Have you signed up to join us on the Low-Carb Cruise yet? This is THE low-carb event of the year featuring the best of the best voices from the low-carb and Paleo communities. Over the past few years on my podcasts I’ve been able to interview virtually all the big guns who are providing excellent research and information on healthy low-carb living. As a result, I’m extremely blessed and honored to bring together for you all in one place a stellar lineup of leaders who can articulate and impart their wisdom upon you while letting you meet so many of your virtual online friends in a fun and engaging atmosphere. We really do have an amazing time and all of us regular attenders begin counting the days until the next one (currently, it’s 271 days!). Won’t you join us May 5-12, 2013 on the Carnival Magic? Learn more about being a part of this extraordinary annual event at LowCarbCruiseInfo.com.
These videos of the lectures provided by the guest speakers on the 2012 Low-Carb Cruise have been a BIG HIT with you guys and I’m pleased to be offering them to my readers with some key pull quotes from each one to whet your appetite to watch them. These were some of the most insightful and educational lectures I think we’ve ever had at this event and the bar has been set very high for future Low-Carb Cruises. You never know if we’ll be making video footage available to you again in the future, so I hope you enjoy watching these presentations from this year. Have you missed any of them? Don’t miss watching the lectures from Dr. Eric Westman, Fred Hahn, Monique Forslund, Denise Minger, Dr. John Briffa and Dr. Jeff Volek.
As I’ve been sharing with you, this superb video footage was taken voluntarily by Terry and Pam Young from “Make It Fun & It Will Get Done” who used their professional talents to produce the best video quality I could have ever wanted. A great way to say THANK YOU to them for doing these videos for us is by visiting their web site and checking out the content they have to offer. She has so many excellent low-carb recipe and tips videos, including one for Creamy Salad Dressing made from that little bit of mayonnaise that’s left over in the jar when you think it’s empty. Crafty idea, Pam! Again, a VERY SPECIAL THANK YOU to Terry and Pam for allowing my readers this unique glimpse into what it’s like to be at the conference portion of the Low-Carb Cruise with these outstanding videos.
DR. ANDREAS EENFELDT – May 8, 2012 at 2:30PM
“The Food Revolution”
A real revolution in nutritional habits has come to Scandinavia over the past few years and Dr. Eenfeldt is a big reason why. This Swedish medical doctor’s tall physical stature is symbolic of the leadership he has displayed as a key voice in the LCHF (low-carb, high-fat) movement happening there. He is the #1 low-carb blogger in the entire world boasting 35,000+ visitors daily to his Swedish-only blog Kostdoktorn and Dr. Eenfeldt was gracious enough to translate it into English for us in 2011 when he created his “Diet Doctor” blog. In 2010, Dr. Eenfeldt joined us on The 3rd Annual Low-Carb Cruise delivering his first-ever lecture in English. He’s been back every year since and brought with him many enthusiastic LCHF devotees who believe this way of eating has saved their life. On the 2013 Low-Carb Cruise, Dr. Eenfeldt will be giving an update on what’s happening with LCHF now featuring many of the other key players in Sweden who are involved in spreading the word about it in a culture still hellbent on low-fat, high-carb diets being the only way to get healthy. Check out my LLVLC Blog Spotlight of Dr. Eenfeldt as well as his appearances on “The Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb Show” podcast in Episode 494 and again during “Encore Week 2012″ in Episode 525.
Watch Dr. Eenfeldt’s 2012 Low-Carb Cruise lecture (with key pull quotes):
“It takes a long time (millions of years) to change our bodies, to change our genes. But the modern obesity epidemic as you know it didn’t take millions of years. It took only 28 years. That’s all. And how could this even be possible? Obviously something must have changed in the environment. This could not just be a genetic problem with everybody mutating at the same time, right? No.”
