00:00:00
Studies showed that if you are flossing,
00:00:02
you can reduce your risk of dementia by
00:00:04
nearly half, which is quite impressive.
00:00:06
So I started to research the brain much
00:00:09
more and it made me realize this link
00:00:11
with the brain and the gut is absolutely
00:00:12
crucial and how that influences many
00:00:15
things in our brain. For example, things
00:00:17
like depression, mood changes, fatigue
00:00:19
and energy. But for 40 years, we've been
00:00:22
going down the wrong path. We've got so
00:00:24
distracted by treating the brain as
00:00:26
something so different to the rest of
00:00:27
the body. So, what do we do about it if
00:00:29
we want to have optimally healthy
00:00:31
brains? So, Professor Tim Spectre is one
00:00:34
of the top 100 most cited scientists
00:00:36
worldwide, and he's back to reveal the
00:00:38
critical role our gut plays with our
00:00:40
physical and mental health,
00:00:42
>> our cognition, and the prevention of
00:00:44
chronic disease.
00:00:45
>> We can dramatically improve our lives
00:00:48
and our health just by making the right
00:00:50
food choices. And I've got eight rules
00:00:52
for gut health which work for all
00:00:54
health. So, first thing, pivot your
00:00:56
protein. Then there's quality, not
00:00:58
calories. The whole idea of assessing
00:01:00
food by calories is wrong. Calorie
00:01:02
restricted diets have been shown for the
00:01:04
vast majority of people not to work.
00:01:06
Your hunger signals go up. And hunger is
00:01:09
the main driver of obesity. And we'll
00:01:11
get into the other rules.
00:01:12
>> And what about coffee?
00:01:13
>> So drinking between two and five cups of
00:01:15
coffee reduces your risk of heart
00:01:17
disease by about 25%.
00:01:19
>> And then what do you think of almonds?
00:01:20
>> So there's lots of studies showing that
00:01:22
they're good for your cognition and
00:01:23
mood. And what about your views on GLP1s
00:01:26
like Zen?
00:01:27
>> I think from a public health
00:01:29
perspective, they're going to transform
00:01:31
medicine and we ought to be taking it
00:01:33
much more seriously. But I've got two
00:01:35
real worries about them. My first worry
00:01:37
is that
00:01:45
Listen, my my team gave me a script that
00:01:46
they asked me to read, but I'm just
00:01:48
going to ask you um in the nicest way I
00:01:50
possibly can. Thank you first and
00:01:52
foremost for choosing to subscribe to
00:01:53
this channel. It is um it's been one of
00:01:55
the most incredible crazy years of my
00:01:56
life. I never could have imagined. I had
00:01:58
so many dreams in my life, but this was
00:02:00
not one of them. And the very fact that
00:02:02
these conversations have resonated with
00:02:03
you and you've given me so much feedback
00:02:04
is something I will always be
00:02:06
appreciative of. And I almost carry away
00:02:07
a sort of burden of uh responsibility to
00:02:10
pay you back. And the favor I would like
00:02:12
to ask from you today is to subscribe to
00:02:14
the channel if you um would be so
00:02:16
obliged. It's completely free to do
00:02:17
that. Roughly about 47% of you that
00:02:20
listen to this channel frequently
00:02:21
currently don't subscribe to this
00:02:22
channel. So if you're one of those
00:02:23
people, please come and join us. Hit the
00:02:25
subscribe button. It's the single free
00:02:27
thing you can do to make this channel
00:02:28
better. And every subscriber sort of
00:02:30
pays into this show and allows us to do
00:02:32
things bigger and better and to push
00:02:33
ourselves even more. And I will not let
00:02:35
you down if you hit the subscribe
00:02:36
button. I promise you. And if I do,
00:02:37
please do unsubscribe, but I promise I
00:02:39
won't. Thank you.
00:02:48
Professor Tim Spectre.
00:02:51
Who is um who's this lovely lady and how
00:02:54
does she tie into the work you're
00:02:55
focused on right now?
00:02:58
>> That's my lovely mom, June, who is still
00:03:03
with us, age 93. Wow. but for the last
00:03:07
seven years has been in a in a home in
00:03:10
London after suffering a stroke and uh
00:03:13
then developing dementia
00:03:15
and so um yeah that's um changed
00:03:21
some of my views on life and uh she was
00:03:25
really pro- uh euthanasia and signed
00:03:29
every paper possible that if this ever
00:03:31
happened to her you know she would be
00:03:33
able to end her life but Unfortunately,
00:03:36
that didn't come true and under UK law,
00:03:38
it's not possible to to help her in that
00:03:42
because she lost capability and mobility
00:03:45
very early. So, she's still there, but
00:03:48
she doesn't no longer recognizes me. And
00:03:50
um it's it's a reminder of you know our
00:03:55
potential
00:03:57
future life and uh how so many so many
00:04:01
people in the are going to end up with
00:04:03
dementia that wasn't the case 50 years
00:04:06
ago. If I can do something to reverse
00:04:09
this epidemic of dementia, then that's
00:04:12
really motivating for me and in a way
00:04:15
one reason why I've started to research
00:04:19
the brain much more than I I've done in
00:04:21
the past.
00:04:22
>> So, is dementia
00:04:25
increasing or is it that we know of it
00:04:28
more now? So, we're better at diagnosing
00:04:30
it.
00:04:31
>> It's increasing for a number of reasons.
00:04:33
So some of it is the age demographic. So
00:04:36
we're living longer,
00:04:38
>> but we're not living healthier. So our
00:04:42
health span hasn't really increased, but
00:04:44
our lifespan has. We're good at keeping
00:04:47
elderly people alive longer. That's
00:04:50
definitely true, but there's also stats
00:04:52
to show that it is increasing even when
00:04:54
you take that into account. So that more
00:04:57
people are developing uh dementia than
00:05:00
ever before, even when you account for
00:05:02
the demographics. and those other
00:05:03
changes. So, it is a major worry and I
00:05:07
think it's one of the the major fears
00:05:09
that all of us have. You know, obviously
00:05:12
you've got cancer is one fear, but I
00:05:15
think the other really bad one is ending
00:05:17
up with dementia because nearly everyone
00:05:19
knows somebody with dementia.
00:05:22
>> Did this inspire you to go get your own
00:05:24
brain scanned?
00:05:25
>> Yes, I'd had, as you know, problems with
00:05:28
my brain before. I'd had a mini stroke
00:05:31
back in 2011
00:05:33
and
00:05:35
never really worked out the causes of
00:05:37
that. I knew I had some white spots in
00:05:40
my brain. I wanted to see if they were
00:05:44
still there, if there were any signs of
00:05:45
that. And at the same time, I wanted to
00:05:49
get a checkup to see was I likely to end
00:05:52
up like my mother or not. And did I have
00:05:55
the genetic form of the disease? Was it
00:05:58
a straightforward Alzheimer's or was it
00:06:00
more the vascular type that my mother
00:06:02
had or probably has?
00:06:05
And so yeah, partly it was motivated out
00:06:09
of my cur my medical curiosity and
00:06:13
partly for self-interest.
00:06:15
>> And what did you find? I went to this
00:06:17
specialized clinic in London that does
00:06:20
these dementia screens, so I know if I
00:06:24
had the risk genes for Alzheimer's,
00:06:26
which luckily I don't. Um, but I do have
00:06:29
bad genes for diabetes and heart
00:06:32
disease, which predispose you to the
00:06:35
vascular side of things.
00:06:36
>> What's vascular dementia?
00:06:38
>> There's several types of dementia, but
00:06:39
the two main ones are Alzheimer's, where
00:06:42
you get these protein folds in the
00:06:45
brain. you get local inflammation, these
00:06:47
protein tangles, and that then causes
00:06:51
these damage to the bits of the brain.
00:06:53
That's a very specific type of dementia.
00:06:56
Then you get more generalized dementia,
00:06:58
which is usually called vascular
00:07:00
dementia, where you're just getting
00:07:02
clogging up of the arteries supplying
00:07:04
the brain just like you do in the heart.
00:07:08
And that knocks off other bits of the
00:07:11
brain
00:07:13
uh in a slightly more random way than
00:07:15
happens uh with Alzheimer's. Slightly
00:07:17
less predictable, but that accounts for
00:07:19
about a third of all dementia is this
00:07:22
vascular time. I'm predisposed to it
00:07:24
because after my this weird episode in
00:07:26
2011, my blood pressure went up. So
00:07:28
anyone with high blood pressure
00:07:31
generally has slightly stiffer arteries
00:07:32
than most people and that impacts the
00:07:36
arteries in your brain. So, you are
00:07:38
slightly more at risk. And with these
00:07:40
diabetes genes that I've got, thanks to
00:07:43
my grandmother, I am more at risk of
00:07:46
vascular dementia. And so, what I wanted
00:07:49
to do was learn about that in order to
00:07:52
optimize all the things I could do to
00:07:54
postpone it or prevent it as much as
00:07:57
possible.
00:07:59
>> Over the last 5 years or so, your
00:08:02
interest in the brain has increased.
00:08:04
What what is the the the variance in
00:08:06
your views of the brain now versus five
00:08:08
years ago before you started doing
00:08:09
research and getting interested in it?
00:08:11
>> I think I saw the brain as a rather
00:08:13
distinct organ
00:08:15
that
00:08:17
uh was the domain of psychiatry and you
00:08:21
know perhaps gerontologists who look at
00:08:22
dementia that wasn't really part of the
00:08:25
major picture and certainly wasn't
00:08:28
within my domain of expertise. I think I
00:08:31
still believe in this the cartesian view
00:08:34
of the difference between the mind and
00:08:37
the brain the mind and the body
00:08:40
that these two separate entities and
00:08:42
you've got this barrier between them
00:08:44
this blood brain barrier that was really
00:08:47
like an iron curtain. So I I was
00:08:50
interested in it but I didn't realize
00:08:52
this huge connection I've now discovered
00:08:56
really that um has really excited me and
00:08:59
I think the thing that triggered it was
00:09:02
some of our own experiments which
00:09:04
happened a bit by chance. So when we
00:09:07
started Zoey, we did a number of trials
00:09:10
and we gave our participants apps so
00:09:14
they could report how they felt. In
00:09:18
every study we did, we started getting
00:09:21
back these incredible results of people
00:09:23
saying when they were when they started
00:09:25
the Zoey diet, for example, the first
00:09:27
thing they noticed was their mood and
00:09:29
energy improved and their hunger uh got
00:09:31
less. And that was before any blood
00:09:34
changes, before any gut changes. And so
00:09:37
initially we slightly discounted it, but
00:09:38
it happened in every study we did. We'd
00:09:40
looked at the menopause. And again, the
00:09:44
most dramatic change when people were
00:09:47
improving their gut health through food
00:09:49
with menopausal symptoms was was on mood
00:09:51
and energy. Because originally I'm a
00:09:54
rheatologist uh and was really
00:09:56
interested in inflammation. I'd never
00:09:58
put that connection between what was
00:10:01
inflammation in the body and in your
00:10:03
joints with what was going on in your
00:10:05
brain. And suddenly the latest science
00:10:07
when I'm going away you doing my reading
00:10:10
is making it all so so much clearer.
00:10:13
It's it's really become,
00:10:16
you know, this this new idea of things
00:10:19
like depression, things like mood
00:10:21
changes, things like fatigue and energy,
00:10:24
which I hadn't really thought about as
00:10:27
in a way a malfunction of the brain,
00:10:30
responding the wrong way to signals from
00:10:32
the rest of the body. But it it suddenly
00:10:35
all comes into focus about how holistic
00:10:38
the whole system is and how really the
00:10:40
brain is just another organ. And this
00:10:43
link with the gut is absolutely crucial
00:10:46
because that's where it gets most of its
00:10:48
information from. You know, we have this
00:10:51
vagus nerve that goes from our gut to
00:10:54
our brain, the longest nerve in the
00:10:55
body. And 80% of the signals go gut to
00:10:58
brain. Only 20% go brain to gut.
00:11:02
So all these things together have just
00:11:06
made me realize how important what going
00:11:08
into our gut is, our diet is, and how
00:11:11
that influences many things in our brain
00:11:13
that I didn't put together before. And I
00:11:16
don't think most most of the medical
00:11:18
world have put together before. And it
00:11:20
we've all got the brain on a pedestal, I
00:11:22
should say. You know, we we think it's
00:11:24
this some this unique thing that's
00:11:25
driving our bodies, but actually it's
00:11:27
not. It's just responding to them just
00:11:30
like any other organ.
