Nutrition Bars Fuel Energy…And Cavities
For centuries, mankind has relished the idea of a portable food. A food that was light, nutritious and easy to carry. During the fur trade, we learned of the Plains Indian and their use of pemmican which suited them extremely well. In fact, it can be fairly said that pemmican is the ration by which the western United States was really settled. Admiral Peary declared that pemmican contains more nourishment per ounce than any other complete food and he considered it to be the only condensed ration that could sustain a man’s health and strength indefinitely, using it as the main dish at every meal 365 days in the year. He used it for twenty years and never tired of it.
Our modern, civilized societies are not very good at following the lead of others, especially those whom they feel superior to. The Plains Indian could have taught us so much about surviving with pemmican and how to thrive in such an environment as the Plains, but we forged ahead doing it our own way. Needless to say, today’s version of portable foods bear no resemblance to the genuine article. Todays so-called “nutrition bars” are nothing more than energy-sapping candy bars concocted in laboratories.
This particular headline outlined the situation very well from the dentists’ perspective:
While candy bars and sugary drinks are well-known cavity culprits, many people like Corn have been surprised to learn their nutritious, delicious snack bars — packed with all manner of healthy ingredients like dates, nuts, raisins and other fruit — can be just as bad for their teeth.
“It’s the consistency of these bars,” says Dr. Richard Price, consumer advisor for the American Dental Association and a retired Boston-area dentist. “They’re sticky and when something is sticky it stays in the mouth longer and the longer it stays in the mouth, the more time bacteria have to work on it. That creates an environment that’s not healthy for teeth.”
Tooth decay happens when foods containing carbohydrates (i.e., sugars and starches) such as milk, pop, raisins, cakes or candy are frequently left on the teeth. Bacteria that live in the mouth thrive on these foods, producing acids which over a period of time, can destroy tooth enamel resulting in decay.
As I’ve written before, “What’s good for the teeth is good for the body!” Some would suggest that in addition to brushing and flossing (which are only necessary if you consume carbohydrates), but as I’ve written before, it is deplorably hard to square anthropology with this comfortable excuse of the dentist. Among the best teeth of the mixed-diet world are those of a few South Sea Islanders who as yet largely keep to their native diets. Similar or better tooth condition was described, for instance, from the Hawaiian Islands by the earliest visitors. But can you think of a case less fortunate for the chewing-and-coarse-diet advocates? The animal food of these people was mainly fish, and fish is soft to the teeth, whether boiled or raw. Among the chief vegetable elements was poi, a kind of soup or paste. Then they used sweet potatoes, and yams are not so very hard to chew either. It would be difficult to find a New Yorker or Parisian who does not chew more, and use coarser food, than the South Sea Islanders did on the native diets which are said to have given them, in at least some cases, better than 90 per cent freedom from caries, a record no block on Park Avenue can approach.
They do this without brushing and flossing as well!
At this point, it’s good to conclude with the words of Dr. Phillpe Hujoels:
The close correlation between the biological mechanisms that cause dental decay and the factors responsible for high average levels of glucose in the blood is intriguing. Hujoel explains that eating sugar or fermentable carbohydrates drops the acidity levels of dental plaque and is considered an initiating cause of dental decay.
“Eating these same foods, he says, is also associated with spikes in blood sugar levels. There is fascinating evidence that suggests that the higher the glycemic level of a food, the more it will drop the acidity of dental plaque, and the higher it will raise blood sugar. So, possibly, dental decay may really be a marker for the chronic high-glycemic diets that lead to both dental decay and chronic systemic diseases. This puts a whole new light on studies that have linked dental diseases to such diverse illnesses as Alzheimer’s disease and pancreatic cancer.”
The correlations between dental diseases and systemic disease, he adds, provide indirect support for those researchers who have suggested that Alzheimer’s disease and pancreatic cancer are due to an abnormal blood glucose metabolism.
In: Anthropology, Diet, Disease, Heart Disease
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on September 18, 2009 at 4:31 am
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