Japanese researchers just published a study that green tea doesn’t prevent breast cancer in the Journal Breast Cancer Research.
Whenever a study does not fit our expectations, we have to consider if we are dealing with a biased or otherwise flawed study.
Do these researcher want that we throw out green and herbal teas "because they don't prevent breast cancer"? We would assume that Japanese people would want to increase the sales of their Japanese tea, wouldn’t we? But that is as flawed as thinking that all American would want to boost the sales of American lettuce.
Medical science is confusing to lay people - and to doctors as well. Clearly, this study goes in the face of everything I am standing for ) or pretty much everything), and you could call me biased. I am. And that study did not convince me that green tea is not good for you – or me. (But clearly, I have a hard time arguing my case here!).
Looking into the research, two facts are interesting: The Breast Cancer Research journal is reputable – but certainly not The Lancet, The British Medical Journal or the New England Journal of Medicine. It clearly is a second tier journal. Why was this article not accepted by any of the biggies?
The other find is that the numbers are all over the place, even more varying with the bancha than with the sencha tea drinkers. Bancha is the cheap version of sencha. Could it be that people who can’t afford sencha can also not afford a healthier diet? We know that junk food has made inroads into the Japanese society. Sencha comes out sort of even – the claim that green tea doesn’t do anything against breast cancer comes mostly from the bancha drinkers.
Since we don’t know anything else about the lifestyle of the cohort, we do not know how healthy people lived otherwise.
Meanwhile, I suggest sticking with common sense and green tea for your health because sugared beverages are clearly not the answer. Read More
Blog: On Health. On Writing. On Life. On Everything.
Do We Need Vitamins?
April 21, 2010
A recent Swedish study showed that breast cancer in women taking multivitamins was nineteen percent higher than in women who did not. Other studies earlier linked single vitamin preparations (vitamin E and A) also to higher cancer rates.
This feeds into my hunch that artificial high-dosed vitamin pills are not the same as vitamins naturally occurring in food. And why should they be?
Imagine: Glucose is a fuel molecule needed in every single cell of your body. But the moment we were able to refine sugar and put it on everybody's table, the downhill course in our health began: Diabetes, heart disease, cancer, syndrome X, depression, and so on.
Think about man-made vitamins in the same way: Too much of a good thing in too short time - your body just does not know what to do with it and is overwhelmed. As Annemarie Colbin once put it: If you pop a vitamin A in the morning, your body might be searching for the rest of the carrot the whole day…
Your vitamins should come from fresh food. There is no substitute for freshness – we are learning it now the hard way. As I see American cuisine in the last half century or so: In the fifties, families started to eat "modern" canned food and “enriched” cereals as an easy way to get meals on the table. Then frozen and take-out foods arrived. And to assuage our guilty feelings (somehow we know this can’t be right), we shove in vitamins.
Medically speaking, vitamin deficiencies do exists. If your physician diagnoses such a state, by all means take the prescribed pill. But not forever and ever. Your doctor should find out why you are deficient in the first place. Often, there is a poor diet, or an inflamed gut is unable to take up vitamins. Common causes for inflamed bowels are gluten intolerance and food sensitivities. Heal your gut with better food, and your vitamin deficiencies might improve.
In the seventies, a new fad took over: astronaut food. These were un-food-like substances (in the form of cubes in beautiful pastel colors) which could be digested without the need of elimination. See, going to the bathroom in space was considered a major obstacle. – What happened? Turns out, defecating is a marvelous thing because it eliminates wastes and toxins from the body. Astronauts got sick from their beautiful cubes, and astronaut food vanished from the market.
But wait – don’t throw out your vitamins yet. Keep them in a drawer, don’t take them every day. But if one day suddenly you feel like taking one of those vitamins; do take it. Because your body might be telling you that you need one. But only one. Read More