00:11:32
It made me reflect on the days that I've
00:11:35
had like good and bad moods and how
00:11:41
how much it's linked to my diet in the
00:11:44
preceding couple of days like how I
00:11:46
feel. If I sleep is such a big
00:11:48
exacerbating factor in how I feel, but
00:11:50
if I'm slept and I still don't feel
00:11:52
good, it's typically linked I think to
00:11:54
something I've been eating or something
00:11:56
I've eaten very recently maybe in the
00:11:58
last 24 hours. So when you talk about
00:11:59
how there's this holistic picture and
00:12:01
how my brain might be I think I can't
00:12:03
remember the words you used but but it
00:12:04
sounded like you said my brain is
00:12:06
receiving signals from other parts of my
00:12:08
body and it's kind of malfunctioning
00:12:09
based on those signals which is causing
00:12:10
depression, anxiety, bad moods,
00:12:12
whatever. That I think is really
00:12:14
interesting because people think of mood
00:12:16
as a separate thing. We don't think of
00:12:17
mood connected to my gut.
00:12:18
>> No, it's it's your own fault. You're in
00:12:20
a bad mood. Why are you in a bad mood?
00:12:22
>> Something happened.
00:12:23
>> Yeah.
00:12:23
>> Externally. So someone cut you off in
00:12:25
traffic or whatever it might be. all
00:12:26
these studies, you know, we've got four
00:12:28
studies now where we're changing
00:12:30
people's diets and they're going,
00:12:32
they've been on generally bad diets,
00:12:34
we've moved them to good diets that mood
00:12:37
and particularly energy levels,
00:12:40
the first thing they noticed, they're
00:12:41
improving. And they never linked, just
00:12:44
like you, their mood and energy levels
00:12:46
with things like diet. It was just
00:12:49
inherent. They thought, "Oh, it's just
00:12:51
cuz I'm, you know, my life's or
00:12:53
whatever it is." An extreme example is
00:12:56
some families we've been working with
00:12:58
doing a channel 4 series at the moment
00:13:00
called What Not to Eat and we visit four
00:13:03
families and they're terrible diets and
00:13:07
we transform them, give them a gut
00:13:10
friendly
00:13:11
makeover diet. Look at them after 6
00:13:14
weeks. The first thing they all notice
00:13:16
is their mood and energy is dramatically
00:13:19
increased. They were napping all the
00:13:21
time. They were asleep all the time
00:13:23
during the day.
00:13:24
>> What were they eating?
00:13:25
>> Crap food. Highly processed crap food
00:13:29
and snacking late at night. Bars of
00:13:32
chocolate, you know, sodas, chicken
00:13:35
nuggets, pot noodles, rubbish food,
00:13:37
right? So, these were more worse than
00:13:40
your average, but still there's millions
00:13:42
of people like that doing this. And they
00:13:45
had no clue that it was linked to them
00:13:48
feeling terrible and tired all the time.
00:13:50
And again the first thing that improved
00:13:54
was what was going on in their brains
00:13:56
and they suddenly felt alert again. And
00:13:58
once people realize there's connection
00:14:01
then in a way you'd have this feedback
00:14:04
loop to say okay I'm not going to eat
00:14:06
this food you know because I know
00:14:08
it's making me feel so sick. But until
00:14:12
you make that connection you're not
00:14:13
going to know. you'll just be in this
00:14:16
constant state saying, well, you know,
00:14:18
I'm just overweight, that's why I'm
00:14:20
tired. Uh, or I'm not exercising, that's
00:14:23
why I'm tired. There's a bit of a
00:14:25
vicious cycle here with eating something
00:14:27
bad, then being low energy and sleeping
00:14:30
all day, not feeling good. So, you eat
00:14:33
something bad and the cycle continues.
00:14:36
Cuz if I don't feel good, I probably
00:14:37
want to eat a chocolate bar. In our Zoe
00:14:39
studies, we found that people who had a
00:14:41
bad night's sleep desperately craved
00:14:44
some sugary crap in the morning. Right?
00:14:46
It's the first you don't go for a
00:14:48
healthy breakfast. It's like there's
00:14:51
some little evil thing in your brain
00:14:52
saying, "Um, okay, I need a quick fix. I
00:14:56
don't care about the rest of the day.
00:14:57
Just get me through the next hour."
00:15:00
>> Do you know Do you know what that I had
00:15:01
someone posit on my podcast that um that
00:15:04
was because your body's basically under
00:15:06
a form of stress. So from an
00:15:08
evolutionary perspective, if if you're
00:15:09
waking up in the middle of the night for
00:15:10
some reason or you weren't sleeping
00:15:12
properly, it might be because you were
00:15:14
under threat. So your brain wants
00:15:16
energy. So there a lot of studies now
00:15:18
that stress, which we thought of as a
00:15:21
sort of external
00:15:23
psychological event, is actually a
00:15:25
physiological one and is actually
00:15:26
driving inflammation. It's directly
00:15:28
affecting your immune system, which is
00:15:30
then sending these signals to your brain
00:15:32
to change your behavior. And this I
00:15:34
think is very much the heart of what
00:15:37
seems to be happening, you know, in
00:15:40
depression.
00:15:42
What I've been finding out is that it's
00:15:45
detecting a change in the immune system.
00:15:47
It's switching on to the stress mode.
00:15:50
And the stress mode then triggers these
00:15:52
different behaviors in your brain. And
00:15:54
very often it's not, you know, real
00:15:58
stress. I mean most of the stresses we
00:16:00
get it every day are not like our
00:16:02
ancestors had. Uh we're not being chased
00:16:05
by wild animals or um being burnt out of
00:16:08
our village, you know. So the and what
00:16:12
really interested me was this whole link
00:16:14
between what happens when uh you have a
00:16:17
vaccination. During Zoe, we looked at a
00:16:20
million people's responses to the if you
00:16:22
remember the the FISA and uh vaccine and
00:16:25
the SK vaccine. And what was really
00:16:29
interesting was that uh people were
00:16:32
actually depressed during that time. So
00:16:35
you had about 24 hours of depression
00:16:38
which was mimicking
00:16:40
um a more constant threat. And this
00:16:43
suddenly brought home this idea that you
00:16:45
can trigger depression through a little
00:16:48
shift in your immune system. There's a
00:16:50
really growing theory about people who
00:16:53
have long-term depression is that these
00:16:56
their immune changes are switched on so
00:16:58
that they're getting the equivalent of
00:17:00
this constant tickling of the immune
00:17:02
system by a vaccine. So that to me is
00:17:06
was was a really important thing because
00:17:09
I I have vaccines. I have regular
00:17:12
vaccines. I'm big believer in vaccines,
00:17:14
but they do make you feel a little bit
00:17:16
down. That makes sense cuz your blood
00:17:19
tests will show a spike in your proteins
00:17:22
for inflammation. Your immune system's
00:17:24
kicking in. That sends signals to your
00:17:26
brain. Your brain says, "Okay, I looks
00:17:28
like I've got an illness coming here."
00:17:30
That illness behavior in some people
00:17:32
then gets carried on
00:17:35
for months or years. And this is now
00:17:38
developing this whole new theory of of
00:17:41
why uh people are depressed which isn't
00:17:44
the old theory of it's just due to a
00:17:47
chemical imbalance. It's actually
00:17:49
your body responding abnormally to a you
00:17:54
know a normal response. It's it thinks
00:17:56
it's under attack. Your brain thinks
00:17:58
it's under attack. It should then shut
00:18:00
down and protect you. This I find
00:18:02
fascinating that we're now linking so
00:18:04
much to the immune system and it's the
00:18:08
immune basis of things of mental and
00:18:11
brain diseases is becoming incredibly
00:18:14
important. I'm sure you've talked on the
00:18:16
podcast a lot about inflamming and the
00:18:19
role of controlling the immune system
00:18:23
because if your immune system is out of
00:18:25
control you inflammation levels are high
00:18:28
your body can't repair itself. So aging
00:18:30
happens faster in the brain. All of
00:18:32
these things are pointing to
00:18:33
inflammation being crucial to
00:18:35
everything, but particularly in all
00:18:37
aspects of brain health. And when I went
00:18:40
and looked, you can really find that the
00:18:44
immune system has a role in every brain
00:18:46
disease they've ever looked at. And yet
00:18:49
we've missed it because we've been so
00:18:51
obsessed with new, you know, the way
00:18:54
that Prozac works by it just being about
00:18:58
serotonin
00:18:59
uh or dopamine. And for 40 years, we've
00:19:04
been going down the wrong path and
00:19:06
missing this holistic view that actually
00:19:09
it's it's about inflammation
00:19:12
paired with metabolism. Because the
00:19:14
other big player here is and the reason
00:19:16
a lot of people get dementia is blood
00:19:18
sugar is not well controlled and the the
00:19:21
energy supply to the brain is not well
00:19:23
controlled. So those two things for me
00:19:25
have
00:19:27
transformed my view of of brain health.
00:19:30
And I used to study genetics as you know
00:19:33
and it was always interesting that in um
00:19:36
when we looked at twins which were
00:19:38
usually very similar for most things
00:19:40
when we looked at um brain diseases
00:19:42
there was very little similarity in the
00:19:44
twins. So the genetic component was
00:19:46
always quite small apart from a few
00:19:48
diseases. Most of them were really
00:19:50
low-level uh what we call heritability.
00:19:54
And there was a massive study in um
00:19:57
Sweden. They looked at several million
00:19:59
sibling pairs and s looked at all their
00:20:04
mental health or brain diseases I prefer
00:20:06
to call them. And there was no gene that
00:20:10
really came out even in several million
00:20:13
people that explained these disease
00:20:16
other than a general tendency
00:20:19
to get any type of brain disease.
00:20:23
So they called you know this like factor
00:20:26
P. Um, if you had this general
00:20:29
susceptibility, you could get any
00:20:31
disease, but that could be mania,
00:20:33
depression, bipolar, ADHD, it could be
00:20:36
Alzheimer's, it could be schizophrenia,
00:20:39
which which suddenly changes your whole
00:20:41
view of these these diseases. We've said
00:20:44
these are individual um diseases that
00:20:46
should always be looked at separately.
00:20:48
And if you start thinking of this as the
00:20:50
brain as a an organ just like anything
00:20:52
else like it was the liver, you'd say,
00:20:54
okay, we talk about liver disease, you
00:20:56
know, how do you prevent liver disease?
00:20:59
We never talk about that in brain
00:21:00
disease. We just say, okay, you got to
00:21:03
talk about manic depression differently
00:21:04
to uh ADHD or personality disorder or
00:21:08
epilepsy or whatever it is. But it turns
00:21:11
out that not only have the similar
00:21:13
genes, but really similar risk factors
00:21:16
as well.
00:21:17
I've heard you say that you think
00:21:20
Parkinson's disease starts in the gut as
00:21:23
inflammation in the gut.
00:21:24
>> Yeah, that's a great um example of how
00:21:29
my view of these diseases changing.
00:21:31
There's really good epidemiology data
00:21:33
now. Um
00:21:35
>> epidemiology data.
00:21:36
>> Epidemiology data is data in large
00:21:40
populations.
00:21:41
Um so you study the cause of disease by
00:21:45
studying populations. That's essentially
00:21:47
what epidemiology is. And what these
00:21:50
studies have shown is that if you follow
00:21:53
susceptible people
00:21:56
uh and find out who at the end ended up
00:21:59
with Parkinson's disease, you will see
00:22:02
that
00:22:03
about 90% of people who end up with
00:22:05
Parkinson disease had some gut problems
00:22:07
10 years before.
00:22:10
And you might say, okay, well, might not
00:22:13
be related, might be two separate
00:22:15
things, but they've actually found the
00:22:18
same protein changes in the brains in
00:22:21
people with Parkinson's disease, this
00:22:24
particular protein that gets misfolded.
00:22:28
It's a bit equivalent to Alzheimer's but
00:22:29
it's it's separate a separate type of
00:22:31
protein alpha sinuclean and it gets
00:22:34
folded and you get this characteristic
00:22:36
thing you can see
00:22:39
postmortem called a a louisi body but
00:22:42
it's the protein folding that's
00:22:43
important and if you look in the gut not
00:22:45
only do these people have constipation
00:22:47
and bloating and problems 10 years
00:22:49
before a really sluggish uh intestine
00:22:52
but they have the same proteins that are
00:22:55
misfolded that you can find in their gut
00:22:58
And they think that it takes 10 years
00:23:01
for these proteins to go slowly up the
00:23:03
vagus nerve into the brain and then it
00:23:06
causes the problem there. So this is the
00:23:08
the latest theory behind Parkinson's
00:23:11
disease that it actually starts in the
00:23:13
gut and it's related to inflammation in
00:23:16
the gut. So these proteins start folding
00:23:19
when the gut is not happy which means
00:23:23
that you could potentially prevent
00:23:25
Parkinson's disease by a gut friendly
00:23:29
diet. It looks like it's the evidence is
00:23:32
building that you know that's going to
00:23:33
be pretty concrete soon. If that's true
00:23:35
then you may think what other diseases
00:23:39
might have that origin there that we um
00:23:42
really don't understand. What about
00:23:44
multiple scerosis that might happen
00:23:46
there first? And it really starts to
00:23:49
bring,
00:23:50
you know, this obscure of these brain
00:23:53
disease back into the domain of the rest
00:23:55
of the body and what's going on there
00:23:57
and these metabolic problems. You know,
00:24:00
diabetes is the number one risk factor
00:24:03
for so many of these conditions as well.
