Pat Hartman | Childhood Obesity News

GLP-1 and Akkermansia, the Rest of the Story

Pat Hartman June 24, 2025 No Comments

A few more things remain to be said about the bug (and tenant of our intimate innards) called Akkermansia muciniphila. As previously mentioned, its sole purpose in life is apparently to ensure that the human gut lining stays nicely knitted together and does not spring any leaks. And this is a worthy existence.

A person who wonders if they are hosting a beneficial proportion of this bug can find out from a stool test. Some of the circumstances that harm the organism are age, antibiotic use, stress, and a diet containing insufficient fiber. Unfortunately, the presence of oxygen prevents Akkermansia muciniphila from growing, so it is not available in food — with the sole exception of human breast milk, which is a great reason to breastfeed a baby for as long as possible. What a wonderful and irreplaceable gift to pass along to a newborn child!

It is possible to encourage one’s personal stock of the helpful bacterium by eating its favorite foods, like high-fiber vegetation and nondigestible carbohydrates. Note: People who suffer from, or are at risk for, inflammatory bowel disease should use caution and check with their doctors.

Now, what about the GLP-1?

Dr. Michael Ruscio informs us that, “In animal models, Akkermansia appears to stimulate the secretion of a hormone known as glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1).” In other words, it’s like manufacturing gold. Imagine saying, “Farewell, Eli Lilly; au revoir, Novo Nordisk. From now on, I’ll be producing my own GLP-1 — right here in my own innards!”

This appears to be a real possibility. At the very least, it appears capable of keeping a microbiome in excellent health. If it can help us shed fat, too, so much the better!

Of course, we have to discount for “novelty bias,” and recall that the allure of the new tends to make people overlook shortcomings. The results gained so far in petri dishes and lab animals do not necessarily apply to human beings in the wild. It will take some time and a lot more study to get a handle on some of these questions.

In animals, at least, too much Akkermansia is as bad as too little. We should know a lot more about the bug before going overboard with the prescriptions, or before allowing civilians to overdose on it.

Dr. Ruscio points out that, despite strong evidence, “[W]e don’t know if low Akkermansia levels actually cause illness or not.” He also reminds us that we only have one small study to go on, so far, and consequently are a long way from knowing if this bug is our best bet for acquiring GLP-1 in aid of weight loss.

As scientists so often and so rightly repeat, more research is needed. We do not know enough about the metabolic effects and blood sugar benefits. “For now, existing probiotics (like Lactobacillus–Bifidobacterium blends) have more research and are more effective.”

And what about those claims of healing the leaky gut? “Basically, higher LPS suggests gut leakiness, and lower LPS indicates tighter intestinal wall junctions.” One study says,

After the participants took Akkermansia for 3 months, the researchers found they had lower serum LPS. This suggests that the gut wall had become less leaky, analogous to those fence boards fitting together more tightly.

While probiotics in general are useful for intestinal health and healing, Dr. Ruscio reminds us that Akkermansia has not been proven special in this area, and that above all, “[W]e should be careful not to try and micromanage the gut microbiome.” In other words, considering our vast ignorance of the whole field, we would do better to foster nourishment and balance in the whole system, rather than trying to pick a favorite based on abysmally scarce data.

The average cost of Akkermansia supplementation would be in the neighborhood of $60 to $80 per month, which is inexpensive compared to the standard GLP-1 meds — but nobody knows yet how much would be needed, for how long, or what happens when the patient quits swallowing extra bacteria? Anyway, here is Dr. Ruscio’s specific advice:

We’ll get more information on Akkermansia in time. But for now, it’s probably better and more cost-effective for your gut health to stick to the three well-studied probiotic categories. These are a Lactobacillus and Bifidobacteria blend, soil-based probiotics, and the beneficial yeast Saccharomyces boulardii.

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “Getting To Know Your Gut Bugs: Akkermansia Muciniphila,” DrHyman.com, 07/25/21
Source: “What Is Akkermansia? Here’s Everything to Know Before You Start Taking Supplements,” GoodHousekeeping.com, 05/13/25
Source: “Fact-Checking The 4 Most Popular Akkermansia Claims,” DrRuscio.com, 10/07/24
Image by vocablitz/Pixabay

GLP-1 and Akkermansia, a Glowing Prospect

Pat Hartman June 20, 2025 No Comments

We left off by mentioning Dr. Mark Hyman’s explanation of how acquaintance with the mucus-loving bacterium Akkermansia muciniphila offers a glimpse of an exciting future, featuring drug-free therapy that achieves sustainable weight loss. (Today’s post follows on from a very recent one, so get up to speed here.)

And besides, there does not seem to be a need for age limits. Imagine an affordable obesity prevention solution, for kids!

