Episode 174: Professor Tim Noakes ON The Impact of Low-Carb Diets on Performance and Health

In this episode of the Ketones and Coffee Podcast, host Lorenz welcomes Professor Tim Noakes, a renowned figure in the fields of nutrition and exercise science. With over 750 scientific publications, Professor Noakes shares insights from his career, including his shift from supporting high-carbohydrate diets to advocating low-carb, high-fat diets. He discusses his personal journey of overcoming diabetes through dietary changes, the global misunderstanding of carbohydrates in nutrition, and the role of sugar addiction in obesity.

 Professor Noakes also highlights his work with the Noakes Foundation, focusing on educating poorer communities about the benefits of dietary changes and challenging conventional dietary wisdom. Furthermore, he touches on the resistance from the medical establishment and the impact of the pharmaceutical industry on nutritional advice. The episode emphasizes the importance of questioning established guidelines and seeking evidence-based dietary approaches for better health.

00:00 Welcome to the Ketones and Coffee Podcast with Professor Tim Noakes

00:15 The Revolutionary Journey of Professor Tim Noakes

02:31 A Deep Dive into Carbohydrates and Health

09:37 Challenging Conventional Wisdom: The Legal Battles

12:13 The Impact of Low-Carb Diets on Performance and Health

26:19 Questioning Dietary Guidelines and Embracing Evidence

30:36 The Fear of Fat and Its Impact on Health Perceptions

31:18 Uncovering the Truth: The Flaws in Heart Disease and Cholesterol Research

33:42 Personal Anecdotes and the Misconception of Cholesterol

36:21 Learning from Indigenous Diets: The Inuit and Zulu Peoples

43:28 The NOCS Foundation: Changing Lives Through Diet

50:34 The Importance of Questioning Conventional Wisdom in Medicine

53:40 The Power of Curiosity and Personal Journey in Medicine

57:20 Closing Thoughts and the Impact of Sharing Knowledge

AI responses can produce inaccurate information about people, places, or facts.

Connect with Professor Tim Noakes and the Noakes Foundation

https://nutrition-network.org/

https://thenoakesfoundation.org/eat-better-south-africa/

https://thenoakesfoundation.org/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1ncpHCujYWS3yzB1C_tSbg 

Call to action for listeners: Follow ketones and Coffee Podcast on Instagram ( https://www.instagram.com/keton.esncoffee ), Youtube ( https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsZZmBEenvZnU8tA1npAODA ), 

