Paying the price of a Wrong Diet
Nandkumar Kamat
NT Panorama Sunday Sept. 6, 2009
The time has come to launch a new movement in Goa, to reintroduce people to
their centuries-old traditional diets. Actually the main theme of this
article can be summed up right at the beginning in just one statement - "
Forget the hype of private profit makers in the health and healing sector,
the key to health and longevity lies in switching over loyally to authentic
traditional diets".
Let us work to prevent diseases and not waste money on costly diagnosis and
expensive treatments. To give a simple example: If a Goan reduces his/her
consumption of chilies or buys less pungent chilies or prefers a bland diet
then he/she often becomes predisposed to frequent coughs and colds,. Spices
and spicy preparations are absolutely essential for the same reason. But
amazingly, over the generations people have forgotten all about homemade
Goon spices. The traditional Goon probiotic to keep away flu and cold
viruses is by consuming piping hot, pungent, reddish curry with or without
fish or prawns mixed with some rice preparation at least thrice a day for
four days consecutively. The temperature of the curry and the profuse
salivation it induces is sufficient to neutralize viruses. But people have
forgotten the art of making such curries and then they fall sick. Goans
could become centenarians like the Georgians; the residents near the cold
Caucasus Mountains, who live on a simple diet of fresh bread, fruits, mil,
honey, cheese and wine. Believe me, Goa's traditional diet offers a
mind-boggling range of foods much better than the bland, limited Georgian
diet. Besides, if you do a minute analysis, many recipes have built in
probiotics-phytochemicals, which our ancestors discovered by studying the
cause-and-effect relationship.
On the last day of national nutrition week (September 1-6) I wish to give a
call to all the Goans. If you're below fifty-five then switch over to the
diet you had 25-40 years ago, immediately." Fill your shopping bags with
colorful local vegetables and fruits, Red Amaranthus, local radishes,
drumsticks and breadfruits are essential. Bitter gourd is a god sent
medicinal vegetable. Include at least a kilogram of fresh button mushrooms
per week. Look out for edible fern-Ankur. Don't be tempted by temperate
fruits like apples, peaches, plums and avocados. Prefer tropical and
subtropical fruits like local bananas, muskmelons, watermelons, custard
apples, guavas and chickoos.
From September to March there is a wide choice of fish and shellfish. Those
who're genetically predisposed to uric acid problem should not touch
shellfish. But sardines and mackerels have powerful probiotic properties.
That's why we find hundreds of traditional Goan recipes using these fish.
Munch bowlfuls of fresh green salads with a dash of buttermilk or homemade
curd. Give up iodized salt completely. Fish consumers really don't need it.
Stock up on Goa's local salt, which has medicinal properties and is
naturally fortified with calcium, magnesium, iron, potassium and sulphur.
Besides it has traces of carotenoids and Vitamin E.
If Goan family makes a yearly audit of their diet then they would find that
the markets aggressively influence their food habits. It is all right to
fancy a new product once in a while. But why allow a large proportion of
Goan diet to be replaced by packaged, ready to cook, instant or fast foods?
Actually, in the name of food a majority of urban Goans are gobbling up too
much of fats, carbohydrates and steroid-laced proteins. Those who add
alcohol to this intake make themselves prone to various conditions of liver,
heart, kidneys, intestine and the circulatory system. The dietary habits of
Goans in interior talukas are still intact. But with aggressive consumer
culture and new food fads this would change. Our health depends on slow
foods like the fermented preparations. The leavened Goan bread is much
preferable than the sliced varieties. Goans think that they're eating well
but they are not eating a diet their genes demand and the environment
specifies. Their bodies are bio accumulating all types of food preservatives
and toxins. The government needs to spend at least one third of the health
department's budget on systematic nutritional and dietary education.
