Immune News
Stress and Immunity
Posted April 11
By David Bergsma, Formulator of Ai/E10®
The specific role that stress, toxin, infection, poor diet and trauma play in limiting our immune performance always brings questions when I assert that these factors can limit our immune performance.
Perhaps the most common and straight-forward question regarding these factors is "how do they do that and can't we stop that from happening?"
We can stop it from happening in regards to stress by just not having any more stress in our lives. Particularly eliminating prolonged stress is helpful. Unfortunately that is not easy or even realistic for most of us.
Stress brings a release of Cortisol, a steroid hormone produced by our bodies, that suppresses immunity by attacking and destroying cells engaged in "cellular communication." It just happens. It is part of our design.
You may recall that our immune system needs an intact biochemistry and effective "cellular communication" to function effectively.
So when the cells that carry out "cellular communication" are attacked and destroyed, we experience less than optimal immune system performance.
Ai/E10® is the only dietary supplement ingredient developed specifically to support "cellular communication."
I hope that helps to explain how stress affects our immunity and why Ai/E10® is so special, so effective and so necessary for daily use year 'round.
Only Asantae has the exclusive combination of Ai/E10® and Astragalus to support immune health with Amune Plus™.
Immune News
What is Cellular Communication?
Posted 3/17
By David Bergsma, Formulator of Ai/E10®
Cellular communication is to immune function what traffic signals are to commuting.
Imagine trying to drive in Los Angeles with no traffic signals. It would not take long before you were in gridlock or worse. In a single day the entire foundation of our commuter based society would be walking and riding bikes. Much of the efficiency of our society would be lost and recovering that capability would be very difficult.
Well, the same thing happens to your immune system when cellular communication is impaired. The immune system looks for other means to carry out its work.
The immune system is much more complicated than the Los Angeles transportation system, and it has cellular communication needs that are very complex. When those needs are not met the performance of our immune system suffers and we become more likely to develop illness of all kinds.
Our immune system needs two things to function properly
1. Intact immune biochemistry.
2. Cellular communication.
Cellular communication is easily damaged by stress, toxin, infection, poor diet and trauma. These factors actually destroy and impair the cells that conduct cellular communication.
This damage interferes with our immune system's ability to Recognize foreign invaders, Respond to them and Remember them for the next time.
Fortunately, dietary supplementation can support optimized cellular communication.
Ai/E10 is the only dietary ingredient as yet developed specifically for that purpose. And only Asantae has the exclusive combination of Ai/E10® and Astragalus to support immune health with Amune Plus™.
Saturated Fat and Heart Disease
Posted Feb. 14
By Dr. Lundell
Does the thought of a steak, bacon and eggs, or real milk make you cringe thinking you're instantly clogging up your arteries? How many times have you seen physicians and nutritionists write "artery clogging saturated fats"? For the last 40 years the dietary instructions from governments and other authoritative bodies have told us to avoid all animal fats.
Americans took the message seriously and complied. Average fat consumption decreased, average blood cholesterol levels decreased but their rate of heart disease has continued to rise; the cost of its treatment has continued to rise. Now, in 2011 we have 24 MILLION people diagnosed with diabetes and another 65 million with pre-diabetes and an epidemic of obesity now afflicting over 65% of the population.
The evidence continues to mount that there's no benefit and probable harm from a low fat diet. Two recent examples, the Women's Health Initiative which studied 48,835 women demonstrating no benefit from a low fat diet in terms of heart disease or breast cancer. (Ref 1 ).
The Nurses' Health Study which has followed 90,000 female health professionals, once again demonstrated no reduction in heart disease or cancer, from a low-fat diet. (Ref 2). Even the famous Framingham study now admits there is no association between dietary fat and heart disease and indeed the association of elevated cholesterol and heart disease is limited to a small segment of the study population. (Ref 3 ).
The January 2009 American Heart Journal reported that of the 137,000 people admitted to over 500 hospitals in the United States with heart attack, nearly 75% had "normal" LDL cholesterol levels, that is below 130 ( see cholesterol converter for mg / dL to mmol / L conversion ).
The evidence against saturated fat has always been circumstantial. That is, saturated fat was said to elevate blood cholesterol and elevated blood cholesterol was said to cause heart disease therefore saturated fat would cause heart disease. There never has been any direct evidence that saturated fat caused heart disease or even a mechanism whereby heart disease would happen.
Although there are more than a dozen types of saturated fat, humans predominantly consume three; stearic acid, palmitic acid, and lauric acid. These three fats make up 95% of the saturated fat in a piece of prime rib, a slice of bacon, a piece of chicken skin, and nearly 70% of that in butter and whole milk.