00:24:05
So like if you got type two diabetes,
00:24:08
you're like four times as more likely to
00:24:10
have a brain disease. not only
00:24:12
depression but also you know bipolar,
00:24:15
schizophrenia,
00:24:17
epilepsy, all of these ones. So clearly
00:24:20
they're linked. They're this what goes
00:24:22
on in your body,
00:24:24
what you're eating,
00:24:27
what what your immune system is doing
00:24:30
has this amazing knock-on effect.
00:24:32
>> So what do we do about it? What does the
00:24:34
average person do about it? You know,
00:24:35
because the average you know what the
00:24:36
average diet looks like in the western
00:24:38
world. Um, if we want to have
00:24:42
optimally healthy brains and avoid
00:24:44
dementia, Parkinson's, and some of these
00:24:46
other disorders that are linked to the
00:24:48
gut, what is what is the most important
00:24:50
thing the listener right now should be
00:24:52
thinking about and doing? Well, I like
00:24:55
to think we got I've got a list that's
00:24:58
getting longer, but it I've got now
00:25:00
eight rules for gut health, which pretty
00:25:02
much work
00:25:04
for all health because we you to treat
00:25:07
the brain. It's no really different to
00:25:09
treating the rest of your body. If you
00:25:12
treat that well, you're going to be
00:25:13
fine. So, the first thing is to be
00:25:17
mindful of what you're eating. Don't
00:25:18
just put any old in your mouth, you
00:25:21
know? I mean, stop for a bit and saying,
00:25:23
"Is this what's in it? Is it any good
00:25:26
for me? How's it going to make me feel?"
00:25:28
>> You mean checking labels and stuff?
00:25:30
>> Checking labels or even just taking a
00:25:32
second to think, you know, gosh,
00:25:35
don't just blindly eat in front of the
00:25:37
TV without thinking what you're eating
00:25:39
as we most of us do. Second, and
00:25:41
probably the key thing is, I think, is
00:25:43
to eat a diversity of plants. 30 plants
00:25:46
a week. These 30 plants give you the
00:25:50
diversity of chemicals to act as
00:25:53
fertilizers for getting as many good
00:25:55
bugs as you can into your system.
00:25:57
>> How can you explain that to someone that
00:25:59
doesn't know much about the gut?
00:26:00
>> When I'm talking about your gut, I'm
00:26:01
talking about gut microbes. And there
00:26:04
are 40 to 100 trillion of these guys in
00:26:07
your mainly in your large intestine that
00:26:11
are
00:26:13
many pharmacies. And
00:26:16
there we have thousands of different
00:26:18
species, all of which highly selected to
00:26:21
eat only certain foods. There's one that
00:26:23
only likes coffee, for example, called
00:26:26
Lorenabacta.
00:26:27
>> A bug that only likes coffee in my
00:26:28
belly. It's
00:26:29
>> just waiting for you to drink coffee.
00:26:30
>> And when I drink coffee, what happens?
00:26:32
It uh has a party, has sex, has babies,
00:26:36
multiplies, and then produces certain
00:26:39
chemicals in response by breaking down
00:26:41
that coffee into other ingredients which
00:26:43
might then help your immune system and
00:26:46
um in some way explain why coffee is
00:26:48
good for your heart. So, you got to
00:26:51
imagine that you've got lots of bugs
00:26:53
like that that are highly specific
00:26:55
waiting for you to have uh not only
00:26:58
coffee, but you know, maybe it's seaweed
00:27:00
or maybe uh it's baobob or maybe it's
00:27:03
things you don't often have uh so that
00:27:06
we can expand our list of good bugs.
00:27:09
>> So, if I stop eating a particular food
00:27:12
like coffee, if I stop having coffee,
00:27:14
will that bug die? It probably goes down
00:27:17
to very low levels because actually
00:27:21
what's interesting is even if you stop
00:27:22
drinking coffee, you're surrounded by
00:27:24
coffee drinkers
00:27:26
and they they're droplets of saliva and
00:27:30
kisses and uh greetings mean that you'll
00:27:33
be getting uh some of that either those
00:27:36
bugs themselves or you'll be getting um
00:27:40
some bits of coffee in the air, a coffee
00:27:42
aroma. Okay. So, the bugs go up and down
00:27:45
in population.
00:27:46
>> Yes. So, even in non- coffee drinkers,
00:27:48
we do see tiny amounts of this uh this
00:27:51
Lorsonacta.
00:27:53
Um but in countries that don't drink
00:27:55
coffee at all, there are a few African
00:27:57
countries for example where it doesn't
00:27:58
ex
00:28:01
um so it that's but I think it's
00:28:04
important to imagine your it's a bit
00:28:06
like having a rare animal. You know,
00:28:09
you've got to feed in your zoo. You
00:28:12
don't want to give them all the same
00:28:13
food. You've got to give them this
00:28:14
diversity so that all the rare animals
00:28:17
can get out there. And we know that the
00:28:20
more good bugs you've got,
00:28:23
the better your immune system, the more
00:28:25
you dampen inflammation, the more you
00:28:27
can prevent all these problems that
00:28:29
we're seeing. So our our aim is to build
00:28:32
up the good bugs. And the more you build
00:28:34
them up, they squash out the bad bugs,
00:28:36
the ones that like eating the burgers
00:28:38
and the the the bad food and the and the
00:28:41
terrible quality fats and the artificial
00:28:45
substances. So you're squashing them out
00:28:48
by starving them and you do that by
00:28:50
feeding them properly. That's the that's
00:28:52
the concept if that makes sense.
00:28:54
>> And on that point of coffee, doesn't it
00:28:56
restrict blood flow to your brain?
00:28:59
>> No, not as far as I know.
00:29:00
>> Oh, really? Um I'm talking I know about
00:29:04
coffee at the epidemiological level. So
00:29:06
there have been multiple studies like I
00:29:08
was saying between coffee drinkers, non-
00:29:10
coffee drinkers, seeing what happens to
00:29:12
them 20 30 years later and drinking
00:29:16
between two and five cups of coffee
00:29:18
reduces your risk of heart disease by
00:29:20
about 25%.
00:29:22
So there may be other studies showing it
00:29:25
does something to your brain, but
00:29:28
generally everything I've seen is
00:29:30
beneficial. I've not seen anything
00:29:32
negative. Although there are some people
00:29:34
who react to caffeine badly, so there's
00:29:36
always a a personalized element to it.
00:29:39
>> Sleep disruption and stuff.
00:29:41
>> Yes. So you you might be a a
00:29:43
metabolizer. It doesn't metabolize
00:29:45
quickly in you. So that caffeine is
00:29:47
hanging around longer. So they're the
00:29:50
only
00:29:51
downsides to it for some people.
00:29:53
>> Can it make you more anxious?
00:29:55
>> Um I think it can make some people more
00:29:57
anxious. Yes. Um, and that's that's why
00:30:01
things like matcha are better than
00:30:03
coffee because they have a an extra
00:30:05
chemical in there that can calm you
00:30:07
down. So, like anything, it any food,
00:30:10
it's all personalized. And so, when we
00:30:12
talk about epidemiology, we're talking
00:30:14
about the average person. Um, doesn't
00:30:17
mean there aren't aren't exceptions. So,
00:30:19
I'm not saying that everybody in the
00:30:20
world needs to have coffee, but coffee
00:30:22
used to be demonized as something that
00:30:25
would give you heart attacks and
00:30:26
arrhythmias. And in fact the opposite is
00:30:29
true epidemologically speak you can
00:30:32
actually you get less heart
00:30:34
abnormalities arrhythmias when you drink
00:30:36
coffee for reasons we still don't
00:30:39
understand.
00:30:40
>> So the first point of the eight was mind
00:30:41
being mindful about what you eat. Second
00:30:44
was uh eat uh 30 different plants. And
00:30:47
that's that was the basis of our our
00:30:50
Zoey product, the daily 30, which has 34
00:30:55
uh mainly freeze-dried whole plants in
00:30:58
it. And we've recently added some more.
00:31:01
So, we added some seaweed, some algae,
00:31:04
and uh some kombucha in there. So,
00:31:06
they're rare ingredients. We got seven
00:31:08
different types of mushroom that you
00:31:09
wouldn't normally have.
00:31:10
>> It's worth me saying that I'm an
00:31:11
investor in Zoe. Um, and let me take
00:31:15
that back.
00:31:16
>> So, you just you take this out and you
00:31:18
sprinkle it on top of your food
00:31:20
typically.
00:31:21
>> Yes. You add it to food. Um, and it's so
00:31:24
it's it's different to most of the other
00:31:27
sort of supplements you might see. Uh,
00:31:30
it's not instead of food. It looks more
00:31:32
like food than most uh of the of the
00:31:36
common supplements out there that look
00:31:37
like green powders. We we did a big
00:31:40
trial of this with about 340 people
00:31:44
comparing it to a probiotic and a um a
00:31:47
dummy one and over 6 weeks you get
00:31:51
really quite dramatic improvements in
00:31:53
your gut uh microbes with with eating
00:31:56
this. So the you really push up the good
00:31:58
bugs and squash out the bad bugs about
00:32:02
several times more than you would get
00:32:04
just by having a traditional probiotic.
00:32:07
So this fertilizer approach
00:32:10
uh does seem to work and this is this is
00:32:13
the study where we also showed the
00:32:15
improvements in mood after a few days
00:32:17
which um you know surprised me because I
00:32:21
wasn't even thinking about that when we
00:32:24
we we planned the study. So the key
00:32:26
reported findings in that study were a
00:32:28
gut microbiome improvement,
00:32:30
an average increase of five points in
00:32:32
their Zo gut microbiome score, digestive
00:32:35
system, 70% of people reported
00:32:36
improvements in overall digestive
00:32:38
systems
00:32:40
symptoms. Um,
00:32:42
and it increased fullness by 41.5%.
00:32:46
Satisfaction by 21.6% 6% and energy by
00:32:50
43.3% and reduced hunger and desire to
00:32:53
eat versus
00:32:55
the meal alone.
00:32:57
About half reported increased energy and
00:32:59
45% reported improved happiness in the
00:33:02
main study.
00:33:04
>> So we weren't expecting that. That that
00:33:06
was my my point really on these because
00:33:09
we thought it would just be gut it like
00:33:11
okay do I get do I go to the toilet more
00:33:13
often? Is it improving my gut microbes?
00:33:16
And so it was a real bonus to see these
00:33:19
these brain effects.
00:33:20
>> And did you do stool tests on those
00:33:22
people to see yes the change in the bugs
00:33:24
in their stomach over that period? Was
00:33:26
it six weeks?
00:33:26
>> It was around six weeks. Yes.
00:33:28
>> Yeah. And what did you see change in
00:33:30
their their gut bugs?
00:33:32
>> So we've got a new scoring method for
00:33:34
gut bugs which we published last month
00:33:36
in in in nature. And so we used to talk
00:33:40
about diversity and on previous podcasts
00:33:43
I think we've talked about diversity
00:33:45
which is the number of different species
00:33:48
but we've got a better way of looking at
00:33:49
that now which is to take um 100 most
00:33:53
important bugs that change with diet
00:33:55
that everybody's got because we're all
00:33:57
different. It's very hard to compare
00:33:59
your your bugs with my bugs because we
00:34:01
only share 20%. So this looks at 100
00:34:05
common bugs that we've both got, 50 good
00:34:07
and 50 bad. And what we want in an
00:34:11
intervention is to see the the good bugs
00:34:13
are associated with good diet and good
00:34:15
health outcomes, good blood tests
00:34:18
are going up and the bad bugs associated
00:34:21
with inflammation,
00:34:23
uh, poor diets and bad health outcomes
00:34:27
going down. And that's exactly what we
00:34:29
saw. We saw an a change in roughly 40 of
00:34:32
these microbes with the prebiotic the
00:34:35
daily 30 whereas with the probiotic
00:34:38
which we know works from other studies
00:34:40
we saw only a change in about four or
00:34:42
five of the bugs.
00:34:44
>> Okay.
00:34:44
>> So was it so they both worked but the
00:34:47
the prebiotic was working better than
00:34:49
the probiotic which has sort of changed
00:34:52
my mind about what's more powerful.
00:34:54
>> So prebiotic being what and probiotic
00:34:56
being what? Prebiotic is like a
00:34:58
fertilizer for gut microbes. It's there.
00:35:00
It's giving them food.
00:35:02
>> Yeah.
00:35:03
>> So that and in an indiscriminate way
00:35:05
because we're giving a a wide variety of
00:35:07
foods. In these 34 plants, each of them
00:35:10
has hundreds of chemicals. So there's
00:35:12
thousands of different things for them
00:35:14
to feed on. Whereas a probiotic, we used
00:35:17
Lactobacillus ramnosis, which is a
00:35:19
well-known one that's been studied,
00:35:22
you know, hundred of time in hundreds of
00:35:24
trials. It's a live microbe that lives
00:35:27
generally in in foods like yogurt and
00:35:29
things like this in a concentrated form
00:35:31
in a capsule. You give that and it
00:35:35
improved uh the gut microb but much less
00:35:38
than the
00:35:39
>> so prebiotic gives them food. Probiotic
00:35:41
actually just puts bugs in there.