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Transcript

0:49

Hey guys, this is Lawrence and welcome back to the ketones and coffee podcast. And I'm so grateful to have you join me on this journey. Every week, I bring in guests to have the knowledge and experience to help you on your own journey to a better health. So excited for this guy. Today, we have a special guest joining us. We've got professor. Tim Noakes, a hero for a lot of people, and I do not say that lightly, he has dedicated his career to the research of nutrition with over 750 scientific publications and an impressive citation record. He's been a guiding light in challenging conventional dietary wisdom and advocating for an evidence based approach. health. His accolades speaks volumes about his impact and influence. Professor Noak's contribution extends far beyond academia. In fact, in 1995, he co founded the esteemed sports science institute of South Africa, also has rated an A1 scientist by the National Research Foundation of South Africa for a third consecutive term. His work has earned him national recognition and was honored with the Order of Mapunggabwe Silver by the President of South Africa for his contribution. But what truly sets Professor Nox apart is his unwavering commitment to empowering individuals to take control of their health. Through education and awareness. He has authored many books, one of which is the publication of the bestselling book, The Real Meal Revolution, also founded the Noakes Foundation recognized worldwide. It's an honor to be with a legend here. Welcome to the Keystone Psychiatry Podcast, Professor. Thanks, Lawrence. Lovely to be with you. Thank you for coming all the way from Toronto. It's lovely to be speaking to your audience today. I'm so honored to have you on, Professor. You know, your resume is nothing short of extraordinary. Your achievements, um, speaks for themselves, contribution to the field of nutrition and exercise science are, you know, Basically I'm paralleled. You could put your resume up against anybody. Um, the legacy you've built and the countless, uh, accolades you've received throughout your years, um, seems like you haven't lost your passion as if it were your first day on a job. So I wanna know before we start, uh, what is it that drives you, man? I mean, to maintain this level of dedication, is there a deeper mission or purpose that still keeps you, keeps the fire burning for you? Yeah, I think it's the search for truth. And when I see that the truth is not being promoted, that fires me to keep going. And, uh, it's interesting, so you, we're going to talk about my career where I promoted the high carbohydrate diet and then I realized it was completely wrong and got involved in the low carb carnivore type promotions. And so I've been through that and now I'm going back to running because my famous book, most famous book, probably Law of Running. And it's just at this moment that carbohydrates again being, again being over promoted in the sport of running. Yes, yes. And so I'm tackling that and behind me you can see I'm writing and I'm writing The Law of Running again. And focusing on the chapters at the moment which relate to carbohydrate metabolism. I've, I've really, I now finally understand carbohydrate metabolism properly. In a way that very few people do, and I understand now why I got it all wrong and why people continue to get it all wrong. But I'm hoping ultimately to be able to explain why the carbohydrates are so beneficial for people like ourselves. And it's really very simple and that's going to be a goal of mine as I write this book. Because it'll be the last time I ever write Law of Running, and it'll be the legacy I leave about carbohydrates. It must be in that book, and it must be correct. And so that's why I get up early in the morning at the moment, is to make sure I get the facts right. Wow, I'm excited for that book. Um, man, that's so interesting. Um, you know, you've helped, You already helped a lot, millions of people worldwide. And, I know, you know, carbohydrates is still, uh, number one factor for You know, most of the epidemic, like the obesity and, uh, obesity and type two diabetes, um, you know, impacting millions of lives around the world. But for those who don't know, could you share, you know, you talked about, you know, we're going to talk about that story. Um, you, you, you talked about here, um, tell us, tell the audience about your story. And then if you can follow that up with what initially sparked your interest. in the field of nutrition. I know there's a little personal story there. Yeah. So, you know, it goes right back to 1981. So now I'm starting out on my career and I'm an ultramarathon runner. And I begin to think that what you take in during exercise is important. And so we start studying. We say, right, let's look at water. Let's look at salt, let's look at sugar. And we did it. We did research on each component. And as we were re working through this. A couple of things happened. Firstly, I became very friendly with the best ultramarathon runner in South Africa and, and he, he had experienced the need for carbohydrates during the end of long distance races. And of course we misinterpreted that and I'll explain why. And we then started working with a company in South Africa and we got research grants, which, which was amazing because The thing about science is you have to have money to do it. And so we got money and then a company introduced a sports drink from America and we started promoting it and doing research on it. So initially it was critical that we found in favor of carbohydrates because otherwise we didn't have any money. And I mean, you know, that sounds, it doesn't sound great, but unfortunately, that's how research works. You, if you haven't got money, you can't do the research. So you become blinkered into this belief that the research you're doing is the only way you, there's nothing else that you don't want to disprove what you do, which is science. Science is about disproof. It's not about proof. So you set up these experiments. Which has continued to lead you along the same path. Well, fortunately, we eventually worked out that the advice that athletes were getting was completely wrong in terms of water. And they were being encouraged to drink too much water. And that was causing problems. So, ultimately, we used that, that information from the sports drink industry to disprove their product. In terms of fluid replacement. And I wrote the book, waterlogged, which, which was quite an epic book, but that's, that was discovering this problem of overhydration. And this was funded by the sports drink industry. So that I use money from the industry to disprove their industry. But at the time, that was about over drinking water, we still had sugar in it, and we still thought that the sugar was important, and I still promoted high carbohydrate diets. And my own running just fell off, as I, because I was insulin resistant, and seriously insulin resistant from a very young age, I put on weight, I became a reluctant athlete, my running went, went very poorly. And eventually I was fortunate to, to read the book, the, the real, sorry, the, the, the real Atkins, well, I'm just, I'll get the name