Many of my fellow competitors supplement with salt. I argue that this is unnecessary and possibly harmful. What do you say?

I agree. But I remember how, in the 1960s, when first setting sail for the tropics, a bottle of salt tablets, the size of horse pills, was part of the equipment! since we lose salt through sweat, this had to be replaced. It was only later that we learnt that sweat is also the body’s way of disposing of waste. So if the sweat tastes salty that means the body is getting rid of an excess of it! So did foragers take salt tablets? Not likely! Kalahari explorer Laurens van der Post describes how (in a Land Rover) he followed, with difficulty, a band of Bushmen while they chased a wounded eland for several days. That is endurance running par excellence. On the other hand beware of the phenomenon of excessive water intake. That does have consequences: see ‘Distance Runners Drink too much’: Sept 2011.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, August 2014

Should I up my salt intake during hot weather? Particularly with exercise I sweat a lot.

No! When I first set off to live and work in tropical Africa in the late 1960s, the “armchair general” who recruited me advised me to take a daily salt tablet. It was the size of horse pill and made me nauseous. But within days of arrival, the derision of old Africa hands soon disabused me of the practice – to my great relief. There is a great misunderstanding about sweat. It usually tastes salty, so it is easy to assume that this means we are losing valuable salt from the body. On the contrary we now know that sweat is one of the ways that the body gets rid of waste products. So, salt sweated out in the heat is the body getting rid of an UNWANTED EXCESS of salt! See also: Salt Intake and Sweat, May 2008 [15]; Salt and Endurance Athletes, Aug 2014 [16] So, what does a forager do? He lives 24 hours a day under a tropical sun. he doesn’t have salt cellars hanging from trees! No, he just gets on with his usual diet which is low in salt. Indeed, the body sorts out its sodium balance just fine under tropical forager life patterns. Meanwhile the horrors of salt (sodium) overconsumption are well documented. Apart from the well known effects on blood pressure and heart disease, see also, for example: High-salt Diet & Alzheimer’s Nov 2019 [17]; Salt a Factor in MS, Sept 2015 [18]; High Salt - Calcium Depletion, Sept 2012 [19]

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, June 2023

My fiancée eats entirely too much salt. Are there any health risks to salt substitute (potassium chloride) while I try to wean her off of salt?

The short answer is that the salt substitutes are better than salt itself. Potassium chloride has a bitter taste and does not have the same saltiness as salt, so salt substitutes are usually a mixture of both. A Chinese study found that salt substitute (65% sodium chloride, 25% potassium chloride, 10% magnesium sulfate) significantly reduced peripheral and central systolic blood pressure and arterial stiffness [6] An American study found that following a high potassium diet (target 4 grams per day) and controlled sodium (target 1.6 grams per day) gave good results [7]. How did they bump up the intake of potassium and reduce salt? By putting the subjects on a high intake of fruit, salads and vegetables! And that is the message: salt substitutes are a help – but most dietary salt comes from processed foods. Cut those out of the diet and replace them with plant food.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, September 2010

I know to go easy on table salt, but is sea salt all right?

Sorry! Salt is salt wherever it comes from. Many products aiming at the health conscious make great play of their sea-salt content. They pretend that it is somehow ‘natural’ and ‘unprocessed’. It doesn’t make a difference! They pretend that it is important to consume this salt for the micro-minerals. It isn’t! Mostly ordinary table salt comes from underground strata that were laid down in an ancient seabed anyway. They usually iodize this salt and that is worth having. Many Americans suffer a deficiency of iodine. But that is no excuse to oversalt your food! Humans are designed for a low salt diet rich in potassium. The salt/potassium ratio should be low. In today’s world we have inverted this ratio much to the detriment of our health. More on this topic in the forthcoming book.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, February 2000

What should be children’s water intake, when sports training in hot weather? The consensus seems to be 500 ml in the hour before training, 200/250 ml each 15 minutes during training, and 500 ml after training.