It is well established that stearic acid has no affect on cholesterol levels. In fact stearic acid is converted in the liver to oleic acid which is monounsaturated like olive oil and said to be healthy. Most scientists now consider stearic acid to be benign or potentially beneficial. Palmitic and lauric acid do raise LDL cholesterol levels, but they also raise HDL cholesterol levels, and therefore may be beneficial.
Still worried about clogging up your arteries? The question reflects how most people today have become conditioned to eliminate fat from their diet for fear of clogging their arteries. With doctors and medical establishments recommending the elimination of saturated fat, nutritionists and other authors repeating the phrase "artery clogging saturated fats" the media certainly follows and we have formed a deep ingrained belief that saturated fat is evil and unhealthy.
In March of 2009, researchers from the U.S. National Cancer Institute reported that those whose diets contained the highest proportion of red or processed meat had a higher overall risk of death and specifically a higher risk of cancer and heart disease than those who ate the least processed or red meat. (Ref 4 ).
The press had a field day as the news circulated the wires quickly. Here are a few of the headlines:
"Eating red meat linked to early death, study finds"
"Study shows red meat consumption linked to higher risk of dying from cancer, heart disease"
"Death linked to too much red meat"
Dr. Michael R. Eades wrote a brilliant reply to the fault in this study and the media overreaction in a blog titled Meat and Mortality. (Ref 5 ).
Here is a brief excerpt:
"At the same time that this paper appeared, showing increased red meat consumption to be tied to a slight increased risk of death (and showing that those subjects eating white meat had less risk), a couple of other papers came out in the online pre-publication section of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (AJCN), arguably the world's most prestigious nutritional scientific journal.
These two AJCN papers saw the light of day at around the same time as this highly-publicized study on meat and mortality, but demonstrated the opposite results. They got no press coverage whatsoever. Which proves what I've been saying all along: the press is biased against meat in general, and especially against red meat."
I completely agree with Dr. Eades about the media bias and am surprised by authors who should know better and continue to write "artery clogging saturated fats".
The most recent definitive study of all the competent studies regarding saturated fats and heart disease called a meta-analysis and published in the AJCN January 13, 2010 shows that over a 5 to 23 year follow-up of 347,747 subjects, there is no association between the intake of saturated fat and heart disease or stroke.(Ref 6 ).
The bottom line is that there is no connection between the intake of saturated fat and heart disease or stroke. But there is a connection between the currently recommended high carbohydrate diet and heart disease and stroke.
So enjoy bacon and eggs and forgo the oatmeal and bagels, your LDL will come down your HDL will go up, your weight will go down and your satisfaction with your diet will go up. The low fat diet is the worst dietary advice in the last 50 years and it is the proximate cause of our epidemics of heart disease, diabetes and obesity.
Accurate knowledge cannot come from reading abstracts of articles or reporters' interpretation of the abstract.
House Calls With Dr. Lundell
Heart Health Tips
Posted Feb. 1
Check out these tips for greater heart health:
1) Stop Smoking
One in six smokers will die of lung cancer almost all the rest will die prematurely of heart disease. The chemicals that enter our bodies when we smoke cigarettes not only irritate and cause inflammation of the delicate lining of the lungs that leads to cancer, but they also irritate and inflame the delicate lining of our blood vessels leading to heart disease.
2) Control Your Weight
With 2/3 Americans overweight or obese and excess weight having now been firmly established as a significant risk factor for heart disease one of the most important things we can do is eliminate some of the excess body fat. As little as 10% will make a dramatic difference because of the significant reduction in inflammatory of cytokines produced by overloaded fat cells.
3) Control Your Blood Sugar
Elevated blood sugar is now known to kill several types of cells in the body; capillary endothelial cells in the retina of the eye, cells in the kidney, peripheral nerve cells and beta cells in the pancreas that produce insulin. This explains the unique set of complications that occur in poorly controlled diabetics namely, loss of vision, kidney failure, peripheral neuropathy pain and ultimately failure of the pancreas. Blood sugar can be controlled by reducing the intake of simple carbohydrates, notably sodas, cookies, crackers, chips, refined flower and starchy wine vegetables.
There may be others who have longer or more comprehensive lists, but at Asantae we know that the real key to heart health is controlling inflammation and oxidative stress.
Give your heart extra TLC by taking HeartShot every day and encourage your loved ones to do the same. HeartShot is a completely unique combination of ingredients that support the reduction of inflammation and oxidative stress. Get more information on HeartShot.
