The "Complexity" of Our Food System and Health

“The deal we made with our planet, its creatures, and our rural workforces, all so we could enjoy a slightly cheaper hamburger, might just be the worst deal that was ever made.” - Will Harris

Last week I shared an article titled Colon cancer is rising in young Americans. It’s not clear why. and my commentary that healthcare is invested in the technique of sowing doubt. This week the Wall Street Journal provided further evidence of my claim with the headline: Cancer Is Striking More Young People, and Doctors Are Alarmed and Baffled.

Even if doctors, researchers and experts remain baffled, I’m not. It’s evidently clear that the rise in disease is directly related to the rise of industrialized food.

Just take this example from A Bold Return to Giving a Damn, this week’s book, discussing the toxins that cattle are treated with.

“What’s the weed situation out here… is it more weedy than I want… If affirmative, I’d get out the herbicide. Next… Is there an infestation of fall army worms? If yes, spray some Pyrethroid to take them out. Search… for leaf spot mold. Better get the fungicide. Test the soil for nutrients, then add nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. Now look over the cattle for bottle jaw… some of them might need a dewormer. And if there are over two hundred flies per head, the books says to spray insecticide on them, so I’d do that too.”

Or this example from The Botany of Desire.

“I asked Forsyth [a potato farmer] to walk me through a season’s regimen... Typically it begins early in the spring… potato farmers douse their fields before planting with a chemical toxic enough to kill every trace of microbial life in the soil. Next… herbicide to “clean” his field of all weeds. Then… a systemic insecticide is applied to the soil. This will be absorbed by the young seedlings and kill any insect that eats their leaves... When the potato seedlings are six inches tall, a second herbicide is sprayed to control weeds.”

Both the cattle and the potatoes in each of the examples will end up in fast food chains and grocery stores around the country, and ultimately in the stomachs of millions of Americans.

Or read this week’s article discussing 7 food additives that are banned in other countries for causing diseases such as cancer and nerve damage, but remain legal in the U.S.

So when doctors and researchers say they’re baffled, I’m baffled that they’re baffled. But the twisted part is that they’re not baffled. They’ve just decided to trade lives for profits.

And all of these chemicals and additives don’t even account for the impact that ultra-processed foods (UPFs) has on our health. As Michael Easter points out in this weeks podcast, in a tightly controlled one month study, participants fed a UPF diet ate on average 500 more calories per day than when they were fed a minimally processed diet. Extrapolate that over a full year and the math to obesity and disease becomes clear.

So here in lies the problem. We have a population that is getting sicker by the day. We know why, but politicians and corporate greed keep telling us “they’re not sure why.” Pharmaceutical companies keep developing and marketing treatments and medicines, meanwhile the prevalence of disease continues to rise.

Instead its up to us as consumers to spend our money in places where health, quality food, the welfare of animals and the land is the priority. The best way to do that is by buying local, from farmers and growers in your area. Here is a list of resources from A Bold Return to Giving a Damn where you can search for locally sourced food in your area.

eatwild.com

americangrassfed.org

getrealchicken.com

localcatch.org

But if you can’t do that, you can at least keep your dollars from going to the likes of fast food chains and food manufacturers which rely on cheap corn, soy, beef, and grains grown with toxic chemicals. You can opt for cooking food from whole foods produce and humanely raised meats. Every dollar shifted away from Big Food, Ag, Drinks, and Healthcare is a dollar shifted in the direction we need to go.

This Week’s Posts:

Three Easy Ways I Improved My Nutrition

Ruck Plate Series: Workout 2

Kidney Bean and Mushroom Soup Recipe

A Book, Podcast, and Article Worth Sharing

A Bold Return to Giving a Damn: One Farm, Six Generations, and the Future of Food, By Will Harris III

In 2020 the pandemic revealed cracks in our food system and I became interested in learning more about it. In 2021 I leaned in a little more and worked part-time on a farm near Los Angeles. Through my reading and experience I became a believer that fixing the food system was a path to fixing most (if not all) the ailments we face as a nation. November 2022 I listened to Will Harris on the Joe Rogan Experience and the episode provided even more fuel and I started manifesting a trip to visit his farm, White Oak Pastures, to learn more.

Order the book here… and Read my takeaways here…

Peter Attia The Drive with Michael Easter, Author of The Comfort Crisis and Scarcity Brain

Michael Easter is an investigative journalist, author or The Comfort Crisis and a new book Scarcity Brain, discussed in this episode. Michael Easter makes the point that most of our behaviors as humans are based off what he calls “the scarcity loop,” which consists of three components.

• Opportunity - you have an opportunity to get something of value

• Unpredictable rewards - you don’t know when and how much, but you know something is coming

• Quick repeatability - The faster a human or any animal can repeat a behavior the more likely they are to repeat that behavior

And it’s this evolutionary scarcity loop that food manufacturers, casinos, drugs, retailers, and social media take advantage of to keep us eating, gambling, inebriated, shopping and scrolling.

Listen to the episode here… and Read my takeaways here…

7 Additives in our Processed Food That Are Banned Outside the U.S.

The reasons why we face a catastrophic health epidemic in this country are many and complex. But if we can’t get this right, having an FDA with a backbone to stand up against Big Food and ban ingredients KNOWN to cause cancer, neurological problems, and metabolic disease (the main culprit of obesity and diabetes), then what chance do we have?

Credit to California, the first state to pass a law that will ban 4 of these additives from being used in food sold in California. But even they fell short. The law, which passed in 2023, doesn’t go into effect until 2027, giving companies time to "revise their recipes to avoid these harmful chemicals," said Governor Gavin Newsom. Said another way, “corporate profits are more important than your health.”

Our politicians are constantly faced with the decision: do I support the public that supports me, or the companies that line my pockets? And without fail, they choose the latter. We deserve so much better.

Read the article: 7 Additives in Our Processed Food That Are Bannee Outside the U.S.