Prevention is always better than cure. Has anyone looked at the
proliferation of chemists and druggist stores all over Goa? It indicates
that contrary to government health statistics the morbidity is higher. A
large number of Goans are self-medicating themselves for minor illnesses,
which are preventable with better diet, hygiene and sanitation. Why is the
disease load in Goa not showing a decreasing trend? Why can't we reduce the
morbidity? What good diet and nutrition can do? Why are lifestyle related
diseases, disorders and deaths increasing in Goa? What caused this shift
over the past 25-30 years? Is it due to high urbanization, small families,
change in lifestyle, pollution, and work related stresses or is it the
dietary transition? Why are diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular, bypass
surgeries, tumor and cancer cases increasing in Goa?
The early onset of menstruation among young girls has been attributed to a
diet loaded with chicken fattened with anabolic steroids. A similar
connection would be found between change in diet and rise in incidence of
breast cancers. The midday meal scheme should have been a focus of
exemplary dietary and nutritional package. Why couldn't the government
identify a menu from the vast repertoire of traditional Goa recipes, some
cheap, easy to cook, delicious and nutritious items for the midday meal
schemes?
There is no application of mind to study and prescribe a traditional well
balanced diet for pregnant and lactating women. Extraordinary enthusiasm was
shown to promote consumption of iodized salt in Goa. There was no emphasis
on promoting diets rich in Vitamin A, Folic Acid and Iron, which are
deficient among women and children. Then government does not even have a
single subsidized publication properly documenting the traditional
nutritional recipes.
If Goans completely switch over to a new western-style dietary regime then
they would only benefit the booming business of private healthcare. Stick
religiously to well prepared traditional diets, reduced alcohol intake,
relax, exercise and deep away angioplasties and bypass surgeries.
Note: Direct all queries to [email protected]
COMMENTS:
Of late, due to health reasons, my interest in the type of foods that we eat
has been awakened and it is for this reason that I have decided to comment
on this article by professor and scientist Dr. Nandkumar Kamat. Most who
read the subject line will deduce that I am, once again, going to show my
bias against Dr. Nandkumar Kamat's writings. But they are going to be
surprised to note that I do agree with his food analysis completely and
thoroughly on this subject matter but I must admit that I am disappointed
that he has not come out openly to identify the main killer poison in our
everyday cooking life. I do hope that he will subsequently do so, but in the
meantime, one who has gone through the rigors of nursing the unacceptable
cardio-vascular clogging which couldn't be solved through the much resorted
to 'stenting' (angioplasty) or by-pass surgery, I will say 'well done' to
Dr. Kamat.
I have come to realize that advertantly or inadvertantly, our modernization
momentum is taking us to our graves much much earlier than expected and that
too by polishing us and/or our families of our life's savings and the misery
that ensues. And the gullible us run to the next available super-markets
after having been barged incessantly in our own homes by the TV
advertisements, to cash on the -'buy one- take one free' items off the
shelves which are loaded with endless lines of refined oils, one superior
over the other, that we fall over one another to grab. Hopefully, Dr.
Nandkumar Kamat will explain to us the HYDROGENATION process, the plus
points (all for the manufacturers) and it's minus points ( the ones which
send us to the Apollo Hospitals of this world and finally to our graves).
Dr. Kamat, while telling us to throw out the much touted 'Iodized Salt' from
our kitchens which has been even promoted by our well known doctors
(including our dear own Dr. Wilfred D'Souza) has not told us that its
consumption is the singular cause of 'Thyroid' problems and perhaps
infertility in Goa.
Dr. Kamat has told us that we need Folic Acid in our diet but has not told
us that the deficiency of Folic Acid combined with the deficiency of enzyme
CO-Q10 leads to the increase in the 'Homocisteine' levels in our blood
stream making our blood thicker and most fatal in most cardio-vascular
clogged cases. They don't even test 'homocisteine' levels in Goa and blood
samples have to be sent to Mumbai. Besides, doctors do not advise the
patients that the blood thinning drugs they prescribe (Ecosprin / Acorex) is
instrumental in causing the depletion of the available folic acid and CO-Q10
in our system, which our aged livers do not manufacture any more and at the
same time we have stopped their intake from eating organ meats like livers
etc.