right, the New Atkins for the New You, by Jeff Volek and Steve Finney and Eric Westman. And that changed my life. Within, within two hours of reading it, I decided, I now understand what my problem is. I'm insulin resistant, I'm eating a high carbohydrate diet, and I'm probably diabetic, and it turned out I was diabetic. So I followed their advice, stopped the carbs, started taking metformin, and put my diabetes in remission, lost a ton of weight, and my running went back 20 years. I went back to, as a 60 year old, I went back to running what I had done as a 40 year old. And it was astonishing because my running was terrible and then all of a sudden, within six months, I was running as I had 20 years earlier. So no one could tell me that the low carbohydrate diet was bad for, for me. Then we wrote that book you mentioned, The Real Meal Revolution. And, and what happened with this book was that all over the world, elite athletes started writing to me and telling me how they benefited from this diet. And they weren't just run of the mill athletes, they were some of the best in the world. So now, so I'd had experience, and I'd benefited. And then people started writing and saying they'd lost weight. One guy lost 160 pounds in 28 weeks. I mean, it was just astonishing. And so I reported that in a paper. And immediately the profession fell on my back. I was making unqualified claims about these, the diet, and I was promoting it as the solution, blah, blah, blah. What year was this, Professor? Sorry? What year was that, Professor? That the, I got it, 2014 was when it really started, and then what really happened was that my university wanted to expose me, so they wrote a letter to a local newspaper saying they distanced themselves from, from me as a scientist. Now, at the time, I am the second most cited academic at that university, so they said, yeah, here is the second most cited scientist at this university. And he's no good. He's a crack. And you have to think, well, well, how did they come across that idea? And so they made a whole lot of claims and ultimately the health professions council caught me on something I tweeted, and then I was up for, for incompetence and so on and misleading the public and killing millions of people because of the advice. So we went to court for four years and I was in court for 28 days over those four years. Including nine days where I gave evidence and I was cross examined for three days under oath. Of course, it's all under oath. And eventually after 28 days, I was declared completely innocent of all charges. And it had gone to the appeal. So we'd had the first, I won the first case. Then it went to appeal and I won that equally. And there were 13 decisions. I won every single one of them. It was not one that we didn't win. But it made absolutely no difference whatsoever that the university continues to teach the same rubbish that they were teaching then, the same incorrect rubbish. And so, so that was what happened. But it was during that time that there was a Capetonian who's living in Pennsylvania and he'd grown up in Cape Town, he knew me as a scientist and he'd followed my books and he trained according to the law of running. And he said, prof, would you like to help us do some research? So it turns out he's really one of the best research groups in, in North America. His, his laboratory is phenomenal. And that's not because they've got buckets of money. It's because they clever and they challenge, they challenge the, the dictator, the dictates. And so we set up some research and over the past six years or so, We've been able to completely disprove that carbohydrates are essential for exercise performance. We have, we've had, we've got a third paper coming out very soon. It's finished, but it's just being finalized. And we found no evidence that you need carbohydrates, except, except for one exception. And that's if you exercise for more than three hours, and you're not taking carbohydrates, it is possible you need a touch of carbohydrate. And by that I mean a touch. So, I can't give the full details, but it turns out that what you eat before is immaterial. You can eat a high carb, high fat diet, makes no material difference. But what you do during the exercise, that makes a big difference. And it's astonishing how little you require. So the idea that you need to load up on carbs before exercise, we've disproved that. Of course, it won't be accepted. Because it goes against the, what's being taught. You know, a guy wrote to me recently, he's, he's a South African cycling on one of the tour teams in the Tour de France and so on. And he had improved his performance by going on the carnivore diet. And he said, I can't talk about it. You know, I just have to subtly do it behind the scene, because if I don't, everyone says, well, you, you know, you're not going to survive on the team. So that's, that's the reality is that the carb addiction, and it's largely addiction, that it's largely an addiction. And it's an easy addiction to keep going. So they just keep loading up on these carbs, saying it's for performance. It's not, it's for addiction. So that's what we've been able to show and it's it's very exciting that it's happening. It's finally coming out, but it'll take another 10 or 15 years before it's finally accepted. It almost likely when that was a decade ago, 2014, we're now 2024. And we could definitely say that, um, we had a surge of people coming into low carb, you know, people messaging you, you talked about, you know, when you, when your book came out, massive transformations, right. You talked about a hundred. or some pounds lost on this high carb, low, high fat, low carb diet. Because, because of the research that was done, um, I didn't know there was lawsuits coming your way at the time, and you know, you've won all of them, which says a lot about, it's something to say, right? Something to be said about that, when you win your cases, and I really hope that we have a metric that can measure the impact that was done, but um, The fact that you're still need to disprove that to this day, writing your, your new book says that you did talk about, it will maybe take another 10 years, 15 years before it was accepted, but we're already helping, you're already helping a lot of people there, millions of people globally, um, I don't think we would carb if not for the, The books, the network, your foundation that we built, um, if we want, if we go back to in time of which we were absolutely convinced about a high fat, low carb diet, uh, as the healthier option, is that the, is that the time when you reversed your, uh, insulin resistance? You reversed, uh, you being diabetic? Was that the time that you can say, Hey, this was the absolutely got me convinced? about this diet? Yeah. I mean, as a scientist, we're always, always skeptical and we're always open to being wrong. And so, so you're quite correct. I became increasingly certain that this was the route, but I was always open to suggestion that there might be problems that it might not be the whole solution. However, it was, Through my personal experience, and I think you'll find that if you look at every single person who promotes the low carb diet, like we do on podcasts, every single one of them was