Why carbs are the wrong foods for diabetics

[Guest guest]

Correct dietary treatment for Diabetes-2. Part 4: Why diabetics should not

eat carbohydrates

DIABETES TYPE-2

Part 4: Why carbs are the wrong foods for diabetics

Obviously something has gone very wrong with the conventional treatment of

Type-2 diabetes and a growing number of nutritionists and nutritionally

oriented

doctors are beginning to question the conventional wisdom behind the

standard diabetic diet. In this part we discuss what that might be.

What Is Diabetes?

I believe we need another definition of Type-2 diabetes. And that is:

Diabetes mellitus is a chronic disorder of carbohydrate metabolism .

The chief substance in the body responsible for keeping blood-sugar levels

in check is the hormone insulin. In diabetes, either there is insufficient

insulin

or the insulin simply doesn't do its job. Between 5% and 10% of diabetics

has what is known as type 1 diabetes, where the body fails to make

sufficient

quantities of insulin. In the more common type 2 diabetes, there is usually

plenty of insulin around – the problem is that the body has become resistant

to its effects.

Whatever the precise nature of the diabetes, eating a diet that helps to

keep blood-sugar levels on an even keel is of obvious importance. Until

recently,

the traditional view has been that sugar, because it causes surges in

blood-sugar levels, should be limited in the diet. On the other hand,

starches such

as bread, potato, rice and pasta are recommended by doctors and dieticians

because of the long-held belief that they give slow, sustained releases of

sugar

into the bloodstream. Fruit is also recommended because it is believed the

sugar fruit contains – fructose – also does not raise insulin levels.

And this approach shows better than anything just how little the diabetes

establishment understands about diabetes – because, biochemically, it makes

no

sense whatsoever.

Let me give you a short chemistry lesson.

Sugars

The first and most important point to make is that all carbohydrates are

sugars , although we do not normally call them that, but differentiate

between

those that taste sweet, which we call 'sugar', and those that don't, which

we call 'starch'.

The simple sugars in foods that are most important to human nutrition are

called sucrose, fructose, lactose, and maltose. But the body is only

interested

in the simple sugar called glucose, so these other simple sugars break apart

in the digestion to become glucose.

Sucrose is the white granulated stuff we call 'sugar' and put in bowls on

the table. Sucrose is the form of sugar we are most familiar with. It is

obtained

from sugar cane, sugar beets, and the syrup from sugar maple trees. It is

also naturally present in some amounts in most fruits and vegetables, along

with

higher amounts of other sugars. Whenever the word 'sugar' is used in common

conversation, it is usually sucrose that is being referred to. Sucrose is a

disaccharide (meaning 'two sugars') which hydrolyses to glucose and

fructose.

Fructose is the form of sugar found in fruits, honey, and corn syrup. It is

1.7 times as sweet as sucrose. In recent times fructose, which is every bit

as much a sugar as sucrose, has been added to processed foods so that the

manufacturers can say on the packet that their product 'has no added sugar'.

It's a legal loophole as fructose is a sugar. Fructose is a monosaccharide

(meaning 'one sugar') which is absorbed intact and changed into glucose by

the

liver. Diabetics are told that they can eat fruit so, presumably fructose is

thought to be all right.

Lactose is the sugar found in milk and cottage cheese. A disaccharide, it is

hydrolysed into glucose and galactose. The galactose is changed into glucose

in the liver

Maltose is a disaccharide sugar found in grains. It hydrolyses into glucose

and glucose. Thus, for diabetics it seems to be the worst 'sugar'.

Note that all these sugars end in 'ose'. Anything you see on the label of a

product ending with these three letters is almost certain to be a sugar.

Dextrose,

for example, is merely another name for glucose. The only exception is

cellulose, which, while it is a complex sugar molecule, is the material that

plant

cell walls are made of. Cellulose only has a food value for a herbivore. It

is inedible to a carnivore and as the human digestive system has no enzyme

to digest it, cellulose has no nutritional value and passes straight through

you. It used to be called 'roughage'; we now call it fibre.

Dietary Nonsense

Next we need to understand how the current recommendations are actually

based on what I can only describe as dietary nonsense.

Note that DiabetesUK recommendations are to eat at least five servings of

fruit and vegetables every day and base meals and snacks on starchy foods.

Also

note that on the plate (left) sugar is lumped together with fats at the

bottom. Now this is why this is nonsense:

You are told to 'Cut down on . . . sugary foods'

The chemical name for sugar – the white granulated stuff you put in your

tea – is sucrose. Sucrose is a disaccharide , which means two sugars. Its

chemical

formula, C 12 H 22 O 11 , means that it is made up of twelve atoms of

carbon, twenty-two atoms of hydrogen and eleven atoms of oxygen. When it is

digested,

it enters the bloodstream as the blood sugar, glucose, whose formula is C 6

H 12 O 6 . In this process one molecule of C 12 H 22 O 11 ends up as two

molecules

of C 6 H 12 O 6 . But you will notice that sucrose has only twenty-two

hydrogen and eleven oxygen atoms, before it can become glucose, it must gain

two

hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom somehow. It does this very simply by

combining with water whose chemical formula is H 2 O (which means it has two

hydrogen

atoms and one oxygen atom – exactly what we need). The process is

illustrated thus:

C 12 H 22 O 11 + H 2 O == 2 C 6 H 12 O 6

1 Sucrose + 1 Water == 2 glucose

The addition of the water molecule to the sugar molecule increases the total

energy content. In this way, 100g of sugar, which you would think contains

400 kcals, ends up as 105g of glucose or 420 kcals.