Quite frankly it is impossible to be specific – there are so many variables! - size of the child, heat, humidity, the degree of exertion… Furthermore, I am leery of trying to micromanage the body’s processes – doing it by numbers so to speak. In the past I have questioned the obsession with guzzling water at every opportunity (Sept 2002, Aug 2003). As kidney expert Dr Heinz Valtin says, “I find it difficult to believe that evolution left us with a chronic water deficit that needs to be compensated by forcing a high fluid intake" [Ref 1]. After the deaths from “water intoxication” of runners in the Boston marathon, Dr Almond found [Ref 2] that some athletes had 11 pints more in them at the end of the run than at the start (July 2005). On the contrary, heat-stress tests on athletes show that thirst quickly intervenes long before harmful dehydration occurs [Ref 3]

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, July 2009

You say that distilled water is safe to drink. However, other experts say that distilled water does leach minerals and/or toxins, to some degree. On the other hand, I've read that spring water minerals are not bio-available. Apparently, minerals need to be converted into an organic form, via the uptake of plants, before they become bio-available. I thought spring water would be somewhat healthier than distilled water and municipal water?

Analysis paralysis! Just get the H2O inside you and don’t worry about its mineral content or otherwise. Foragers didn’t drink much water and most of that was contaminated with pollution left by other animals at the waterhole. In the grand scheme of things, the mineral content of water is hardly significant. Foragers (and our close relatives, the chimpanzee and gorilla) got most of their fluid from the plants they ate. That is the message – get inside you plenty of water-rich plant foods (salads, fruits, vegetables)!

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, February 2016

Re ‘8x8 myth’ last month, I often drink twice that (a gallon) on 100 mile bicycle rides in a hot, dry climate. Shouldn’t you warn readers: Don’t forget to drink when thirsty! Don’t put it off!

You have a valid point – drink to your thirst! But it shows how bamboozled we are about fluid intake that we have to make that obvious remark. Picture an African country, largely Sahara Desert, in mid-August. The people are devout Muslims and it is Ramadan, the holy month when they don’t eat or drink during daylight hours. I was in charge of carrying out a week-long survey in the desert with a team of local technicians. They regarded fasting in these severe conditions as a test of their manhood. To keep their respect you can be sure I did the same. Every day we rose at 5:00 am, had breakfast before sunup and set off. We tramped all over the desert in the blazing sun carrying out our work. After a few hours we were THIRSTY! And it got WORSE until, after 12 hours and with our heads spinning, we arrived back at camp just as the sun set. The ritual – and the dignity – is in self-control. To first sup the Ramadan sheep’s-head soup slowly. Then, over the next couple of hours, to eat and drink in a steady and controlled way. After 6 hours sleep it is up and doing the same thing again the next day.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, August 2011

Last month you spoke of the dangers of over-hydration and to rely on your thirst reflex. But what if you don’t have a thirst reflex?

Good catch. Normally when I go off about over-hydration, I do make my remarks conditional on having a normal thirst reflex. Old people can have an impaired thirst reflex and, notably, carers in care homes take special measure to ensure their charges are adequately hydrated. Some medications, notably ones which affect the thirst detection center in the brain, the hypothalamus, DEPRESS the thirst reflex. They are mostly ones prescribed for psychiatric conditions [14]. These are not to be confused with a multitude of other medications which make you lose water (diuretic). These can include those for high blood pressure, diabetes, constipation, heart failure, allergies, cancer and many more. So, if you are of advanced age, do think about fluid intake. Likewise, check with your doctor about medications he prescribes you. Having said all that, for the vast majority of people in normal state of health, the message is still: “Drink to your thirst!”

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, August 2023

You say that humans are not natural carnivores, so how do you explain the huge yearning for meat in our populations?

“You like what you are used to eating”. So said polar explorer Amundsen when he was asked how he could enjoy, with gusto, the consumption of raw seal blood and guts. How many of your meat-loving friends would enjoy, with or without gusto, such a ‘meat’diet? Another example: gorillas are natural vegetarians. Yet baby gorillas, if brought up on a meat diet, will fall on their meals with vigorous enthusiasm. Finally there are huge sections of the human population, like the 1 bn Hindus and another 1 bn or so Buddhists (like the Japanese) that, traditionally, just don’t eat meat at all. For peoples brought up like that, the idea of eating meat is repulsive. So it is all in the mind! Our desires for or against a particular food are not a good guide to what is right for human consumption. If it were, Pizza Hut and Haagen-Dazs would have gone out of business a long time ago.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, March 2002

I’ve heard that mushrooms are a good source of protein – is this true? Is there a problem with food combining?