a high carb eater, and they had a medical issue, and they solved the medical issue by doing exactly the opposite to what they've been told. So, you know, it's interesting if we just take a step back. Because I only realized this very recently, we've just had the 10th anniversary of the Noakes Foundation and I gave a talk about everything I'd discovered, and as I was going through my slides, I immediately remembered that Ansel Keys was the man who promoted the high carbohydrate, low fat diet. He said saturated fat causes arterial disease. Right. And causes coronary heart disease. Now the first study he ever did in a population, he did right here in Cape Town. With my university, and it was into that university that I went, so since 1956, that university, the medical school, had been actively promoting the high carbohydrate, low fat diet health, and so it was ingrained in the university. And here I came along and said, no, actually it's wrong. And that, that was the problem for them because they'd committed to this thing since 1955. And, and they'd been teaching it and they, and you know, the one professor becomes the next professor and they all believe in it because they just keep perpetuating themselves. So, and it took me a long time to realize that I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, because now when I started my research, I did cardiological research and my professor taught me that a high fat diet would kill me and so I converted and within, within a year my running became worse. And I was only in my mid twenties then, and I didn't, I didn't realize it at the time. So, so that there was a, there was great wastage there. And what I discovered was I could only control my weight if I ran more than 120 kilometers or up to 100 miles a week. That, that was all I could, then I could control my weight. But the instant I stopped, my weight just went like that. And so that was my instant resistance. And it was only when I reversed the diet, then I had absolutely, I don't have to run if I want to control my weight. Now I don't need to exercise. Of course, I do exercise, but I don't need to control my weight. But when I was young, I couldn't control my weight without running an hour and a half, two hours a day. You know, you said it there when you said, if not for, you know, people's struggle with weight or insulin resistance or struggle with diminishing health, if not for those things, these practitioners that we, the experts that's leading the charge with high carb, high fat, low carb diet, if not for their personal story, They wouldn't have, um, realized that what they're doing isn't helping their health, right? I mean, that belief that, um, a carbohydrate is needed or running for energy, that we wouldn't bat an eye about that if not for a failing health. Um, and so being a, being a scientist yourself gives you a perspective of being an open and objective to the result, right? And you said that, you said it there, you, if not for your personal story, your struggle, you wouldn't have maybe realized that, hey, the guidelines today isn't accurate. The dietary guidelines today. Actually is making things worst, right? Because when you, when you didn't question what the guidelines are, even though your runs are not improving. Right. Until you hit a roadblock. Yeah. And you make a very good point. You know, why did it take me to the age of 61 before I started questioning, you know, that's, and so I started this, uh, probably in the mid twenties. And so it was 33 years. of eating this terrible diet and never questioning it. And that's the power of the profession to, to keep you thinking in that way. And it's, uh, it, Even though you're a scientist and you're meant to question, you only question certain things. There are certain things which you're not allowed to question. And so you don't question them because they just become dogma and accepted dogma. I mean, the number of, one of the keys is a slide that only a year and a half ago I looked at. Now, I've shown this slide, if I've shown it at once, I've shown it hundreds of times in lectures. all around the world. And I didn't notice the key thing on the slide, which I missed for 30, 40 years. In fact, I even missed it. And as I said, until about a year and a half ago, and, and the study, this, this was the famous study. So Up till 1967, people believed that you took carbohydrates to keep your blood glucose level elevated during exercise. And that's how it worked. It didn't work anywhere else, it just worked in the bloodstream. And that, because that was what we were taught from the 1930s by two Scandinavians, three Scandinavians. Then another group of Scandinavians came along with the needle biopsy and then they put the needle into the muscle and they cut out the piece of muscle and you could then measure the carbohydrate or glycogen content of the muscle. Now, if in the 1980s you weren't doing muscle biopsies, you were not an exercise scientist. You had to have two things. You had to have a treadmill and something to measure oxygen. and the treadmill had to go fast and oxygen and then you had to do biopsies and then you were world class elite sports scientist. But without the biopsy needle you weren't anything. So of course we were the first to start doing biopsies and we were totally committed and I've had something like 40 biopsies myself for different experiments and so we were totally committed to the what you were measuring was the most important thing which was muscle glycogen. And so I've showed the slide which comes from that very study, the 1960s, and it shows what happens if you eat high carbohydrate, low carbohydrate diets and you exercise for a prolonged period. When you eat a low carbohydrate diet, you can't go very far and your muscle glycogen drops very quickly and you stop. But if you eat a high carbohydrate diet, you can go for longer. And so that's the part of the graph. That's the graph that we focused on. But there's also a bottom part of the graph of what happens to your blood glucose level. And it turns out that if you start on a low carbohydrate diet, your blood glucose falls to the ground within minutes. And that's why you stop. But, but we ignored it. And so did the scientists. Because they'd come along with their new piece of equipment. This was going to change the sports sciences. And they weren't interested in measuring blood glucose. What's that got to do with anything? The fact that We'd always believed it was important, and now all of a sudden, because we've got another piece of equipment, the blood glucose got lost. And I showed that slide until about a year and a half ago. I was writing another article, and I looked at that slide, and I said, but, but what's happening here? The blood glucose is falling out of the sky. Now, one of these people was struggling. I said, then, did the scientists ever acknowledge it? Not a word. They completely ignored it as if it didn't exist. Yet, that was the hypothesis at the time, that the glucose was the problem. And they just put in the new technology, and they said, well, we'll forget about that idea. We'll just discount it. We'll come up with a new idea. And then they, then eventually, a couple of, two American scientists, who were heavily funded by the sports drink industry, said, oh, well, of course, you see, why you take carbs during exercises, for the muscle needs the carbohydrate. And once the glycogen has gone, you have to provide the muscle with carbohydrate. The only way you can do it is by taking in carbohydrate. And so now we're at the stage where we're telling athletes in the Tour de France they have to drink 120 grams of carbohydrate an hour. 120 grams. You cannot burn 120 grams an hour. The body cannot process. 