People who choose not to eat for 12 hours a day, a.k.a. those who fast, claim it gives you better sleep and abs. Are these people just annoying or are they onto something?

Generally, intermittent fasting is a diet strategy that involves alternating periods of eating and extended fasting (meaning no food at all or very low calorie consumption). Theres quite a bit of debate in our research community: How much of the benefits of intermittent fasting are just due to the fact that it helps people eat less? Could you get the same benefits by just cutting your calories by the same amount? said Courtney M. Peterson, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the Department of Nutrition Sciences at the University of Alabama at Birmingham who studies time-restricted feeding, a form of intermittent fasting.

We asked Dr. Peterson and a few other experts to help us sort out the real from the scam on intermittent fasting.

There are four popular fasting approaches: periodic fasting, time-restricted feeding, alternate day fasting and the 5:2 diet. Time-restricted feeding, sometimes called daily intermittent fasting, is perhaps the easiest and most popular fasting method. Daily intermittent fasters restrict eating to certain time periods each day, say 11 in the morning to 7 at night. The fasting period is usually around 12 or more hours that, helpfully, includes time spent sleeping overnight. Periodic fasting will feel most familiar: No food or drinks with calories for 24-hour periods. Another type of fast, alternate day fasting requires severe calorie reduction every other day. Lastly, the 5:2 method was popularized by author Kate Harrisons book The 5:2 Diet" and requires fasting on two nonconsecutive days a week.

If you are obese or overweight, fasting is an effective weight loss method, if you stick to it. But it is no more effective than a diet that restricts your daily calories. We know this because there were no additional weight-loss or cardiovascular benefits of fasting two days per week, over an ordinary calorie restriction diet, in a study of 150 obese adults over the course of 50 weeks.

But you should also consider how difficult the diet will be to stick to. In a study of 100 randomized obese and overweight adults published in 2017, the dropout rate was higher with those who were fasting, 38 percent, compared to 29 percent for calorie restrictors and 26 percent for those who kept eating as they normally did.

Some people really struggle with having to monitor their intake and constantly record food in an app every day. So the takeaway of the study was if daily calorie restriction doesnt work for you, maybe alternate day fasting would be a little easier, said Krista Varady, Ph.D., professor of nutrition at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the senior author of the study. Theres nothing magical here. Were tricking people into eating less food, in different ways, she said in 2017.

There is some new evidence that shows different forms of fasting are not equal in part because some are easier than others, but also because some forms of fasting better match our bodys natural circadian rhythm, thus lowering insulin levels, increasing fat burning hormones and decreasing appetite.

Basically, because our metabolism has evolved to digest food during the day and rest at night, changing the timing of meals to earlier in the day may be beneficial.

In a study done in Dr. Petersons lab, 11 adults did time-restricted feeding (eating from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.) and a control 12-hour eating period, for four days each. On the last day of each session, researchers measured energy expenditure and hunger hormones and found that time-restricted feeding improves the appetite hormone ghrelin and increases fat burning. Its shown to reduce the amount of fat in the liver, which is a risk factor for diabetes and cardiovascular disease, said Dr. Peterson.

Bottom line: If you want to lose weight and are someone who hates counting calories, you might consider fasting, as both methods offer similar weight loss benefits.

The most effective diet is the one you can stick to while still living your best life. Its hard to know which will work best before trying, but doctors and recent studies offer some guidance. Dr. Peterson said that complete, zero-calorie fasts generally prove to be too difficult to maintain. People stick with them maybe for the short-term, but they get quite hungry in the long-term, she said.

Time-restricted feeding fasting overnight and into the next morning is likely the easiest form of fasting to comply with. A longer than normal fasting period each night allows you to burn through some of your sugar stores, called glycogen. That does a couple things. It gives your body a little bit more time to burn fat. It also may help your body get rid of any extra salt in your diet, which would lower your blood pressure, Dr. Peterson said.

There arent any studies right now that state exactly how long one should fast. Researchers, like Dr. Peterson, are working on that. The minimum amount of time it takes to make fasting efficacious hasnt been proven via study, but the prevailing notion is its somewhere between 12 and 18 hours. But it can take a few days sometimes weeks of fasting regularly for your body to start burning fat for fuel. Brooke Alpert, nutritionist and author of The Diet Detox, suggests starting by moving your last meal to around 7 p.m. She said the reason for this is our bodies are better at doing some things at certain times. Our bodies are better at processing sugar in the morning than at night, said Dr. Varady. So eat bigger meals in the morning, for example.

And how often do you have to do daily intermittent fasting to see the benefit? Again, there hasnt been a study thats shown exactly how many days you need to fast, but a recent study in rodents showed they get about the same benefits fasting five days per week as they did fasting every day. The great thing is that were learning is that this type of fasting isnt all or nothing, said Dr. Peterson.

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Are There Benefits to Intermittent Fasting? - The New York Times

When your to-do list just keeps multiplying and you feel like theres never enough time in the day, you may eat the majority of your meals on autopilot. And hey, sometimes thats necessary. If you want to give your everyday eating habits a healthy diagnostic though, try taking the healthy diet quiz designed by nutrition experts at the University of Newcastle in Australia.