Mushrooms are above the average for protein content compared to other plant foods. However it is still not a lot, around 3g per 100g compared to about 20g per 100g for fish. On top of that, it is quite hard to eat 100g (3½ oz) of mushrooms, whereas it is only too easy to eat at least 100g of fish at a sitting. Some mushrooms are richer in protein than others: Oyster 4.1% Straw 3.8% Button (most common) 3.0% Portabella 2.5% Crimini 2.5% Enoki 2.3% Shiitake 2.1% Other plant foods in the same protein bracket are broccoli (3%) and avocado (2.5%). As for food combining, no, don’t treat mushroom as a ‘protein dominated’ food. It is just a vegetable.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, November 2002

The papers recently hyped a study showing that people who eat processed meat died younger. What’s going on? We eat smoked fish every day for breakfast e.g. salmon, herring or mackerel. Smoking is a very old process. No doubt these days there are lots of chemicals and salt too.

This study was an ‘epidemiological’ (population) study. By its nature, it is less conclusive. In this case, the study analyzed what happened, according to diet, to half a million Europeans from 10 countries, [11]. The researchers found a modest CORRELATION between the consumption of ‘processed’ meat and dying younger – notably of cancer or heart disease. But population studies cannot identify what is the CAUSE of this correlation. The ‘processed meat’ consisted mainly of the ‘red meats’ beef and pork, which have been processed into sausages, salami, bacon, hamburgers and so forth. The researchers suggest that the high saturated fat levels (up to 50%) in sausages and salami, might be a cause. So too might be the use of nitrites in the preserving process. But this is speculation. My view is that such products should be avoided in any case. Apart from their content of red meat, which is likely to have suspect levels of bad fats, the processing introduces chemicals that only make matters worse. Fish not Included The study restricted itself to just meat of all kinds: it did not study fish eating. My View: When it comes to smoked and salted fish, my instinct is to go easy on them.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, March 2013

What about wild game meat as a suitable animal protein. We can get bison easily – is that all right?

Yes, in some parts of the country, wild game is readily available. When it is truly wild (and not artificially fed) most wild game conforms closely to that consumed by our Pleistocene ancestors. It is very low fat, has a good essential fatty acid content and has a good fatty acid ratio. These are all good wild foods. As ever, keep the portion size down to the size of a deck of cards (really!): bison, boar, buffalo, deer, elk, goat, horse, moose, rabbit, squirrel etc…

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, November 2000

I am a small woman, eat like you say but also drink one or two glasses of red wine with the evening meal. I suffer muscle cramps and I hear that these might be due to alcohol induced magnesium deficiency. Is this likely? Would it help to supplement?

I answered this question at length in August 2004. So I will just make some supplementary remarks. If you eat like we say you will be ingesting far more magnesium than the average westerner. Moreover you will be getting it in wondrous combinations with dozens of other micronutrients. This ensures that they are all working together in harmony. Magnesium is present in almost everything you eat, from nuts to seafood to colored salads and vegetables. So you can be sure you are eating it. Magnesium is an essential component of chlorophyll. If you are eating green, you are eating magnesium. So eat up your spinach, bok choy, and lettuce. Don’t throw away the outer, darkest green leaves – they have the most magnesium! Researcher Samuel Johnson has published an extremely good summary [Endnote 1].

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, April 2009

I hear a lot about ‘tired’ and ‘depleted’ soils. Are our foods depleted in magnesium?

No. Magnesium is an essentia l element in all living matter. Plants cannot make chlorophyll without it, nor can they build cell walls. Plants that have insufficient magnesium have yellowed leaves and stunted growth. Farmers, purely from a selfinterest point of view, make sure that their plants get all the magnesium they need. Rejoice in that beautiful dark green color of the spinach or broccoli -- it is the signal of a mineralrich, healthy plant. It is a similar story with animals, poultry and fish. Just as magnesium is essential for humans in a myriad of ways, so it is for all other creatures. They cannot manufacture magnesium in their bodies. Without it they don’t grow, are sick, even die off. Stockmen, fish farmers and poultrymen, from a self-interest point of view, make sure that their stock get enough magnesium in the feed.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, August 2004

You speak of widespread magnesium deficiency [Aug 2004, Jan 2005, Sept 2006, April 2009, April 2010]. Should we supplement?