“A big campaign was launched (in 1984) to teach the American people to fear fat–real food like eggs, bacon, meat, butter, everything with fat in it. And the idea was as you know that fat raises the cholesterol so therefore it was supposed to give us heart disease–a largely unproven theory back then. But we did this anyway sorta like an experiment…if you eat less fat, you will have to eat more carbohydrates if you don’t want to be hungry all the time. And if you eat too much bad carbohydrates, your insulin will go up and this can lead to obesity because it’s the fat-storing hormone.”
“Obesity is spreading like a cancer across the (United States) and obese Americans have become common in just a couple of decades…so, three times more obesity in less than one generation…This started right after we became afraid of fat and started eating more bad carbohydrates instead.”
“Some researchers have calculated that if the (obesity) trend lines continue, if nothing happens, in the year 2048, every single American will be either obese or overweight. Nobody’s gonna be normal anymore. And obviously that’s just crazy! So something has gotta be done to change this. And perhaps we can find some ideas in the place where I come from which in a small country in Northern Europe called Sweden.”
“(LCHF) is a low-carb diet similar to the Atkins diet of course. You’re supposed to avoid sugar, avoid starch, bread, pasta, and such things. And instead eat all you like from other kinds of real food such as meat and fish, plenty of vegetables, and even butter and high-fat cheese in your cooking if you like…some people still believe that this real food here is really dangerous to eat, really bad for you. Why? Because there’s no percentage limit on how much saturated fat you’re allowed to eat. It’s all up to you, right? And that’s supposed to be dangerous.”
“Sales of butter actually increased (in Sweden) in 2008 and it’s gone up even more since then. And the rate of obesity seems to have at least slowed down, while it’s probably perhaps going up slowly still. I think absolutely it’s gonna be possible to reverse (obesity rates). Because I believe that something big is about to happen in Sweden.”
“(The Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare announced in January 2008 that) ‘low-carb diets can today be seen as compatible with scientific evidence and best practice.’ I think it’s really unique actually that some government agency has done this. They said that it’s scientifically proven that it’s working for weight reduction, it’s been shown in a number of studies. And they said that there’s no evidence that they could find that (low-carb, high-fat) is harmful. This was a revolution in the debate because low-carb had been labeled a ‘dangerous fat diet.’ But now the highest medical authority in Sweden said the opposite. They said that it’s proven to work and there are no known dangers…this was great for the media…this really affected things (with LCHF) moving on in Sweden.”
“In 2010, something else interesting happened. (Sweden) got our first Olympic gold eating low-carb.”
“Actually, Weight Watchers launched a big campaign with TV commercials for their new online service this year so it’s been all over. And they got quite a few searches from that as you can (on his slide graphic). Now, low-carb, high-fat–there’s been no commercials, nothing. This all free on the Internet. And this is what happened (slide graphic showing an exponential spike in Google searches for LCHF). So, it’s just taking off…it’s going really well so much so that we ran out of butter–an unexpected consequence you might say!”
“They put (the last 10 pounds of butter in Sweden) out for auction on an online site and it went up to $750, so $75 a pound. Pretty good. Actually, this kind of eating has become popular in our neighboring countries, too–it’s spreading! So they had a bit of a butter shortage in Finland too this winter. And it Norway, it got really interesting because they’re outside the European Union and they have different import rules. They couldn’t really import more butter. So when their butter ran out, it was gone.”
“Is (low-carb, high-fat) a fad? It’s labeled a fad but I say it’s not. Why? Well that’s simple. Because it works. That’s what the highest medical authority in Sweden concluded and that’s what the science shows. I think it’s reasonable to ask if it’s not low-fat that’s been a fad all along.”
“People who had heart disease going into the (Women’s Health Initiative) study, if they were told to eat a low-fat diet, they got sicker. They got more heart attacks–26% more! And this is statistically significant. I think that’s amazing. And if you don’t believe (the researchers) tried to hide it…(looking at the study closely, you’ll see) history of cardiovascular disease. No. But there is no yes. It’s not there. But you can actually see it…it’s the only statistically significant line (in the study).”
“The point to all this is that maybe low-fat diets are not only useless, maybe they’re actually dangerous for sensitive people.”
