The Diet Myth Quotes

“A very pleasant surprise was that items I thought were naughty but that I enjoyed immensely, like strong coffee, dark chocolate, nuts, high fat yoghurt, wine and cheese, are actually likely to be healthy for me and my microbes.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: Why the Secret to Health and Weight Loss is Already in Your Gut

“diets that are high in sugar and processed foods are bad for our microbes, and by extension for our health, and diets that are high in vegetables and fruits are good for both.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: Why the Secret to Health and Weight Loss is Already in Your Gut

“we already know enough scientifically about our microbes and our bodies to enable us to alter our lifestyles, eating patterns and diets to suit our individual needs and improve our health. It is useful to think of your microbial community as your own garden that you are responsible for. We need to make sure the soil (your intestines) that the plants (your microbes) grow in is healthy, containing plenty of nutrients; and to stop weeds or poisonous plants (toxic or disease microbes) taking over we need to cultivate the widest variety of different plants and seeds possible. I will give you a clue how we do this. Diversity is the key.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: Why the Secret to Health and Weight Loss is Already in Your Gut

“The famously pungent Limburger cheese is made from the same bacteria that many people have between their toes (Brevibacteria linens), the ones that cause smelly feet.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: Why the Secret to Health and Weight Loss is Already in Your Gut

“In the mid-noughties some of these anecdotes, observational studies and marketing claims were finally tested in a number of properly randomised trials that looked at the trendiest antioxidant vitamins, especially carotene, selenium and vitamin E. They detected no benefit whatsoever for heart disease and in fact found a significantly increased cancer and heart failure risk in the groups taking them.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat

“We need to make sure the soil (your intestines) that the plants (your microbes) grow in is healthy, containing plenty of nutrients; and to stop weeds or poisonous plants (toxic or disease microbes) taking over we need to cultivate the widest variety of different plants and seeds possible.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat

“When you next go to the toilet, spare a thought for your trillions of microbes. Nearly half the mass you are flushing away are microbes; so you become relatively more human afterwards.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat

“We evolved not from Adam and Eve but from microbes, and we have continued our close connection with them ever since. This is most obvious in our guts, where thousands of diverse species that are as different from each other as we are from jellyfish play a much greater role than we ever realised.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat

“Failing to keep an open mind and to realise how people differ so widely in their responses to the virus (as well as to food) was a mistake.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat

“change, they often rapidly succumb to diseases. The”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat

“In 2018, we took part in one of the largest ever population studies by combining the American Gut Project (run by Rob Knight) data from 8,000 people and our British Gut Project of 3,000 people, all of whom were self-paying citizen-scientists.12 We found the gut diversity of Americans to be slightly worse than the British, though both were bad compared to poorer countries. The main factor that predicted diversity was the number of different plant species you ate each week; diversity peaked when you ate at least thirty different types of plant. This may sound a lot but includes grains, nuts, seeds and herbs. The data showed that eating some meat was fine, as long as you also had a large diversity of plants, and showed no clear difference between vegans and vegetarians.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat

“Pesticides are an increasing potential problem for our microbes and they take many forms. The most popular is called glyphosate (or Roundup), which stops vegetables and fruit sprouting or going mouldy once developed. It was invented by Monsanto in the 1970s and is probably the most commonly used chemical for farming in the world. In 2013 over 1.7 million hectares of land in the UK was sprayed with it, and the majority of non-organic breads (especially wholemeal) tested contain glyphosate residues. Traces of it are found in the blood and urine of cattle and even in humans living in cities. Even at sub-toxic doses it could be adversely affecting human health and, like most chemicals, contains potential carcinogens.4 We know it affects soil microbes, and much less is known about its effects on our gut microbes – but early studies suggest it is not good.5 We may prefer to let our fruit and vegetables deteriorate and change colour after a few days, rather than keep them chemically in suspended animation with adverse effects on our microbes. While there is little solid research on whether eating organic foods is better for us and our microbes, there are studies showing levels of pesticides in our bodies can be dramatically reduced within a week by switching to organic produce.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat

“With the nutrition professionals constantly contradicting and criticising each other, it is no wonder that few large collaborative studies or projects get funded. I know from personal experience that many academics seeking funds for a project deliberately omit to mention an important diet component because they know that it will be heavily criticised by colleagues. Although there are a huge number of small studies performed and paid for each year, the standard of research compared to other fields is lagging far behind. Most studies are still cross-sectional and observational, full of possible biases and flaws; a few are superior observational studies followed over time, and only a tiny fraction are the gold-standard randomised trials in which subjects are randomly allocated to one foodstuff or diet and followed for long durations.”
― Tim Spector, The Diet Myth: Why the Secret to Health and Weight Loss is Already in Your Gut