00:35:42
>> It puts bugs in there and we used to
00:35:44
think it was like a seed.
00:35:46
Uh so the it was the you know so
00:35:48
fertilizers and maybe seeds but we now
00:35:51
know that that bug will never really
00:35:53
seed in your in your gut microbiome.
00:35:56
And so the science is and our thinking
00:35:58
has changed. We think the probiotic is
00:36:00
is really tickling your immune system as
00:36:03
it's going down.
00:36:04
>> Okay.
00:36:05
>> So it's probably working higher up in
00:36:08
the the small intestine which is um
00:36:11
further up in the gut.
00:36:13
Where where is where is the gut?
00:36:16
>> Yes. So most people if you ask people to
00:36:19
point to the gut they always think of
00:36:20
their stomach.
00:36:22
>> Yeah.
00:36:23
>> Uh that's not your stomach. You see
00:36:25
that's that's your there the intestines.
00:36:28
So your your stomach is up here. U take
00:36:31
away your your liver.
00:36:33
If you imagine we've got a body here,
00:36:36
you got a mouth. Food goes in there
00:36:39
through the esophagus, which is a tube
00:36:41
that leads to the stomach. And this is
00:36:45
the stomach here, which is highly
00:36:46
acidic. And that leads into the geodenum
00:36:50
through a a little valve. And that is
00:36:53
where food starts getting mushed around
00:36:56
into little balls. It goes into the
00:36:58
small intestine here, which is badly
00:37:01
named because the small intestine is
00:37:04
really the largest bit of the gut. And
00:37:07
it's endless coils as of u guts there.
00:37:12
Lots of crypts. There's little nooks and
00:37:15
crannies everywhere. And so the surface
00:37:17
area is really huge. It's it's several
00:37:19
tennis courts if you laid it out just
00:37:22
one um in one human. And that's because
00:37:26
that's where most of the nutrients get
00:37:28
absorbed. They get extracted from the
00:37:31
food and absorbed that way. So that all
00:37:33
the trace elements and things we're
00:37:35
recycling. We're like a recycling
00:37:37
factory. And then from the small
00:37:39
intestine, it then goes into the large
00:37:42
intestine, which is also called the
00:37:44
colon. And that's where most of the gut
00:37:48
microbes are. So, so 99% of the gut
00:37:52
microbes are in that final part, the
00:37:56
large intestine, which uh is a a couple
00:38:00
of meters long and varies widely between
00:38:02
people. And this is the spot where fiber
00:38:07
uh goes, things that hasn't been
00:38:09
digested in the early part of the the
00:38:11
gut uh is and that's because the
00:38:14
microbes mainly feed off fiber.
00:38:18
And so that's where they do the good.
00:38:20
They convert that fiber into products
00:38:23
such as short- chain fatty acids, which
00:38:25
are the really beneficial chemicals that
00:38:28
are good for our immune system. And it's
00:38:30
important to realize that across both
00:38:32
the small and the large intestine,
00:38:34
you've got ner huge amounts of nerves.
00:38:37
You've got what's called the interic
00:38:39
nervous system, which is our second
00:38:42
brain and is it was actually the first
00:38:46
brain to be formed. So when we were
00:38:48
little embryos
00:38:50
uh we started as a little tube and the
00:38:54
nervous system that formed around our
00:38:55
intestine was actually the first bit
00:38:57
first brain of our body and in a way we
00:39:00
developed the second one on our head as
00:39:01
a oh bit of an afterthought. Uh which is
00:39:04
quite fun way of thinking about it but
00:39:05
just shows how important the nerves are
00:39:09
in our in our gut to our the way we
00:39:11
function. And as we were talking earlier
00:39:13
about this this connection between the
00:39:15
two and there's also immune cells. So
00:39:18
70% of our immune cells are uh in the
00:39:21
gut. Most of them in in the large
00:39:23
intestine but also in the small
00:39:24
intestine. So our immune system is here
00:39:28
and a huge amount of our nervous system
00:39:29
is here.
00:39:31
>> Why? Presumably the the bugs are all
00:39:33
through the body.
00:39:34
>> They're everywhere. So they're also in
00:39:35
your Yes. So I should point out we're
00:39:38
covered in bugs. So every bit of the
00:39:40
human body uh has uh some bugs in it.
00:39:44
The second biggest place where we have
00:39:46
them is in our mouth. So the oral
00:39:48
microbiome in our in our saliva and in
00:39:52
our teeth and uh our gums. And that's
00:39:56
why poor uh hygiene if you're not
00:40:00
flossing properly, you double the risk
00:40:02
of getting dementia as well.
00:40:03
Interestingly, because there's a a real
00:40:05
link between microbes here that if
00:40:08
they're eating plaque and other stuff
00:40:10
that you're leaving around in your gums
00:40:12
gets inflamed,
00:40:14
that creates an environment where nasty
00:40:17
microbes that love inflammation live.
00:40:19
And for reasons we don't know, they seem
00:40:22
to pass into from from your mouth into
00:40:25
your brain and trigger inflammation in
00:40:28
the brain, which then uh increase your
00:40:30
risk of dementia. if you're not
00:40:32
flossing.
00:40:33
>> Yes, this is really new science showing
00:40:35
that just how important these getting
00:40:38
the right bugs in the right place and
00:40:40
avoiding the ones who are in the wrong
00:40:42
place really is.
00:40:43
>> Why do we need these bugs? Why didn't
00:40:46
evolution design us so that we could
00:40:47
just do all this stuff without the need
00:40:49
of these little workers, these little
00:40:52
bugs in our bodies? It it seems super
00:40:54
weird to me that you know you think of
00:40:56
the human body as being this one
00:40:58
organism but actually it's appears to be
00:41:00
many millions and millions and millions
00:41:02
of organisms.
00:41:02
>> Well, you've got a sort of humanentric
00:41:04
view of the world. So um we we evolve
00:41:07
from microbes.
00:41:08
>> We are one. We we used to be one.
00:41:10
>> We used to be one and um it it turns out
00:41:14
that most of our body is are remnants of
00:41:19
microbes. microbes obviously fused to
00:41:21
cause to cause uh human cells.
00:41:26
So that was the whole origin of of how
00:41:29
multisellular creatures came together.
00:41:31
These single-sellled microbes,
00:41:34
some of them fused to to do that, others
00:41:36
stayed as single cells. There was always
00:41:39
this link between the single-sellled
00:41:41
guys and their multisellular
00:41:44
ancestors, if you like. And so as we
00:41:49
co-evolved into more complicated beings,
00:41:51
the the two were always together. And it
00:41:54
turned out that again as like as we're
00:41:57
formed as embryos, the gut is the first
00:42:01
thing that you know this this cylind
00:42:03
this tube is the first thing that comes
00:42:05
out um of the design system. And it's
00:42:10
designed to have microbes in it that
00:42:13
serve a crucial purpose in training our
00:42:16
immune system to recognize what's out
00:42:19
what's harmful and what's beneficial.
00:42:21
And it's also shown to be crucial for
00:42:24
our brain development. But it it is
00:42:26
fascinating when we start think about
00:42:28
our origins and think of it that you
00:42:30
know we essentially start as microbes
00:42:32
because also we don't think of our body
00:42:35
you know we've always historically
00:42:37
thought of you know God's creation this
00:42:39
body had nothing to do with anything
00:42:40
else we were the masters of the universe
00:42:42
and I think it's quite humbling to
00:42:44
realize that so much of us comes from
00:42:47
microbes and I learned something
00:42:49
recently that was that also blew me away
00:42:51
is that all ourselves have these
00:42:55
powerhouses in them called mitochondria.
00:42:57
And it turns out they do much more than
00:43:00
just supply batteries for the cell. They
00:43:03
they fighting inflammation. They're
00:43:05
important for gene expression. They're
00:43:06
good for metabolism. And it turns out
00:43:10
the origin of these things is little
00:43:12
microbes that got trapped in our bodies.
00:43:16
They are essentially uh microbes that
00:43:20
were good at making creating energy.
00:43:23
And um at some point in our distant
00:43:27
past, we fused um our multisellular
00:43:32
um microbes that were were going around
00:43:34
doing stuff. They said, "Oh, we could do
00:43:36
with some more energy." And so by chance
00:43:38
they fused with these energy microbes
00:43:42
and slowly and slowly became
00:43:44
incorporated into our bodies so that we
00:43:46
now have these mitochondria all of our
00:43:48
bodies which whose ancestors are also uh
00:43:51
microbes
00:43:52
>> and we have them in every cell of our
00:43:53
body.
00:43:54
>> Yes, we do. And they're turning out to
00:43:56
be quite crucial as well in in brain
00:43:58
health. Do you do you do you spend much
00:44:00
time wondering or have there been
00:44:02
periods in your life where you've
00:44:03
wondered about the meaning of all of
00:44:04
this and why there's living organisms?
00:44:07
Because it doesn't appear to be a great
00:44:09
need for living organisms.
00:44:11
You know, you could just have rocks and
00:44:13
water on these planets. I don't know why
00:44:16
you need humans necessarily in as it
00:44:20
relates to the contribution we make to
00:44:23
the um the environment. Well, I think as
00:44:27
soon as you had life, whether it was
00:44:30
plant life, I mean, you're you're
00:44:31
thinking perhaps of animal life, but you
00:44:34
know, things like lyken on rocks were
00:44:38
one of the first forms of life
00:44:42
and something that was needed to
00:44:46
get, you know, energy, nutrients from
00:44:49
the rock and then they for some reason
00:44:52
just wanted to survive, you know, and I
00:44:54
think that's the the point that life is
00:44:58
about
00:44:59
getting enough nutrients so you can uh
00:45:02
keep living or pass you know your genes
00:45:05
on to someone else. It's this uh that
00:45:07
concept once that was started maybe it
00:45:10
was lyken everything else came from that
00:45:12
and that could have just been a chance
00:45:13
event.
00:45:15
So I but I you know it is always
00:45:17
humbling humbling to think that you know
00:45:20
we've probably come back from some lowly
00:45:22
point like this uh as we emerge from
00:45:25
emerge from rocks and and water but um
00:45:30
uh yeah I philosophy is not my strong
00:45:32
suit but I I just get so much pleasure
00:45:34
from finding new facts uh that are all
00:45:37
around us and I think it's fascinating
00:45:39
that we've spent so long as humans
00:45:41
looking up at the stars
00:45:43
whereas looking inside us at things like
00:45:47
microbes and their origin is to me far
00:45:50
more exciting
00:45:52
>> and maybe explanatory
00:45:55
>> as to like you know we're looking at the
00:45:57
stars in France.
00:45:58
>> Yeah, we look at the stars oh where do
00:45:59
we come from? You know where what about
00:46:00
the big bang all this kind of stuff
00:46:02
whereas actually studying what's in
00:46:05
ourselves and where do they come from we
00:46:08
could learn a hell of a lot more about
00:46:10
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description below. So that was the
00:48:13
second point of the eight, which is eat
00:48:14
30 plants.
00:48:16
And uh so daily 30 is a is a easy way to
00:48:20
do that and a tasty way to do that.
00:48:22
What's the third one? I'd go for eat eat
00:48:25
fermented foods and try and get three
00:48:28
portions of fermentss in your diet
00:48:32
>> every day.
00:48:32
>> Every day.
00:48:34
>> And I wouldn't have said this three
00:48:36
years ago because the science wasn't
00:48:38
really strong enough to support
00:48:42
this, but a study three years ago by a
00:48:45
group in Stanford of 28 people showed
00:48:48
the giving. They gave them five portions
00:48:50
a day for about a month and showed that
00:48:55
you can get a reduction in blood
00:48:57
inflammation levels about 25%
00:49:00
in that time compared to a fiber diet.
00:49:03
And that,
00:49:06
you know, blew me away because this this
00:49:08
was the first really good study in this
00:49:10
because there have been lots of studies
00:49:11
but they're not good quality. Suddenly
00:49:14
someone doing daily bloods, you know,
00:49:16
they would looked at 20 odd proteins in
00:49:19
the blood and suddenly you've got this
00:49:23
link between a a food
00:49:26
and directly affecting inflammation in
00:49:28
the blood, which as we've been talking
00:49:30
about has big knock-on effects on the
00:49:32
brain and the rest of the body.
00:49:33
>> That's like kimchi and stuff like that.
00:49:35
Fermented food is any food that's been
00:49:37
transformed by microbes into something
00:49:40
better, which means it it tastes better.
00:49:43
It's more complex. It lasts longer, so
00:49:47
you don't need a fridge. That's why our
00:49:48
ancestors did it. And it it's been
00:49:51
chemically transformed and is generally
00:49:53
more nutritious.