The backstory: Confronted by a serious personal health situation, Dr. Hyman discovered in himself “gut infections and really low levels of beneficial bacteria.” The mucus-loving Akkermansia, which normally accounts for between 1% and 5% of a human’s gut bacteria, was pretty much missing in him. But emerging research showed promise for this life form as “the next generation of beneficial gut microbes.” The field was on the verge of “an explosion… It’s been linked to positive health outcomes like weight loss, improved insulin resistance, lower inflammation, and more.” He wrote,

Akkermansia muciniphila feeds on mucin, a glycoprotein that regulates the thickness of our gut’s intestinal mucosal layer…. Akkermansia produces propionate and acetate, two short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) that feed other beneficial gut bacteria…. SCFAs strengthen tight junctions (the glue that holds our intestinal cells together) and prevent unwanted materials from passing through and into circulation.

Ideally, the only substances that should pass through are “macro and micronutrients from real whole foods.” Some of the icky substances we do not want circulating at will are food particles, allergens, endotoxins, and fecal matter. The very undesirable condition that allows other stuff to circulate is known as intestinal hyperpermeability or, informally, as “leaky gut,” and is recognized as the cause of many chronic diseases.

Having a leaky gut causes the immune system to go haywire and become hypersensitive, constantly reacting to antigens (foreign proteins from food and bacteria) that enter the bloodstream unannounced.

It became increasingly obvious that Akkermansia is a good thing to have a sufficient supply of, and studies of obese adults found that high levels of this organism correlate with “healthier metabolic status and better clinical outcomes (fasting blood sugar, body fat distribution, and insulin sensitivity).” In mice, high levels of it are also associated with lower blood lipid levels, lower insulin resistance, and less adipose tissue inflammation.

One way to encourage the good bugs is to avoid highly processed foods. Another is to take it as a supplement, and a very recent article from GoodHousekeeping.com explores the possibility.

From January 2004 to February 2022, the annual number of studies published on Akkermansia grew by 33.36%, and researchers say it “is likely to remain a research hotspot in the foreseeable future.” Journalist Kaitlyn Phoenix has studied the subject in depth and quotes Madiha Saeed, M.D., on the basic mechanism of this organism’s unique talent. Akkermansia eats mucin, a protein in mucus,

[…] and produces short chain fatty acids that “strengthen the tight junctions in between our gut cells, keeping the bad stuff out of our gut…. The more mucin Akkermansia uses, the more it encourages the epithelial cells to make more mucin, which then improves gut function and overall health.

Here is an interesting detail from Dr. Michael Ruscio, DNM, DC, a doctor and clinical researcher who explores the tireless ability of Akkermansia to populate the mucosal lining of the intestines, both small and large. It appears very likely that this life form exists for the sole purpose of reinforcing the intestines to prevent their contents from seeping into other areas.

(Please return next week for the rest of this fascinating story.)

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

GLP-1 and Akkermansia

Pat Hartman June 17, 2025 No Comments

One of the interesting challenges taken up by scientists in the past few years has been how to convince a body to make more GLP-1 on its own, so overweight people do not have to spend enormous sums on monthly drug buys. And clues have been found. Take, for instance, this highly technical quotation indicating progress in that direction:

The newly identified protein P9 is secreted by Akkermansia muciniphila and binds to ICAM-2 to directly trigger the secretion of GLP-1 by the L cells, while P9-stimulated IL-6 secretion by macrophages and/or intestinal epithelial cells (via an unclear mechanism) further promotes GLP-1 secretion.

A more recent and more approachable piece of reportage brings us up to date on progress in this area:

Emerging research indicates that the metabolites produced by Akkermansia […] may play a role in modulating the secretion of GLP-1… This interplay highlights the potential for Akkermansia to indirectly affect glucose metabolism and appetite regulation, offering a novel approach to addressing metabolic disorders.

Imagine us having the power to stop food cravings before they even start, right there in our own digestive tracts! Instead of swallowing or injecting medicine, why not simply manufacture it from our own innate inner resources? How do we set up the ideal conditions to facilitate that process?

Fiber is the raw material that needs to be present for metabolizing into a bunch of different stuff that all facilitates the production of GLP-1 inside a person. Then the pancreas makes insulin, which directs the brain to tell the mouth to stop eating. It also tells the stomach to hang onto the latest meal, and savor that full feeling.

What we need the body to do is to facilitate the flourishing of the prime types of gut bacteria, like Clostridium butyricum. But above all, attention is focusing on the rock-star known as Akkermansia muciniphila, which has been making quite a name for itself, and is being strenuously marketed as an over-the-counter supplement that consumers may choose at will. As we have noted here before, “Gut bacteria can significantly impact weight, independent of genes. Transplanting the microbiome from an obese twin drives obesity. Conversely, transplanting the microbiome from a healthy twin drives weight loss.”

The popularity of RYGB (roux-en-y gastric bypass surgery) has led to interesting observations and hints about what goes on inside a person after this type of surgery:

A decrease in adiposity and body weight without a change in food intake suggests that the RYGB-associated microbiota may either reduce the ability to harvest energy from the diet or produce signals regulating energy expenditure and/or lipid metabolism.