The 10-minute questionnaire differs from other online quizzes about what constitutes a healthy diet. Yes, youll run through familiar questions about your macros (the fats, proteins, and carbohydrates that make up your diet). But the quiz also names a specific foodlike pumpkinand ask whether you eat it less than once a week or never or once a week or more often. Because of this extra step, the quiz gets a more better idea of what a week of eating looks like for you.

After answering questions about about the vegetables, fruits, proteins, plant-based proteins, grains, dairy, condiments, and water you consume over the course of seven days, your diet gets a score up to 73 points. A score below 33 needs work, between 33 and 38 is getting there, between 39 and 46 is excellent, and above 47 is outstanding. Youll also get a comprehensive report on the areas where your diet is fueling you, and the parts that could use improvement.

At first, I felt personally offended by my score of 37 points. Then I realized that I wasnt being penalized for the food already in my diet. Instead, the folks at the University of Newcastle want me to diversify the eating styles of those who take the 10-minute questionnaire. For example, I mostly eat cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, and spinach for my daily intake of veggies. Maybe I need to shake things up and add in green peas, tomato, and corn.

Whether you decide to take every piece of advice or not, the quiz serves to identify nutritional holes in the 21 meals you consume on a weekly basis.

Stock up on a dietitians Whole Foods shopping list to add a little variety to your fridge:

Learn the core four for making a healthy plate at every meal, and dont forget healthy desserts, too!

Link:
Is my diet healthy? This Australian quiz gave me the answer in 10 minutes - Well+Good

Its not just politics dividing dinner tables this Thanksgiving.

Carbs are the new taboo thanks to the insanely popular and uber-strict keto eating plan. And though the high-fat, low-carb diet allows for plenty of turkey, its the beloved sides that have the dieters plotting their strategy against judgmental family members and waistline-threatening treats.

Keto, which has become a favorite diet of A-listers like Halle Berry and Kourtney Kardashian, works by forcing the body into ketosis, a metabolic state in which energy is sourced from fat instead of carbs, its proponents say. But for it to work, followers have to stay away from carbs and sugar including most fruits and even some vegetables which means Thanksgiving staples such as mashed potatoes, stuffing, and sugary desserts are off-limits.

Thats going to be a challenge for keto dieters such as Daniela Gonzalez, a Chicago-based photographer, who started following the eating plan last January, along with her husband.

I was into mashed potatoes and gravy, Gonzalez, 36, says of her past carb-filled life. And cranberry sauce, which is loaded with sugar. I was a big dessert lover.

But Gonzalez has lost 46 pounds, going from 176 to 130, so she doesnt plan on indulging in no-no foods over the holidays.

Cheating would defeat my victory, the 5-foot-2-inch mom of four says.

Appeasing judgmental relatives is a constant struggle for those on the controversial diet which many doctors and dietitians say isnt sustainable for the average person and critics call a fad.

People tell me that Im going to become anorexic or have high cholesterol, she says. I have friends whose families say, Dont bring that keto stuff here.

Still, she says the haters are floored when they see her progress in person. Theyre the same people who are asking me on the side, like, Howd you do it?

She and other followers of the diet say their strategy to avoid hurt feelings over a rebuffed pecan pie is to just bring their own food partially so that they can get enough to eat, but mostly to prove that the diet isnt just butter and bacon, Gonzalez says.

Im taking a lot so they can see all the options there are. Especially for my father-in-law. Father-in-laws always have something to say.

When Gonzalez shows up to her in-laws house for Thanksgiving next week, shell be armed with a keto stuffing she uses a recipe in which the bread is replaced with a keto corn bread a Puerto Rican lechn, a keto cheesecake, keto pumpkin pie and a zucchini noodle shrimp dish.

Meanwhile, her mother-in-law will make more traditional dishes: Its kind of like a face-off, she says with a laugh.

For the most part, the diets trademark emphasis on butter may actually win over reluctant family members, says Lisa MarcAurele, 49, a Connecticut-based diet coach with 345,000 Instagram followers.

My son actually liked the mock mashed potatoes better than the regular ones because it had cream cheese, heavy cream, which is real, high fat, and butter, MarcAurele says.

Andra Barrow, whos been on the diet for about a year, says for all the trouble of planning separate dishes, itll be worth it when those who stick to the diet see the family photos later.

Last year, we were the only people we knew who weighed less after the holidays than before, says Barrow, 47, a stagehand from the Hudson Valley. Were looking forward to making it two-for-two.

Read more:
Here's how keto dieters are avoiding the carb-filled hell of Thanksgiving - New York Post

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently announced a preliminary finding that implicates a vitamin E additive as the potential cause of lung injury from THC vaping.

The agency examined fluid samples from the lungs of 29 patients with vaping-related illness and found vitamin E acetate in all 29 samples. This is a major development in the search for answers, and it was of great interest to me generally as a public health researcher.