120 grams an hour for very obvious reasons. That just makes you diabetic. So the body's got an upper limit. It says that's as much as we'll allow you. Doesn't matter if you take in 300 grams an hour. We're only going to let you burn a certain amount. And the rest is going to sit in your gut and make you feel sick, and which is exactly what happened. So, so that's where we are today. Yeah. And it's all because people don't understand the simple biology of what the situation is. It's been, it's been distorted by industry. Which speaks to the complexities of challenging the guideline, right? It's not that simple. Um, a lot of, you know, we talked about the evidence based science. Most people who are skeptical about the high fat, low carb diet approach are very smart people who look to science for solid evidence. Um, with your background in research, why do you think it's important to, for people in general, questions, um, the con, question, consensus guidelines in the field of nutrition? And how can we ensure that recommendations are. You know, based on solid evidence. Yeah. You know, Nina Tal who wrote the, the book, uh, the Big Fat Surprise and who's just one of the giants in the field. She was one of my expert witnesses, and it was so funny because, well, a couple of things were funny, but the chief, the lead prosecutor, when he started the trial, he was overweight diabetic. When he finished the trial, he was underweight and his diabetes had disappeared. And so he admitted, you know, I've been trying your diet. It, it actually works quite well. Yeah. And he reversed his diabetes. And the other person who was heavily involved in charging me. When you look at her picture on, on YouTube now, she's much thinner and she talks about reversing her polycystic ovarian syndrome. Well, the only way you reverse polycystic ovarian syndrome, the only diet is a low carb diet. So, looks like I helped two of those people on the opposition, at least. So, anyway, to get back to the story, I was chatting to, to Nina. We were doing an interview the other day, and she answered your question. In a way that I'd never thought of, and which of course, you know, she thinks about this 24 hours a day. And she says, it's simple. Just look around you. In the 1970s, everyone was lean, and now everyone's fat. What changed? The diet changed. You don't need any more evidence. That this is a dietary induced problem. And so, that's, that's the evidence that the, that the high fat, high carbohydrate diet is causing the problem. Is you can just see it around you. And then when you experience, as we have, the results, then you know that that's the truth. The evidence is there. Absolutely everywhere. We've, we've written another textbook. Sorry, I'm advertising all the time, but I don't get any of this money for these books. It all goes to charities and so on. And this goes to the Noakes Foundation, but this is the textbook we've written, The Science of Therapeutic Carbohydrate Restriction. We got 60 of the leading experts in the world and, and we're a small little NGO and we got them to contribute to this book. We're not Yale or Harvard or Stanford. We are a tiny little NGO, and we produce something no other academic institution has been able to achieve. This is the complete story on the low carbohydrate diet, and it shows that this diet is the most effective diet ever studied. And it takes us back right to the origins of the diet, the carnivore period of human beings, which goes back 3 million years. And that's what we come from. We came from that period when we were mainly, we were essentially meat eaters. and we ate large animals and that's what kept us going. And then as the animals, we killed all the animals off, we had to start farming to provide calories, uh, to, to, to, to substitute for what we'd lost in the animals that we'd killed off. And so the argument is simple, that that's the biology, we are, we're designed as carnivores, and we can't, 18, 000 years of eating grains has made no difference, we're still carnivores. And when we really ramped up the ultra processed foods in the last 10 or 15 years, the obesity rates have just gone through the roof, and the chronic disease rates have just gone through the roof as well. You know, the strongest, I think, the strongest defense they have is, uh, fat, I feel like. You know, the fear of fat. I mean, the fear is so great for most people, right, it has influenced the public perception of food for decades, you know, led to the popularity of low fat diets. Um, the food industry, uh, making its money, cholesterol lowering drugs like statins with the pharmaceutical industry. I mean, you must be tired answering this question, but, uh, I mean, do you remember how you approached this discussion about fat when you were just starting your advocacy? Yeah, that's a really good question. Um, I, I started reading about what the history was. Of how the dietary advice came around, and I could see that Ancel Keys, who was the main driver was a crook. He, he falsified, he didn't falsify evidence, but he didn't publish all the evidence that he had. When he had experiments that disprove his hypothesis, he hid them. The famous Minnesota Coronary Trial, which disproved the diet, he just hid that. Um, I looked at the Women's Health Initiative because ironically the, the person in charge in America was a South African who had, who was used by my trial legal team to try to, to find me guilty. And I discovered he'd hidden evidence. He did in the Women's Health Initiative clearly shows that the women who had heart disease at the start of the trial, so they're the, the most susceptible to damage if the diet's harmful. It's going to show first in those people who already have established heart disease, and that's exactly what it showed. It showed that these women who were, who had heart disease at the start of the trial, by the end of the analysis, they went for 13 years, they were at 67 percent increased risk of having additional heart problems. Now, when they came to publish it, they, they acknowledged that sort of indirectly, And they said, but if you were healthy, the diet was great. Didn't do good or bad. It was great. And they just ignored the fact that if you're unhealthy, it made you sicker. And that, I've indicated, that's the group you're really interested in. You're not interested in healthy people going for 13 years without developing disease. You're interested in the people who have disease, what happens to them? Because they're the ones at risk and it made them worse. So they just ignored that. So, you know, that didn't come to me immediately, but it very soon came to me that the whole heart disease cholesterol story was a myth. And it, it was not scientifically based. And when I spoke before doctors, particularly