Dr. Kamat has talked about morbidity, probiotics, phytochemicals etc., most
of which terms I had to look up in the dictionary, but he has failed to tell
us about the dangers of free radicals we ingest and the need to take in
sufficient anti-oxidants to nutralize them before they cause worse damage to
our system, a major cause of organ failures (diabetes) and tumors. Most of
all Dr. Nandkumar Kamat has not told us that our very own miracle water that
we drink is no miracle water at all and in most cases it is laden with
free-radicals (pollutants) which has turned it acidic instead of being ph
neutral. He has not told us that of late, the Japanese have found out that
ionized water (alkaline) is the need of the hour today to fight our polluted
environment. I am happy to say that I and my family drink ionized water
everyday, with its HO (hydroxyl) anti-oxidant superiority and a shortened
molecular chain which makes it easier to be absorbed into the body cells
unlike the normal water we drink. And when I talk about drinking ionized
water at home, I am not talking about the imported from Taiwan, China,
Japan etc., water ionizers which costs not a simple bomb but an atom bomb
( I am talking about Rs 25,000 to Rs. 30,000 a piece), but a simple ionizing
process cobbled-up from surfing the 'INTERNET' [Dr. Kamat's favorite, I
must say, :-)) ] and which has cost me approximately less than Rs. 700/- to
put together.
Besides a lot of vegetables that Dr. Kamat has talked about, he has not
mentioned the excellent nutritional and calorific value of 'dark chocolate'
( I am not talking about the Swiss made 'Lindt' - Rs. 235/ a bar or the
cheaper dark chocolate slabs (Rs. 110/- a piece) now available at Ajay
Supermarket at Mapusa) but the original 100% chocolate cacao nibs, a
facilitator of cardio-vascular circulation with the generation of Nitrous
Oxide gas which dilates the already clogged arteries. Like the ionized
water, I also make my own 100 per cent dark chocolate at home at a price
which cannot be imagined.
It is a fact that our nutritious good old Goan diet has gone to dogs,
replaced by the fast food, ready to cook culture, through gobbling down of
vast amounts of soft drinks which are totally acidic. There was a time, when
in 1968, Goa had a State Nutrition Officer's post, a centrally guided and
UNICEF funded programme, where the appointed State Nutrition Office was
exposed to WHO seminars and training programmes. However, it is sad to say
that this programme got grounded in 1997 with the lone appointed State
Nutrition Officer having forced to fight legal battles while in government
health service, now long since retired and not even having got his full
retirement benefits. This is a classic case of the Goan Crab Mentality where
juniors have scaled the promotion ladders illegally and have enjoyed the
benefits of office to the hilt.
The Goa Su-Raj Party's raison d'être is to build-up the concrete
infrastructure for a healthy state, fortify the Food And Drugs
Administration to a no-nonsense status where any and all food items in the
market place will be banned if found not complying strictly to the permitted
parameters. A good example is the refined edible oils (hydrogenated) which
often sport labels which are clearly above the prescribed safe levels and
getting away with it. The mission of the party is to force the automatic
slow-down of the proliferation of the chemist and druggist stores in the
State, in Dr. Kamat's own words. It is believed that the hydrogenation
process was conceived by a German Scientist much like the Gas Chambers of
the Holocaust were attributed to the Germans. This, by the way, is the
safest way of gassing the people of the world, :-))
In my case, the 'Virgin' Coconut oil [VCO] ( not a poly-unsaturated oil
but a fully saturated oil with abundance of lauric acid capable of
destroying tough viruses in the body has displaced the best of refined,
purified, supermarket shelf edible oils. And the TATA (iodized) Salt has
been kicked out from my kitchen by the the good old Goa's common (sea) salt.
There is a lot of money to be made in the health care business. If the
people do not fall ill, there is no money to be made. Therefore our whole
food industry is geared towards getting people sick to the core before
their time. A simple Goan batatawada or a mirchi that we love so much is
perhaps responsible for filling half the hospital beds in Goa. A veritable
food for thought, indeed.
Cheers
floriano
goasuraj
9890470896
www.goasu-raj.org
PS: If I am proved wrong at all in what I have said above, blame the
INTERNET.