Even more, it was of special interest to me because I previously researched vitamin Es role in lung health and development. For three years, as a post-doctoral research fellow, I studied the role of vitamin Es typical role in lung health, lung development and the epidemiology of childhood lung diseases when it is absorbed from our diet.

Vitamin E comes from oily foods in our diet. It has also long been known to be important for child development, especially in the womb, where it contributes to healthy lung and nervous system growth, among other things. Vitamin E has eight different isoforms, or types, and each may do slightly different things in our bodies. The kind of vitamin E you get from your diet can therefore vary widely based upon the types of oily foods that you eat.

When we eat vitamin E, it is absorbed by our gastrointestinal tract along with fats. It then travels throughout our bloodstream in the fatty molecules called cholesterol. Finally, it is taken up into our bodys fatty tissues and cellular membranes.

Once incorporated into the body, vitamin E serves as an antioxidant, protecting us from some of the harmful effects of our metabolism and respiration. Antioxidants stabilize what are called free radicals, unstable and highly chemically reactive compounds with extra electrons generated by our metabolism. Free radicals, when left unchecked, can destabilize other molecules around them and cause cellular damage.

When vitamin E comes into contact with certain kinds of free radicals, it transfers that instability onto itself and neutralizes those free radicals.

So, in the aftermath of the vaping illnesses and deaths, an important question emerges: What happens if, instead of eating vitamin E in your diet, you inhale vitamin E, along with a vaporized solution of THC?

I have no idea.

There are only a tiny handful of studies in which someone tried to nebulize, or vaporize, vitamin E in experiments related to lung health. All were animal studies with a small sample size, and none were combined with a THC vaping fluid.

Its also not clear in this case why vitamin E acetate was added to the vaping fluid, but reports suggest it is used as a cutting agent to make the THC oils less thick. Perhaps someone thought it was safe to do this in an inhaled product because vitamin E was a natural vitamin. Importantly, however, many substances that are helpful when taken orally can be harmful when inhaled.

The fact that vitamin E typically has to travel in fat-soluble lipids may perhaps provide a clue as to the harms vitamin E acetate can cause when vaped. Physicians have long known that inhaling oils and other lipids can lead to the deposition of oily droplets in the lungs. They also know that this deposition can in turn can lead to inflammation and the potential for permanent lung scarring, respiratory failure or death. Its not a good idea to consistently inhale particles like small solids or oily liquid drops into your very delicate lungs.

We all know what it feels like to choke on something large enough to block our windpipe. But a small, inhaled particle can go past the large airways and lodge in the tiniest airways and the alveoli that transfer oxygen into our bloodstream, causing damage to these fragile structures.

We may not notice right away that we are being harmed. Only tiny segments of the lung are affected, and our lungs are designed to have some reserve capacity.

But over time, as these small injuries add up, more and more lung tissue becomes involved, and symptoms develop. Such injuries can become fatal. For example, think of the diseases caused by asbestos, silica from sand blasting, coal dust and tobacco smoke.

So, perhaps a vitamin E additive could cause damage in a similar way in this context.

In addition, I believe this is actually a symptom of a broader problem, brought about in part by the 1994 law that allows dietary supplements and some devices to go to market without meeting stringent safety and efficacy standards. Supplement makers dont have to provide evidence that their products work, and the FDA allows them to monitor the safety features themselves.

Its a good business for the manufacturers; dietary supplements sales are estimated to be worth about US$120 billion by 2020. But it may not be good for the American public. By taking untested products, or by using products that are safe in one context but not studied in another, consumers end up participating in millions of uncontrolled experiments in which safety data are frequently absent. There is minimal quality control, minimal oversight and minimal knowledge of what might happen.

Any type of minimally regulated product that we inhale into our lungs on a regular basis clearly deserves a special level of scrutiny before use. I would argue that any inhaled product should have to demonstrate significant safety data prior to being allowed on the consumer market. Do these products even work? How do they work? If they do work, whats the right dose so that its safe, but still effective? How long can you safely use it? Without that knowledge, we are sailing in dangerous waters with no map.

So, until the day that our poorly regulated, uncontrolled market of self experimentation in lung health comes to an end, I will share a motto that experiments and experience have equally proven to be true. If you want your lungs to outlast your hair, please dont inhale anything but air.

[ Youre smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversations authors and editors. You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter. ]

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Vitamin E and vaping injuries: What's safe in your diet is rarely safe in your lungs - The Conversation US

On a bitterly cold January afternoon in 2011, Tom Gable was snowmobiling to his familys remote cabin near Killarney Provincial Park in Ontario.

Suddenly, on his right flank, a dark figure appeared across the frozen lake. Initially, I wasnt sure what I was looking at but then I realized it was a wolf, he said. I could hardly believe it I had never seen a wolf before, let alone watch one for a minute or so. I was enthralled.