cardiologists, I realized they had no inquisitiveness. They didn't want to know that. I mean, you know, today I was at gym, and one of the guys I work out with, he says, Oh, he's got cholesterol. He's got familial hypercholesterolemia. And I said, You don't have familial hypercholesterolemia. You have a slightly elevated cholesterol, which is meaningless. Because he's my, he's 50 odd. He's had no problems. He says, You know, my arteries are perfect. How is it possible? I've got such a high cholesterol, I've got perfect arteries. Well, the answer is hypercholesterolemia isn't the problem, it's the clotting, clotting problem that goes with it in some people with very high cholesterols. But he said, I was speaking to your two colleagues at the university, and I said, I know exactly who they are. And I said, they still want to put him on a statin. And I said, I debated with them, 10 years ago. And I said, but this is nonsense. The drugs don't work. They make no difference. You don't need them. It's diabetes that causes arterial disease. And they're just, this is 10 years later, they're still saying the same old story because their careers are determined by making sure they're selling statins to the public. Because if they have a question, then they will lose all their funding, etc. So, um, It took me a long time to, to convince myself that the evidence was not there. And I read everything. And fortunately, during my trial, because it lasted four years, I could go through that literature and examine it in thoroughly and then present it. at the trial and they couldn't fault me. There was not one thing they said you said is wrong here. So that, that was the story. And so then I knew that cholesterol has got nothing to do with heart disease. And, uh, it's only the only people who would tell you it does are the cardiologists who are being paid by industry to, to, to promote these drugs. Absolutely. And statins, another discussion could be said about it is that the dangers of taking statins. And how that can lead to other, uh, other, uh, And most especially dementia. Most especially dementia. That's the one that's going to come out in the long term. Absolutely. And diabetes. Sorry, diabetes and dementia. Those are going to be the two major complications. Plus, apart from other neurological disorders as well. But those I think will be the two mainstays. Yeah. And you know, you're, you have a study with Inuit people. You know, you research with, that shed light about their dietary habits, uh, the people which uh, challenge the nutritional advice. Um, what can you, what can we learn from them, uh, you think? How, how do we, uh, how do these findings from, you know, studying these people, uh, challenge the conventional, uh, wisdom, if you will? Yeah, Jay Wartman, Dr. Jay Wartman is the great Canadian physician who's promoted this, the idea by looking, because he, he was also diabetic or pre diabetic and he's an, he's a First Nations Canadian. And he went on the diet and of course he cured everything and he's, he's got this lovely granddaughter who skis up a bomb and she's tiny and she just, she eats these, she was raised on the carnivore diet. So I think it was, it's very clear that in the First Nations Canadian populations, they were incredibly healthy, amongst the most healthy people on the planet. And that was, uh, shown by people who studied them for, for many years. And in part, one of the stories in, in this, this, the ketogenic textbook is the health of populations eating their standard diets. And cancer was simply unknown in the First Nations Canadians. It was unknown until the wheat, the refined wheat and the sugar and those foods got into the, got into the diet. So they're a classic example. In my country, we have the, the Zulu people who, who were pastoralists. They, they lived on their meat animals. And, and before that they would have lived on animals, on wild animals. They would have killed wild game. But then as the wild game slowly got, got shot out and eaten, they would have had to change their diets. And then they started. Becoming urbanized and they started eating the Western diet and that was an absolute disaster and the rates of obesity and diabetes just shot up. And that was well described and there's a 20 year rule which was discovered in my country by early researchers in the 1960s. They said when a Zulu man is born, lives in his own communities, no diabetes, within 20 years of moving into the cities, He will develop diabetes and that's, that's the 20 year rule. And it was directly linked to a diet that was higher in sugar and, and not in fat, but higher in sugar. And that was, you know, that was so well known and Keyes ignored that. And it's, it's so amazing because we do studies in the poorest communities in South Africa and those, their diet is, it's sugar and carbs. It's nothing else. There's no meat, there's no meat, there's no dairy or very little dairy, and there's, there's no protein, and there's no fat, because fat's expensive. It's all carbohydrates. And then we get the experts come back to South Africa and tell us, The problem why you have such a big diabetes rate in South Africa amongst the poorest communities is because they're eating so much fat. They don't bother to go and find out what are the people eating. And as soon as you, you do that, you find that, that it's, it's carbohydrates. One of the great moments in our 10th anniversary a few weeks ago, Of the Nags Foundation was Timba, who is a, a, a Zambian, za, sorry, Zambian, not sorry. A Zimbabwean who's living in South Africa now, and he's been diabetic for 15 years. His glucose has been off the scale. He, he got into one of our programs in the small, poorest community in South in Cape Town. And he reversed his diabetes. He said, I can't believe it. I could not believe it was so simple to just remove all that rubbish from the diet and eating fish and dairy and some meat as he could afford it, his diabetes disappeared. Now, what caused it? Was it fat in the diet? No, he wasn't eating any fat. He was just eating carbohydrate. So anyone who tells me that, I just take them to that community and I say, Well, what are these people eating? Here are the diabetics. Ask them what they're eating. And that's the other thing I always say to the cardiologists. Do you ever ask anyone what they're eating? Yeah. And you tell them that they're sick because they're eating a high fat diet. The high fat diet doesn't exist. In South Africa, except in the low carb community. You could almost tell if someone's diabetic just by looking at them. And no, no, and no, uh, judgment there. It's just, uh, the truth of the matter. Um, and also, it's, it's really sad when people who are obese and diabetic, um, who doesn't know about the high carb, the high fat, low carb diet is that they, they judge themselves by By not being disciplined enough, right, to lose the weight, which is, um, really, You know, at the end of the day, it may be a problem of environment, right? I may be a problem of just circumstance where they haven't heard about the, the, the science, uh, evidence based science, but then also not being open about it. Right. Um, of, of the teachings from going back to decades with Ansel Keys, uh, of how Red meat and cholesterol fat