Hello Dr. Davis, I had no idea about either you or your book 2 1/2 years ago when I entirely removed gluten from my diet but I wanted to say I experienced all of the positive responses you spoke about. No more migraines, acid reflux, sore painting shoulder, lost 35 lbs without feeling I was dieting. I was also able to incorporate a morning Yoga program every morning and find that I'm naturally more disciplined in thought and action. I would bet that I'm effectively 20 years younger. Thanks for speaking out, it will be worth it if we can do anything about diabetes!

I heard this interview!  The "debate" was pathetic. The argument by Dr. Whiting amounted to "but what you are talking about is an Atkins diet, so your conclusions don't matter.  Nothing matters except that you are promoting an Atkins diet"  She had NO new information, and nothing to back up her asertions that you can't be right.  I was embarassed for her, but more convinced than ever that there is no sound arguement to spport eating wheat.
I gave up wheat in April of this year.  I have lost 35 pounds, and 5 1/2 inches on my waist.  I have been eating more, not less calories.  I went from being almost couch bound several days of the week from severe "fibromyalgia" symptoms, to forgetting I even had problems which left me in a fog most days. I see no reason to eat wheat.  After the fact, I am reading your book and discovering the "why" behind my miracle.  I purhcased your book so I can read it, pass it around to everyone I know, and tell them to buy one and do the same!  
Thank you, Dr. Davis!

I'm rather chuckling mentioning this, but as you probably picked up I enjoy the 90s group Nirvana.  What originally attracted me to the group was the band's song writer having a bad stomach problem, similar to mine.  I recall reading after he committed suicide, and by the note he left that was due to the stomach problem and drugs being taken to deaden the pain,  that Kurt had worked on avoiding different foods.  He did this with the hope of improving the condition.  Never did see him mention avoiding wheat.  Oranges were a concern of his as "they made his gums bleed."  There were other items he stayed away from too.

I recall even then, middle 90s, thinking that Kurt probably was a celiac, could have found some pain relief avoiding wheat, and probably would be with us today if he had done so.  Looking back I should have taken my own advice!  I had tried eating wheat free back then, found some relief, but never enough to continue eating that way I thought.  What I didn't realize was that it took more than a month to find significant gut relief.  And it probably would have helped if I had support encouraging me to continue from doctors and family.    

So, anyway!   This is the 20th anniversary year of when Nirvana's famous album came out.  And with that has come a release of digitally remastered album plus new songs.  I was laughing at the lyrics to this tune, School.  I can relate when witnessing internet debates!    

Nirvana - School
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xCgwXWEQ10

Yes, sad when the solution may have been so simple: Just avoid the food that all "official" agencies tell us to eat more of.

That's great, Arlene! 5 1/2 inches off your waist is fabulous.

I, too, was kind of embarassed for her. I don't think she knew what she was getting into!

Hi, Tracey--

I'm happy you've found this solution. However, you and I remain in the minority. There are people struggling with all manner of health problems, sometimes disabling, not getting answers from their doctors . . . and the solution can be as simple as removing all wheat. So this is a message worth repeating over and over and over again.

Dr Davis

Read your book with great interest. I am a type 2 diabetic and have taken all the steps to control levels. (exercise, weight loss, low carb, etc). My one concern is the elimination of oats. I have received excellent H1N results while consuming my favorie morning oatmeal porridge. Should I stop?

Jim

I get sad thinking about how so many people in my life have suffered.  My Mother had Parkinsons with dementia diagnosis and suffered terribly for 7 years til she died.
I suspected Diabetes because she had peripheral vascular disease and poor wound healing but the blood test always showed her sugar within normal ranges.
She craved pastries and acted like a crack addict begging for them, then would spend hours in a carb induced coma after eating them.  She died at 89 but suffered many years of her life, she tried to commit suicide before I was born and spent a year in hospital getting electric shock treatments.  She had yearly seasonal depression after that, crying for months in the winter.
My father lived to be 94 but he had 4 major heart diseases and needed 4 nitroglycerine tabs just to get dressed in AM.  He always said he felt best when he didn't eat.  Now in hindsight I know better.  I have struggled my whole life with stomach pain.  I had a small bowel biospsy 15 years ago but it was negative for celiac.  I facilitated a support group for celiac at a local hospital and lived gluten free for several years but was never one hundred percent better, now I realize because I was drinking soda and gaining weight eating all the gluten free products.  I had surgery this past December and had great difficulty recovering, symptoms of fatigue and chronic muscle pain returned to my life again.   Thanks for your book Dr. Davis, it has reminded me to go wheat free for good.  I know I feel better wheat free, dairy free and sugar free.  I gained 20 lbs after my surgery
due to inactivity from muscle pain and eating fast food carb meals.  I was caught in a vicious cycle of feeling aweful.  Fibromyalgia symptoms to the extreme, my thyroid function is low and my Vitamin D was at 14.  I have started wheat free for a week now, lost 4 lbs and feeling much better but still residual muscle pain.  I have a doctors appointment to persue thyroid treatment, I have been seeing a Natropath who gave me thyroid and adrenal gland supplements and I feel better but not 100% after 2 months of taking them.  Is it possible for thyroid function to return to normal after a time period of staying strictly wheat free?  I hate the thought of taking medicine the rest of my life.
Everyday I think of a friend, family member or celebrity that has died who might have been spared by going wheat free.  RIP...Mom, Dad, my husband Joe(non smoker lung cancer, major sugar/wheat addiction) Chris Farley, Steve Jobs (an article I read said he didn't eat animal products).Patrick Swazy. Linda McCartney (vegetarian frozen meals).  I know many of these people have had other vices like drugs and alcohol but I strongly believe that wheat is a gateway substance that can lead to addiction.  My husband drank beer every evening and ate ice cream everyday for 26 years that I knew him.  He was thin and worked hard everyday thus didn't ever see he had a problem.  He had chronic pain, allergies, skin rashes. Addicted to beer, could not stop drinking it even with cancer diagnosis and chemo treatments.  Finally quite when radiation tx damaged his throat but was too late for him.  Sorry to ramble on but just am overwhelmed with all the connections I'm suspecting.  Thanks for having a place to vent.