It wouldnt be Gables last encounter. Far from it. Since 2015, Gable, 28, a Ph.D. student at the University of Minnesota, has been the project lead for the Voyageurs Wolf Project an ongoing research effort to uncover the secretive lives of North Woods wolves. It began as a small project in 2012 at Voyageurs National Park and increased in scope and intensity in 2015.

Gable said the project addresses one of the biggest knowledge gaps in wolf ecology: What do wolves do during the summer? The projects goal is to provide a comprehensive understanding of summer wolf ecology (number of pups born, where they den, what wolves kill and eat) in the roughly 218,000-acre Greater Voyageurs Ecosystem (which includes Voyageurs National Park) in northern Minnesota.

The research, Gable said, is conducted by trapping and fitting wolves with GPS collars that take locations every 20 minutes throughout the field season (April-October). When a collared wolf remains relatively stationary for more than 20 minutes, the site is investigated. By doing this we get all sorts of great information such as where wolves have their dens and where wolves are killing prey, Gable said.

The research is aided by remote trail cameras that capture photos and video of what Gable calls the unique and mysterious behavior of wolves in high-traffic parts of the study area. Since 2016, the wolf project has produced 13 peer-reviewed research papers. Last November, in an effort to reach a broader audience, Gable began posting findings from daily field work (including captured photos and video) on Facebook and Instagram. Its been a big hit. The wolf projects Facebook page alone has roughly 26,000 followers.

We wanted to give an intimate view into our research and the animals and ecosystem that we study, said Gable. We got a sizable following quickly. That confirmed our suspicion that the public is extremely interested in wildlife, wildlife research and wolf ecology. By maintaining our social media presence, we are able to provide content that entertains, engages, and educates the public.

Gable and his seven-person crew recently finished the 2019 field season in which the group monitored 11 collared wolves from seven packs. Now Gable begins analyzing the research and writing papers.

We had a wonderful crew this year, said Gable. Finishing up is very satisfying but also a relief because after seven months of continual field work, we are just running on fumes both physically and mentally. Our field seasons are pretty intense because we cover a lot of ground every day in all kinds of conditions.

The Voyageurs Wolf Project is a collaborative effort between the National Park Service and the University of Minnesota. Its funded by the states lottery-funded Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund and other sources.

In a recent conversation, Gable elaborated on some discoveries about wolves diets and their much-publicized pursuit of fish. The excerpts have been edited for length and clarity.

On research discoveries

Wolves hunt and kill beavers by bedding down around beaver ponds and waiting for many hours to ambush them. This has been a particularly fascinating finding because before our work, wolves were not really thought of as ambush predators. Most of the time wolves hunt their prey by outrunning and outlasting their prey, like chasing down a deer. Our study is the first to systematically show that wolves can ambush prey, and we are learning more every year about how they actually do this. We were the first to document wolves hunting and killing freshwater fish. Researchers had known wolves went after spawning salmon in coastal areas of Alaska and British Columbia, but that is categorically different from wolves catching suckers in a little creek in the North Woods. And not only did we document it, but we were able to get it on video footage.

On the varied diets of wolves

Wolves are adaptable predators. They have very flexible diets that change dramatically throughout the summer season. During winter, wolves diets are not nearly as varied because they are mainly hunting and killing whitetail deer. But from spring to fall, things are much different. We have shown that during this period wolves rely on all sorts of food sources including deer, beavers, blueberries, fish, trumpeter swans, bear bait piles, and hunter-killed bear carcasses. Typically, the diet of our wolf packs is different from month to month.

On using social media

Ultimately, our vision with our social media platforms is to couple cutting-edge wolf research with highly effective outreach, which allows the Voyageurs Wolf Project to have tremendous value to both the scientific community and the public. I think most in the scientific community know that effective public outreach is important, but this is something that researchers are often not great at. Part of this is because most researchers receive little to no training on how to effectively share their research. The other part is that good outreach, just like good science, requires time and effort. And there is little incentive for researchers to devote their often limited time or financial resources to developing materials or content for outreach.

On rigors of the work

We estimate that a typical person on our crew covers between 700 to 850 miles during the field season. And most of these miles are not on nicely maintained hiking trails. Instead, we are usually bushwhacking through the thick, dense and often swampy forests of northern Minnesota. June to August are by far the most challenging months for our crew because its hot, humid, and the bugs (in particular, the deer flies) are horrible. Thats in part why theres so little research on summer wolves.

On research in 2020

We basically have to start over. We start trying to collar wolves in mid-April. The reason is battery life. When collars take locations every 20 minutes (which is what we need for our work), it chews up a lot of battery life, so our collars only last one field season. To continue our work, we need to get fresh collars on wolves.

On the future of the project

Our goal is to secure permanent, long-term funding that allows the Voyageurs Wolf Project to continue for decades to come. We have published several research papers since 2016 and presented our results at numerous regional, national and international scientific conferences. I would like to write a book someday but think we need at least a few more years of research before that is something I would seriously consider.

Tori J. McCormick is a freelance writer. Reach him at torimccormick33@gmail.com.

