Pastor Larry spends one day a week with our medical team. The Pastor is preparing to go to an undeveloped country to offer both spiritual and social services to a population with great needs. He would like to bring some of the principles of Environmental Medicine. I like to chide him about the many people in need in our own country and that he doesn’t need to go to a foreign country to find them.
I was motivated to write this alert after watching CNN’s Sanjay Gupta talk about a group who challenged the American population to eat only non-processed food in order to cut down on our epidemic of obesity. So, how does Pastor Larry fit into this story? One day each week I have lunch with the Pastor in our conference room. He brings his lunch in a cooler and puts the food out on the table. This week I was literally awed by what he was eating for lunch. The colors alone were magnificent with a display of green, yellow, red, orange and brown from raw vegetables, fruits and a variety of seeds and nuts.
As many of you know, I often talk about our ancestors who for 300,000 years ate nothing but what they hunted and gathered, which basically consisted of meats, vegetables, a few fruits and lots of seeds and nuts. Their diet was free of grains and dairy products, two classes of foods that produce some of our greatest health problems. What could be simpler than eating such a primitive diet?
I forgot to mention the many vitamins, minerals, essential fatty acids and other nutraceuticals the Pastor takes with his meals. The point of all of this is to say how fit and trim our Pastor is and how he inspires all of us to do as he does.
At a time when we as a nation are debating a health care initiative, I hear nothing about lessons the lifestyle of our Pastor could be teaching us. In dollars and cents, can you imagine what could be saved if we imitated the country of Finland who reduced their incidence of heart attack and stroke by 75% by simply switching their regular table and cooking salt to one high in potassium, magnesium, iodine, other trace minerals and the amino acid Lysine?
How can we ignore an 80% reduction in Breast and Prostate cancer and probably most other malignancies by taking enough Vitamin D3 to raise our blood levels to about 50-70 ng.? These are some of the principles that Environmental Medicine teaches to help keep us from disease.
I am ready. Are you ready?
We at the Center are ready to help you achieve optimal health. Give us a call @ 843-572-1600 or visit our website @ www.coem.com
Allan Lieberman, M.D., F.A.A.E.M.
Medical Director,
The Center for Occupational and Environmental Medicine