No. Not unless you have a clinical problem which requires a special medical intervention. The problem is that cherry-picking supplements rarely works in isolation (see ‘Micronutrient Symphony’, above). For example we know that various mineral and vitamin deficiencies are correlated with many ailments yet supplements do not fix the problem. In ‘Doc Rethinks Food/Disease Link’, August 2010, I report how Dr Mozaffarian wrote an excellent article in JAMA criticizing the ‘magic bullet’ approach to nutrition. We need to get our nutrients in complete food! With magnesium we know that this is particularly true. Moreover, we cannot even tell where the magnesium is going in the body. It can show good blood levels but be deficient in the cells. If you are really deficient, the doctor has to give a kick-start just to get the body to absorb magnesium. The only honest (and sure) way is to get our magnesium naturally – and what do you know - the chlorophyll in green plant food is a rich source!

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, December 2010

You are against the taking of supplements, yet you recommend that vegans supplement with vitamin B12. How do you reconcile this contradiction?

Quite simply, a strictly vegan diet is not appropriate for the human species. It is all right for gorillas, horses and elephants, but not for us. We know that some animal matter was a modest but essential part of our Pleistoceneadapted diet – and we haven’t changed since! The proof is that strict vegans end up with B12 deficiency leading to blindness, even death (see Newsletter for April 2000). There are many things that vegans might do that are bad for health, like over-rely on grains, bread, pastas, lentils, beans and suchlike. The Natural Eating pattern puts them straight on that. But in the absence of any animal matter whatsoever (just one egg a week would be enough), supplementation is the lesser of two evils.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, December 2000

Everyone is moving to skimmed milk. What happens to the fat they skim off?

Ever since the public’s move to drinking skimmed milk, the dairymen have worried what to do with the surplus fat or ‘butterfat’. Butterfat is a bad fat loaded with artery-rotting palmitic and myristic acids. However, there is an unforeseen movement to eat more premium ice cream - which uses lots of butterfat! So… the healthy move by one section of the American public -- to low-fat milk is more than counterbalanced by the unhealthy move by the same people or others

-- to consumption of high fat ice cream. Our View Today? We were too innocent in saying “… there is an unforeseen movement to eat more premium ice cream…”. This movement was not ‘unforeseen’. It was carefully orchestrated by the dairy industry - and ice cream makers like Ben and Jerry’s. They skillfully used the Bernays psycho-techniques (‘Manipulation of the Masses’, page 4) to shift public attitudes and recycle reject butterfat into people’s bodies.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, December 2003

What do you make of Harvard Professor Dr Karin Michels’ claim that coconut oil is pure poison [10]? – And British Heart Foundation dietician, Victoria Taylor’s view that: “replacing saturated fats with unsaturated fats like vegetable oil, olive oil and sunflower oil would be a healthier choice” [11]?

As usual much humbug and misinformation here. Although coconut oil is a saturated fat, it is a plant fat and it is an unusual one to boot – lauric acid. Due to the saturated fat’s position on the triglyceride molecule, most of it is not absorbed into the body. See: Palm Oil: Friend or Foe?, Oct 2011 [12] The bottom line is that coconut oil is not great, but definitely not poison. See Coconut oil Mania, Oct 2011 [12]. The advice of Victoria Taylor is equally flawed. She lauds and mingles a neutral oil, (olive) with a bad, omega-6 oil (sunflower) and doesn’t even mention the ‘good’ omega-3 oils (like rapeseed and fish oils) as the way to go.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, August 2018

Do you know Dr. Raymond Peat? www.raypeat.com. He seems to disagree with most health claims regarding fish oil.

Dr Peat has closely wrought views on the role of oils in human nutrition. I agree with some of them, notably the advent and subsequent mischief of vegetable oils (see Deadly Harvest, page 68). However, Dr Peat does entangle himself in the welter of detail to lose sight of the big picture. Fish oil is a clear example. He finds studies which suggest that fish oil intake might increase some kinds of ill-health since, under one circumstance, the body oxidizes fish-oil to form toxic substances called “lipid peroxides”. I start from the other end of the picture. Fish oils were an all pervasive part of our Pleistocene past. So what are we doing wrong if they make us sick? The answer is very simple, and is one that is completely overlooked by Dr Peat’s tunnel vision: antioxidant deficiency! In our Pleistocene past we always consumed copious amounts of anti-oxidant rich plant foods. So our body’s biochemistry is designed on the assumption that they will always be there. They work as a team to prevent “peroxidation” and keep the fish oil healthy for us.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, July 2008

I am confused. From the way you denigrate Omega 6 oils I assumed they are saturated fats. Now I am not so sure. Clarifications please.