“I think it’s time for a paradigm shift…these changes take time. But, it’s going on and I think this is what’s gonna happen. We used to believe that saturated fat is bad. Now we’re gonna see that it’s safe. We used to believe that carbs like bread and pasta were the best thing you could eat for your health. And now we’re gonna see that too much of it can make you fat and sick…I think in 2015 perhaps (Sweden) will have reached the tipping point and big things are gonna really start to happen. And I think this is gonna happen in the U.S. too. I think it’s inevitable. And why? Because we have the science now.”
“If you test low-fat versus low-carb for weight loss, low-carb wins time after time after time. And this I find really interesting because (people in the low-fat diet groups in these studies) are told to restrict their calories, to count their calories and eat less. So it would be kind of impressive if you could eat an unlimited amount of low-carb food and lose the same amount of weight, right? But you don’t only lose the same amount, you lose even more. So that’s really impressive!”
“Actually, there are 17 of these studies comparing low-carb and low-fat for weight loss where they ended up with a significant difference between the groups. Seventeen times they found a clear winner. And the result is 17-0 (low-carb beating low-fat). I find this a bit upsetting because when obese people come searching for help from the medical system, we’re usually telling them to eat less and run more, right? So less fat often and that’s how you get rid of calories most easily. And when people fail doing this, you’d hope that they’d get this better advice. But usually that’s not the case. Instead (doctors) conclude that (their patients who can’t lose weight) are lazy, hopeless gluttons. And we advise them to let us cut away their stomachs to keep them from eating (gastric bypass).”
“(Gastric bypass surgery) is about to become one of the most common surgeries in the world. I think we need a reality check because these are healthy organs that we are cutting away. We sorta trying to surgically adapt our bodies to the industrial food instead of adapting the food to our bodies. And some people are seeing this kind of surgery as the solution to the obesity epidemic. But it can’t be for a simple reason: removing healthy organs is not the cure to bad food.”
“Weight (loss) is just the beginning because if you look at the dieting trials, they often test different kinds of health factors too. And a lot of them improve, such as blood pressure, cholesterol profile, and perhaps most of all, blood sugar and diabetes.”
“The people who get diabetes are not expected to get well ever again. They’re expected to get a little bit sicker every year and need more and more medication and get complications. So what kind of diet advice do we give them as they get sicker and sicker? Well, perhaps we give them sick advice…because the base of the (diabetic food) pyramid is starchy food, exactly the kind of food that turns to glucose in the gut and will raise your blood sugar.”
“The irony is that a hundred years ago we knew better (than to feed lots of carbohydrates to diabetics).”
“You’d think if you’re diabetic you’d get advice to eat real low-carb food. But that’s not the case.”
“There’s a lot of economic interests that kind of slow down change. So I think change will have to come from the bottom–from the grassroots. Viral change using media. And then the best way perhaps to start this is via the Internet and blogs, a great way to get information out there.”
“Just a few words about the message that I think can make this happen. I think we should really focus on the health aspects and not only on the weight. I think it’s crucial that we focus on real food, not special processed low-carb products. This is a huge problem I think in Sweden and maybe even more so in America.”
“I don’t think that (low-carb) products are the solution. I think they are a big part of the problem keeping people from losing weight and they’re keeping others from even taking low-carb seriously. So I think we absolutely have to focus on real food.”
Stay tuned for even more video lectures from the 2012 Low-Carb Cruise posted at my blog. We’d LOVE to have you join us on the 2013 Low-Carb Cruise leaving out of Galveston, Texas on May 5-12, 2013 on board the Carnival Magic featuring guest speakers Robb Wolf, Dr. Mary Vernon, Dr. Jay Wortman, Dr. Larry McCleary, Dr. Cate Shanahan, Dr. Dwight Lundell, Dr. Andreas Eenfeldt and his LCHF friends, Jackie Eberstein with a special tribute to Dr. Atkins, Dr. Jayson and Mira Calton, Dave Asprey and Jonathan Bailor. Plus, Tom Naughton will be back for another rip-roaring roast of the guest speakers! YOU WON’T WANT TO MISS THIS!