00:49:54
>> Give me some examples.
00:49:56
>> So, um, yogurt from milk. All you're
00:50:00
doing is adding
00:50:02
>> uh
00:50:02
>> zero fat. Zero fat Greek yogurt.
00:50:06
>> Oh, I'd never have zero fat Greek
00:50:07
yogurt. Why do you want to drink that?
00:50:09
>> I don't know. I just I was just
00:50:10
>> No. Uh no,
00:50:11
>> that that means it be Yeah. heavily
00:50:13
processed. You don't want that. But
00:50:15
there's still good microbes in it. And
00:50:18
um you know, all you're doing is
00:50:20
transforming something rather average
00:50:21
like milk, which adults don't really
00:50:24
need. It's not particularly beneficial
00:50:26
milk. And just by adding the microbes to
00:50:29
it, you make it something healthy for
00:50:31
the for the body. And that's now been
00:50:33
shown by uh by these these kind of
00:50:36
studies.
00:50:37
>> Which what do you mean by what's what's
00:50:38
wrong with this zero fat Greek yogurt?
00:50:40
It says zero fat. So that's sounds like
00:50:42
it's
00:50:43
>> there's nothing. Well, we we need fats
00:50:45
to live. So fat is good. And in fact,
00:50:49
the just a few days ago, the USDA have
00:50:53
changed their all their guidelines,
00:50:56
which used to be about saying don't have
00:50:58
fat and and have lowfat products to
00:51:00
saying actually fat is good. All that
00:51:02
advice we said in the past is wrong.
00:51:05
>> So why do they label things zero zero
00:51:07
fat still?
00:51:08
>> Because public still believe they're
00:51:10
healthy and the companies that make them
00:51:14
save money by calling it by having zero
00:51:16
fat. they replace the fat with starchy
00:51:19
artificially made um fillers basically.
00:51:23
So it's usually more sugary uh by having
00:51:25
zero fat in it. But if it says zero fat,
00:51:29
it's a sign it's unhealthy. You should
00:51:30
avoid it.
00:51:31
>> So what are those fermented foods then?
00:51:33
You were going to say you said
00:51:34
>> well I should I just give you a quick
00:51:35
list of all them so people know what I'm
00:51:37
talking about. So we've got yogurt,
00:51:39
>> we've got cheese, and virtually every
00:51:41
cheese has live microbes except American
00:51:44
cheeses. The more artisan the bigger the
00:51:47
number. Uh milk keir which is like a
00:51:51
super yogurt often has 10 to 20 types of
00:51:54
micro in it. The krauts. So I think of
00:51:58
the 4ks. So we got we've done keier. The
00:52:01
kraut is like a sauerkraut. So we got
00:52:03
fermented cabbage. Cabbage is pretty
00:52:06
boring on its own. You ferment it. The
00:52:08
tastes are amazing and it has these
00:52:10
health benefits. Then you've got kimchi,
00:52:13
which is a a spicy uh kraut and the
00:52:17
staple diet of Korea. And they're pretty
00:52:20
healthy. And even though it's got salt
00:52:21
in it, people who have kimchi have lower
00:52:24
blood pressure than people that don't
00:52:25
have kimchi, and I love kimchi. Now, I
00:52:28
hated it at first, but I'm now a real
00:52:31
addict. Then you've got kombuchas. Um
00:52:35
you see those in in most supermarkets
00:52:37
and stores. Uh that's fermented tea and
00:52:42
the good ones can have 30 or 40 of
00:52:45
these. There's other another type water
00:52:48
kefir which isn't as popular but I think
00:52:49
we're going to see more of it. Tibikos
00:52:51
is the other name for it. It's grains
00:52:54
with lots of microbes in it. A bit like
00:52:56
milk keir but with fruit added. And then
00:52:59
you got miso all the misos you get in
00:53:01
Japan. miso soup, uh, miso paste,
00:53:05
tempes, all the all these, uh, fermentss
00:53:09
around the world. There's hundreds of
00:53:11
different fermentss in nearly every
00:53:13
continent has their own type of ferment.
00:53:15
In Africa, there's all kinds of
00:53:16
fermented beers and porrides. And of
00:53:19
course, we got the these are the live
00:53:20
ones, but they've also got lots of dead
00:53:22
ferments. Obviously, bread is a dead
00:53:25
ferment. Everybody makes sourdough. Then
00:53:28
you've got wines and beers.
00:53:31
And interestingly,
00:53:34
um, again, very new science, dead
00:53:38
fermentss actually have some health
00:53:40
benefits. So, I used to be very
00:53:43
dismissive of
00:53:45
uh products like kombuchas that you
00:53:47
would see in in stores in America that
00:53:50
say lightly pasteurized. And I'd say,
00:53:52
well, that's a load of rubbish. Be
00:53:54
nothing good about that. But it turns
00:53:56
out that even dead microbes when you do
00:53:59
a randomized trial have some benefit for
00:54:02
the host.
00:54:03
>> You're looking a bit skeptical. But I
00:54:05
these against placebo uh studies and
00:54:08
enough of them now that you uh
00:54:11
definitely believe I know some of the
00:54:12
researchers that they they were
00:54:14
surprised but it's it's genuine.
00:54:16
>> Why is that? What's going on? We think
00:54:18
again if you go back to the vaccine um
00:54:22
discussion we we were having it looks
00:54:25
like although it's not alive the micro
00:54:29
still has a cell wall and it has
00:54:32
proteins in the cell wall. So it's like
00:54:34
the debris of these dead bodies that
00:54:37
you're ingesting. We think they're
00:54:39
tickling your immune cells as they go
00:54:42
through the uh small intestine.
00:54:45
>> Okay. And it it's it's giving a signal
00:54:48
to your immune system to calm down,
00:54:50
reduce inflammation.
00:54:53
That's our best understanding of what
00:54:56
this phenomenon is about. So
00:54:59
live microbes are best, but it looks
00:55:01
like dead microbes, which are called
00:55:03
postbiotics or zombie biotics, are
00:55:09
probably also good for you. So, I think
00:55:11
all fermented foods, even those that,
00:55:13
you know, I I would have dismissed 3
00:55:16
years ago, are probably good for us. And
00:55:19
that's really the best way to reduce
00:55:21
your inflammation levels. We did a big
00:55:24
study in Zoey of we asked 9,000 people
00:55:27
who are Zoey members who weren't taking
00:55:31
fermentss to try and see how they get on
00:55:34
taking three fermentss a day. How do
00:55:35
they feel?
00:55:38
I think about 3,000 dropped out. Didn't
00:55:41
didn't fancy it, but nearly 6,000
00:55:44
continued and did the the two weeks
00:55:47
taking it after a oneweek run-in period.
00:55:50
And around half of them noticed
00:55:52
improvements in mood, energy, and had
00:55:56
less hunger.
00:55:58
So, anyone out there who hasn't tried
00:56:00
this, I think it's a great simple way to
00:56:04
u see what you can improve just by
00:56:07
changing what you're eating and and
00:56:08
going for some of these fermentss that
00:56:10
you might not have thought about.
00:56:11
>> What's number four?
00:56:12
>> Number four is pivot your protein. At
00:56:15
the moment, proteins
00:56:18
all in the news. Everyone wants to have
00:56:20
more protein. Big controversy about
00:56:21
whether you need more. Uh most studies
00:56:25
showed 90% of us are getting enough
00:56:26
protein. Probably doesn't do too much
00:56:28
harm other than it's really hard to get
00:56:30
lots of protein in your diet. And most
00:56:32
people are focusing on eggs and meat
00:56:35
when they think about protein. So what I
00:56:39
think people should focus on is there
00:56:41
many other sources of good quality
00:56:42
protein like beans, like legumes, like
00:56:45
mushrooms,
00:56:47
uh like whole grains, like quinoa and
00:56:49
pole barley instead of rice. That if
00:56:52
you're thinking about it, you can get
00:56:54
your protein and get your fiber because
00:56:57
90% of us are deficient in fiber. And if
00:57:00
you want to look after your gut
00:57:01
microbes, you really need to uh be
00:57:04
giving them the fiber. Otherwise, you're
00:57:06
starving them just by having a a protein
00:57:07
drink. Next one. Which one are we on?
00:57:10
>> Number five.
00:57:11
>> Number five is think quality, not
00:57:15
calories.
00:57:16
The whole idea of assessing food by
00:57:19
calories is wrong. We've discussed this
00:57:22
in the past. You should never really go
00:57:25
for low calorie products. you should go
00:57:28
for ones that are whole foods that are
00:57:30
have their initial structure in them
00:57:32
that uh have all those original
00:57:35
nutrients. So, it's all focusing really
00:57:37
on high quality foods that haven't been
00:57:39
tampered with. And
00:57:41
>> why why not calories?
00:57:42
>> Because it's not a good way to assess
00:57:44
food. Uh calorie restricted diets have
00:57:48
been shown for the vast majority of
00:57:50
people not to work. And we know
00:57:54
particularly through GLP-1 drugs that as
00:57:58
you restrict your your diet and
00:58:01
calories, your hunger signals go up. And
00:58:04
hunger is the main driver of obesity.
00:58:08
So all you're doing is losing some
00:58:11
weight shortterm. Longterm it will
00:58:13
bounce back as your as your body does
00:58:15
that. So um calories should be ignored
00:58:18
on any labels really. You should be
00:58:20
looking to get high quality food that
00:58:23
supports your gut. And that's an
00:58:24
important change in mindset for many
00:58:27
people. But the next point is is is the
00:58:31
crucial one which links to that which is
00:58:33
avoiding high-risisk processed foods
00:58:37
because they
00:58:39
damage your your gut and your body in in
00:58:43
a number of ways. The first obvious one
00:58:45
is that they have lots of additives and
00:58:47
chemicals to transform them into
00:58:49
something edible.
00:58:50
And those ones
00:58:52
um things like emulsifiers,
00:58:55
preservatives,
00:58:57
uh gums, uh colorants, flavorings,
00:59:01
artificial sweeteners are all things
00:59:05
made by the food companies to trick your
00:59:08
body into thinking these are tasty. and
00:59:10
they often are, but they will damage
00:59:13
your gut microbes who in their billions
00:59:16
of years of evolution have never come
00:59:18
across these products because they don't
00:59:21
exist in nature in that form.
00:59:23
>> So like the cereal bar I have here.
00:59:28
>> Yes. So, this has got um flavored
00:59:30
fillings, whatever that means, glucose
00:59:33
syrup, glycerin, uh wheat, fruit juice
00:59:37
concentrate,
00:59:39
vegetable fiber, natural flavorings,
00:59:42
oatmeal, and soya. Well, this one
00:59:46
doesn't look too bad. Whatever. I'm not
00:59:48
quite sure how flavored filling is,
00:59:50
though. Flavored filling anything.
00:59:54
>> Was that corn flakes or something?
00:59:55
>> Corn flakes. Yes. So they would be uh
00:59:58
something I would regard as uh highly
01:00:01
processed and uh probably a moderate
01:00:05
risk. At Zoey we've created a new scale
01:00:08
because in the past we'd have grouped
01:00:10
all of these together as the same but I
01:00:12
think we now need to think of these as
01:00:15
zero mild moderate high risk depending
01:00:18
on whether they have them.
01:00:20
>> What about this?
01:00:20
>> That that would be high risk. Okay.
01:00:22
because this is designed by uh the
01:00:27
people that make them. It's got
01:00:28
preservatives in it that so this will be
01:00:30
the same in a week's time, right? We can
01:00:32
still be playing with it. It's not going
01:00:34
to change or get moldy. Um it's got uh
01:00:38
emulsifiers to keep it together. It's
01:00:41
got extra sugar in it. It'll have a
01:00:44
really amount of salt in there probably
01:00:46
and and sugar and got some fat in here.
01:00:50
Um, so it'll be hyper palatable. And
01:00:54
>> what does that mean?
01:00:55
>> That means that you can eat a lot of it
01:00:57
before you get full. So it makes you
01:01:00
overeat.
01:01:01
>> For anyone that can't see, we're talking
01:01:02
about white bread. Just normal white
01:01:04
bread that you'd probably get in the
01:01:05
supermarket.
01:01:06
>> Yeah. And it's it's got a special
01:01:08
structure that's different. That also
01:01:09
means that it it it takes very little
01:01:12
chewing. All right. So you put this in
01:01:14
your mouth, you don't really have to
01:01:16
chew it. It's like baby food. Whereas,
01:01:18
you know, a real bread made with high
01:01:20
fiber, you you know, it takes several
01:01:23
chews to get it down you. So, there's
01:01:25
lots of features of these foods that um
01:01:28
alert you to them being uh unhealthy.
01:01:30
So, not only ingredients which are bad
01:01:32
for your gut microbes and disrupt them,
01:01:35
the additives. U you've got the fact
01:01:37
that it makes you overeat. So, a lot of
01:01:42
those potato snacks and things you get,
01:01:44
they just dissolve in your mouth.