As we have seen, the gastric bypass, or Roux-en-Y procedure, used for morbidly obese people, is an irreversible combination of restrictive and malabsorptive methods. Part of the stomach is cordoned off and the very minimalist remainder of it is routed directly to the small intestine, drastically reducing the amount of food the body can absorb. This can lead to some weird results, as detailed in an article about discoveries at the Cleveland Clinic related to Type 2 diabetes:

As a treatment for obesity, Roux-en-Y is effective. As a treatment for diabetes, it is extraordinary. In 80% of cases the condition vanishes within days. Experiments conducted on mice […] show that Roux-en-Y causes the composition of the gut microbiome to change. Dr Nicholson thinks this explains the sudden disappearance of diabetes.

DiabetesJournals.org said,

[A] possibility remains that the improvement of glucose homeostasis observed following bariatric surgery is mediated by a change in gut microbiota, leading to an enhancement of nutrient-sensing mechanisms in the jejunum and an improvement in glucose tolerance…

As more surgeons investigated associations between the successful post-op maintenance of weight loss after bariatric surgery and changes in gut bacteria and functional brain activity, the gut microbiome began to be perceived as a significant regulator of obesity.

All sorts of interesting observations began to appear in the literature. From UCLA came a report by Emeran A. Mayer, M.D., about the various mechanisms by which weight-loss surgery accomplished its purpose:

We know from several studies that surgically reducing the size of the stomach is not the main mechanism for weight loss. Surprisingly, several studies have demonstrated that weight loss surgery produces changes in food preferences and appetite. Our research aims to find out what causes these unexpected changes…

What was the brain doing about weight loss, appetite reduction and changes in food preferences in response to surgery? How could this information lead to the long‐term goal of finding non-invasive treatment “capable of reproducing these brain changes and associated reductions in appetite without surgical intervention”?

Akkermansia is an enriched bacterial group that can “work independently or interdependently to influence host metabolic improvements.” Several authors from the Obesity, Metabolism & Nutrition Institute and Gastrointestinal Unit, Massachusetts General Hospital, wrote of how the probiotic Akkermansia muciniphila is a beneficial strain that is alleged to increase GLP-1 production:

[I]t is possible that Akkermansia may have a substantial role in regulating host adiposity and weight loss. Akkermansia can use mucus as a sole source of carbon and nitrogen in times of health and particularly in times of caloric restriction…

It strengthens the gut lining and improves health by reducing permeability. In this region of the body, permeable is a dirty word. We have heard the slogan, “What happens in Las Vegas, stays in Las Vegas,” and the same ought to be true of the human intestine. What belongs in there should remain in there, not go leaking all over the place.

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “A newly identified protein from Akkermansia muciniphila stimulates GLP-1 secretion,” ScienceDirect.com, 06/01/21
Source: “Akkermansia’s Impact on GLP-1 and Gut Microbiota Dynamics,” BiologyInsights.com, 04/29/25
Source: “Conserved Shifts in the Gut Microbiota Due to Gastric Bypass Reduce Host Weight and Adiposity,” NIH.gov, 05/13/13
Source: “Me, myself, us,” Economist.com, 08/18/12
Source: “Nutrient-Sensing Mechanisms in the Gut as Therapeutic Targets for Diabetes…,” DiabetesJournals.org, September 2013
Source: “From the Desk of Emeran A. Mayer, MD,” UCLA.edu, Spring 2014
Source: “Conserved Shifts in the Gut Microbiota Due to Gastric Bypass Reduce Host Weight and Adiposity,” ScienceMag.org, March 2013
Source: ‘Getting To Know Your Gut Bugs: Akkermansia Muciniphila,” DrHyman.com, 07/25/21
Image by SamuelFJohanns/Pixabay

If It’s Not the Calories, What Is It?

Pat Hartman June 12, 2025 No Comments

In relation to the food our kids eat every day of their lives, we do not like to associate such a phrase as “dirty little secret,” and yet over at Tufts School of Nutrition Science and Policy, a high official named Dariush Mozaffarian did that exact thing. As stated to journalist Dhruv Khullar, the quotation goes like this:

The dirty little secret is that no one really knows what caused the obesity epidemic. It’s the biggest change to human biology in modern history. But we still don’t have a good handle on why.

These days, any theory that embraces calories as the sole cause is likely to be rejected. But Mozaffarian offers a couple of possibilities:

Our bodies process carbs differently from fats, for instance; a calorie from corn leads your body to secrete more insulin than a calorie from cheese. Certain food additives seem to activate genes associated with weight gain, and things like weight loss and exercise can reset the body’s metabolic rate.

Dean Mozaffarian has also pointed out that with the relatively new concept of ultra-processed foods, various factions against sugary drinks, fast food, and harmful additives can join forces under one convenient banner.