has been vilified for years just because, um, of a agenda, right? That is so well known. Um, you talked about South Africa, which is, um, you know, you talked about how you have the Zulu people there, and if they move into the city, they develop obesity and type 2 diabetes. Um, also saw a, an article that you written where in 10 years in the next decade, the national health care system of South Africa can be crippled. Um, if, if nothing is done. So I think the key thing to understand here for people is how to is the root cause of the issue that goes back to our diet. Therefore, um, how you know, it requires systems in place that teaches dietary interventions to the masses, which you've done with your foundations, um, you know, finding founding, uh, uh, funding research. You established the NOCS Foundation that spearheaded the research aimed to, you know, tackling this growing epidemic. Could you share with us some of the strategies you've implemented, uh, through your foundation, through, through, um, the NOCS, uh, network that have had the most significant impact in the healthcare do you think? Yeah, I think the, the, the best programs are the programs we run in the poorer communities and where we take those who have lot, have nothing, they, they are so poor they have nothing and their health, no one cares about them, absolutely couldn't care, the, the state doesn't care about them, doesn't look after them in any way, so to be able to show that we can reverse diabetes in that community, that's, that's one of our key goals. Because we, we can show, well, actually it didn't cost anything to do. They're the most impacted. Excuse me? Are they the most impacted? Is that why? Yes. Because they, they listen, you know, and then they start to feel better immediately. And I just wish you could have heard Timber speaking at the, at our 10th anniversary. I mean, he was just crying and the nurse, sorry, the doctor, the doctor who runs the program is a. a Zulu South African, sorry, a Xhosa South African. And so she, she, when she met me, she almost fell on the ground as if, you know, she'd met someone who was rather important. And that's not what I want anyone to do. But she was so overcome, because she's seen the effects of what we talk about in her community. It gives people hope. It's a community that has no hope. But once they can start controlling their health, then they start to realize that they have got some control. And if they can control one thing, they can start thinking about controlling other things. So that's the, that's the communities that we, we focus on. Of course, we have national programs and trying to advertise and talk about this, about what we've been doing. The problem is you, the medical schools will not teach what we teach. They will not teach it. because it will stop diabetes and diabetes is one of the biggest money spinners for pharmacology in industry. So that's the problem. The pharmaceutical industry controls every single medical school around the world. And South Africa is no exception. And if diabetes was reversed and insulin was no longer required, five or six pharmaceutical companies could go bankrupt overnight. And their, their job is to sell insulin. It's not to make people healthy. And the more we prove that insulin harms people with diabetes, the more resistant they become. So that's extremely difficult, but we have realized that there, that governments have to change the food supply. That's the key. Until people get decent food away from home, you, you, you, it's hopeless. So we advise people, you only eat at home. You eat produce, fresh produce at home and you cook it and prepare it at home. And when you're outside the home, for example, you take your food with you and you don't eat in the canteens. because that's where you're going to get food of low quality and highly addictive. The other thing that we've started to focus on is sugar addiction because I again didn't appreciate sugar addiction. I knew that I had food cravings and, and I had a lot of desire to eat bad foods, but I didn't even understand it was a sugar addiction. And I got over that slowly over a period of about 14 months. I was able to remove my food to do my sugar addiction, but I believe that obesity is simply for sugar addiction. It's as simple as that. I mean, sorry, it's not as simple as that. There are some people who eat because they have psychological issues, but for the average person who's, who's employed and relatively healthy, normal, The reason they're carrying 10 or 20 kilos extra is a sugar addiction. It completely destroys your homeostat, the weight homeostat. And that's why when we take the, the, the carbohydrate and the sugar out of the diet, the weight just plummets back to the proper homeostatic weight it should be, which is where you're replacing what you need. You're not eating to, to cope with a craving in the brain. So I think that's the other area. We're really pushing that now. And then the other part of the foundation is to questioning science. We just question science. Because, you know, I wish I could lecture schoolboys and schoolgirls about the rubbish they are told in the mainstream media. I mean, it's just, they're just lies. It's all just lies nowadays. But if you don't understand how science works, you don't understand why you're being fed these lies and, and how bad they are. And they have no interest in you as a human being. They're just to promote someone else's financial requirements. So, so society at the moment is, has been captured by, by lies in the, in the mainstream media. And, and nutrition is just one of them. It's, it's probably one of the worst, but it's only one of them. And so we have to teach people. how to understand science. And when people make statements, and I'm not going to make any of them because that will fire us all up, but there you hear on the media that people now say they've got a catchword and the catchword comes out and then you must accept that that is the truth and you mustn't question what's the person actually saying and what's the evidence for that statement. And that you're not allowed to do. And that in a sense, that's how medicine has changed. When I was trained in medicine in the 1970s, early seventies, we were taught, you know, you have to question why is the patient sitting in front of you today? What's what brought the patient to you today? But now it's not, that's what's the diagnosis and here's the pills. That's it. So I'm not interested in what caused it and how to reverse it. It's just. Just take these pills, almost just make a diagnosis. You've got asthma, therefore here's the asthma treatment. You've got diabetes, here's the insulin. Yeah. You've had a heart attack, here's the statins or whatever. That's, there's nothing about what's actually causing, what's the evidence that, that the treatment I'm giving you is going to make a bit of difference to your health. Because in most cases, makes no difference whatsoever. But people are not taught that. Mmm, you said something really Uh, important there is questioning the conventional wisdom, right? These are not just claims. These are backed by decades of research, uh, evidence based science, which is now helping millions of people globally, which all started