Dr. Davis,
Go get 'em!   Maybe you can get on the Dr. Oz show!  You and Gary Taubes can sit on the couch while Dr. Oz eats whole grain cereal with Soy Milk!

Dr. Davis--

I think someone has taken you up on your book.  Her name is Melissa McEwen.  I read her article this morning.  You might find it interesting: http://huntgatherlove.com/content/wheat-belly

Take care,
Kane

I struggled my way through this review ... a bewildering rambling rant that goes nowhere with plenty of distracting irrelevant fillers thrown in for good measure. The pervasive derisive mocking tone is also off-putting. It’s this kind of “noise” that blurs and dilutes an important message unfortunately.  One case in point (amongst a myriad) in the review is the dismissive incoherent treatment of the high glucose and high insulin impact of wheat. Personally this is the one key aspect of Dr Davies thesis that really impressed me, after seeing how one slice of wheat bread caused my blood sugar level to go through the roof. I also have plenty of anecdotal evidence (and growing) that Dr Davies is onto something.

"Attributes" which get cured......

Have you seen unintended consequences?

Maybe it has nothing to do with any modification of the plant but maybe the plant itself???

http://www.livescience.com/14194-egyptian-mummy-heart-disease.html

I've been a Registered Dietitian for 7 years and I'm appalled when I look back at my incredibly biased education.  An hour on PubMed disproves a majority of the conventional "wisdom" I was force fed, especially the ongoing demonization of saturated fat.  Its a joke. I'm glad to see more medical practitioners like yourself speaking out.  The studies showing the damaging effect of gliadin on the intestenial wall in supposedly health, non-celiac individuals is alarming to say the least. Keep it up!

The USDA has just published an evaluation that the "new varieties" of broccoli have the same vitamin and mineral content of the older ones.
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2011/111013.htm

The headline and first paragraph of the web page are given below. When will they do "wheat"?

USDA Research Demonstrates New Breeds of Broccoli Remain Packed with Health Benefits
By Sharon Durham
October 13, 2011

WASHINGTON—Research performed by scientists at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and published recently in the journal Crop Science has demonstrated that mineral levels in new varieties of broccoli have not declined since 1975, and that the broccoli contains the same levels of calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, potassium and other minerals that have made the vegetable a healthy staple of American diets for decades.

http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2011/111013.htm

Good for you, Daniel!

I am waiting for your and your colleagues to stage a revolt. Let me know and I will hold up the placards and yell with you!

Hi, Cynthia--

If you mean unintended consequences of wheat removal, yes: the withdrawal phenomenon. This affects somewhere around 30% of people. It is harmless, though no fun to experience.

Hi, Kane--

I found this about as interesting as saying to someone, "I don't like your face."

I've stumbled on her blog from time to time and found it interesting and insightful. I was surprised by this blatant "I don't like it because it's stupid" kind of criticism with no real substance. Maybe she had a bad day.

It is absolutely ovewhelming, isn't it, Mary, when you stop and think how many people may have had serious brushes with the wheat demon, yet nobody ever suspected?

My prediction: Wheat will prove to be among the most powerful provokers of gastrointestinal cancers. Everyone was falsely lulled by comparing whole grains to white flour that showed a relative reduction in risk. Replace something bad with something less bad, the less bad thing looks good. Flawed logic.

Well, it depends on what you mean by excellent H1N (HbA1c?).

I aim for HbA1c of 5.0% or less, a level at which glycation is not occurring faster than the normal endogenous rate.

There is a theory that the glutamates in wheat fill a crutial roll in wheat related intestinal porosity .....glutamate prepares epithelial tTg for attachment by wheat-surfafe HWP1.

Do you have an opinion?

Hi, Cynthia--

Not being a biochemist, I believe that is true, though I don't believe it is an effect unique to wheat, but shared by other foods.

Boy, I hope that didn't sound like I was defending wheat!

Dear Dr :

We have been vegans culturally - born and brought up in a Lacto-ovo Vegan society.  Recently, during routine annual blood tests, my husband has been diagnosed with more number of smaller particle sized LDL cholestrol.  He is at 95% level with very high risk.  Rest of the factors - triglycerides, HDL/LDL, overall cholestrol are all normal.  Also, sugar levels are normal.  He has been advised to take the suppressants due to high risk of particle size.  We have never tested this parameter before though.  Wheat, rice and burritos, pizzas and all the stuff you mention here are a part of our daily diet! We also eat Eggs, drink lots of full fat milk, homemade yoghurt .   I also use Coconut oil for most of the cooking which is for most part oil free!  We are worried about whether to wait and watch or start the medication.  If we wait - what is the optimal period to wait and what do we do during the wait period....

Thanks for any help and a wonderful blog - helps many people like us!

Hi, Vasu--

The solution for excessive quantities of small LDL particles is diet, not drugs. Please search "small LDL" on this blog and you will see dozens, if not more, posts on just this issue.

I had been trying for a full year to shake free of wheat, but couldn't do it because my fix was always available in the kitchen. My husband, though he has a small wheat tummy, didn't want to quit eating wheat.

Then we both came down with a gastrointestinal complaint, maybe something we ate? Nausea and loose stools and lack of appetite meant that for several days we drank lots of fluids and only ate to live. We both feel fine now, but thanks to the short period of illness during which time we COULDN'T eat wheat or sugars, we basically skipped the withdrawal period, and we no longer crave wheat.