A few details

If the obesity rate is falling here and there, it is likely not due to any improvement in the food or some enlightened practices, but because of the widespread use of GLP-1 drugs. Nevertheless, Americans are more overweight than their peers in other similar countries. In pursuit of knowledge, increasing numbers of researchers are looking not at what goes into the body, but what comes out. When traversing the environment of the gut, various foods leave bacterial signatures that reveal a lot.

A bug called B. theta is supposed to digest fiber, but if it doesn’t have enough fiber to work on, it will happily start digesting the mucus that forms the gut lining. Artificial sweeteners, along with a whole lot of other things, affect the microbiome. No one is quite sure of the details yet, but apparently humans have a lot fewer species of gut bugs than we used to, and this is not good.

Some experts say, maybe this is because we have changed. Others say, on an evolutionary timescale, not enough time has passed for us to have changed quite so much. So, it must be that the food itself is to blame. Foods do change our individual biology. They don’t just go in and then out in a different form. Along the way, they change our actual biology and our ability to cope with them and with other foods.

Another multifactorial field

A lot of things could be happening, and probably are. The additives that make food qualify as “highly processed” could be ruining the delicate taste receptors, which become confused and think they are encountering some nutritious substance, which turns out to actually be just fattening garbage. Feeling the lack, we struggle to make up for it by seeking (largely non-existent) nutritional value in yet more food. Dr. Chris van Tulleken describes overeating as probably “searching for that nutrition that never arrived.”

Research pioneer Kevin Hall, whose much-quoted study influenced the field tremendously, demonstrated for the first time that our metabolic health is disrupted by ultra-processed foods. He has pointed out such miscellaneous facts as, for instance, that a certain brand of vitamin water is sold as a health drink although a 20-ounce bottle of it contains almost as much sugar as a can of Coca-Cola. In regard to another point, it seems increasingly apparent that a food additive does not need to be physically addictive, but only needs to be irresistible enough to enable a behavioral addiction.

Nutritionist and molecular biologist Marion Nestle created the USA’s first academic food-studies program. She taught that during WWII, when many prospective soldiers had to be rejected because of health issues stemming from malnutrition during the Great Depression, the army became very concerned about nutrition — just as it did much more recently, when so many recruits were rejected because of obesity. That was when the Army, the National Academy of Sciences, and the National Research Council got together and published the first table of recommended amounts of various nutrients.

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “Why Is the American Diet So Deadly?,” NewYorker.com, 01/06/25
Image by Mateuszg89/Pixabay

Deliver Us From Ethanol

Pat Hartman June 10, 2025 No Comments

No matter how you slice it, high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is a thing that humanity would be better off without. Consequently, the state of Indiana decided to ban it as a food ingredient. On the surface, this is an odd and impractical choice, because Indiana grows a lot of corn. But it mainly winds up being changed into animal feed, and fuel, via ethanol, which has psychoactive properties, and is also used in processing vanilla beans into vanilla extract.

Additionally, ethanol can be made into both gasoline and antifreeze. And also into HFCS. Some people simply don’t want to be feeding their kids anything related to jet fuel.

The Indiana attempt to put a leash on HFCS failed. A couple of years back, New York tried to ban a bunch of food additives, and Pennsylvania did too. In the latter state, Rep. Natalie Mihalek dryly remarked, “It is not asking too much for consumers to have a reasonable expectation that the foods they are eating are safe.” It appears that objectionable food additives are sometimes “grandfathered in,” just because they have been allowed for so long, even though no one has ever bothered to look into their composition or calculate the probable harm caused to humans.

Picky about prohibition

Many voters wish that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration would fix things by banning various substances on a nationwide basis, to save the trouble and expense of each state needing to fight the battle. But some states don’t really care very much, and many Americans value the freedom-of-choice principle over any other consideration.

In many cases, the problem is not so much in the composition of the product itself, but in the passion that children feel for it. Even if any one ingredient could be indisputably proven not dangerous and not addictive, there will always be a certain number of kids who react to it as if it were both. They attract the attention of journalists, and sometimes other interested parties. Professionals on both sides of the issue are forced into defending their positions.

Folks get upset. They defend their positions, and with good reason. Here is one issue, stated in practical terms. As previously noted,

Many adults feel that when a child acts addicted, she or he is as difficult to deal with as a physically addicted child would be. Whatever is in that snack or cereal may be potent enough in some way to stoke up a behavioral addiction, which sells product quite as effectively as a literal, molecular-level addictive ingredient could.

A hopped-up speed freak and a child who acts like a hopped-up speed freak are both troubling propositions, especially if the child is overweight and capable of causing more damage because of it.

This is the sort of problem that the protests attempt to bring to an end. Everyone has better things to do than argue about the obvious. Foods without all kinds of detritus mixed up in them should be just as easily available as the other kind. Or maybe the objectionable substances should not be available at all. Some folks are in favor of banning bad stuff for everybody.

Others cherish the right to pursue perdition in their own ways. At the same time, they may be willing to do what is best for everyone. In their view, research is fine, but until the results come in, leave us alone. Plenty of folks are reluctant to violate the rights of others, while at the same time endeavoring to peacefully change laws they do not like.

