To understand how muscle helps drive metabolism and why its effect is so important, it helps to grasp three core concepts: 1 Glucose becomes toxic to the body when too much remains in the bloodstream for too long, that is, more than two hours. (We call this disease state diabetes.) 2 Insulin is the body’s main mechanism for removing glucose from the bloodstream. 3 A root cause of obesity and related diseases (including type 2 diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, and impaired fertility, among other conditions) is decreased insulin sensitivity, also known as insulin resistance.