I highly recommend quitting wheat during a gastrointestinal illness; for us it was incredibly easy.  

Dr. Davis:  After reading Wheat Belly and being wheat/glute-free for 2 months.  I've definately noticed less inflammation with my moderate osteoartritis of the knees & less abdominal bloating.  Friend, recently told me about UC Berkeley's Health Newsletter that disputes Wheat Belly.  WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THEIR RESPONSE?  Here's the article:

Wheatophobia: Will Avoiding Wheat Really Improve Your Health?
  
Wheat has long been a dietary pariah for the millions of people who have jumped on the low-carb-diet bandwagon or who think they’re allergic (or at least sensitive) to the grain. Now even more people are hesitating about eating wheat after reading the claims made by Dr. William Davis, a cardiologist and author of the bestseller Wheat Belly, which is subtitled “Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight, and Find Your Path Back to Health.” Not only does wheat make us fat, he says, it is addictive and causes everything from heart disease, diabetes, and obesity to arthritis, osteoporosis, cognitive problems, and cataracts. In fact, it has caused “more harm than any foreign terrorist can inflict on us.”
Wouldn’t it be great if there was a single villain behind the chronic health problems plaguing us, and if all it took to reverse them was to stop eating wheat? Don’t bet on it.

Kernels of half-truth
Here are some of Dr. Davis’s key points—and our counterpoints:

Claim: Most grains are bad, but modern wheat is the worst because it has been altered over the years via selective breeding and is now a virtual “Frankengrain.” It is loaded with amylopectin A (a starch unique to wheat), which is “worse than table sugar,” Dr. Davis says, boosting blood sugar dramatically and stimulating appetite. Modern wheat also contains other components with adverse effects, and its gluten (a protein) is more likely to trigger reactions than that in older wheat.

Fact: For well over a century, food scientists have developed hybrid varieties of wheat to be sturdier and have higher yields, better quality, and greater resistance to disease and insects. That’s true of most food crops. There’s no clinical evidence that differences between today’s wheat and older varieties have adverse effects on our health. It’s all supposition on Dr. Davis’s part, and feeds into pervasive fears of modern agricultural methods. We think this particular fear is unfounded.

Claim: Wheat is the main culprit behind the obesity epidemic.

Fact: Wheat is a staple in most parts of the world, and there’s little or no correlation between regional intakes (as a proportion of daily calories) and rates of obesity. Per capita wheat consumption in the U.S. has actually dropped since 2000, but there’s no sign that is slowing the expansion of our waistlines. In fact, a century ago Americans ate much more wheat than we do today, and very few were obese (granted, diets and lifestyles differed in many ways then). In any case, the obesity epidemic certainly can’t be attributed to any single factor.

What about Dr. Davis’s claims that when he told his patients to avoid wheat they lost weight and become healthier? As with nearly all diet books, this is only anecdotal evidence, but it’s not surprising. Had he told his patients to cut out all meat or all sugary snacks, for instance, they might have done as well or better. Nearly all diets work for a while (especially in supervised settings), usually by getting people to avoid whole categories of foods and thus tricking them into cutting calories. Keep in mind, too, that Dr. Davis basically recommends a low-carb diet, and well-designed studies have found that such diets work no better than other diets in the long term.

Claim: Wheat has played an outsized role in surging rates of diabetes, heart disease, and other chronic disorders.

Fact: There’s no evidence that wheat bears special blame for these. Blood sugar does rise after eating bread, pasta, and other wheat products. But that’s true of any foods containing carbohydrates—even those in gluten-free products—especially if the grains are refined.
The effect of carbohydrate-rich foods on blood sugar, which is ranked by the “glycemic index” (GI), depends on many factors, including how much fiber is in the food, how the food is processed and prepared, and what else is in the meal. Wheat ranks moderately high on the GI. But research looking at the effect of a high-GI diet on weight control and the risk of diabetes and heart disease has had inconsistent results.

Refined wheat, like other starchy or sugary foods, can also have adverse effects on blood cholesterol and triglycerides—for instance, increasing levels of the small, dense LDL cholesterol particles that are most damaging. To avoid this, you needn’t avoid all wheat or go on a very-low-carb diet. Just choose healthier wheat products that are minimally refined or unrefined, and don’t go overboard.

Claim: Whole wheat isn’t much better than refined wheat, so overweight people and those with chronic diseases should avoid it as well.

Fact: Many studies have linked higher intakes of whole grains (including whole wheat) with a reduced risk of diabetes, heart disease, and stroke, as well as improvements in blood cholesterol, blood pressure, and blood sugar control. Other studies have found that whole wheat can help people control their weight and/or lose body fat, especially when they eat it in place of refined-wheat products. Thus, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, American Heart Association, American Diabetes Association, and most nutrition experts recommend foods made from 100% whole grains.

BOTTOM LINE: Unless you have celiac disease or another type of gluten intolerance or sensitivity (see box above), there’s no reason to avoid wheat. No doubt many Americans eat too much refined wheat, usually in the form of cakes, cookies, pizza, and other foods loaded with added sugar and/or fat (which can double or triple the calorie count), as well as lots of sodium. Cutting down on such wheat products can help people lose weight and improve their overall diet, provided they substitute lower-calorie foods. But 100% whole-wheat and other whole-grain products can fit well into a healthy diet, as can many refined-wheat dishes that include nutritious ingredients, such as pasta with vegetables. As with so many dietary matters, moderation is the key.