Continued here:
Uncovering the secretive lives of Minnesota's North Woods wolves - Minneapolis Star Tribune

The current population of the United States: 327.2 million. The number of students attending New York Public Schools: 1.1 million. The number of meals the system serves each day: 1 million. And the number of those meals with meat on Mondays?

Zero.

In March NYC announced that for the 2019-2020 school year, the citys more than 1,800 public schools would join Meatless Monday, a global movement promoting healthy people and the environment by swapping meat for veggies, just one day a week. Theyre joining hundreds of other K-12 schools, more than 150 U.S. universities, large hospital systems, celebrities like Ariana Grande, Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney and others from more than 40 countries.

By 2050, the worlds population is expected to reach 9.7 billion. And in a special UN Report in August, more than 100 scientists suggested that industrialized nations like the United States should move toward plant-based diets to ensure everyone eats in an environmentally friendly way.

As younger generations embrace plant-based foods, going meatless just one day a week offers hope for a simple solution. Could it be so easy?

We examined the nations largest school system for a sneak peak: One in 300 Americans are sitting in our schools every single day, said Isabelle Boundy, Assistant Press Secretary at the NYC Department of Education. Were very aware that the eyes of the nation are often on New York.

On Mondays, New Yorks k-12 students munch down on vegetarian specials like stuffed shells with marinara, mac-and-cheese, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and hummus. Recently, fourth-graders visited a test kitchen in Queens to sample vegan burgers that will potentially make the menu.

NYC is part of a trend thats likely here to stay. The market for plant-based foods, worth nearly $4.5 billion, grew 31 percent in just two years.

Call it flexitarian, reductaterian or just an interest in testing out new plant-based foods, surveys have found that 22 percent of Americans are working on consuming less meat, and 39 percent which includes 50 percent of millennials are trying to eat more plant-based foods. Even Burger Kingand McDonalds are testing the waters.

It's really the thought that, oh, I can have more plant based meals in my diet and be O.K, said Becky Ramsing, Senior Program Officer for Food, Communities and Public Health at Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future and a scientific advisor for Meatless Mondays.

The future is plant-forward. Cutting meat is doable. But measuring what that means for the climate is complicated.

Economists like Ramsing, nutritionists and climate scientists studying food and the environment say theres no blanket formula to reach a sustainable future. Food systems are complicated, global, interdependent and interconnected, leaving researchers with a planet-sized balancing act instead. Food sourcing, production methods (even with meat), menu planning, nutritional needs, economic priorities, cultural traditions and how meatless days roll out from place to place: They all add weight.

You can create a model diet, or a scenario diet, or an average diet, but theres just so much variation across people, across diets, across foods, nothing is perfect, says Rebecca Boehm, an economist at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

But the research is still useful.

Counting carbon

A recent study looking at how meatless days affected greenhouse gas and water footprints in 140 countries found that if everyone in the United States participated in a meatless day, they could cut greenhouse gasses by 22 percent. Just half participation could cut 11 percent, and a third? Six percent. But thats if substitution diets were healthy. With more typical American diets, which contain more dairy and fewer veggies, meatless days dropped greenhouse gasses by only 4 percent.

It matters where you produce the food, from a climate perspective, but it also matters how you consume it, from a nutrition and health perspective. And those elements are not always in sync, said Martin Bloem, director at Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future and author on the study.

Thats especially important in schools, where menu planners balance nutritional standards, feasibility, affordability and taste, says Sean Cash, an economist at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University.

Cashhasnt examined New York, but in another large school district practicing Meatless Mondays, hes found that when planners simply rearrange existing menu items, such as serving burgers on Monday or Tuesday, it doesnt matter.

New York City only shared that its meatless meals are healthy, free, evaluated highly by students and still contain cheese, which limits their impact.

In some cases we might caution with: If you run all the numbers of the greenhouse gas impact of a meatless meal one day a week in a school, it's going to be low, said Ramsing. "But if you think about its potential, it can be huge.

Starting conversations

Whats more important than some kind of magic formula, she added, is realizing that the next generation of eaters has a better chance of adopting lifelong habits and influencing others.

Peggy Neu, President of the Meatless Mondays campaign, agrees: Its a promotional platform for conversation and often participants extend meatless meals to other days or their families, their surveys have shown. It doesnt work without the conversation, adds Bloem.

New York City took a big step toward opening this conversation by announcing their plans years ahead. Theyve removed politics, finances and stigma from the equation by providing free lunch for all. And as part of the Urban School Food Alliance,a nonprofit group including school food service professionals from the largest cities in the nation, theyre ultimately influencing school systems nationwide with purchasing power that drives supply.

But it doesnt always play out this way, said Cash. Other paths to a sustainable future may be more appropriate in cases where cultural, financial, political or personal positions clash with Meatless Mondays.

We need to be creative again how to use food, said Bloem. We are at the beginning of a big shift in thinking. Food is now linked with health, nutrition, climate, culture and money. Thats not the way we thought about it ten years ago.

I think it will be a small revolution.