Omega 6 oils are polyunsaturated fats! Yes, that is the drama of it. We’ve been brainwashed to believe: ‘Polyunsaturated fats – good, Saturated fats – bad’. The truth is more complex. Polyunsaturated fats can be bad too – if the ratios get out of proportion. That is what has happened in Western diets. We consume far too much Omega 6. Alpha linolenic acid (Omega 3) is crowded out. Essential fatty acid imbalances reinforce diseases like osteoporosis, plaque formation, cancers, inflammation etc… (See N.E. Book, ‘Fats and Oils’, p. 79). In other words, in these circumstances, a polyunsaturated fat can be just as dangerous as a saturated fat.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, October 2000

Do fruits such as apples give you a sugar rush then a "low"? I think I experienced this the other day and wondered if I ate too early or should have eaten something else to reduce the speed that the sugar gets in the blood. I ate an egg white to slow down sugar absorption and keep the sleepiness at bay.

It is just possible, if you have a weakened blood sugar control system (or you are diabetic), that apples will give a small rush and then slump.

1. You can try diluting them by eating a lower glycemic fruit, such as a grapefruit, at the same time .

2. You can try spreading out the consumption over a longer period of time.

3. You can try eating vegetation (such as salad) beforehand or at the same time. (this is less desirable from combining point of view) It is not recommended to eat too much protein (such as egg white ) before eating fruit for the same reason. (although just one or two whites are not a big deal -- and it might just help)

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, July 2001

Fructose has a low Glycemic Index. Is it therefore safe to use it as a straight substitute for sugar (sucrose)?

It is true that fructose is a sugar to which the human body is well adapted. Not surprising really, since we are built to consume good quantities of fruit - and fructose is the chief sugar in the ‘safe’ fruits. However there’s the rub. Even so, we are not going to be consuming (from the fruit) more than the equivalent of about 2 tbs. per day of fructose. Whereas the average consumption of sugar in the US is over ½ lb.! If we were to eat ½ lb. per day of fructose then that would give us problems too. Admittedly not to do with blood-sugar spikes and the horrors of hyperinsulinemia, but with other health undermining factors. First of all, fructose is still empty calories. ½ lb. fructose is about 250 cal. Next, fructose quantities upsets blood lipid profiles. It tends to increase triglycerides, and LDL levels. Finally, fructose at these levels can also cause intestinal upsets. So fructose is not a free ride! Use it abstemiously to help bake the occasional dessert.

-- And that’s about it! Some practical points:

• Fructose is sweeter than sugar, so you can use 2/3 the quantity.

• Fructose does not caramelize.

• High fructose corn-syrup is not fructose. It is just like ordinary sugar. The Bottom Line? Fructose is a helpful adjunct to the strategies for savvy eating in the modern world. But it is more important to train the palate (and the body) to not crave sweetness in all our foodstuffs

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, June 1999

What do you say to others when they ask you the question "if sugar is bad for your health, why do you eat fruit? There is sugar in fruit!"

Indeed there is, but we tend to stick to low glycemic fruits (like most berries), go easy on the medium ones like apples and oranges – and avoid high sugar fruits like pineapple and melons. Having said that, the ‘glycemic load’ of most of these fruits is quite low. That is to say, you have to eat quite a lot to get a sugar rush.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, September 2013

I don’t see what is so wrong with grains – they were the staple of the ancient Egyptians.

Yes – and they suffered from it! Dental cav ities, gum disease, arthritis and diabetes a ll became prevalent during that period. Grains were a phenomenon of the agricultural revolution, were a novelty in the diet a nd turn out to be a double-edged sword for humanity. The Egyptians of 5,000 years ago were among the first to experience it. We need to go back well before agricultural times, over 50,000 years ago, to understand the foods that are right for the human species.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, April 2001

Why are Pizza, Paella and Pasta so maligned? After all they bulk, are Mediterranean dishes.