Gluten for punishment
There’s one very good reason to avoid wheat: if you are allergic to gluten because of celiac disease, also known as gluten-sensitive enteropathy or nontropical sprue. Gluten is a protein in wheat that makes dough elastic and smooth; it’s also in rye, barley, and certain other grains.

In people with this genetic disorder, gluten provokes an autoimmune response that damages the small intestine and may cause symptoms such as diarrhea, bloating, cramps, abdominal pain, weight loss, fatigue, and loss of appetite. Celiac disease has become more common in the past 50 years for largely unknown reasons. It’s now estimated that about 1 in 100 people in the U.S. and Canada have it. If you have a parent or sibling with the disease, your risk rises to 1 in 22; having an aunt, uncle, or grandparent with it increases your risk to 1 in 39.

Celiac disease can begin at any age and occurs more often in people of European descent and in women. Many people with it go undiagnosed or are misdiagnosed, however, because there may be no gastrointestinal symptoms—and when there are symptoms, they’re often nonspecific (that is, they could be caused by many disorders). Celiac disease causes malabsorption of key nutrients, notably calcium and iron, so it can lead to osteoporosis, anemia, and other serious health problems. People with it are also more likely to have other autoimmune disorders, such as psoriasis, lupus, Crohn’s disease, and certain types of thyroid disease.

Confusing matters, about 6 percent of Americans are thought to be gluten-sensitive but don’t have celiac disease, according to the Center for Celiac Research at the University of Maryland. There’s much debate about this condition, sometimes called “nonceliac gluten sensitivity,” and about how prevalent it is. Because so many people now believe they are sensitive to gluten, rightly or wrongly, “gluten-free” has become one of the fastest growing sectors of the food industry.

Before giving up gluten, get tested
If you have chronic indigestion or other symptoms suggestive of gluten sensitivity, consult your doctor and get tested for celiac disease before going on a gluten-free diet. (Long-term avoidance of gluten can interfere with the diagnostic tests for celiac disease.) A positive result on the blood test should be followed by a biopsy of the small intestine to confirm the diagnosis. If celiac disease is ruled out and you continue to have problems, you can be tested for nonceliac gluten sensitivity via an “elimination and provocation” diet.

If you have a family member with celiac disease, you should be tested even if you have no symptoms, since diagnosing and treating the disease can help prevent intestinal damage and serious complications. Many gastroenterologists advise initially having a simple genetic test for predisposition to celiac disease.

Few people are properly diagnosed for gluten problems, however, according to a paper in the Annals of Internal Medicine earlier this year, which warned that many are undoubtedly going on highly restrictive diets unnecessarily.

It’s best to consult an experienced registered dietitian if you have celiac disease. You can—and should—eat other healthy grains, including corn, rice, oats, buckwheat, quinoa, and amaranth. Look for “certified gluten-free” on labels, since products can be cross-contaminated with gluten. Keep in mind, most “gluten-free” packaged products are made from refined flour (albeit gluten-free flour) and are not particularly nutritious, and many are junk food.

For more information, you can contact the Celiac Disease Foundation or the Celiac Sprue Association.
Issue: August 2012

Whoever wrote this clearly did not read the book with an open mind. ALL the questions are addressed in the book.

This is the stuff that the dietitians are arguing, a "rebuttal" based on conventional notions of wheat.

Rather that have to pick each argument apart to debate with people who clearly do not want to change their opinions, please just read the book.

I don't know if you're right or wrong (about wheat being worse than other starch sources), but am going to give you the benefit of the doubt, remove it, and see what happens.
P.S. Listened to the debate between you and Timothy Caulfield. What an embarrassing hack he was.

The lowest mortality is correlated with HbA1c between 5.0 and 5.4%.

That guy was way ahead of his time.  Doctors were posing for cigarette ads in the '50s.  And who cared if you had "middle-age spread?"  We've just update his benzedrine Rx with Red Bull and triple lattés.  I'm surprised Nitroglycerine wasn't mentioned; my dad took it for his angina.  The winter vacation in the tropics suggestion could have been all about Vitamin D, without knowing it.

The Atlantic Monthly had an essay on the placebo effect that I have never forgotten.  You can read it below.

http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/10/fisher.htm

Are you talking about cold butter consumed without heating?

And do exogenous AGEs make it into systemic circulation, or are they broken down into simpler forms on digestion?  That would be the crucial thing to know.

food gone and water gone... we are to survive on air? no wait thats polluted too..

Is there a way to mitigate potential damage caused by exogenous AGEs?

"The results indicate that diet can be a significant environmental source of AGEs, which may constitute a chronic risk factor for cardiovascular and kidney damage."

I'll start worrying when they can do a little better than "may".

We're back to the "Eating fat makes you fat" mindset here...

I'd echo the question about whether or not this issue is limited to over-heated butter or butter in general.

Also, is there enough information in the source data to indicate whether or not clarifying the butter into ghee would offer any improvement?

Funny.
You promote soy, which is known to be bad for you, but dump on butter which is known to be good for you....
Strange?

From the article:
"...(AGEs), the derivatives of glucose-protein or glucose-lipid interactions"

Can anyone explain the glucose-lipid interactions in ...butter?! Sheesh! Talk about bad science, those people did not follow the DEFINITION, never mind the protocols!

Exogenous AGEs are handily dealt with my people with healthy metabolims.  

I know that's not many of your patients, so if you consider this a patient blog, ignore my comment.  

Many people think of this blog as a "paleo blog" or a "low-carb blog" but in recent months, you've been basing many of your posts (and thinking) on the metabolically impaired.

I can eat a plain mashed potato for breafast without seeing my blood glucose go over 100.  Are potatoes bad for me?  I really don't think so.  2 million years of evolution suggests otherwise.  Are potatoes bad for your patients that have been poisoned by years of fructose and PUFA induced metabolic carnage?  Yes.