GRAS means “generally recognized as safe”

A while back, California assemblymember Jesse Gabriel said,

The [FDA] has increasingly avoided its responsibility to rigorously evaluate proposed food chemicals by allowing food manufacturers to self-certify that a chemical is generally recognized as safe to be used in food. Between 2000 and 2022, manufacturers have been allowed to self-certify almost 99% of the 756 new chemicals used in food.

The terms “99%” and “self-certify”, appearing in such proximity, send cold chills up the spines of many citizens. Reportedly, the whole determination process is being rethought. In September 2024, the Food and Drug Administration held a public hearing where officials announced that they recognize the need to conduct post-market assessments of the presence of chemicals in food, and are developing a “systematic process” for that purpose.

We really need to know what the substances are doing to our kids (and us). Does a certain ingredient make children obese? Even if the answer is no, what else does it do to the human body, especially to one that belongs to a still-growing and not totally formed young person? Many parents and others have a keen interest in finding out more about these issues, and in defining the rules pertaining to who gets to write the rules.

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “15 uses of Ethanol,” AllUsesOf.com, 06/13/21
Source: “How State-Led Ingredient Bans Are Reshaping Food Manufacturing Regulations,” HartDesign.com, 02/14/25
Image by fietzfotos/Pixabay

The Cancer Is Just As Real

Pat Hartman June 5, 2025 No Comments

Last year, California passed a couple of laws (including specific deadlines) to ban certain food additives suspected of being harmful. As a consequence, starting in about a year and a half, the state will ban red dye No. 3, brominated vegetable oil, potassium bromate and propylparaben from all food sales under its jurisdiction, and assess fines of “up to $5,000 for a first violation and up to $10,000 each for subsequent violations.”

The Red 3 was a tough one. Its tendency to associate with cancer has been studied since the 1980s, with no legal restraint in sight. But the Center for Science in the Public Interest and many other experts kept at it, and in 2023, California banned it.

Another substance, titanium dioxide (TiO2), also had been banned, but that order was rescinded. Still, progress was made when the California School Food Safety Act was passed to forbid public schools from serving foods containing half a dozen different food dyes. A while later, the Food and Drug Administration kicked out brominated vegetable oil on a national basis, and that goes into effect a couple of months from now, in August.

An ocean’s width

It’s funny how the Europeans manage to keep harmful stuff out of their groceries, proving that it can be done. But over here, powerful forces insist that such precautions need not and should not be taken. There is another issue, as explained by California Assemblymember Jesse Gabriel, who told HART Design,

Even if the FDA has conducted a thorough review of a proposed food chemical, the agency does not conduct periodic reviews to assess whether old safety determinations remain valid. As a result, many food chemicals have not been reviewed by the FDA since the 1960s or 1970s. The original evaluations frequently fail to reflect both modern toxicology and modern levels of consumption.

Citizens would like to know where to turn if they want to have similar rules to California’s, or even if they do not want to. There is debate about who should be in charge of these matters, and uncertainty about who is currently responsible. As this uncredited author inquires, “Is it a federal agency charged with keeping current around risks in foods? Or is it a state which has significantly fewer resources and is not charged with protecting public health across the entire country?”

A good example

In 2023, activists in four other states aspired to get some food laws, but failed. Still, activists in those and more states who are still trying say that the California precedent helps their efforts. It seems like the public is unable to obtain straight answers about important aspects of grocery shopping. A responsible adult who pauses to read the label on a box or can of alleged food might experience disturbing thoughts. For instance, “The government that regulates alcohol, nicotine, and certain recreational drugs so thoroughly and definitively, why is this same government unable to keep weird chemicals out of the food?”

Apparently, bureaucracy is flexible enough to move with relative alacrity under some circumstances, and with glacial slowness in other situations. Why has the tug-of-war over food additives marketed to kids been dragging on for so long? There is plenty of evidence that they can affect childhood obesity in a causal relationship. The dirty little secret in this case seems to be that such a product does not need to contain literally addictive ingredients. And besides, good dope is expensive.

No, it is quite sufficient to sell children snacks laced with ingredients that stimulate addictive behavior. And yes, having kids act like junkies is a big deal for most parents, as well as imposing a lot of stress on other family members, teachers, babysitters, dentists, and anyone else who comes in contact with the minor in question. If some weird additive causes cancer, that cancer is just as real as one brought on by smoking.

There is such a thing as behavioral addiction. Many adults feel that when a child acts addicted, she or he is as difficult to deal with as a physically addicted child would be. Whatever is in that snack or cereal may be potent enough in some way to stoke up a behavioral addiction, which sells product quite as effectively as a literal, molecular-level addictive ingredient could.