This is a common misconception. The so-called Mediterranean diet was popularized by Ancel Keys who was much impressed by the health of the Cretans. He studied these peoples and their diet in the 1950’s. However, the Cretan diet has little in common with Italian, Spanish or French cuisine. The Cretans followed a diet that had endured for 40 centuries. It comprised a high proportion of plant food, no dairy products, no meat, some fish, some goat’s cheese, some red wine, some rough bread, and some olive oil. In spite of a hard, frugal existence, the Cretan life expectancy and general health were impressive. Far better in fact than the so-called advanced nations of Northern Europe and the US. The Cretan diet had a lot of good things about it. One of the lesser known subtleties is this: the olive oil was not a help – just empty calories – but the Cretans had the peculiar habit of eating purslane – an extremely rich source of the rare essential fatty acid, Vitamin F2.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, July 1999

Why do you say that pizza is especially bad? – it is just a kind of bread with some vegetables and anchovies on it.

First of all, pizza is more than that –it usually has a lot of melted cheese too. Many people add pepperoni, Bologna and other artery-rotting meats. All this makes for a food-combining nightmare. But that is not the main point. Studies have shown that pizza has an exaggerated hyperglycemic effect. Instead of glucose levels dropping down to zero after about four hours as might be expected, they increase for another five hours! This graphically demonstrates how treacherous it is to doubleguess the Glycemic Index of a food. It has to be measured directly. Pizza is assuredly one of the most unhealthy, obesity-making foods that you can put in you body.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, September 2001

You recommend avoiding cheese – yet you still use it in cooking and as a dish – why?

Our starting point is always to look at the kinds of foods which are novelties in the human diet. Cheese is one of them. The next stage is to see what is good and bad about this ‘novel’ food. Of all the dairy products, cheese has one of the fewest drawbacks. It has little lactose and its bad fat is poorly absorbed into the body. It has good, strong flavor, which is appreciated in cooking. Nevertheless many people are still allergic to cheese and it is only too easy to overeat it. The protein in cheese, casein, is very bad for the body. In particular it raises cholesterol a lot. So the bottom line on cheese is that it is grudgingly accepted as an occasional gourmet experience and as a useful flavor enhancer in cooking. Don’t overdo it! Eliminate cheese entirely if you suspect allergic reactions migraines, bowel disturbances, rashes, congestion and the like.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, November 1999

If I do eat some cereal, would rice milk, soymilk or another milk be the better addition? (I'm thinking about the problem of mixing carbohydrates and protein.)

The purist would not dream of eating cereals and so would not be faced with the dilemma as to what liquid to put on them. However, if you must indulge, rice milk and soymilk are much better alternatives than mammary-gland milk of any kind. Do watch out for the added sugars! These substitute milks are mostly water and the tiny amount of protein in soymilk is of no consequence at all.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, September 2002

I know that lactose tolerance diminishes with age, but scientific studies show that the calcium is still bioavailable. Why don’t you recommend low fat yogurt?

The short answer is that dairy products were never part of our ancestral diet. They have so many drawbacks that there is absolutely no reason to force ourselves to use them. It is like trying to ‘make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear’. The longer answer is that dairy products might be tolerated only when they have the fat removed, when they have the lactose removed, and when they have the casein removed (casein is the milk protein that raises cholesterol levels sharply). But why bother? Humans, once weaned (and just like any other mammal) simply do not have the digestive apparatus chemistry to use dairy products appropriately. This answers your question about low fat yogurt. It is still rich in casein (that is what provides the bulk). The lactose question is a bit of a red herring. Many people of Germanic origin have developed a tolerance to lactose – but that is all it is – tolerance. Just as one can ‘tolerate’ a couple of tots of vodka it doesn’t mean that it is a good thing to be doing! As for the question of calcium, it is a remarkable commentary on the success of the dairy industry, that the populations of Europe and North America are neurotic about “getting enough calcium”. An attentive reading of the N.E. book will show that this is a nonproblem. Bone health is to do with a great range of very serious factors, none of which involves calcium deficiency. As for your assertion that calcium in dairy products ‘has been shown to be bioavailable’, we would like to see the references for that. All the research that we have seen shows just the opposite. Presumably you have by now been weaned (joke) and, that being the case, it is a self-delusion to imagine that dairy products can continue to serve any useful purpose in your diet.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, December 2000

Why don’t you recommend low fat yogurt?