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What happens when the nation's largest school system goes meatless one day a week? - The Hill

As we enter the holiday season, Americans are abandoning their attempts to be healthy,as about half will break their diet andgive in to the temptation of holiday food, according to new research.

A survey of 2,000 Americans who celebrate the holidaysfound that 47 percent have succumbed tothe lure of their favorite treats, and ended up quitting their diet as a result.The biggest food temptations were found to be cookies (53 percent), pies or cakes (53 percent) and home-cooked holiday meals (44 percent).

Santa will eat 300 million cookies alone. (iStock)

NEIL CAVUTO 'CAN'T STAND' THIS ONE DISH AT HIS THANKSGIVING DINNER

But theyre not alone in making unhealthy decisions at the end of the year: The results of the second annual Writing Off the End of the Year survey have found that 41 percent use the holidays as an excuse to postpone being healthy, compared to 47 percent the previous year.

Commissioned by Herbalife Nutrition and conducted by OnePoll, the survey found that for those planning to start again in January,"a third start postponing their healthy habits by mid-November.

Fifty-ninepercent of respondents said it was hardest to stay healthy during the winter holiday season, and food is a major reason why. Forty-four percent also admitted to having eaten more than one dessert at a meal, while 36 percent have eaten more than one holiday dinner in a day. Another30 percent say theyve had to undo a button on their pants because of eating too much.

In fact, the average person expects to gain six pounds during the holiday season, according to both the 2018 and 2019 survey.

The biggest food temptations were found to be cookies (53 percent), pies or cakes (53 percent) and home-cooked holiday meals (44 percent). (iStock)

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And the survey found that three in 10 actually plan to eat more during the holidays specifically because their New Years resolution is to be healthier.

Staying on track can be hard especially if you are tackling it on your own,"says Dr. John Agwunobi, co-president and chief health and nutrition officer at Herbalife Nutrition."Developing a support system of people who know your goals, strengths and weaknesses can be extremely beneficial in maintaining a healthy lifestyle, especially during the challenging times of the year.

In addition to overindulging, not getting enough exercise was another reason respondents might be piling on the pounds during the holidays. Twenty-seven percent of respondents say they exercise less during the holidays and of those, the average time spent working out each week was two hours less than usual.

Interestingly, this years survey showed that respondents are less optimistic about their ability to stay healthy in the new year (45 percent)as compared to 2018 when54 percent believed their efforts would be successful.

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But with January comes a new year, new me attitude, and results found that 33 percent are planning to make a New Years resolution compared to 34 percent last year.

The top resolution for the second consecutive year is to exercise more. In 2018, however, that resolution ranked higher among respondents. (Just 59 percent listed it as their 2019 goal, as compared to 71 percent in 2018.) Eating healthier and saving more money accounted for the second and third most common resolutions, with59 percentand 53 percent planning to do so, respectively.

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Half of Americans plan to abandon their diets around the holidays, survey finds - Fox News

YOUR morning coffee may have the power to get you out of bed in the morning - but it could also be making it more difficult for you to lose weight.

Top nutritionist and fitness blogger Graeme Tomlinson has revealed that your choice of cup of joe could be adding over 15,000 calories to your monthly diet.

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Despite this, he says you can still incorporate coffee into a healthy diet, as long as you make the right choices.

He says: "There is nothing wrong with consuming cappuccinos, lattes or caramel macchiatos.

"But if one is persistently bemoaning lack of progress regarding composition, reduction of such beverages offer a very easy opportunity to support a caloric deficit without upheaval of habitual eating habits."

In particular, Graeme highlights thatcoffee in its purest form - such as a large americano - contains no calories whatsoever.

Whether its coffee, a biscuit or any given food, seemingly insignificant alternations to minuscule parts of overall diet are likely to be the tweaks that finally deliver significant results

However, if you opt for a caramel macchiato you would be consuming 250 calories, and if you have 14 of these a month that's 3500 calories.

Similarly, a large caffe latte contains 290 calories, and 14 of these a month would total up to 2660 calories.

And a large cappuccino contains 120 calories, and you'd be drinking 1680 liquid calories a month if you had 14.

Graeme points out that simply picking an americano over a macchiato, latte or cappucino could make a huge difference to your diet and maximise your weight loss results.

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He says: "Selection of alternative coffee inclusive drinks at lower (or no) caloric cost can ensure that one still gets their fill of daily coffee whilst also getting more progress in their compositional goal."And while it may be difficult to ditch that creamy coffee at first, small changes can ultimately make a big difference.

Graeme adds: "Whether its coffee, a biscuit or any given food, seemingly insignificant alternations to minuscule parts of overall diet are likely to be the tweaks that finally deliver significant results.

"But more importantly, make the results last forever."

NHS tips for weight loss success

The NHS has shared their three key tips for weight loss success:

Lots of useat and drink more than we realise and do little physical activity. The result is often weight gain.

To lose weight, we need to change our current habits. Thismeans eating less even when eating ahealthy, balanced diet and getting more active.

Fad dietsand exercise regimes that result in rapid weight loss are unlikely to work for long, because these kinds of lifestyle changes can't be maintained.