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “How State-Led Ingredient Bans Are Reshaping Food Manufacturing Regulations,” HARTDesign.com, 02/14/25
Image by Alexas_Fotos/Pixabay

Killer Diet on the Loose

Pat Hartman June 3, 2025 No Comments

In “Why is the American Diet So Deadly,” Dhruv Khullar mentions a Frenchman, Guillaume Raineri, who moved to Maryland, USA, and experienced a particularly personal form of culture shock. Every meal seemed to contain too much sugar, too much salt, and too much food, period. So he became a human lab rat, participating in an official scientific study.

This involved spending a month in an environment that could be described as monastic, or perhaps even carceral, learning firsthand that the entire secret of a successful animal study is to control as many variables as possible:

He was not allowed to go outside unsupervised, owing to the risk that he might sneak a few morsels of unsanctioned food.

Over the course of the trials, he was given both extremely nutritious, sensible meals, and, at other times, a plethora of calorie-dense, processed foods. Results were meticulously recorded, and the whole story is pretty interesting. But sadly, most Americans will never have the opportunity to understand so much about the damage we do to ourselves through incautious eating habits. Who devises these complicated research projects?

It needed to be faced

At the point in history when it started to become apparent that more Americans were overweight than ever before, sugar-sweetened beverages and saturated fat quickly became the “usual suspects.” But an investigator for the National Institutes of Health, Kevin Hall, pointed the finger directly at a third possibility: ultra-processed food, informally known as UPF. He suspected that equally as important as the “what” is the “how.” Industrial techniques and chemical modifications seemed the likely culprits.

In a study published in 2019, Hall invited twenty people to spend a month at the NIH Clinical Center, where his team measured how their bodies responded to different types of food. (Many researchers rely instead on surveys of what people recall eating.) For two weeks, participants ate a minimally processed diet, mostly consisting of “Group 1” foods such as salmon and brown rice; for the other two weeks, they ate an ultra-processed or “Group 4” diet, in which at least 80% of the calories came from the most objectional food choices.

When participants were on the ultra-processed diet, they ate 500 calories more per day and put on an average of two pounds. They ate meals faster; their bodies secreted more insulin; their blood contained more glucose. When participants were on the minimally processed diet, they lost about two pounds. Researchers observed a rise in levels of an appetite-suppressing hormone and a decline in the one that makes us feel hungry.

It was not clear why ultra-processed diets led people to eat more, or what exactly these foods did to their bodies. Still, a few factors stood out. The first was energy density, measured in calories per gram of food. Dehydration, which increases shelf life and lowers transport costs, makes many ultra-processed foods (chips, jerky, pork rinds) energy-dense.

A little surprise

The second, hyper-palatability, was a focus of one of Hall’s collaborators, Tera Fazzino. Long ago, evolution trained us to like sweet, salty, and rich foods because, on the most basic level, they help us survive. Hyper-palatable foods — those esoteric combinations of fat and sugar, or fat and salt, or salt and carbs — cater to these tastes, but are rare in nature. A grape is high in sugar but low in fat, and the typical person can stop eating after one, leading to a suspicion that maybe sugar is not so blameworthy after all. A slice of cheesecake is high in both sugar and fat, and the typical person feels compelled to devour it.

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “Why Is the American Diet So Deadly?”, The New Yorker, 01/06/25
Photo by Alexander Grey/Pexels

Target of Influence

Pat Hartman May 29, 2025 No Comments

A recent post described how in 2019, The New York Times reporter Andrew Jacobs exposed some of the doings of the International Life Sciences Institute, otherwise known as ILSI. During that year, the director-general of the World Health Organization was Dr. Margaret Chan, and ILSI founder Alex Malaspina aimed to discover how to influence her thinking, and bend it away from any impulse to critique his organization.

“This threat to our business is serious,” he said, which puzzled some listeners because ILSI was allegedly a legitimate nonprofit organization whose only mission was to help. Jacobs wrote,

In addition to its far-flung offices, ILSI runs a research foundation and an institute focused on health and environmental issues that is largely funded by the chemical industry. It also publishes the academic journal Nutrition Reviews and organizes scores of scientific conferences around the world.

But more was going on than met the eye. Monsanto and other less-than-ethical companies donated boatloads of money to ILSI, whose whole funding system looked kind of shady. In countries where it established a presence, its behavior was neither straightforward nor impartial. In India, for instance, it infiltrated government bodies that were supposed to prevent too many additives in processed foods. The processed food industry was rumored to be more powerful than even the tobacco industry, and that is a pretty serious indictment.

Meanwhile, with all kinds of shady maneuvers going on, India saw alarming increases in obesity, diabetes, and heart disease. In 2012, reacting to a Public Interest Litigation suit that had been filed by concerned citizens, the Delhi High Court directed that guidelines be drawn up to ensure that school children had access to wholesome, nutritious, safe, and hygienic foods.

Action taken

A rule was made for the whole country that edible items high in fat, salt, and sugar could not be sold within 50 meters of any school. Other guidelines were established, and officials charged with carrying out the new orders were pleased to find that some schools had already acted on their own to keep a stricter eye on what the students were being fed.

