clean eating
By Melissa Diane Smith
the health benefits of going organic
F
irst, understand the difference between organic farming and conventional. Certified organic farmers may not use synthetic chemical pesticides, artificial fertilizers, genetically modified organisms (GMOs), and unnecessary hormones or antibiotics. Instead of these toxic substances, they use practices that restore, maintain, and enhance soil and ecosystem health. This type of farming translates to more nutritious foods. Organic foods have 18–69 percent higher concentrations of healthprotective antioxidants—along with lower levels of toxic heavy metals and pesticides— than conventionally grown foods, according to a 2014 meta-analysis examining 343 peer-reviewed publications in the British Journal of Nutrition. Organic farmers don’t use synthetic chemical pesticides, while conventional farmers apply, on average, 2–12 synthetic pesticides to their crops. According to a study published earlier this year in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Research, families who switched to an organic diet rapidly and dramatically reduced their exposure to four classes of pesticides—by an average of 60 percent after just six days of eating organic. Limiting that exposure is important, especially for kids. Residues of some pesticides can trigger subtle changes in a child’s development, and have been linked to a wide range of health problems including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism, reduced fertility, obesity, and certain forms of cancer.
Lower Risk of Cancer A study reported in October 2018 in JAMA Internal Medicine found that eating organic can significantly cut your risk of developing cancer. The study, which followed close to 70,000 adults for five 30
Removing GMOs and pesticides from your diet can seriously reduce your body’s toxic burden
and allergies, and eventually experienced years, found a 25 percent decrease in the an anaphylactic reaction. When she risk of all types of cancer among regular adopted an all-organic diet, she recovered consumers of organic foods, compared to her health so much that she no longer feels people who eat organic less often. The she has a disability, and her children association was particularly marked in overcame their health problems, too. breast cancer among postmenopausal This type of evidence is anecdotal. But women (34 percent decreased risk) and in Perlmutter explains that multiple aneclymphoma (a staggering 76 percent dotes make up data, meaning that each decreased risk). individual anecdote accumulates to a “Things like cancer don’t just body of information that we can happen. They happen for a call data. Plus, those anecdotes reason,” says Grain Brain matter to those individuals, author David Perlmutter, dramatically improving MD. And now we’re seeing Pesticide residues have been linked to several their lives in significant connections between the health issues in kids, so health-enhancing ways. mechanisms of cancer and limiting their exposure mechanisms by which by eating organic is important. glyphosate changes human Taming Toxins physiology to increase the risk It makes sense why eating of cancer, Perlmutter says. organic foods would upgrade health to overcome disease, Perlmutter says. The herbicide glyphosate, for Growing Evidence example, is a metal chelator, antibiotic In addition to studies that show benefits, (that can kill good bacteria), endocrine or success stories of people explaining how hormone disruptor, and probable human they recovered from numerous ailments carcinogen. For all of these reasons, it sets after switching to an organic diet are up what he calls “a perfect storm” of ways growing. A documentary called Secret it deteriorates body health. Ingredients shares personal accounts By eating organic foods that aren’t of more than a dozen people who sprayed with glyphosate and other turned around serious health condipesticides, people remove the ingredients tions—including breast cancer, infertility, that cause the most toxic burden for the and life-threatening food allergies—after body’s best function, and doing that helps adopting an organic diet that avoided restore the body’s innate ability to heal GMOs and food sprayed with pesticides. itself, no matter what health condition For example, Kathleen DiChiara and her each of us has. family were struggling with 21 chronic In her practice in Northern California, diseases. Kathleen experienced a severe veteran pediatrician Michelle Perro, MD, health crisis— sudden onset neuropathy in co-author of What’s Making Our Children her legs, followed by surgery, followed by paralysis and chronic pain syndrome. Her Sick? has seen similar clinical data. Perro children suffered from chronic conditions says switching to an all organic diet doesn’t of their own. Her oldest son had autistic just help dramatically improve the health spectrum disorder. Her middle son had of the children who are most sick. It offers asthma, chronic bronchitis, bloating, and health benefits for all members of the mood swings. Her youngest son had rashes family, some quite dramatically.
Did You Know?
April 2020
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2/26/20 6:32 AM