from, we talked about it, questioning conventional wisdom, right? Which is key part to anyone's transition to a healthier approach, I believe. because if you don't start questioning, why should I take statins? Right? And then another layer of that is, I believe that, you know, making the patient aware about the prognosis, right? Okay. What, what, what happens if I do take metformin for years? What, what, What could possibly be the side effect? What could possibly be the side effect of statins? Um, I, I believe that if we just give people options, right, I know not a lot of people, not many people would not, I mean, not all people who has been diagnosed with diabetes would go the lifestyle route, but at least give them the option of doing that, right? Put it, put it, put all the options they have on the table. And I think that could be the first step, right? Okay. Either you take these drugs or you change your lifestyle either way. It's up to you. It's up to the person giving them a, a, an educational, a informed decision to make, right? Um, and you talked about why people should start questioning, uh, the conventional wisdom themselves. How do we strike a balance there, do you think, with questioning and also, um, not being so, um, for lack of a better term, judging the system? How do you strike a balance, do you think, Professor? Yeah, you know, I think that the problem is that They estimate 70 percent of people don't like to question and they just want to be told so that they, they give over their brains to the experts. And if you then question, they, they think that that threatens their personality and their character and everything. So that, that's a real problem. And is it because of the society that we live in, or is it because of a genetic factor and people just don't like to question? I think it's, it's the culture that we, we're not taught to question. We, we forced to accept. And the only way to break that is to change the way we, we educate people. And that's, that's what we try to do, but it's, it's extremely difficult. And when I think of the number of people who I know, who actively question in medicine, there's not many of us. Oh yeah. What do you say? Why do you think that is? Why, what do you think you guys have? that the other people don't. Why are you so curious? Is that curiosity or is it some other, is it something else? Yeah, definitely curiosity. That's the question. We get bored very easily if we're not out of question and think, and that that's unquestionably one of it, but it's, it's not the whole story. I, you know, I realized early on in medicine that, that I wasn't cut out to be a practicing physician. Because I, there's certain characteristics you have which are very good characteristics, which I don't have. And I'm, in other words, I see that as a failing, that I don't have those characteristics. But then I have other characteristics, which I said would make up for those ones. And I'd rather focus on that than trying to make me better in things I'm no use, no good at. And that's, I mean, I'm no good at dealing with death. I'm absolutely hopeless. And to deal with death on a daily basis was something I just couldn't face. And to have to tell, I'm a coward. I can't tell a person that the husband has just died. It's just. I've become so emotional. I'm too emotional for that. So I realized that that wasn't the right site for me, but, but much more important was I was, I wanted to write the textbook, not to learn it. Because essentially, if you want to become a physician and you've done your medical training at school, you have to take the textbook, this massive textbook. And there are a couple behind me over there. And you have to learn it. You have to learn it word for word. And so you have to learn a hundred causes of why your body temperature might be elevated. And the person who knows 99 is not as good as the guy that knows 100. And that's how you can be judged. So I can only remember what's important to me and what makes logical sense. So I tried to learn, okay, if this fact leads to that fact, then I don't have to remember that fact because I know this fact. So that's, that's easy. And that's how I remember. I don't remember by, by right learning. And it has to have a reason. It's all tied to your personal experience, all tied to your story and how you, how you overcame, right? And that's the story of, of, uh, overcoming. And it, it, uh, it just so happens that you're given this. Almost like, uh, almost, almost like, uh, I don't want to say a job, but, uh, Responsibility is the word that I'm looking for. Responsibility that you have, um, on you, uh, almost accidentally, right? Um, that you have to pursue because you know a lot of people is also struggling, right? A lot of people are struggling. And, um, you know, you, we were struggling and you found a solution that nobody else knows about. And which so happens that, uh, for, for, for a change to happen, there's a lot of work to do. Right. And what you've done with your foundation, what you've done with your, your network, um, speaks volumes of, you know, A lot of people has transitioned to a high fat, low carb diet that can, you know, I can attest to that woman that you met that just in awe of your presence because of what you've done, uh, for a lot of people, right. And that's why I'm so grateful to have you on and we're so grateful for, you know, telling your story here with us today. And you know, for me. The number one thing for me is just to hope to help that one person and you being here, uh, you know, increase that odds, maybe two person, two people, maybe a hundred people who knows, but you know, what matters is we're going to change someone's life out there. From our stories, from, from your research, from the books that you shared with us today. And so I will link everything down below so you guys can check out the books, the links, links to the foundation, links to connect with, uh, Professor Tim Nokes here. Um, and, and, you know, You know, if, uh, like Professor Noakes said, there is hope, right? We, we've all healed from a chronic disease. I healed from a major depressive disorder and, um, you know, reversing insulin resistance for, uh, uh, Professor Noakes. And a lot of people has changed their lives because of this approach, an evidence based science approach. Professor Noakes, any last, uh, any last statements for our listeners here? Well, no, thank you. It's been a great pleasure. And thank you for all the work you do. I mean, you've been very complimentary about what I do, but, but you're contributing hugely by getting our message out to much wider audience than we would otherwise. So compliments for what you've done. And thank you very much. I'm honored to have been part of this program. I greatly enjoyed it. Lovely to meet you. And I hope this won't be the last time we chat. Awesome. I am so honored to have you, sir. And, um, I am a fan of you. I hope to meet you one day in person. Um, again, guys, link is down in the description box below. Get the books, connect with Professor Nokes, um, connect with the foundation. Um, and, uh, yeah, thank, thank you again, Professor Nokes for coming on and sharing your story here with us today. Thank you so much again. My pleasure and privilege.