By 2015, almost one-third of the country’s teenagers were in the obese category. Still, rural areas were less affected than the cities — which strongly hinted that readily available highly processed foods laced with additives probably had something to do with the disparity. It was estimated that the urban areas alone held more than 15 million obese children, helping to make India the third most obese country on the planet.

In the same year, officials added up the operations performed to excise fat, and the news said,

The number of bariatric surgeries performed in the country has increased almost ten times over the last decade, with over 10,000 such surgeries performed in the previous year.

Medical conference attendees emphasized the importance of teaching parents that a chubby child is not necessarily a healthy one. The worst culprits were seen to be “shortcut” meals and, you guessed it, highly processed foods. Around the same time a study confirmed that India’s affluent class was plagued by obesity, but the same societal and environmental factors impacted folks of all kinds, which implied that unless corrective action was taken, future conditions would be “serious.” Some authorities claimed that other authorities underestimated the childhood obesity rate, and that the upper classes were still in worse shape than was previously admitted.

One philosophy held that obesity was caused by the environment, rather than by socio-economic conditions; although it could be argued that the environment itself is a socio-economic condition, and vice versa. Not surprisingly, obesity also correlated with a lack of playgrounds. The fact that schools where unhealthful snacks were served had more obese students was an observable reality.

The epigenetic theory was popular, suggesting that the ability to retain fat is a useful survival trait bestowed by the “thrifty phenotype” widely shared by natives of the subcontinent. In 2016, when India’s first obesity clinic for adolescents opened, the situation was dire:

[A] a recent survey in Pune and Mumbai found that 18 per cent of the school-going children suffer from obesity, 32 per cent are over-weight and 52 per cent of the students are potential diabetics.

In 2017, the government slapped sugar-sweetened soda with a 40% tax.

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “A Shadowy Industry Group Shapes Food Policy Around the World,” NYTimes.com, 09/16/19
Source: “Obesity among Indian teens swells,” IndiaTimes.com, 07/04/14
Source: “India sees 10 time increase in bariatric surgeries in last decade: OSSI,” IndiaTimes.com/ 07/17/15
Source: “India’s quiet tide of childhood obesity,” Scroll.in, 05/07/16
Source: “First obesity clinic for adolescents in India opens in Mumbai,” TheHealthSite.com, 10/09/16
Image by Waldemar_RU/Pixabay

What Is ILSI, and Why Does It Hate Our Kids?

Pat Hartman May 27, 2025 No Comments

Wherever there is a hugely populated country, there is ILSI. Some years back, this was a problem in India because many people wanted manufacturers to begin placing red warning labels on the packaging of highly processed foods. But strangely, the leader of the committee responsible for achieving this reform turned out to be a member of the American non-profit, International Life Sciences Institute, funded by all the biggest producers of ultra-processed foods on the planet.

A reader might ask, “Just a moment, please. Isn’t that exactly backwards?” As a matter of fact, yes. A recent Childhood Obesity News post mentioned what has been deemed a “shadowy industry group,” the International Life Sciences Institute, which has managed to get its fingers into all sorts of places where they don’t belong.

ILSI’s publicly avowed mission is to improve “public and planetary health by convening international experts from academia, the public sector, the private sector, and other NGOs to advance evidence-based scientific research.” The federation currently includes 10 “entities,” namely: Mesoamerica, North Andean, Brazil, Europe, India, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Southeast Asia, and U.S./Canada/Global (headquartered in the U.S.).

The grim details

It is a 501(c)(3) non-profit which, by law, ought not to “engage in lobbying or political activities.” On its homepage, ILSI’s science videos boast a collective total of 33,726 YouTube views, which is not a lot. (By not a lot, we mean that a podiatrist’s single YouTube video titled “Two-Inch Toenails Trimmed” has accrued 227,000 views.)

Internet searches like ILSI+scandal, ILSI+corruption, ILSI+exposed, and ILSI+unethical bring up alarming results. Even Coca-Cola, which had long been a prominent financial backer, broke up with the non-profit. Mars, Nestlé, and other companies have also severed ties. Apparently, the outfit’s efforts have been focused on such dubious goals as convincing the world that obesity is caused solely by insufficient exercise, and sugar has nothing to do with it. Like so many other organizations that want something quite badly (and quite bad), it entices its members with nice conference vacations, at the very least.

Journalism to the rescue

A few years back, ILSI was examined comprehensively by The New York Times reporter Andrew Jacobs. For the public’s benefit, he broke down for general comprehension information originally made available in professional journals about ILSI, which at the time ran 17 branches around the world. At first, outrage was mainly focused on what was going on in China, with the encouragement and support of that country’s government.

A few months later, Jacobs expanded on the first round of reportage. Harking back to the initial paragraph of our blog post, it turned out that the committee head who put a stop to the red warning labels was ILSI’s own Dr. Boindala Sesikeran. Of course, all suggestions of conflict of interest were righteously denied. “Under no circumstance does ILSI protect industry from being affected by disadvantageous policy and laws,” the official statement attested.

