coming to us from just 5 Supermarket Firms (an Oligopoly for sure)), it's not as though we have that much room to manoeuvre our way out of our unhealthy dietary menus.
Clearly, science and food production do not appear to work in harmony these days, but the contradictions are now so regular that perhaps they should collectively confess to us that the more they have learned, the less they know for sure.
Last year I began to compile all the reports I could find of food product scares, everything from children's fish fingers containing carcinogenic agents to the apparent poison of Soya sauce, with a view to writing an article. But in the end, I gave up on it, as the quantity was so vast that only a volume of books could contain it all. I was, in the process, richly educated also into learning that as a life long vegetarian (no, I don't eat fish etc.,) I was not to escape any of this, for a tomato was said to contain up to 22 different chemicals, lettuce was as bad, and almost all other fruit, vegetable and bean products were in some way contaminated.
EAT LESS
If we cannot influence, let alone control, what is in the food they give us, then perhaps the only option left is to take heed of very new research which appears, at least. to blow a hole in the basis of the medical profession's successful efforts to advise us that we need at least 2,500 calories a day for an average male, and 1500 for an average female. It is of course the same medical profession who tells us that one in every two people are too fat.
The proposal is that it is not the restriction of food intake which is abnormal - but rather, the unlimited food supply of which the majority of the western population takes full advantage of without any justified physical or medical need.
Serious research in respect of calorie intake restriction (in other words, eating a lot less in quantity, of anything) suggests that simply eating less is the key to greater health and significant longevity. It pursues the hypotheses that cell damage is caused by the by products of food combustion in cells. In an experiment involving laboratory rats, reduction of food intake\calories of between one third and one half, increased average life span by one third. Others have reinterpreted this work to suggest that in humans in might be equivalent to extending an average age of 75 to a new average age of 120 years!
LIGHT AND AIR
Just by going out for a walk in our neighbourhoods, we can witness how the Nation has become more sedentary. I have lost track of how many vehicle drivers stop me to ask directions from here to wherever, as I am typically the only person they see on foot. Despite walking a lot, I rarely bump into anyone else, whatever time of day it is. Outside of the City, it does seem that few people now walk even the shortest distance.
Personally though, I think you can get the same exercise by walking up and down the stairs or around the office, and that it is probably the fresh air and natural light which is the real benefit of walking. Not such a strange statement if you pay attention to what Dr. Grimes has said about light.
Dr. David Grimes, Medical Director at Blackburn and Ribley Valley NHS Trust, recently stated that it is wrong to blame food for heart disease, and that the true cause of it in the UK is the cloudy climate, and the individual's lack of regular exposure to sunlight!
His research was based on two years of tests on 38,000 blood samples. He disagrees with the notion that a Mediterranean diet accounts for low heart disease, and states that it is actually the sunshine which accounts for it.
He postulates that the large incidence of disease in the UK is directly attributable to our lack of exposure to daylight, and is highlighted by the fact that in the UK, cholesterol levels are higher in winter than in summer, people with gardens who spend more time in the sun have lower cholesterol levels, as well as more healthy levels of Vitamin D.
I suppose to hedge our bets, we need to (a) )adopt the Med diet (b) make sure we have two glasses of red, plus plenty of tea with it, and (c) ensure that we dine outside.
EXERCISE
Whatever one's view, more exercise, in moderation, is surely good for us. Like many though, the thought of joining muscle clad clones in the gym, or jogging three miles each morning, fills me with a feeling of complete disinterest.
Even the eye boggling aerobic exercise videos of Jane Fonda, Raquel Welch, Pamela Anderson, and others, have not persuaded me of the merits of jumping up and down all day and pretending to enjoy it as some of sort of semi yogic ecstasy. Yet I am bound to be persuaded that we need some exercise of some sort, other than lifting a pint glass. But what sort of exercise is both good for us, and easy to accommodate into our busy lives?
Many years ago I was reading a book by the Jogging King himself, Jim Fixx. The same week he dropped dead on a run at 52. Recently I was in Waterstones reading a book about how to keep a healthy heart, authored by the revered heart specialist Dr. Christian Barnard. By some meaningless coincidence, the news on my portable ear radio announced on the same day that he had died, of a heart attack. Needless to say, I didn't buy the book.
Douglas Adams, the author of the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, recently passed on at 49, but did you know they found him dead on his exercise bike? Hollywood Actress Sharon Stone recently made it into the annuls of medicine by suffering a mild stroke, at age 43, the day after completing a three mile charity run. Only a revolutionary operation, presumably available to the rich only, saved her life. The North California Medical Association wants the phenomena named "Stone Syndrome", which they believe is behind thousands dying of each year, following a study which suggested that stroke and heart problem victims as a consequence of high level workouts have recently trebled.
THE BULLWORKER IS BACK
Nonetheless, moderate exercise at least is thought to be absolutely necessary to help combat the growing waist, and to keep blood vessels in good shape. The question for those of us who are glued to our computer screens or desks all day is how do we get any?
Well I was rummaging through the attic recently, as one does, and came across an item which I must have bought some 25 years ago, and never used. It was a "Bullworker". Recently there has been something of a revival of interest in this piece of isotonic equipment, designed to exercise all main muscles. (see illustrations at foot of this page).
Well, I've given it a good dusting off and now use it three times a day to get loads of meaningful exercise without ever leaving sight of my computer screens, or venturing out of my front door. The lazy man's way to constant exercise has been found! I'm not sure yet whether I am using it correctly though, as my waistline doesn't look any lighter and I am developing shoulders like the incredible hulk.
Although I have been told that the modern version is obtainable from the USA for about a hundred dollars, I have discovered that you can get one over here, for a penny short of twenty quid, from www.bodysolid.co.uk.
AND FINALLY
Although we are told that medicinal science is advancing at a great speed, it seems unable to tell us, without contradiction, the best ways we can change our habits in order to make true the age old belief that the human body has its own built in ability to prevent illness and escape many of the ravages of ageing.
In the meantime, I shall continue to live off my miserly 700 calories a day, made up entirely of a water porridge breakfast and a rice and vegetable dinner, and continue with my daily brisk walks and bullworker exercise.
As a result of this, I am looking forward to celebrating my 120th birthday, and selling millions of copies of my book "how to live to be 120".
If however I don't make it, perhaps one of you might be kind enough to tell anyone who may miss me, that it was not because I didn't pay attention to what the experts said.