Once you stop the regime, you're likely to return to old habits and regain weight.

Source: NHS

Graeme's comments come after scientists found a cup of coffee can help the body burn calories faster.

They say it stimulates "brown fat", which burns calories to generate body heat.

Professor Michael Symonds, from the University of Nottingham, said theirs is the first study to show how coffee can affect brown fat in humans.

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He said the breakthrough could help tackle the obesity crisis.

"Brown fat works in a different way to other fat in your body and produces heat by burning sugar and fat, often in response to cold," he explained.

"Increasing its activity improves blood sugar control as well as improving blood lipid (fat) levels and the extra calories burnt help with weight loss.

"This is the first study in humans to show that something like a cup of coffee can have a direct effect on our brown fat functions."

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Weight loss: Coffee could be adding 15,000kcals to your diet a month the best swaps for dieters - The Sun

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently announced a preliminary finding that implicates a vitamin E additive as the potential cause of lung injury from THC vaping.

The agency examined fluid samples from the lungs of 29 patients with vaping-related illness and found vitamin E acetate in all 29 samples. This is a major development in the search for answers, and it was of great interest to me generally as a public health researcher.

Even more, it was of special interest to me because I previously researched vitamin Es role in lung health and development. For three years, as a post-doctoral research fellow, I studied the role of vitamin Es typical role in lung health, lung development and the epidemiology of childhood lung diseases when it is absorbed from our diet.

Free radical fighter

Vitamin E comes from oily foods in our diet. It has also long been known to be important for child development, especially in the womb, where it contributes to healthy lung and nervous system growth, among other things. Vitamin E has eight different isoforms, or types, and each may do slightly different things in our bodies. The kind of vitamin E you get from your diet can therefore vary widely based upon the types of oily foods that you eat.

When we eat vitamin E, it is absorbed by our gastrointestinal tract along with fats. It then travels throughout our bloodstream in the fatty molecules called cholesterol. Finally, it is taken up into our bodys fatty tissues and cellular membranes.

Once incorporated into the body, vitamin E serves as an antioxidant, protecting us from some of the harmful effects of our metabolism and respiration. Antioxidants stabilize what are called free radicals, unstable and highly chemically reactive compounds with extra electrons generated by our metabolism. Free radicals, when left unchecked, can destabilize other molecules around them and cause cellular damage.

When vitamin E comes into contact with certain kinds of free radicals, it transfers that instability onto itself and neutralizes those free radicals.

So, in the aftermath of the vaping illnesses and deaths, an important question emerges: What happens if, instead of eating vitamin E in your diet, you inhale vitamin E, along with a vaporized solution of THC?

I have no idea.

There are only a tiny handful of studies in which someone tried to nebulize, or vaporize, vitamin E in experiments related to lung health. All were animal studies with a small sample size, and none were combined with a THC vaping fluid.

Its also not clear in this case why vitamin E acetate was added to the vaping fluid, but reports suggest it is used as a cutting agent to make the THC oils less thick. Perhaps someone thought it was safe to do this in an inhaled product because vitamin E was a natural vitamin. Importantly, however, many substances that are helpful when taken orally can be harmful when inhaled.

No place for oily molecules

The fact that vitamin E typically has to travel in fat-soluble lipids may perhaps provide a clue as to the harms vitamin E acetate can cause when vaped. Physicians have long known that inhaling oils and other lipids can lead to the deposition of oily droplets in the lungs. They also know that this deposition can in turn can lead to inflammation and the potential for permanent lung scarring, respiratory failure or death. Its not a good idea to consistently inhale particles like small solids or oily liquid drops into your very delicate lungs.

We all know what it feels like to choke on something large enough to block our windpipe. But a small, inhaled particle can go past the large airways and lodge in the tiniest airways and the alveoli that transfer oxygen into our bloodstream, causing damage to these fragile structures.

We may not notice right away that we are being harmed. Only tiny segments of the lung are affected, and our lungs are designed to have some reserve capacity.

But over time, as these small injuries add up, more and more lung tissue becomes involved, and symptoms develop. Such injuries can become fatal. For example, think of the diseases caused by asbestos, silica from sand blasting, coal dust and tobacco smoke.

So, perhaps a vitamin E additive could cause damage in a similar way in this context.

A bigger issue

In addition, I believe this is actually a symptom of a broader problem, brought about in part by the 1994 law that allows dietary supplements and some devices to go to market without meeting stringent safety and efficacy standards. Supplement makers dont have to provide evidence that their products work, and the FDA allows them to monitor the safety features themselves.

Its a good business for the manufacturers; dietary supplements sales are estimated to be worth about US$120 billion by 2020. But it may not be good for the American public. By taking untested products, or by using products that are safe in one context but not studied in another, consumers end up participating in millions of uncontrolled experiments in which safety data are frequently absent. There is minimal quality control, minimal oversight and minimal knowledge of what might happen.

