Mental Health: Food For The Brain

Many typify good health from the neck down. But it hardly needs to be spelled out that eating too much junk food is not only bad for the way our bodies look, but also how our brain works.

 The ticket to health, happiness and clear thinking is applying those laws which regulate how our mind operates. None of the principles involved are rocket science. Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling said: “It is now recognized by leading workers in the field that behaviour is determined by the functioning of the brain, and that the functioning of the brain is dependent on its composition and its structure” (The Crazy Makers, page 39).

Edward Lee Thorndike, of Columbia University, says that “thinking is as biological as digestion” (ibid., page 47). These scientists recognize that the physical state of our brain affects our thinking.                                                       

You are what you eat!

Food for the masses no longer comes from the ground and for many, there is seldom a home cooked meal. And even “home-cooking” has been re-defined to include Hamburger Helper, canned vegetables and processed meats. And what’s left out are fresh fruits and vegetables, beneficial fats from nuts and fish (the brain is 60% fat), quality proteins such as lean meats and water.

The World Health Organization claims that mental health problems “are fast becoming the number-one health issue of the 21st century”. Clinical depression is the biggest international health threat after heart disease. And many studies now point to junk food increasing the occurrence of other mental ailments such as bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Too many people believe ill health and disease happen by chance. But studies show that nine out 10 people eat less than the recommended daily amounts of essential nutrients. They’re not called essential for nothing. When this is combined with other factors such as high homocysteine levels, which leave one twice as likely to succumb to depression, blood-sugar and neurotransmitter imbalances, it is hardly startling that people’s brain chemistry goes awry. There are definitive laws that regulate the workings of the body and these are as undeniable as gravity.

It’s yet another case of garbage in, garbage out. Whenever you eat from a can, a package or a box, food technology not only denies you essential nutrients, but it also gives you the added burden of unwanted elements. Everything we eat seems to have the stamp of ill health: irradiation, sterilization, pasteurization, over-processing, biotechnology, agricultural superbugs, overcrowded farm pens and unhealthy animal feeds, added chemicals, preservatives, sugars and harmful fats, pesticides, herbicides, steroids, hormones, and a lack of enzymes, fibre and nutrients.

Meanwhile, there is a growing interest in an orthomolecular, or nutritional approach to mental health problems. Food as medicine is not a revelatory proposition – it was the hobbyhorse of Hippocrates, the father of western medicine.

Believe it or not, what you eat becomes your brain and your body. The proteins, carbohydrates, fats, fibre, water and nutrients you ingest from wholesome foods impacts the functioning of the brain. Obviously, the nutritional value of your diet is then an important aspect to consider.

Blood sugar and the brain

Aside from nutritional deficiencies, another important key to understanding the link between eating processed foods and mood lies in understanding how blood sugar-levels affect the brain. The brain is the organ most sensitive to a change in blood [sugar] level – too little produces fatigue, confusion, irritability and aggression, while too much may result in loss of consciousness.

Processed foods like refined sugars and flours can send blood sugar levels on a roller coaster ride throughout the day, resulting in emotional ups and downs and possibly a dependence on such foods. The immediate effect on blood sugar levels after consumption is almost drug-like and temporarily lifts the moods.

Denial of cause is a growing trend in modern society, followed by shock at the occurrence of disease. The solution is to eat whole foods to feed the brain. Our physical body is not separate from our mind. If we disconnect the two, it becomes easy to think that diet plays no role in mental health. But it does, as a contributing factor. Contrary to what most assume, mental illness is not all psychological, but also physiological.

Whole foods, as close to their natural state as possible allow optimum capacity to think, reason and make decisions. Learn to apply these health principles to keep your mind sharp.

Chicken Dung Used To Feed Fish

If you’ve ever eaten farmed fish, you may not want to know what is being fed to them. The vast majority of fish served in restaurants are not wild fish but farm raised. Typically, only seafood specialty restaurants tend to have access to the more expensive wild-caught fish.The practice increases fish growth and therefore profits, and when health and profit collide, health is usually the loser.

This is unfortunate as wild fish raised in uncontaminated waters is clearly one of the healthiest foods in the world. So even though there is not a big sign on your menu, it is likely you are consuming farm-raised fish raised on feces feed and having a potential for infections.

The use of chicken feces as feed is common in integrated livestock-fish farming, which also involves the transfer of pig and duck waste directly to fish farms.

An international group of bird conservationists believes that this practice — which is routine in Asia — may be responsible for the spread of the avian flu.

Some believe the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, which oversees this practice, may have been aware for some time that there were serious health risks involved with mixing farmed fish and animal feces.