As explained in our December 2000 newsletter, dairy products were never part of our ancestral diet and they have so many drawbacks that there is absolutely no reason to force ourselves to use them. Low fat yogurt is still rich in the protein, casein. BUT casein:

- raises cholesterol levels sharply.

- is one of the most virulent allergens known. These are two powerful reasons to avoid yogurt of ANY kind. Even low-fat yogurt contains cholesterol-raising, allergenic casein. And even if you are not worried about cholesterol and allergies, you are kidding yourself. Everyone’s health is undermined, even if you don’t come out in hives. Gut function is perturbed, bad bacteria are encouraged, and you generate unnatural amounts of gas. It is a self-delusion to imagine that dairy products can continue to serve any useful purpose in your diet.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, September 2001

Yesterday I ate a spicy Thai meal, and today I ate a hot Indian curry. I now feel uncomfortable and have the sensation of a ‘burning’ stomach. I have also heard that hot, spicy meals can provoke outbreaks of eczema. What is the take on hot, spicy foods?

First, the anthropological connection. The “hot” spices are almost always derived from the various members of the capsicum family. This includes chili, cayenne, and paprika. These plants have their origins in central and south America and only entered the diet around 400 years ago. They were therefore not present in the homeland of the human race in central Africa. For humans, chili peppers, cayenne pepper and paprika are a ‘novelty’ in the diet and must undergo suitable vetting before being admitted to the exclusive ‘club’ of foods suitable [for human] consumption. How do chilies etc… shape up? The first warning signs are, of course, their “hot” taste and red color. These are defense mechanism developed by the plant for just such a purpose – to stop hungry predators from eating them! Humans have learned to ignore the red danger signal and they choose to ignore the taste too! Does it matter? Certainly! Hot spices are an irritant. They cause irritation and inflammation in the mouth and other sensitive areas of mucous membrane -- including the stomach. So it is not surprising that many people feel heartburn. What about allergies? This is the interesting point. It has recently been discovered that these peppers cause the intestine to become porous. Normally the cells lining the small intestine bind together in what are called “tight junctions” to keep foreign substances out of the bloodstream. An allergic reaction occurs when an allergen passes through such junctions. Allergen protein molecules, such as milk casein or wheat gluten, that are normally too large to pass through the intestinal wall into the bloodstream, percolate through when hot spices are around. So, the answer to your question is: yes! Hot spices definitely increase allergic reactions – and that includes eczema. In any event, anyone who suffers from allergic reactions should systematically avoid consuming wheat gluten and milk protein – they are the most potent allergens around. Not surprising really – humans are not genetically programmed to consume them anyway.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, April 1999

I can’t get organic fruit so I rinse regular fruit, soak it for 20 minutes in diluted grapefruit seed extract and rinse again in filtered water. Now I read that none of these procedures gets rid of pesticides etc. Would it be better to stop eating fruit?

While I think it important to wash fruit and raw vegetables (see ‘Veggie Wash’ Oct 2003), I also think it is possible to be too obsessive. Studies show that WASHING OFF the bugs and whatnot is better than trying to DISINFECT them. See ‘Myth of a Germ-free world’, April 2011. Personally we use a soapy veggie wash spray and then quickly rinse it under tap-water. If you can't find a dedicated veggie wash spray, use a 5:1 dilution of a clear washing up liquid (basically they use the same, food-grade, detergent). See ‘Simple Veggie Wash is Most Effective’, June 2008. I tend to be rather relaxed about pesticides – most of them are extracted from vegetables in the first place and our bodies know how to deal with them. See ‘Dietary Pesticides 99% Natural’, Sept 2010. The one area for concern relates to the germs that the plant sucks in through the roots. This was big news when many Germans suffered food poisoning from fenugreek sprouts grown from infected seeds imported from Egypt [8]. See: ‘Plants: Internalized Germs’ May 2011. No amount of cleaning by the unsuspecting German cultivator extirpated the bugs growing within the seeds and in the subsequent grown sprouts. Even so, get these risks into proportion – you risk your life far more if you get sucked into the sickness factories we call hospitals! My View? The important thing is to get the fruit inside you and not be OTT about cleansing.

— Geoff Bond, The Bond Briefing, May 2014