Any type of minimally regulated product that we inhale into our lungs on a regular basis clearly deserves a special level of scrutiny before use. I would argue that any inhaled product should have to demonstrate significant safety data prior to being allowed on the consumer market. Do these products even work? How do they work? If they do work, whats the right dose so that its safe, but still effective? How long can you safely use it? Without that knowledge, we are sailing in dangerous waters with no map.

So, until the day that our poorly regulated, uncontrolled market of self experimentation in lung health comes to an end, I will share a motto that experiments and experience have equally proven to be true. If you want your lungs to outlast your hair, please dont inhale anything but air.

[ Youre smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversations authors and editors. You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter. ]

Cosby Stone, Instructor in Allergy/Immunology, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Vanderbilt University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Image: Reuters

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How Vaping Could Create a Bigger Health Risk - The National Interest Online

We love sweet treats. But too much sugar in our diets can lead to weight gain and obesity, type 2 diabetes, and dental decay. We know we shouldnt be eating candy, ice cream, cookies, and cakes and drinking sugary sodas, but sometimes they are so hard to resist.

Its as if our brain is hardwired to want these foods.

As a neuroscientist, my research centers on how modern day obesogenic, or obesity-promoting, diets change the brain. I want to understand how what we eat alters our behavior and whether brain changes can be mitigated by other lifestyle factors.

Your body runs on sugarglucose to be precise. Glucose comes from the Greek word glukos, which means sweet. Glucose fuels the cells that make up our bodyincluding brain cells (neurons).

On an evolutionary basis, our primitive ancestors were scavengers. Sugary foods are excellent sources of energy, so we have evolved to find sweet foods particularly pleasurable. Foods with unpleasant, bitter, and sour tastes can be unripe, poisonous, or rottingcausing sickness.

So to maximize our survival as a species, we have an innate brain system that makes us like sweet foods since theyre a great source of energy to fuel our bodies.

When we eat sweet foods the brains reward systemcalled the mesolimbic dopamine systemgets activated. Dopamine is a brain chemical released by neurons and can signal that an event was positive. When the reward system fires, it reinforces behaviorsmaking it more likely for us to carry out these actions again.

Dopamine hits from eating sugar promote rapid learning to preferentially find more of these foods.

Our environment today is abundant with sweet, energy-rich foods. We no longer have to forage for these special sugary foodsthey are available everywhere. Unfortunately, our brain is still functionally very similar to our ancestors, and it really likes sugar. So what happens in the brain when we excessively consume sugar?

The brain continuously remodels and rewires itself through a process called neuroplasticity. This rewiring can happen in the reward system. Repeated activation of the reward pathway by drugs or by eating lots of sugary foods causes the brain to adapt to frequent stimulation, leading to a sort of tolerance.

In the case of sweet foods, this means we need to eat more to get the same rewarding feelinga classic feature of addiction.

Food addiction is a controversial subject among scientists and clinicians. While it is true that you can become physically dependent on certain drugs, it is debated whether you can be addicted to food when you need it for basic survival.

Regardless of our need for food to power our bodies, many people experience food cravings, particularly when stressed, hungry, or just faced with an alluring display of cakes in a coffee shop.

To resist cravings, we need to inhibit our natural response to indulge in these tasty foods. A network of inhibitory neurons is critical for controlling behavior. These neurons are concentrated in the prefrontal cortexa key area of the brain involved in decision-making, impulse control, and delaying gratification.

Inhibitory neurons are like the brains brakes and release the chemical GABA. Research in rats has shown that eating high-sugar diets can alter the inhibitory neurons. The sugar-fed rats were also less able to control their behavior and make decisions.

Importantly, this shows that what we eat can influence our ability to resist temptations and may underlie why diet changes are so difficult for people.

A recent study asked people to rate how much they wanted to eat high-calorie snack foods when they were feeling hungry versus when they had recently eaten. The people who regularly ate a high-fat, high-sugar diet rated their cravings for snack foods higher even when they werent hungry.

This suggests that regularly eating high-sugar foods could amplify cravingscreating a vicious circle of wanting more and more of these foods.

Another brain area affected by high sugar diets is the hippocampusa key memory center.

Research shows that rats eating high-sugar diets were less able to remember whether they had previously seen objects in specific locations before.

The sugar-induced changes in the hippocampus were both a reduction of newborn neurons, which are vital for encoding memories, and an increase in chemicals linked to inflammation.

The World Health Organization advises that we limit our intake of added sugars to 5% of our daily calorie intake, which is 25g (six teaspoons).

Considering the average Canadian adult consumes 85g (20 teaspoons) of sugar per day, this is a big diet change for many.

Importantly, the brains neuroplasticity capabilities allow it to reset to an extent following cutting down on dietary sugar, and physical exercise can augment this process. Foods rich in omega-3 fats (found in fish oil, nuts, and seeds) are also neuroprotective and can boost brain chemicals needed to form new neurons.

While its not easy to break habits like always eating dessert or making your coffee a double-double, your brain will thank you for making positive steps.

Read the original post:
This is what consuming sugar does to your brain - Fast Company