01:01:46
They're designed so you can eat them so
01:01:48
fast.
01:01:49
>> Is there a good bread or a preferable
01:01:51
bread?
01:01:52
>> Yeah, there are. There's not many things
01:01:56
like rye breads and spelt breads,
01:01:58
ideally sourdoughs,
01:02:00
um the German style breads that, you
01:02:02
know, the Scandinavian breads, they're
01:02:05
pretty good for you because they still
01:02:07
have the whole grain intact and that
01:02:10
means it's got the nutrients. also means
01:02:12
it's harder to eat them quickly and they
01:02:15
fill you up. These if you eat this
01:02:17
bread, it just doesn't makes you
01:02:19
hungrier. I used to have this all the
01:02:21
time when I was a a junior doctor. Every
01:02:25
ward had toasters and uh cheap bread
01:02:29
courtesy of the NHS and you you eat
01:02:31
them, they give you a little kick, but
01:02:33
you just feel just as hungry an hour
01:02:35
later having eaten, you know, four of
01:02:37
them. And I think this is the problem.
01:02:39
Many people don't realize that this food
01:02:41
is is not only making them sick, making
01:02:44
their gut microbes sick, but it it's
01:02:46
actually making them overeat. And
01:02:47
studies show it makes you overeat by
01:02:49
about 25%, which you know really adds up
01:02:53
every day of your life. A lot of people,
01:02:56
including me, have gone through their
01:02:58
life thinking that because when they eat
01:03:00
this stuff, they get stomach pains and
01:03:04
sometimes they have gas or they'll have
01:03:05
like, I don't know, toilet related
01:03:07
issues. um that they are gluten free,
01:03:11
like they are gluten intolerant or
01:03:13
whatever.
01:03:13
>> I was one of those people. I thought
01:03:15
because if I eat this, if I was to eat
01:03:16
this piece of bread, I'd feel it for the
01:03:18
next two days.
01:03:19
>> So, I assumed I was gluten-free. But
01:03:21
when I think we spoke last time, you
01:03:22
told me that almost nobody is is gluten
01:03:25
intolerant to has a gluten what's the
01:03:28
term?
01:03:28
>> Well, there's Yes.
01:03:30
>> Gluten intolerance.
01:03:30
>> Gluten intolerant.
01:03:32
>> Yeah. But that that's not
01:03:33
>> when you test them. Yes. Directly. I
01:03:35
mean there are some u but most people
01:03:39
who think they are are not and that's
01:03:43
because generally when you eat a
01:03:45
sandwich in the US or the UK uh you're
01:03:49
getting crap bread terrible filling uh
01:03:54
all kinds of other additives and
01:03:55
chemicals which are probably disagreeing
01:03:57
with you. So when you give up eating
01:04:00
sandwiches you might feel better. So
01:04:03
roughly up to 30% of people believe
01:04:06
gluten is a problem for them but only 1%
01:04:08
actually need to strictly avoid it.
01:04:11
>> I think it's a great example of
01:04:15
we love to have a simple solution. So
01:04:17
gluten came in said right everyone can
01:04:20
think about gluten. Let's just get rid
01:04:22
of that and all our problems are solved.
01:04:25
rather than thinking what are all the
01:04:27
other things in a in a cheap bread
01:04:30
sandwich that you might be reacting to.
01:04:32
It also could be the emulsifier that is
01:04:36
uh gluing that bread together or is in
01:04:38
the mayonnaise that you're having. Uh it
01:04:42
could be some of these colorants that
01:04:45
are, you know, making the bread white or
01:04:47
ch making that sauce bright yellow that
01:04:50
you might be intolerant of. The more
01:04:53
things that they these manufacturers add
01:04:55
to these foods, the more likely there is
01:04:57
one that is disagreeing you with you and
01:05:00
your favorite sandwich suddenly, you
01:05:02
know, becomes your worst enemy because,
01:05:05
you know, they're just created by
01:05:08
brilliant scientists to all they care
01:05:11
about is you find it irresistible and
01:05:13
keep eating it. If you eat the healthy
01:05:15
stuff, you don't have these problems.
01:05:17
>> What about these these almonds?
01:05:19
>> Um, some walnuts in there as well. What
01:05:20
do you think of almonds? I love almonds.
01:05:22
Um they're they're good for you and lots
01:05:25
of studies showing they're good for your
01:05:27
cognition, even some mild effects on
01:05:31
other aspects of brain health and uh and
01:05:34
and mood. These are uh good for gut
01:05:37
health. They've got all kinds of really
01:05:40
good fats in them. These omega-3s and
01:05:44
etc. are are in nuts. So, they're a
01:05:47
fantastic snack that um do fill you up
01:05:50
and generally recommend them. Probably
01:05:53
more data about walnuts than almonds for
01:05:55
brain health that that I've read about.
01:05:58
So, there are, you know, studies of
01:05:59
people take a lot of walnuts, they help,
01:06:01
but I I think the idea shouldn't be
01:06:03
there's only one type of nut that you
01:06:05
should eat that's going to help your
01:06:06
brain. We should again go back to this
01:06:09
concept of diversity. And so mix nuts
01:06:12
really are your best way of um helping
01:06:15
your your brain health by eating these
01:06:17
things. And we used to demonize nuts
01:06:19
because they had fat in it. Certainly
01:06:21
when I was uh you know 20 years ago, oh
01:06:25
you can't have peanuts and nuts. They're
01:06:26
really bad for your heart. Now we've
01:06:28
totally reversed this. And I just think
01:06:30
it it just shows
01:06:33
how much has changed in this field in in
01:06:36
a in a relatively short time.
01:06:38
>> What's number seven? So that number six
01:06:39
was avoid high-risk processed foods.
01:06:42
>> Important when you're picking food to
01:06:43
try and get as many colors on your plate
01:06:47
as possible because that's a sign that
01:06:49
they contain these chemicals called
01:06:51
polyphenols.
01:06:52
>> Natural colors.
01:06:54
>> Yes. Yeah. Exactly. Not the uh the blue
01:06:58
colors you get that we really want to
01:06:59
avoid which are bad for you. So natural
01:07:02
colors are a sign that they these foods
01:07:06
are good for you. So, we're talking
01:07:08
bright berries, we're talking
01:07:09
raspberries, blackberries, uh,
01:07:12
strawberries, we're talking um, rosolo
01:07:15
lettuce, we're talking about uh,
01:07:17
cabbages that are purple. Uh, we're
01:07:20
talking really all those bright colors
01:07:22
because they contain chemicals that are
01:07:25
from this family broadly called the
01:07:28
polyphenols which act as
01:07:31
fuel for your gut microbes. and that
01:07:35
allows them to then in turn uh produce
01:07:38
things like short- chain fatty acids and
01:07:40
and keeps them healthy. So, it's a sign
01:07:43
from nature that we're eating these
01:07:46
these foods and it's a signal probably
01:07:49
your ancestors knew. And the other sign
01:07:51
which we can't tell from looking at it,
01:07:53
but you we get to know is bitterness.
01:07:56
So, bitter uh plants tend to be much
01:07:59
healthier than uh bland ones. That's the
01:08:03
broccoli story. That's um why extra
01:08:07
virgin olive oil is so good for us. Why
01:08:10
uh coffee is also good. Why uh red wine
01:08:14
and and uh dark chocolate. It's those
01:08:18
polyphenols in there that are really
01:08:22
giving us our microbes a boost.
01:08:24
>> And the eighth one, last but not least,
01:08:27
>> last but not least, give your gut a
01:08:28
rest.
01:08:29
>> Fast.
01:08:30
>> Yes. So timerestricted eating,
01:08:33
this has been shown to help your uh gut
01:08:38
recover in a proper circadian rhythm.
01:08:41
It's a bit like getting a good night's
01:08:42
sleep for your gut. So we can we all
01:08:45
know the benefits of sleep for us, but
01:08:47
we often disregard our gut. Many people
01:08:50
have a late night snack, uh a kebab
01:08:53
going home from the pub or whatever it
01:08:55
is. It's completely the wrong thing to
01:08:58
do for your gut health. 12 to 14 hour uh
01:09:02
overnight fast trying to restrict your
01:09:04
eating time to 10 hours really has been
01:09:08
shown to have metabolic advantages for
01:09:11
you uh and improves your gut lining. So
01:09:15
it it's less likely to to leak and cause
01:09:18
inflammation and allows the cleaning
01:09:21
team and your microbes to come out and
01:09:22
and clean up your gut. the number of
01:09:25
studies now um showing that it it does
01:09:29
have these metabolic advantages, but I'm
01:09:32
not pushing it so hard these days
01:09:34
because we did do a mass another massive
01:09:37
uh citizen science study with Zoe with
01:09:39
over 100,000 people doing this. Um we
01:09:42
asked them to do 14-hour timerestricted
01:09:45
eating. A third
01:09:47
gave up. They said, "I can't do this. I
01:09:50
feel hung too hungry all the time. I
01:09:52
need to be snacking something like
01:09:53
almonds.
01:09:55
A third loved it and they're still doing
01:09:57
it two years later. And a third was sort
01:09:59
of, yeah, I'll do this sometimes. I feel
01:10:01
better on it. So, I think there's a
01:10:03
personalized element to it. But, uh, if
01:10:06
you can do it, it is really important.
01:10:08
And I would urge even the people that
01:10:09
find it tough, if you can avoid that
01:10:12
unhealthy late night snack, that can
01:10:14
have a really big impact on your gut and
01:10:16
your brain. You know, every once in a
01:10:18
while you come across a product that has
01:10:21
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01:10:25
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01:10:29
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01:10:36
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01:11:24
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01:11:28
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01:12:09
>> You've become more open to keto in
01:12:11
recent years.
01:12:12
>> Yes.
01:12:14
Um, and
01:12:15
>> I'm ke I would say I'm keto curious.
01:12:17
>> You're keto curious. What's made you
01:12:19
keto curious? cuz I don't think you I
01:12:21
don't think you were very um keen on
01:12:23
keto before for
01:12:25
>> No, I think when we discussed it, I was
01:12:27
I was pretty anti it, you know, but
01:12:31
reading about the brain, how important
01:12:34
metabolism of the brain, brain energy is
01:12:38
and doing more research has slightly
01:12:40
changed my mind because what we
01:12:42
discovered is how amazing it is for
01:12:44
childhood epilepsy.
01:12:46
>> Mhm. It it is still used as the main
01:12:51
treatment for uh drugresistant childhood
01:12:54
epilepsy.
01:12:55
>> The keto diet.
01:12:56
>> The keto diet. So what for people who
01:12:59
don't know what what we're talking about
01:13:01
here is you're changing the the energy
01:13:04
supply of the brain from glucose to
01:13:07
ketone bodies, which is a switch that
01:13:10
we've always had ever in evolutionary
01:13:11
terms when we couldn't get food. So
01:13:14
after about 2 days of not having food,
01:13:17
we've used up our glucose reserves. We
01:13:19
used it up from our our muscles and you
01:13:23
switch to this other form uh of energy.
01:13:26
And it's a survival mechanism, but what
01:13:29
it tends to do is reset the brain. And
01:13:32
so in epilepsy, that's what they think.
01:13:34
It's a bit of a like rebooting your
01:13:37
computer. Epilepsy is rather strange
01:13:40
because and it used to be thought of as
01:13:43
a mental illness as as I said because
01:13:46
you can get hallucinations, delusions
01:13:50
um it's associated with depression all
01:13:53
all the same you can have all the same
01:13:56
symptoms you get in all mental illnesses
01:13:57
interestingly
01:13:59
and it can be cured by the by keto. So
01:14:01
that made me curious as to what else is
01:14:04
going on. So in theory, some of the
01:14:06
other mental health issues could be
01:14:09
improved by keto. At the moment, there
01:14:11
isn't sufficient good evidence. There's
01:14:13
lots of anecdotal stories,
01:14:16
studies of seven patients, open label,
01:14:20
not convincing enough for me to say
01:14:23
let's do it. But I think definitely
01:14:25
worth doing some real studies. but also
01:14:28
suggesting that even if you don't go as
01:14:30
far as keto, just by improving the
01:14:33
metabolism
01:14:34
and what how the brain is getting its
01:14:37
energy could be really important.
01:14:39
>> I think um the interesting thing about
01:14:41
the ketogenic diet um as someone that
01:14:43
kind of cycles in and out of it, I
01:14:45
actually I showed you earlier I have
01:14:46
this ketone
01:14:47
>> monitor on my arm which is monitoring my
01:14:49
uh ketone levels at all times and
01:14:52
connected to my phone. Um, I think the
01:14:55
interesting thing is in in the world we
01:14:57
live in where there's a lot of food
01:14:58
noise as they call it. Everywhere you
01:15:01
go, there's temptation to eat something
01:15:02
bad. You're going down the high street,
01:15:04
there's takeaways and junk food stores
01:15:08
and stuff like that. What I think keto
01:15:11
does, which you're probably never going
01:15:12
to see in a study, I don't know if you
01:15:14
would, is
01:15:16
it helps the craving. It like dampens
01:15:20
the food noise. So, this is part of why
01:15:22
I think cycling in and out of it is
01:15:23
quite useful for me because it means I
01:15:26
have several moments in the year where
01:15:29
my cravings for like this junk food,
01:15:31
some of which we have on this table,
01:15:33
just appear to vanish for a while, even
01:15:35
if it's just for a week or two weeks or
01:15:36
3 weeks or four weeks. And that allows
01:15:38
me to kind of reset and kind of take
01:15:40
back control of the steering wheel.
