Brain Decline with Alzheimer's

Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia can certainly be affected by diet. One obvious source of problems is the generalised inflammation which occurs with a high sugar diet.

“High sugar” includes the sugar derived from all starches in the diet. Starches include potatoes, rice, bread and pasta. All these foods consist of 95% or more sugar. They do not taste sweet, but when they are broken down in digestion sugar is released.

The high level of generalised inflammation which these sugars in the diet tend to cause is made worse, the more starches that are eaten. Refined sugar is the worst type of starch to eat; but all starches have this inflammatory effect to some degree.

A recent study showed that in just a matter of four weeks cognitive skills were adversely affected by a diet relatively high in starchy food and sugar and high in saturated fats. Those in the study consisted of 50% of people with with mild cognitive disability, and 50% who were healthy.

Read details at this blog post. Diet does affect brain function.

http://livingto150.com/dementia-low-saturated-fat-low-sugar-helps

It is pretty clear that diets can make cognitive decline, including Alzheimer’s disease, more likely; and faster to take hold.

Related Articles For Alzheimer’s Disease

• Diet and Alzheimer’s Disease – Some Evidence (foodworksblog.wordpress.com)
• First sign of Alzheimer’s Disease (poshcaresupport.com)

Diet and Alzheimers Disease is a post from: Alternative HealthZine

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Consumer magazine Which? tested out UK breakfast cereals. recently for sugar. Not too surprisingly, they found some with very high levels of added sugar..

In fact, they found that some of them were hard to distinguish from sweets.

Top of the sugar pile were supermarket Morrisons’ Choco Crackles. They had more sugar in a serving than is found in a Cadbury’s chocolate flake. Two Kellogg’s products came closely after them – containing 37% sugar.

Special K, marketed at those wishing to lose weight, was not much better. Which? said that starting the day with Special K gave a similar sugar hit to starting the day with Tesco’s Dark Chocolate Fudge Cake Ice Cream.

Question: What do you have for breakfast? Put in a comment.

Best avoid those manufactured breakfast cereals, methinks.

Cereal – Or Sweeties? is a post from: Alternative HealthZine

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Ten litres of Coke – or Pepsi – is a lot. Truth is, some people are drinking this every day.

It’s no wonder that it causes problems. These are mainly caused by  hypokalaemia – insufficient potassium in the blood. The deficiency is caused by an excess of caffeine plus sugar.

It is incredible to think that people drink this amount of cola; but they do.

A Greek study highlights the problem – read more in the Specialist Herbal Supplies blog.

10 Litres of Coke – Not Good Idea is a post from: Alternative HealthZine

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A study in Germany has found that organically grown apples have 15% higher anti-oxidant properties than non-organic.

The study in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, compared the content of polyphenols and anti-oxidants in Golden Delicious apples over a three year period.

We do not recommend eating too many apples as, especially these days, the sugar content is usually very high. But when you do eat one, it makes sense to eat organically grown apples whenever you can.

More detail

Choose Organic Apples is a post from: Alternative HealthZine

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To deal with Swine Flu it is best to make sure the immune system is working strongly.

The fundamental approach to strengthening the immune system must be to keep improving your lifestyle – bit by bit, and over time. For example:

1. Improve your diet, eg
   1. Eat more vegetables
   2. Eat more berries (and less high-sugar fruit)
   3. Cut down on starchy food – bread, rice, pasta, potatoes
   4. Eat lean protein and omega-3 rich protein – skinless chicken and turkey breast, oily fish – sardines, mackerel, trout
   5. Do all the well-known things: cut down on sugar, manufactured food, fatty and cured meats, fast food, breakfast cereals.
2. Improve your exercise regime
   1. Get ‘cardio’ exercise 3-4 times a week – a 30-minute swift walk does this very well – and without damaging the joints.
   2. Carry out muscle resistance exercises 2-3 times a week – the gym is the usual place, but you can do them at home with special ‘rubber bands’ or weights.
3. Don’t overwork, and so exhaust yourself – you’ll know if you are doing this.
4. There’s a good post on the SHS (Specialist Herbal Supplies) blog about herbs for the immune system. Basically there are three herbal options they recommend for the immune system:

   1. The 90-day Immune Programme with Capsules or with Drops
   2. Echinacea Capsules or Drops, or
   3. Power Garlic Capsules

AHZ Aticles:
Immune System Boost
Echinacea – great Immune System herb
Garlic benefits for Immune System
Pau d’Arco – South American boost for the Immune System

Swine ‘Flu Tips is a post from: Alternative HealthZine

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Most people do not consume chocolate because of the fantastic benefit of cocoa polyphenols for the arteries – to help avoid atherosclerosis. They just love chocolate. This favoured sweet might be at risk because of under supply of cocoa.

Growing Pains

Mars and Cadbury’s have realised that they have a cocoa problem on their hands. Supply is ok now; but, unless they do something, cocoa might well be running short in 20 years.

This is why they are committing to sustainability of supplies. (Oh, I forgot – it’s mainly because the consumers would want that. Of course. )

Well, don’t let’s be mean with our praise: it’s a step in the right direction to help farmers out to keep their stocks up.

Cocoa analysts forecast annual production in 2009 at 66,000 tonnes down on 2008 – down for the fourth year in a row. There are limited countries where the climate is suitable. The Ivory Coast in Africa – a fairly unstable country politically – is the world’s biggest producer.

Mars will pour tens of millions of pounds into assuring sustainability. Cadbury has pledged £1.5 billion to make all it’s chocolate Fairtrade.

Cuba in another country where cocoa grows well. With things loosening up in Cuba politically (the US and Cuba just had the first talks for decades), and huge potential for better utilisation of Cuban growing potential, Cuba could perhaps add cocoa to it’s coffee cigar and rum exports.

So far so good with sustainability; now let’s hope they sustain the planet properly by going organic.

Does Chocolate Help the  Arteries?

Cocoa Polyphenols are present in green tea and apples as well as cocoa, and are a tremendous benefit for the arteries. Sorry though; chocolate doesn’t really qualify because it is loaded with sugar

So, if you do eat chocolate, try and make it little and occasional.

Mars Cocoa sustainability

Chocolate Goes Sustainable is a post from: Alternative HealthZine

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