Same for butter.  It's a convenient and healthy source of good quality fat.  It has a lot of AGEs, but you have presented ZERO evidence that dietary AGES are unhealthy for otherwise healthy PEOPLE.    In fact, such evidence doesn't exist.  

So, Doctor, are you treating sick patients or trying to remain a figure in the world of the super healthy?

Is the high level of AGEs in butter due to pasteurization?

not buyin' it

You are slowly hacking away at all I hold dear. Sausages! Butter! Sigh.

Dr. Eades addressed this issue in 2008 and came to a different conclusion:

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/low-carb-library/low-carb-diets-reduce-oxidative-stress/

He specifically addresses the Goldberg 2004 study in the first comment:

"I agree that there are vastly more AGEs in cooked foods, especially meats. What I’m not so sure about is whether or not the AGEs we eat end up as AGEs in us. The transit through the extreme acidity of the stomach would, I imagine, reduce the AGEs to their components, which we would absorb. The healthy human GI tract doesn’t have the ability to absorb large molecules. Even diglycerides (sugars composed of two other sugars, sucrose, for example) must be broken down to monoglycerides before being absorbed, so I seriously doubt that complex molecules such as AGEs could be absorbed in there native state. As a consequence, I’m not particularly worried about the AGEs I eat – I much more worried about the AGEs I create within."

He also cites studies indicating that ketogenic diets reduce oxidative stress, despite butter and fried sausage being very common components of a ketogenic diet.

Another one showing how vegetarians have higher levels of AGEs than omnivores:

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/sugar-and-sweeteners/vegetarians-age-faster-2/

Most likely due to a high fructose intake.

What about butter from grass-few cows, ghee, goat's butter, or high vitamin butter oil? Do you relate to them in the same way?

Are we talking about heated butter here? Dietary AGEs should not be a problem; unless you have a leaky gut, they don't make it into the bloodstream. The problem with butter is that it, like all dairy, raises insulin and it still contains growth hormones and dangerous proteins.

Couple of points.
First, that very paper says that only about 10% of exogenous AGEs actually make it into circulation, so that automatically takes butter down to 26.5KU/g. Of course if a patient has advanced kidney failure then worry about exogenous AGEs should be a concern, but so should protein, potassium etc etc.

Secondly, the focus on exogenous AGEs in this table is obviously one-sided. Saying that butter contains more AGEs than a bowl of fructose, ignores the fact that once inside the body, the carbohydrate will cause immeasurably more glycation than the fat. These researchers are quite obviously pushing an lipophobic agenda here and I wouldn't fall for it.

Third, it's not just butter apparently, but olive oil is also 120KU/ml or about 900 times more than an apple. But it would surely be absurb to think that apples will glycate less then olive oil?

Fourtly, there something extremely suspect about the fact that whole milk contains 5300 times less AGE than butter. This should make us think twice before thinking that there's something uniquely bad about dairy fat that this study has discovered.

I find it hard to believe that butter (you do mean butter made from cow-milk, not margarine?) and red meat, two natural products, could be unhealthy for you. Anecdotal evidence says otherwise.

The studies on AGEs are most often done on animals that have problems to begin with (e.g. diabetes). It's not clear at all whether consuming (a reasonable amount of) AGEs is harmful for healthy individuals.

I've also reported about the AGE content of butter (see the list of AGEs in various foods) and I don't quite understand how they got such a high reading for butter. Did they heat it up? The processing of butter doesn't seem like it should result in much AGEs since milk is pretty low in AGEs.

Like most commenters, I'm more worried about AGEs produced inside the body than AGEs from foods. And I'm even more worried about ALEs (Advanced Lipid peroxidation End-products) than AGEs.

See my blog for more posts on glycation and lipid peroxidation (and how to avoid them).

With the combination of A1 beta casein and AGEs in typical butter I think clarified butter/ghee with the cholesterol, lactose, and casein removed should be an improvement.

But I second D.M. on the milk/butter thing, even though (like everyone else apparently =p) I have not checked the study referenced. It would follow that if they are both pasteurized they should be similarly high in AGEs.

How do we know that eating more AGE's damages our cardiovascular system?

This sounds rather similar to "eating cholesterol results in an increase in cholesterol in the blood which causes heart disease and thus death."

And butter is bad while soy is good? I'm not buying it.

As others have mentioned - what population are we talking about here?

Very illuminating post. I had no idea that butter had all those AGEs, I use it liberally in my cooking. I wonder what to use now instead of butter, lard?

It would be very illustrative to educate us in ways to cook meat at low temperature.

Thanks for the wonderful information.

Would a measurement of CRP reveal the inflammation potentially caused by the AGEs i eat? If I maintain an ideal CRP for years on a butter-rich diet, should I still worry?

I wonder why we love the taste of roasted meat when it is supposedly so unhealthy.

It makes sense that the AGEs will not reach the blood stream if you have a good digestive system. If not well everything is a poison.

Still Meat and Fat would be less of a poison than lectins from grains and legumes or even vegetables.

Dr. Davis, I'm confused. It's all your fault. If I just stick to low carb, it's all fine. But as soon as you start blaming butter, this low carb idea stops making any sense. Why would a low carb diet return me to good health when this very same low carb diet is blamed for disease?

Clean slate. Start over. Fact, a  low carb diet returns me, and pretty much everybody else, to good health. Fact, a low carb diet contains lots of fat especially saturated animal fat. Fact, butter is one such fat and now we find that it contains lots of AGEs. Fact, in spite of this butter returns me to good health because it's part of a low carb diet. Logical conclusion, whatever I find in butter must be why I am now in good health.

So why are you saying that butter is now bad for me?