01:15:42
Whereas it's very easy, especially in
01:15:44
modern life when you're working really
01:15:45
hard or you're traveling, you've got
01:15:46
sleep disruption to get into that exact
01:15:48
spiral we talked about where you get
01:15:50
like cravings for sugar and then you eat
01:15:52
sugar so you feel a bit more tired and
01:15:54
you lay down a bit more and then you're
01:15:57
not you miss the gym and then you kind
01:15:59
of you have the same like downward
01:16:01
spiral. Um keto continually snaps me out
01:16:04
of the probabil the chance of that.
01:16:06
>> How long for though? H probably the
01:16:10
longest I've done it is maybe six weeks
01:16:12
or eight weeks. But even get even doing
01:16:15
it for
01:16:17
let's say one week for me will then mean
01:16:20
the preceding
01:16:22
four 8 weeks are much healthier in every
01:16:25
regard. So even when I come off it, I'm
01:16:28
much healthier when I you know what I'm
01:16:30
saying?
01:16:30
>> That's why what's interested me because
01:16:32
I think being on a long-term keto diet
01:16:35
is never going to work, right? is just
01:16:37
too brutal and it's incompatible with
01:16:42
keeping your gut happy.
01:16:44
>> Mhm.
01:16:44
>> So to me that's I mean very few people
01:16:48
can tolerate it anyway as you know it's
01:16:50
tough.
01:16:51
>> Yeah. If we can come up with a regime
01:16:54
that every three or every six months,
01:16:56
you had a few days of going into keto,
01:16:58
just enough to reset your body and your
01:17:01
brain, and at the same time, you
01:17:03
protected your gut, say by, you know,
01:17:05
taking daily 30 or other things that
01:17:07
weren't going to get you out of keto,
01:17:09
but could keep your your gut in a in a
01:17:12
in the right place, then I think we
01:17:14
could potentially be have a uh something
01:17:17
of practical use for brain health
01:17:20
issues.
01:17:21
And I' I'd love to, you know, do more of
01:17:24
that. I'm I'm planning at some point
01:17:26
later in this year to do to test myself
01:17:29
to see if I can uh do a week of keto
01:17:32
whilst keeping my gut microbes happy.
01:17:34
>> Have you ever done keto?
01:17:36
>> Uh not properly. No. You know, if you've
01:17:38
done a 24-hour fast, you for a
01:17:40
colonoscopy, you are just about getting
01:17:42
into keto at the time you're doing it,
01:17:44
but you're not you've got other things
01:17:45
to worry about going to the toilet to
01:17:48
distract you. I think this is really it
01:17:50
because we talked about how holistic
01:17:52
that the whole picture of the body is
01:17:53
and how it's so interconnected and how
01:17:55
the brain is so connected to the gut and
01:17:57
all these things and
01:17:59
there's something about doing the
01:18:01
ketogenic diet which just it feels like
01:18:03
I get control back
01:18:06
>> in a in a way that then has this bigger
01:18:08
holistic effect on my life my ability
01:18:12
everything in my life like my ability to
01:18:14
articulate myself as a podcaster I heard
01:18:17
actually Joe Rogan say the same thing he
01:18:18
had him say that words to the effect of
01:18:21
the fact that when he's in ketosis, it's
01:18:23
so profound his ability to articulate
01:18:24
himself and think as someone that does
01:18:26
4hour podcasts that he would almost stay
01:18:29
in it forever just for that particular
01:18:31
cognitive benefit of like mental
01:18:33
clarity. And I always say to my team
01:18:34
that when I'm in the keto diet, I feel
01:18:36
like I'm looking at the world like this,
01:18:38
like everything's high definition and my
01:18:40
mouth and brain are like I always say my
01:18:41
mouth and brain are connected suddenly.
01:18:43
>> Yeah. I've had other people say this
01:18:44
that they do get this sort of clarity
01:18:47
which which could be you know more
01:18:48
exaggerated way of feeling that benefit
01:18:51
of a long overnight fast um when you
01:18:55
come in after 14 hours without eating
01:18:58
and you're doing a podcast like this.
01:18:59
Yeah, I definitely do feel better than
01:19:01
if I'd had a big English breakfast
01:19:04
>> just before. But I think the danger is
01:19:06
that, you know, if people disregard
01:19:10
their gut microbiome and do this, the
01:19:13
the any advantage be wiped out so
01:19:16
quickly by the the problems of what's
01:19:19
happening to your immune cells and
01:19:20
everything else in your body. So if we
01:19:22
can find this intermittent middle way
01:19:26
while you can still look after your gut,
01:19:28
then I agree that would be cool. But I
01:19:31
couldn't find any good data on on this
01:19:34
apart from anecdotes of you know
01:19:37
fanatics who will obviously um say it's
01:19:41
great for their patients but without any
01:19:43
control group because must be a big
01:19:45
placebo effect as well. Um it's very you
01:19:48
very hard to not have a placebo effect
01:19:50
when you're doing that when you're when
01:19:52
you're struggling so hard to do things
01:19:53
that as they say you know people get
01:19:56
keto headaches and they get all you know
01:19:58
as you go into it people say it's can be
01:20:00
quite rough so you can't double blind
01:20:03
yourself but I think it is fascinating
01:20:05
that in the same way that reversing type
01:20:08
2 diabetes you know improves your mental
01:20:11
health it makes sense that if you're
01:20:13
switching energy levels in the brain you
01:20:15
could also do things. And let's not
01:20:17
forget things like ECT still an
01:20:19
effective treatment. That's that's a
01:20:22
brain reset.
01:20:24
Sometimes, you know, we may end up going
01:20:26
back to the the old era of um psychiatry
01:20:31
where, you know, before we got into this
01:20:33
obsession with neurochemicals
01:20:35
to have this holistic view, which I
01:20:37
think is is really fascinating. And when
01:20:39
you did that brain scan, you found that
01:20:44
you're in the highest 20% for levels of
01:20:47
environmental microplastics
01:20:50
>> in your blood.
01:20:51
>> Yeah, that was a bit scary. They divide
01:20:53
the microplastics into into two groups.
01:20:55
The sort of depending the dimensions of
01:20:57
them. I was concerned, am I eat was I
01:21:00
eating a lot of microplastics? So it
01:21:01
turned out that the higher levels I had
01:21:03
were actually the the smaller ones that
01:21:05
you get through your lungs
01:21:08
which probably means a life having lived
01:21:11
a life in London
01:21:14
um you know six decades in London
01:21:16
probably wasn't very good for getting
01:21:19
all this dust and and and uh things in
01:21:22
there. That was a bit of a worry. That's
01:21:24
probably because I cycle around London a
01:21:25
lot in the last 30 years.
01:21:27
>> Have you changed anything in that
01:21:29
regard?
01:21:29
>> I still cycle. I don't like wearing a
01:21:32
mask. I know I sort of probably should.
01:21:34
And I've put a new water filter in my
01:21:36
home uh to
01:21:39
take out some of these chemicals and and
01:21:42
at least some of those plastics. I'm
01:21:44
still not totally convinced
01:21:47
on how bad they are. And the science, I
01:21:49
don't think really we've resolved that
01:21:51
issue yet. But it's it's something I'm
01:21:53
I'm looking at closely. And I think if
01:21:55
there's something easy you can do, I try
01:21:57
and avoid plastic containers. I try and
01:21:59
avoid plastic bottles and I think that's
01:22:02
good for the planet as well.
01:22:03
>> Is there a way to take these
01:22:04
microplastics out of our body once
01:22:06
they're in there?
01:22:08
>> They anecdotally they say things like
01:22:10
plasma feresis um you know you can go
01:22:13
into a spa in LA and and get your uh
01:22:16
plasma taken out and filtered and put
01:22:19
back into your body. This is from your
01:22:20
blood. But uh I don't think there's any
01:22:23
real clinical trials that satisfy me
01:22:26
that would be worth and they cost I
01:22:29
think they're sort of $10,000 ago. So
01:22:31
it's not not a cheap process to have
01:22:33
that done. So wait and see but at the
01:22:37
moment yeah it's it's it's a worry but I
01:22:39
I think there are other things in the
01:22:42
environment probably worse. you know,
01:22:45
dust, pesticides.
01:22:48
Is it better to have organic food rather
01:22:50
than worry about plastics? Um, we don't
01:22:53
know the answer to these these problems.
01:22:55
How is your views on GLP1s like a Zmpeek
01:22:58
and WGO or whatever it's called, these
01:23:00
these um
01:23:02
injections and I think now tablets
01:23:04
people are taking for weight loss. How
01:23:05
is your views on those evolved? Are they
01:23:07
good, bad, and different?
01:23:09
>> They're going to be a part of our life
01:23:10
anyway. So they're going to transform
01:23:12
medicine and uh obesity in a way we
01:23:17
can't imagine at the moment especially
01:23:20
now this year that the pills are
01:23:21
available and it's coming off patent in
01:23:24
many countries so it'd be much cheaper.
01:23:27
I
01:23:28
think for people who really need them
01:23:30
they're an incredible drug. The only
01:23:33
problem is you can't really come off
01:23:34
them. So they're pretty much for life.
01:23:38
My first worry is that a lot of people
01:23:40
take them without supervision
01:23:43
and
01:23:44
they are not told to change their diet.
01:23:48
I'd love people to go take the drugs,
01:23:52
their hunger signal gets switched off.
01:23:54
They can then be mindful about their
01:23:55
food. They could do something like, you
01:23:57
know, have the Zoey app or some other
01:24:00
educational program to change their food
01:24:03
habits forever
01:24:05
in that in that window of opportunity.
01:24:08
And that I think is where we should be
01:24:11
doing. And that's been completely
01:24:13
ignored at the moment. Virtually
01:24:15
nobody's getting that lifestyle advice
01:24:18
as well as the drug. And so they're
01:24:21
failing. They're going back in it. you
01:24:23
know, yo-yoing and they're getting the
01:24:25
worst of the worlds. The other the other
01:24:27
slight worry we need to keep an eye on
01:24:28
is the
01:24:32
long-term effects on the brain. So far,
01:24:34
the data suggests that it does reduce
01:24:36
your chances of getting dementia even
01:24:39
beyond,
01:24:41
you know, reversing diabetes.
01:24:44
So, it looks like it's brain protective
01:24:48
probably because it might have
01:24:49
anti-inflammatory effects.
01:24:51
It reduces things like gambling and uh
01:24:56
addictions.
01:24:58
So we don't really know how it does
01:25:00
that. But if it takes away some of your
01:25:04
drives, those basic drives to say I like
01:25:07
to take risks, you know, I I like to
01:25:10
take drugs. I like to smoke. I like to
01:25:12
gamble on horses.
01:25:14
Is it in some way changing you as a a
01:25:18
person long term in that you might be
01:25:22
less good as an entrepreneur for
01:25:24
example?
01:25:25
>> Mhm.
01:25:25
>> So that is something I think that's
01:25:27
really interesting to follow. But in
01:25:29
general, I think from a public health
01:25:31
perspective,
01:25:33
this could save uh you know, health
01:25:37
systems hundreds of billions long term
01:25:40
and we ought to be taking it much more
01:25:42
seriously and integrating it into
01:25:45
holistic and educational advice.
01:25:48
>> And as it relates to brain health, you
01:25:51
also have a sauna routine as part of
01:25:54
your brain health regime. Yeah, I've
01:25:56
been impressed by some of the science uh
01:25:59
coming out of this and the fact that I
01:26:02
quite enjoy just actually enjoy it from
01:26:03
a hedonistic uh point of view. So I try
01:26:07
and have a sauna twice a week if I can
01:26:10
if I can do that ideally with a cold
01:26:13
plunge afterwards, but the science isn't
01:26:15
sure whether that makes a big
01:26:17
difference. It's like just a workout for
01:26:20
your your blood vessels in your body and
01:26:22
your brain. So um I think that the
01:26:26
science is quite compelling and yeah it
01:26:29
makes me feel good which um is always
01:26:31
should be part of anyone's health
01:26:33
routine. Something you enjoy doing is
01:26:34
always easy
01:26:35
>> and regular socializing is part of your
01:26:38
brain routine.