But the jig was up. Jacobs wrote,

After decades largely operating under the radar, ILSI is coming under increasing scrutiny by health advocates in the United States and abroad who say it is little more than a front group advancing the interests of the 400 corporate members that provide its $17 million budget… Over the past year, researchers have documented how the organization’s China affiliate helped shape anti-obesity education campaigns…

But what is wrong with anti-obesity education? Well, it seems the philosophy advocated by ILSI did not call for dietary change, especially if that change involves reducing the amount of sugar that humans consume, even the obese ones. The organization was all about promoting physical activity, which, of course, is excellent advice. But not when it comes along with complete, uncritical acceptance of all the sugar anybody wants.

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “ ILSI: Collaborative science for safe, nutritious and sustainable food,” ILSI.org, undated
Source: “ How Chummy Are Junk Food Giants and China’s Health Officials? They Share Offices,” NYTimes.com, 01/09/19
Source: “A Shadowy Industry Group Shapes Food Policy Around the World,” NYTimes.com, 09/16/19
Image by NB_art/Pixabay

The Worldwide Growth of Growth

Pat Hartman May 22, 2025 No Comments

Back in 2014, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released several charts and tables that collectively told a dismal story of how, since the 1950s, child obesity rates had doubled and adolescent numbers had quadrupled. This led to the publication of an article titled “6 real culprits that are making American kids fat.”

What were those villains deemed to be? For starters, people were eating an enormous amount of sugar, like an average of 132 pounds per year per capita. Even way back at the turn of the century, in 1900, that figure had been 90 pounds per year, and at no point since then had it decreased. Also, awareness was dawning that sugar, especially in the form of high fructose corn syrup, is wickedly addictive.

At the same time, people were eating lots of fast food, which is mostly highly processed fare, and fresh fruits and vegetables were much less popular than pizza, pancakes, pasta, and potatoes of the fried variety.

Bad habits grow fast

People, especially the young, were watching way too much television and neglecting physical activity in droves. Lack of exercise also contributed to insulin resistance, which is associated with both diabetes and obesity. To and from school, kids were traveling by car rather than walking or bicycling.

Among average people and their average meals, portion sizes had grown humongous. Since the 1950s, the standard portion size for soda pop had grown from seven ounces to an astounding 42 ounces, while the size of a hamburger tripled, and an order of fries did too. Last but not least, advertising convinced people to buy more and more of those processed, excessively large meals.

Of course, all these factors sound very familiar to today’s well-informed public, but back then, more than a decade ago, awareness of such matters was nowhere near as acute. In 2019, a randomized controlled trial, led by Kevin D. Hall, Ph.D., stirred things up by finding an association between ultra-processed foods and weight gain that did not exist with an unprocessed diet.

So, what else is new?

In the same year, The New York Times published an exposé of a “shadowy industry group” called ILSI. Reporter Andrew Jacobs commenced by remarking that, when the food corporations objected to the proposed inclusion of red warning labels on junk food, the government of India had backed down. Those who wanted warning labels were, naturally, unhappy; so the government set up a panel of experts to review the proposal yet again.

However, the choice of a Nestlé S.A. adviser to head the three-member committee did not go over well. Dr. Boindala Sesikeran was also a representative of the International Life Sciences Institute, an American nonprofit funded by agribusiness, food, and pharmaceutical corporations that works with, or some say infiltrates, governmental bodies in charge of nutrition and health. ILSI had been founded by a high-ranking Coca-Cola executive, so what could go wrong?

Jacobs writes,

In China, the institute shares both staff and office space with the agency responsible for combating the country’s epidemic of obesity-related illness. In Brazil, ILSI representatives occupy seats on a number of food and nutrition panels that were previously reserved for university researchers.

Sounds cozy.

(To be continued…)

Your responses and feedback are welcome!

Source: “6 real culprits that are making American kids fat,” MarketWatch.com, 01/18/15
Source: “A Shadowy Industry Group Shapes Food Policy Around the World,” NYTimes.com, 09/16/19
Image by Hans/Pixabay

GLP-1 and Akkermansia, the Rest of the Story

Now, what about the GLP-1?

GLP-1 and Akkermansia, a Glowing Prospect

GLP-1 and Akkermansia

If It’s Not the Calories, What Is It?

A few details

Another multifactorial field

Deliver Us From Ethanol

Picky about prohibition

GRAS means “generally recognized as safe”

The Cancer Is Just As Real

An ocean’s width

A good example

Killer Diet on the Loose

It needed to be faced

A little surprise

Target of Influence

Action taken

What Is ILSI, and Why Does It Hate Our Kids?

The grim details

Journalism to the rescue

The Worldwide Growth of Growth

Bad habits grow fast

So, what else is new?

Profiles: Kids Struggling with Weight

The Book

About Dr. Robert A. Pretlow

Presentations

Food & Health Resources