WoW great blog good to know since i love butter... but i totaly dont understand the whole Can anyone explain the glucose-lipid interaction thing.... thanks!

Butter is better for normal humans under normal circumstances than any plant food in existence. Butter: Food of the gods.

I would also wonder if it's due to pasteurization.

well dr davis, clearly you are ruffling the feathers of your readers with this one. nothing wrong with that in particular, except for when, as in this case, the information presented ruffles feathers because we all know it's just not possible. people have been eating (and studying the effects of) butter for a reaaallly long time. pretty much all whole food health gurus (meaning the awesome new wave of nutrionist/doctor bloggers that has sprung up this past decade) agree that full fat butter is very healthy to consume even in fairly substantial amounts. in fact, they ARE consuming it, and living very well while doing so. grass fed butter in particular, as you are well aware, has been tested and studied extensively, and the fat soluable vitamins and nutrients are so rich its astounding.

just because something is found to have high AGEs before consumption, doesn't mean that particular item is causing the problems that you blame butter for here. be careful not to attack one of the most hallowed health foods unless you have have absolutely rock solid information that people can stand on.

i only say this because i know you run a well articulated blog here and your name gets around on many other similar minded blog sites. i have read many of your articles, but reading articles like this make me (and many of your other 'faithfuls') cringe, because we really cannot agree with this.

Unfortunately, the data do not specify how or what was done to the butter, if anything. I suspect it was just off-the-shelf butter.

There seems to be a lot of misunderstandings here about what Vlassara et al's data are showing. This one perspective reported here does not do justice to this fascinating topic, which is clearly worth pursuing further.

It's not my role to indulge anyone's low-carb fantasies. I am trying to interpret observations and data to employ in as effective a diet approach as possible.

The data stand: Butter has some problems, despite fitting into most people's conception of low-carb.

This can be interesting news, apparently not all paleo people had a paleodiet
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1321844/Stone-Age-man-ate-bread-just-meat.html

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but every study on AGEs I've managed to dig up involves feeding humans or rats a lab "preparation" of AGEs, rather than actual real food.

Some of the earliest arguments against a high protein diet came from  experiments with feedings of pure casein or liquid protein powders. When these experiments are repeated with whole food, the results are markedly different.

"It's not my role to indulge anyone's low-carb fantasies."

You're shunning of butter seems to follow this chain of association:

1) Certain AGEs in the body are  bad.
2) Butter contains significant AGEs (type of butter? type of AGEs?).
3) Feeding pure AGE solutions to humans increases AGEs in the body.
4) Ergo, eating butter increases AGEs in the body.

However, certain AGEs such as pyrraline (commonly found in milk products) have been shown NOT to be metabolized in the body:

http://www.biochemsoctrans.org/bst/031/1383/0311383.pdf

Are we getting the full picture here? Until a study shows that feeding butter significantly increases AGEs in the body, I think we're in the land of speculation.

Glycation in food and metabolic transit of dietary
AGEs (advanced glycation end-products): studies
on the urinary excretion of pyrraline

Dr. Davis, the kind of data you presented in your "case against butter" is merely the sort that explains how it works and what it's made of, not the sort that tells us whether butter is good or bad. We can figure out if something's good or bad without knowing how it works, we just feed it to somebody and wait for a result. We can also learn how it works without knowing if it's good or bad. We just feed it to somebody and draw some blood.

The data you rely on here is the latter kind. It doesn't tell us whether butter is good or bad, it merely tells us how butter works and what it's made of. Now you believe that some of what it's made of, and some ways it works, is bad for us and you conclude that because of this butter is also bad for us. But in order to fully believe this you must also ignore the data that says that butter is good for us.

Dr. Davis, you of all people should know health is not merely a measure of what's in the blood, let alone the measure of a single blood parameter.

What we should conclude instead is that our understanding of the data regarding butter has problems.

diglycerides (sugars composed of two other sugars, sucrose, for example)

Eades really wrote that??? LOL. He should go back and study some Biochem 101 to find out the difference between diglycerides and disaccharides.

I might have seen this article referenced at this site previously, but I think it is worth revisiting in view of the topic.

Food Choices and Coronary Heart Disease: A Population Based Cohort Study of Rural Swedish Men with 12 Years of Follow-up

Abstract: Coronary heart disease is associated with diet. Nutritional recommendations are frequently provided, but few long term studies on the effect of food choices on heart disease are available. We followed coronary heart disease morbidity and mortality in a cohort of rural men (N = 1,752) participating in a prospective observational study. Dietary choices were assessed at baseline with a 15-item food questionnaire. 138 men were hospitalized or deceased owing to coronary heart disease during the 12 year follow-up. Daily intake of fruit and vegetables was associated with a lower risk of coronary heart disease when combined with a high dairy fat consumption (odds ratio 0.39, 95% CI 0.21-0.73), but not when combined with a low dairy fat consumption (odds ratio 1.70, 95% CI 0.97-2.98). Choosing wholemeal bread or eating fish at least twice a week showed no association with the outcome.
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2009, 6, 2626-2638;

@Martin levac

It doesn't tell us what butter is made of because we don't know if it was pasteurized or heated/cooked. My guess would be heated since that's what the study in question is looking at, heated foods. It's also known that butter has a very low smoking point.

This is very interseting about butter. I have avoided butter because it is a non paleo food. It always seems that there are problems with these "new foods"

Some things that I wonder though, are has this AGE content be measured accurately? Are there other studies that confirm this high level of AGEs in butter? Could butter from  pasteurized milk be higher in AGEs? Also could the level of freshness and the time it was frozen have some impact? These are some of the questions to consider.