01:26:39
>> Yeah. If you look at the happiest
01:26:42
longived populations on the planet,
01:26:45
they've all got really good social
01:26:47
lives. They are always dining with
01:26:50
friends, going out. often that does
01:26:54
involve a little bit of alcohol in most
01:26:55
of these societies, but that doesn't
01:26:58
seem to adversely affect them. The idea
01:27:00
of having a a a key group of core
01:27:02
friends you see regularly, I think, is
01:27:04
really good for your mental and brain
01:27:06
health, and loneliness has got to be one
01:27:08
of the the worst things uh for your
01:27:11
brain health. So, really important to
01:27:13
maintain your uh your good friends. What
01:27:17
is uh what is the most important thing
01:27:18
as it relates to brain health or overall
01:27:21
health that we haven't talked about that
01:27:22
we should have talked about?
01:27:24
>> I think we haven't talked about early
01:27:25
life experiences and stress but trauma.
01:27:29
>> Yeah. So one thing um and we haven't
01:27:32
talked about talk therapies and um you
01:27:35
know conventional treatments. So if you
01:27:37
look at all all these brain diseases,
01:27:39
virtually all of them, if you go back in
01:27:43
time,
01:27:45
if you've had uh emotional, physical,
01:27:49
sexual trauma in in early life, you're
01:27:53
much more likely to have brain diseases
01:27:56
later in life.
01:27:58
And this is across all of them. Again,
01:28:03
coming up with the idea that they're all
01:28:05
related in some way. And so, you know,
01:28:07
we've moved on from the Freudian idea
01:28:09
that, you know, the mind is different
01:28:12
and from the brain. If you take this
01:28:13
holistic idea, how does this fit into
01:28:16
this inflammatory
01:28:18
metabolic
01:28:19
um theory of brain health? I think it it
01:28:24
now does because they've done studies
01:28:25
showing that uh following trauma or
01:28:28
stress,
01:28:30
you can trigger your immune system to be
01:28:32
permanently raised.
01:28:35
So again, you get this uh consistent uh
01:28:41
stress that the thermostat doesn't go
01:28:44
down to baseline.
01:28:47
So you have a period of a year, a
01:28:50
terrible period as a kid. They do tests
01:28:53
later in life. You'll they'll find your
01:28:56
inflammation levels in your blood are
01:28:58
raised from people who had a nice gentle
01:29:01
quiet childhood.
01:29:03
And I think this is
01:29:05
starts to link all these different
01:29:08
components together. And these cross all
01:29:10
these early life traumas. You see the
01:29:13
same thing in people with chronic pain,
01:29:15
um chronic back pain, fibromyalgia,
01:29:19
um irritable bowel syndrome,
01:29:22
epilepsy, schizophrenia, it it
01:29:25
everything. But it doesn't really matter
01:29:27
where the source of the stress was. It's
01:29:29
caused some physiological problem. So I
01:29:31
think that that is really interesting so
01:29:35
that we could pick up people who if we
01:29:37
had better tests of that stress and
01:29:40
inflammation we could start to help
01:29:44
those people earlier on before the brain
01:29:47
started to uh struggle and I think that
01:29:49
that's really interesting and of course
01:29:52
we want to do most to reduce the problem
01:29:55
in the first place. They've also done
01:29:57
studies on talk therapies. So obviously
01:30:00
psychiatry is compartmentalized into the
01:30:02
talk therapists and the and the drug
01:30:04
therapists
01:30:05
and
01:30:07
there's quite a lot of evidence that
01:30:08
talk therapy does reduce inflammation
01:30:12
levels and help your immune system. So
01:30:14
just in the same way possibly that
01:30:16
talking to friends has that effect. So
01:30:20
uh talking to your therapist long term
01:30:22
uh will reduce your stress and you can
01:30:25
see that in blood markers as well. the
01:30:28
whole thing is starting to come together
01:30:29
that uh all these different ways of
01:30:32
treating it can be working through
01:30:33
similar pathways that looked so
01:30:35
different through our you know the fact
01:30:38
that we've got so distracted by
01:30:42
Dickart um Freud
01:30:46
um treating the brain as something so
01:30:49
different to the rest of the body.
01:30:52
We have a closing tradition on this
01:30:53
podcast with the last guest leaves a
01:30:54
question for the next not knowing who
01:30:55
they're leaving it for. And the question
01:30:57
for you is, what are you uncontainably
01:31:02
excited about?
01:31:04
>> I'm
01:31:06
uncontainably
01:31:08
excited
01:31:10
about the idea that we can dramatically
01:31:15
improve our lives and our health just by
01:31:18
making the right food choices.
01:31:22
This is really driving me to talk about
01:31:24
it so much to do the studies to do the
01:31:27
science to spread the word because
01:31:30
you know we're seeing all the time the
01:31:33
dramatic effects and I was talking about
01:31:35
the TV program was doing with these you
01:31:38
know these these families that are
01:31:40
really suffering. It just shows you what
01:31:43
you can do if you start treating food
01:31:47
like you would treat medicine. you know,
01:31:49
taking it really seriously and
01:31:52
experimenting with it and noticing those
01:31:56
those differences and um you know, I get
01:31:59
the feedback all the time because I
01:32:01
because the books and the media, people
01:32:04
telling me how their lives have been
01:32:06
transformed and so that feedback keeps
01:32:09
me excited on this topic. And so, um
01:32:12
I've never had that in my career before
01:32:14
and it's super exciting. It's um it's
01:32:17
really hard though, isn't it? And this
01:32:18
is I guess the part we don't talk about
01:32:20
much, which is the psychological part of
01:32:23
you know what some might call discipline
01:32:25
in a world we live in where you go into
01:32:27
like I don't know a gas station or a
01:32:28
petrol station or whatever you call it
01:32:30
in different parts of the world and the
01:32:32
options are very
01:32:34
ultrarocessed.
01:32:36
Um and you you live a stressful life.
01:32:38
You're on your phone all day. You're
01:32:39
getting your dopamine fried by watching
01:32:42
short form videos back to back to back
01:32:44
to back to back. you may be, you know,
01:32:46
people are lonier than ever before. So,
01:32:50
making the right choices when we're
01:32:52
controlled by our neurology and our
01:32:54
hormones and how we feel is is often
01:32:58
easier said than done. So, even in the
01:33:00
case of that family that you met, do you
01:33:03
think much about the psychology part of
01:33:05
like discipline when it comes to making
01:33:08
the right choice? And is there any
01:33:10
advice there on how to be more
01:33:12
disciplined with our food choices? Or do
01:33:14
you just think that knowledge is power
01:33:16
in this regard?
01:33:18
>> Well, knowledge is power, but it's not
01:33:19
the only thing. You you need tricks. Um,
01:33:25
we're fighting a food environment.
01:33:28
You know, multi-billion dollar industry
01:33:31
wants us to eat this crap food. your gas
01:33:34
station, they're being bribed to fill
01:33:36
their everything around you with the
01:33:39
worst foods. The worse the food, the
01:33:41
more they pay the supermarkets to have
01:33:44
it in a point where you're going to buy
01:33:45
it. So, you need to have tricks to
01:33:49
counteract that. And not going to a
01:33:51
supermarket is is often one way to avoid
01:33:54
doing that. If my house was filled with
01:33:56
crap food, I would probably be snacking
01:33:59
in it. I find it really hard to throw
01:34:02
stuff away. You know, you you go to
01:34:04
workplaces and you see people with piles
01:34:07
of biscuits and uh M&M's uh there. You
01:34:11
know, they should be banned. Um so there
01:34:14
are certain things you say we need to
01:34:16
fight back by changing the rules a bit.
01:34:18
Um just like you wouldn't have, you
01:34:20
know, glasses of vodka in an office uh
01:34:23
for people just have a swig if they
01:34:25
fancy, you shouldn't have candies and
01:34:27
sweets and these things. um in the
01:34:30
current environment where you know we're
01:34:32
fighting a battle like you know they
01:34:34
used to have cigarettes that were free
01:34:35
everywhere we forget um and they change
01:34:38
that environment and the cigarettes are
01:34:40
now really hard to get at that makes it
01:34:43
easier for people to fight the habit
01:34:46
>> and we we often beat ourselves up
01:34:47
because we think of ourselves as being
01:34:49
weak because of this we think ourselves
01:34:50
being like illd disciplined because we
01:34:52
end up reaching for the wrong things but
01:34:54
it is really really hard and it's really
01:34:55
really hard even you know I sit here all
01:34:57
day every day speaking to people that
01:34:58
are experts on these subjects. And you'd
01:35:00
think that would mean that I made
01:35:02
perfect decisions because I've probably
01:35:04
interviewed, you know, more people than
01:35:05
the average 99.99% of the population on
01:35:08
this subject. But I'm a human with
01:35:11
emotions and hormones and life to deal
01:35:13
with. And and so even I have to um
01:35:16
regardless of how much I know about this
01:35:18
stuff now, I still have to like give
01:35:20
myself the best possible chance by
01:35:22
thinking proactively about my
01:35:23
environment at home and even like in the
01:35:27
cart and even at the office. like I have
01:35:28
to think really proactively, put systems
01:35:30
in place to avoid the possibility that I
01:35:32
get really really hungry really really
01:35:34
late at night and my only options are
01:35:36
for example, you know, um which has
01:35:40
been a bit the big change
01:35:41
>> and it's forming habits and that's the
01:35:42
other thing. So it's yeah you got
01:35:44
knowledge then you got these tricks
01:35:47
tricks to avoid often the the worst
01:35:50
offenders and then you've got to come up
01:35:52
with these these new habits that you you
01:35:55
make that are going to break the old
01:35:56
ones. So, you know, rather than reaching
01:35:58
for your breakfast cereal in the
01:35:59
morning, you've got a different one
01:36:01
ready to go. And
01:36:03
often we've found that if you can change
01:36:05
that first meal of the day, it it
01:36:08
becomes a lot easier because that's the
01:36:10
one you're mainly in control of and
01:36:12
realize when the other risky events are.
01:36:15
>> Tim, you've written many, many books.
01:36:16
I'm going to link them all below. This
01:36:18
is the the newest one. I know you're
01:36:19
working on one specifically about the
01:36:21
brain, but I'm very excited for that
01:36:22
one. But this is the newest one called
01:36:23
Ferment.
01:36:25
um unsurprisingly a number one
01:36:27
bestseller yet again. Um but there's a
01:36:29
whole stack of books here. The diet
01:36:30
myth, the real science behind what we
01:36:32
eat. Um Spoonfed, why almost everything
01:36:35
we've been told about food is wrong. And
01:36:37
this book, which has been extremely
01:36:39
successful, um the Food for Life
01:36:41
cookbook with 100 recipes created by
01:36:43
Zoe. I'm going to link all of them below
01:36:45
for anyone that wants to check them out.
01:36:48
And uh thank you so much once again.
01:36:51
>> Been a pleasure as always. you've kept
01:36:52
my audience very very healthy and
01:36:54
they're very appreciative of that. I I I
01:36:56
remember um just the amount of people
01:36:58
that come up to all over the world and
01:37:00
site the conversations we've had in the
01:37:01
past and how that's had been the thing
01:37:03
for them that has helped them to change
01:37:05
their life. And it's pretty remarkable.
01:37:07
It's really remarkable how many people
01:37:09
you must have fundamentally caused to
01:37:12
create different food and dietary
01:37:13
decisions through the work you've done
01:37:15
yourself, through the books, through
01:37:16
Zoe. Um and that's a really special
01:37:19
thing. So, thank you on behalf of all of
01:37:20
them. Well, hopefully we can do millions
01:37:22
more. I hope so.
01:37:28
If there's anything we need, it is
01:37:30
connection. Especially in the world
01:37:32
we're living in today. And that is
01:37:33
exactly why we created these
01:37:35
conversation cards. Because on this
01:37:36
show, when I sit here with my guests and
01:37:38
have those deep, intimate conversations,
01:37:41
this remarkable thing happens time and
01:37:43
time again. We feel deeply connected to
01:37:46
each other. At the end of every episode,
01:37:47
the guest I'm interviewing leaves a
01:37:49
question for the next guest, and we've
01:37:51
turned them into these conversation
01:37:53
cards. And we've added these twist cards
01:37:55
to make your conversations even more
01:37:56
interesting. And there are so many more
01:37:59
twists along the way with the
01:38:00
conversation cards. This is the brand
01:38:01
new edition. And for the first time
01:38:03
ever, I've added to the pack this gold
01:38:05
card, which is an exclusive question
01:38:07
from me. But I'm only putting the gold
01:38:10
cards in the first run of conversation
01:38:13
cards. So get yours now before the
01:38:15
limited edition gold cards are all gone.
01:38:17
Head to the link in the description
01:38:18
below.
01:38:18
>> You take a healthy person's poop and you
01:38:20
transfer it into the person who's sick.
01:38:23
So this is a great example to show how
01:38:25
important our gut microbiome is because
01:38:27
60% of the weight of your stool is your
01:38:29
microbiome. And so I've identified four
01:38:31
things missing in our diet. And when you
01:38:33
do these, you will thrive and you will
01:38:34
live longer and you will have less
01:38:36
disease. And I'm going to take you
01:38:37
through all of these steps right