The Independent December 28, 2005

Frankensteer: A Disturbing Commentary

Firing up the coals and tossing a juicy beef patty on the grill is a summertime favourite for many people. But after watching the recent Frankensteer documentary on CBC, you may want to think twice about your charbroiled masterpiece – it could be contaminated.

The film investigates the dangers to human health posed by feedlot-raised beef, including some interesting facts about inspection rules, mad cow disease and the rampant use of drugs and growth hormones.

Among some of the revelations:

1. Every year, 50 per cent of the total tonnage of antibiotics used in Canada ends up in livestock, even if they are not sick.

2. Cows are no longer forced to eat the remains of other cows, due to Mad Cow Disease (BSE), but they are still fed cow blood and other animal remains.

3. Changes in inspection rules have shifted the responsibility for food safety from government inspectors to the people who do the slaughtring and packing.

4. Health Canada has given the go-ahead to a cancer-causing growth hormone long banned in Europe, and refused to make their decision public.

5. Ground beef is now considered a toxic product for fear of E. coli bacteria.

For the sake of this article, we’ll focus on only one of these areas of concern – E. coli 0157:H7 – which causes potentially life-threatening problems by producing a toxin that can break down the lining of the intestines and damage the kidneys. According to the Food Safety Network, victims may experience severe cramping and abdominal pain, bloody diarrhea, vomiting, or fever. It could also lead to haemolytic uraemic syndrome (HUS), a life threatening complication of haemorrhagic colitis for about 10 per cent of the cases. Approximately half the HUS patients require kidney dialysis and their illness may last for years (Health Canada).

Here’s the kicker – Health Canada does not recommend routine testing of E. coli as a public health measure, as prevalence is considered too low for testing to be effective. This despite frequent and sometimes massive beef recalls over the years, despite many of the same problems appearing in the US, Britain and other countries with similar production practices; despite the possible grave health implications to consumers. By the way, this is the same type of bacteria linked to last year’s spinach scare.

The beef industry has spent millions of dollars to reduce or eliminate these bacteria, using various measures, but the spoiled meat keeps coming. Production numbers are simply too big and cattle are packed shoulder to shoulder, and knee deep in their own waste, as they wait by the thousands to be unnaturally fattened and slaughtered.

If you plan to meat and stay healthy, then support a local farmer who is as committed to your health as his profit margin. Raising cattle free to roam and fed on grass is far superior to grain fed and chemically encouraged growth, as shown by a 2002 CBC Marketplace report comparison of samples.

Here are the conclusions:

1. Grass-fed beef has over 70% less saturated fat and over 70% less total fat.

2. Omega 3’s in pastured beef, (per gram of fat), were 3.45 times higher than in grain fed beef.

3. The ratio of Omega 6 to Omega 3 was 1:1 in pastured beef, (similar to ratios found in wild game). Grain fed beef was an unbalanced 3:1 ratio.

4. The grass-fed steak contained twice the amount of beta carotene.

So beef properly raised and as free of chemicals as possible is better for long term health, and if eaten in moderation, is a sensible part of a healthy diet.

Should We Fear The Factory Farm?

With recent reports that smaller farms are disappearing at an alarming rate, there is a real danger of the public being exposed to a growing number of unsanitary “large scale” farming practices. The dangers include technological shortcuts such as drugs, hormones and other chemicals, which pose peculiar dangers in the meat, poultry, dairy and egg industries. They are used to maximize production, but unfortunately, create conditions which foster virulent pathogen which are resistant to antibiotics.

The overuse of antibiotics in the giant farm industry is said to be largely responsible for new ‘supergerms,’ which have the potential to cause yet unknown human suffering and deaths.

New and strange maladies such as “Mad Cow Disease”, (bovine spongiform encephalopathy or BSE), peculiar to large scale farming practices, have also popped up - http://people.ku.edu/~jbrown/madcow.html . This fatal dementia affecting cattle, has affected countries the world over and brought entire agricultural businesses to their knees.

The association of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) with “Mad Cow” disease has been suspected since 1996 or so – a group of younger-aged people within Great Britain were diagnosed with a variant of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease – an unheard of circumstance a the time. Since then, numerous cases of CJD have appeared in Europe. As of January, 2001, there are approximately ninety cases reported. As of 2002, 139 cases of vCJD had been diagnosed (129 in Great Britain). The disease is invariably, fatal.

The avian influenza is another disease peculiar to large scale farming practices. The so-called “bird- flu,” has caused a panic in Hong Kong, where over one million chickens were destroyed after dozens of people died.

Food poisoning also has increased dramatically since the early 1960s, and will continue to increase, as unacceptably high levels of food- poisoning organisms in meat continue to show up. Thousands of North Americans die annually from contaminated animal ‘food’ products because the meat inspection system remains grossly inadequate. A great article, with some staggering statistics, can be found at: www.organicconsumers.org