So far as the contention by some here that these chemicals don't pass into your system through your digestive system. The literature that I have seen clearly shows that they do pass through into your system.

questions about butter.  first as many have asked, was the butter heated for patuerization? my guess is yes.  second, what were the cows feed?  standard grain feed would probably lead to ore endogenous AGE in cows compared to a diet of grass.  as for now, i am sticking with my grass fed, non pasteurized butter.

Nothing wrong with saying "Whoops.  My bad.  Thanks for correcting me with your comments guys and gals".

Sorry Doc,

This has been one of your least helpful, and nearly destructive blogs, I've ever seen. If you truly believe butter is not good, why not research how it could be 'better', such as clarifying it into ghee, or buying only grass-fed butter.

So then what do YOU suggest instead as the best possible source of dietary fat???

You must realize that the majority of people buy that horrible slow-poison known as margarine, because it has been billed as 'healthier', and your blog will only strengthen that perception.

It seems like occasionally you go on vacation, and let the TYP committee post an article for you. This one stunk.

The 6-year old study you quoted sounds like it was paid for by the vegetable oil industry.
Anything we swallow gets nearly destroyed by our stomach acids, and who says that carboxymethyllysine (prior to digestion) is a proper marker for eventual AGE cell damage? Wouldn't Uric Acid have an even greater role? OR Hydrogen Peroxide induced in the blood or tissues? Doesn't Glucose, by far, cause the greatest destruction? Remind me what the G in AGE stands for?

Weakly researched or justified blogs like this one make us lose faith in you as an expert.

No apologies from me.

Just because you wish it weren't true, or that the data should be better sorted out, doesn't make it so.

Until we obtain more clarification, butter remains on my list of "watch out."

Wheat is unquestionably bad. Some foods, like spinach and kale, are unquestionably good. Other foods, like butter and other dairy products, have mixed effects.

I'm talking butter here. I'm not insulting your aunt.

I'm not that much of a fan of butter since I've got an autoimmune disorder which seems to get slightly worse with dairy, but, wouldn't ghee/clarified butter remove all/most of the AGEs throught seperation and physical removal of the sugars and proteins, leaving only the pure fat?
Even AGEs from super-heated pasturized butter would be removed...
Unless the fat itself gets glycated
(this is the first time I've heard of this but it seems plausible, and ghee won't get rid of oxidized unsaturated fats from pasturized butter)

Here's something else I don't understand: what makes butter so special in regard to external A.G.E.s as opposed to other low-carb, high-fat foods that it would warrant special attention?
If butter can be filled with A.G.E.s, wouldn't a bunch of other low-carb foods considered healthy now become suspect?
Or is the heating process itself that makes the pasteurized butter they likely tested on the culprit?
(In the same way canola and soybean oils are hot-pressed to reduce toxins and therefore are highly oxidized)

I thought that the butter used in that study was whipped butter. If so, the measured AGE content might be drastically different from normal butter.

Am I missing something, I thought AGEs were a combination of sugars and proteins. The label of my butter says zero carbs and zero protein. So what is glycated ?

"No apologies from me."

“It's not my role to indulge anyone's low-carb fantasies.”

“I'm not insulting your aunt.”

interesting attitude. i'm not real certain that an apology is in order specifically for your article, but perhaps a more in depth look at the 'data' is. the type of people who come here have a veracious appetite to find the real truth, and you are ignoring a host of excellent replies that directly negate the 'data' and 'facts' that you are standing on.

i am not seeing "i love justifying my high fat foods because i am hopelessly addicted to butter" kind of replies here. i am seeing well researched, well articulated points about why the 'data' you presented here (and in your other previous article where you do state as a fact that "butter makes you fat") are not holding up well. And therefore, the quotes from you that I point out above do actually seem to be a bit insulting to your readers. your reply is quite pompous as well.

please keep in mind that we (meaning the collective group of caring folk who frequent your blog) are only making noise on this one for everyone’s good. you may not want to be so hasty in shunning good responses that question your findings, but, uh, it's your call doc, and your reputation.

as always, i appreciate the work you do. even with my disagreement about an article like this, i believe you do a great service to the health community and i sincerely thank you for it.

It's funny you mentioned that spinach and kale are unquestionably good. I can easily find plenty of bad in those two vegetables. High levels of oxalates is one. Kale is also highly goitrogenic. Those two vegetables are also some the most pesticide laden. On top of the pesticides, spinach is often irradiated.

I'll stick with occasional greens and frequent butter consumption.

Hi Dr. Davis:

Please take a look at the daily lipid's post from today, on AGE's.  Here is the link:
http://blog.cholesterol-and-health.com/2010/10/is-butter-high-in-ages.html

To paraphrase Henry Ford "nutrition is bunk". No statistically valid long term dietary clinical trial has ever been performed on humans. So we have no statistically valid evidence-based science on what constitutes a healthy diet. In particular the recommendations for eating fruit and vegetables is totally irrational. All vegetables are full of toxins and contain large quantities of known carcinogens. In fact the EPA would be required by law to ban the consumption and sale all vegetables if they were man made.

Nutrition 'science' consists entirely of extremely dubious experiments on rats, meaningless population studies and irrelevant test tube experiments.

@blogblog

What you say is ridicolous.
Consumption of vegetables has always been found to have nothing but extremely positive effects and not even one negative effect, except for people with Chrons.

Not even one evidence of cangerous or toxic effect.

The source of the butter data is this paper: "Advanced Glycoxidation End Products in Commonly Consumed Foods" (2004, Journal of the American Dietetic Association, via Google Scholar cache).

Here are some numbers from Table 1:

Milk, cow, whole .... 0.05 kU/mL
Butter .............. 265 kU/g

The table caption refers to "foods prepared by standard cooking methods" (these include frying). Expecting high AGEs in uncooked butter -- over 5000 times the level in milk! -- would make little sense. There's every reason to think that this butter had been exposed to high temperatures.