'Base meals and snacks on starchy foods'

The situation is similar with starches. Dieticians call starches 'complex

carbohydrates' or polysaccharides , which means many sugars. Our digestion

also

converts these into glucose but, in this case, the formula is a little

different. Starch is made up of strings of thousands of sugar molecules

fastened

together. The formula for each of these individual sugar molecules is C 6 H

10 O 5 so, to make it into C 6 H 12 O 6, it again needs to find two hydrogen

atoms and one oxygen atom. So one molecule of water, H 2 O, is combined with

each of the starch sugars. In this way:

C 6 H 10 O 5 + H 2 O == C 6 H 12 O 6

Starch + Water == glucose

But as the atoms from the water now form a greater proportion of the total

in this equation, 100g of starch actually become 111 g of glucose or 444

calories.

That's more than the sugar!

So if you are taking DiabetesUK's advice for weight loss and trying to

reduce your calorie intake, basing meals on starchy foods doesn't look like

a very

clever thing to do.

And the second piece of advice appears to be no more sound:

Q: What are diabetics told to eat?

A: " 5 portions of fruit and vegetables a day "

Q: What carbohydrate do fruit and vegetables contain?

A: FRUCTOSE – which is a sugar!

Ah, yes . . . but . . . glucose raises blood levels very quickly (Fructose

is preferred to glucose because it is thought to take longer to raise blood

sugar).

Earlier I lied . . . well didn't tell the whole truth. You see C 6 H 12 O 6

is the formula for both glucose and fructose

Sucrose hydrolyses to 50% glucose and 50% fructose. In other words, table

sugar is half fructose . . .whereas starch hydrolyses to glucose alone. So

does

that make sugar healthier than fruit?

Perhaps not . . .

You might point out that, on DiabetesUK's plate, equal emphasis is given to

both glucose-producing starch and fructose-producing fruit and veg. In the

USA,

the American Diabetes Association places a bigger emphasis on starches,

telling diabetics to eat 6 to 11 portions of bread, pasta and so forth a

day –

so is that healthier in the USA than fruit?

The belief seems to be that glucose raises blood levels and, consequently,

insulin levels quickly but, as fructose doesn't require insulin, it is

healthier.

But again it isn't that simple. The aim of diabetes treatment is to reduce

the complications, the major one being heart attacks. In this respect

fructose

does not seem to be a good choice because:

Fructose Increases CHD Risk!

fructose glycosylates haemoglobin 7 times faster than glucose.

(1)

This may be important because glycosylation (as well as oxidation) of other

proteins, including LDL & HDL particles, may increase the growth rate of

atheroma..

(2)

Fructose also appears to increase Total Cholesterol (TC) primarily by

elevating LDL-C.

(3)

Increasing dietary fructose from 3% to 20% of calories at the expense of

starch increased Total Cholesterol by 9% and LDL by 11%.

It appears that every 2% increase in dietary fructose raises LDL by more

than 1%. Swanson et al say that " There is now reason to believe that dietary

fructose

will increase the risk of atherosclerosis. "

The glycosylation of proteins is also responsible for the other

complications of diabetes which were listed in Part 1

So one has to ask: why are diabetics at such risk told to " Eat five portions

of fruit and vegetables a day " ?

Conclusion

Diabetes mellitus is a disease of incorrect nutrition.

The disease develops as a result of a high intake of carbohydrates – the

'healthy' diet.

Since 'healthy eating' was introduced, type 2 diabetes has become epidemic

to such an extent that it now affects children.

This increase at such a time is NOT a coincidence – it is cause and effect.

The reason conventional treatment of diabetes fails is because authoritative

bodies such as DiabetesUK and the American Diabetes Association promote the

very diet that caused the disease in the first place – a diet that actually

exacerbates the condition..

Fortunately Type-2 diabetes is easily treated without the need to resort to

drugs by:

A strategy that offers the prospect of cure or successful treatment for

diabetes is one that limits hyperinsulinaemia by restricting carbohydrate

intake

– the exact opposite of the conventional approach.

Part 5

looks at some of the evidence that eating a low-carb, high-fat diet is

better for diabetics.

References

1. Bunn HF, Higgins PJ. Reaction of monosaccharides with proteins: possible

evolutionary significance. Science 1981;213:222-9.

2. Bierman EL. Arteriosclerosis and Thrombosis 1992;12:647-646.

3. Swanson JE, Laine DC, W, Bantle JP. Metabolic effects of dietary

fructose in healthy subjects. Am J Clin Nutr 1992;55:851-6.