@anonymous (Nov 3 comment)
Actually, what you say is ridiculous too. I'd be careful not to make blanket statements like that. Built-in defense mechanisms are not reserved for Venus Fly-traps only. Vegetables, like many other plants, have them too.

PLANTS BITE BACK

What do you think about this from Dr Mercola?

Good-old-fashioned butter, when made from grass-fed cows, is a rich in a substance called conjugated linoleic acid (CLA). CLA is not only known to help fight cancer and diabetes, it may even help you to lose weight, which cannot be said for its trans-fat substitutes.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/12/07/why-is-butter-better.aspx

According to the chart, a frankfurter or a serving of roast beef is quite a bit worse than a serving of butter.
http://inhumanexperiment.blogspot.com/2009/09/age-content-of-foods.html

Butter is not good because it's low carb.  Butter is good because it's butter.  

Before I ever heard of low-carb, or vitamins or minerals or any of that, when ALL I knew about nutrition was that sugar was bad and veggies good cause mom said so, butter was good.  Butter made me WANT to eat an artichoke.  And... it still works today!

If there were no other benefit to butter than it made vegetables palatable, butter would be an unqualified good.  I would not eat 1/10th the veggies I do if not for butter.  

Since I am stubbornly of the opinion that eating at least half the diet (by volume) as nonstarchy vegetables is the main thing anyone can do for health, butter is an unqualified good in my world.  

If it makes people voluntarily eat their veggies, it's good.  

*********************************************************************

While just the veggie intake with butter in the diet is a HUGE good; butter is better than just the vegetables that go with it.  

Butter is the number one source of butyric acid, a fatty acid that is a major constituent of the GI tract and often deficient in folks with GI disturbances like celiac and Chron's and systemic Candida.  IMO, the number one thing anyone with GI issues can do is eat lots of butter.  If you want to heal even faster, don't just eat it, but take it in both ends, so to speak.  

Butyric acid also counteracts inflammation, the main underlying issue with heart disease as I understand, and the apparent underlying issue with the epidemic of autoimmune disorders we're seeing.

My grandmother's generation ate GOBS of bread, wheat was a mainstay of their diet.  But they didn't have all the gluten-intolerance this generation has.  IMO, the reason is cause they slathered butter on their bread.  

Anyways, she lived to 102, so must've done SOMeTHING right.  And she never believed the hype about margarine, always overate butter like crazy.

Butyric acid has other interesting effects... it lowers total cholesterol 25%, serum triglycerides 50%, fasting insulin 25%, and increases insulin sensitivity 300% - there's a bunch of pubmed references listed here: http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2009/12/butyric-acid-ancient-controller-of.html

Note that "metabolic syndrome," the precursor to T2 diabetes, is pretty much insulin resistance and high triglycerides.  When metabolic syndrome is the question, apparently, butter is the answer.

*********************************************************************

Butter is particularly good from pasture-raised animals, which maximizes the vitamins A, D3 and K2 in it.  

Very few of us get enough vitamin A.  Many of us, diabetics being an example I'm terrifically familair with, do not convert beta-carotene to vitamin A well at all.  In general, omnivores and carnivores don't do this efficiently, even the healthy ones with good genes.  

Herbivores do it wonderfully.  All the gorgeous colors of the pasture convert into lots of real vitamin A for us to eat.  You can take nasty cod liver oil, or you can just melt yummy butter on your veggies.

I do not spend 16 hours in the sun in summer.  But I rent a small house on a farm and am surrounded by cattle, and they do.  They walk about, eating pasture, chewing cud and the calves frolicking across the fields, in the sunshine all day, where they also are making loads of vitamin D3 - the real stuff, not the crappy D2 they "fortify" factory farmed milk with.

Butter from cows eating rapidly growing grass is also the best known source of K2 other than natto.  Just like Vitamin A, we are not good at making K2, but cows are.

*********************************************************************

IMO, butter is a near-miraculous food, one of the true health foods.  

I buy from a farm that makes butter from cream from cows on pasture, with no ingredients except cream.  When the beta-carotene content is highest, it turns darker, which is also when the vitamin A, D3 and K2 is highest.  When it gets like that, I buy 40 lbs and stick it in my freezer for consumption over the next year.  When I run out, I just buy it weekly again until it gets dark again.

I eat between 1/2 - 1 lb butter every week. It's yummy.  As noted, it's wonderful on vegetables.  But it's also nice just melted over some over-easy eggs, or a pat melted on a burger or steak.  

Also, pasture-raised butter tastes better.  The stuff I buy comes in tubs, not sticks, but hubby being a truck driver finds sticks more convenient.  He buttered a dish with his butter recently before he served it to me and... well, I added the real butter.  His butter just wasn't... buttery enough.  

Butter is... just awesome stuff.  And for those who REALLY disagree, my advice is to heed Julia Child who said, "If you're afraid of butter, use cream."

Like Olga, I''d be very interested to hear your opinion on this daily lipid''s post:
http://blog.cholesterol-and-health.com/2010/10/is-butter-high-in-ages.html

Also, what about ghee?

Apparently the AGEs in the study cited by Dr. Davis were measured using anti-body immunoassay which is an indirect method that is susceptible to distortions.   A mass spectrometer, a direct measurement, was used to analysis AGE in butter in this study http://biomedgerontology.oxfordjournals.org/content/65A/9/963.full and found: "The CML concentrations of various foods vary widely from about 0.35–0.37 mg CML/kg food for pasteurized skimmed milk and butter to about 11 mg CML/kg food for fried minced beef and 37 mg CML/kg food for white bread crust".

So wheat in the form of white bread crust is a factor of 100 more than butter in CML AGE.