The Magic Pill

When you look at every other species on our planet...

they all control their weight automatically.

The only exception was us...

and any animal unfortunate enough to be fed by us.

I just couldn't understand why we were the exception.

Why did we require willpower,

and everything else did it on autopilot?

So I applied the only relevant skill I had,

which was looking at evidence,

and I found there was very little evidence

for the standard eating advice we are normally given,

and there was a whole stream of evidence

which had been largely ignored.

In fact, what we have been taught about nutrition

is dangerously wrong.

Who can tell me how Yolngu people die today?

Heart disease.

So, heart disease, yeah.

- Liver disease. - Liver disease.

- Asthma. -Asthma. Yeah.

-Diabetes. - Diabetes.

-Yes! -How many of you have diabetes?

A lot!

Probably half the people here have diabetes.

Yeah?

Diabetes, heart disease,

high blood pressure, kidney disease--

all what we call chronic diseases.

When did those diseases start?

1970s... late '70s, '80s...

So before that, people were dying from...?

- Hepatitis. - Hepatitis.

- Pneumonia. -Pneumonia.

- TB. -TB.

They're all the infectious diseases.

These are the ones that came with the Europeans.

- - Bacteria. Infectious diseases.

-Yes, yes. - If we go back further...

How about the time before the Europeans came?

Fighting... One person kills another.

People died from fighting.

Accidents...

Sharks... Crocodiles...

- What's the main one? -Old age.

-Old age. -Old age.

I had this label that I'm a fat girl.

I am overweight.

I have asthma. I've always had asthma.

I have a rescue inhaler,

and then I have a maintenance inhaler.

My rescue inhaler is becoming, like a regular inhaler.

where I use it two or three times a day.

- Okay. - And I've just gotten used to it now.

And I've been in the hospital a couple of times for asthma,

where it got really bad.

When people talk about wellness and health,

and "Are you well? How do you feel?"

My automatic pilot is always, "I'm great!"

My vision is getting worse and worse, very rapidly.

I had three fibroids, and one was really big.

Upper respiratory infection.

They put me on broad-spectrum antibiotics,

mega doses of prednisone, azithromycin.

And so, I have this standing prescription.

I'll just take it myself. I was also diagnosed with ADD.

I don't know if that came up anywhere on there.

-This is really important, so we missed the ADD. -Yeah.

- -I'm like, "Oh, and incidentally..."

- "Oh, and by the way..."

I remember when I was little,

my mom taught me to write a letter

"Dear Cathy, how are you?

I am fine."

Like, those were the three things I learned first.

"How are you? I am fine."

And I'm still doing that, but I'm not fine!

This is levothyroxine.

I take one a day for my thyroid.

This is atorvastatin.

It's for my high cholesterol.

This is fenofibric, tizanidine, duloxetine--

I take that for anxiety. Hydrocodone,

cyclobenzaprine, gabapentin tablets--

That's supposed to make your brain process pain in a different way.

This is also for my thyroid. This is for my neck pain.

These are muscle relaxers.

And that's my medication, which I think is more than enough.

My mom struggled with weight her whole life.

She created me to be an emotional eater.

Somebody was picking on me at school.

"Come on, let's go get an ice cream."

Something happened good in school,

"Oh, let's go out and celebrate.

We'll go to Mickey D's," you know.

And I ended up doing the same thing with my kids

and my grandkids.

My mom finally developed

the Alzheimer's and the dementia,

and I saw the progression

of the disease from start to finish.

And you know, I forget things now,

and I can't think of words,

and I start thinking, "Oh, my God."

You know? "I'm-- I'm the same way.

I've gotten to be the same way."

You know?

This is a vicious cycle that needs to be stopped.

Kim, my daughter, she has arthritis.

She has lymphodema. She has hypothyroid.

Her daughter, Kaylee, is nine.

She has celiac's disease.

Barry's children are five and four,

Barry and Lauren, my son and daughter-in-law,

they have a daughter, Abigail, who's five.

Abigail? You want to come back with me?

Okay, sweetheart. Just step right up here.

She has autism. She's nonverbal.

She has epilepsy. She has central sleep apnea.

No, no, no, no, no, no.

-No, no. -

She has digestive problems.

Any trouble urinating?

Any trouble with bowel movements?

-She has constipation. -Constipation.

She's on the MiraLAX daily for that?

-Yeah. Yeah. - Okay.

The hardest part--

it's just having a child that can't speak.

I know my wife feels the same way.

That's-- To me, that's like the most painful part.

-Abigail. -Abs.

-Look. Look over here. -Abigail.

Abigail seems like she's doing really well,

and then she'll get tired, and she'll have a whole bunch of seizures.

And it's like she's forgotten everything.

It's like her brain resets itself.

-Playing music? -Yeah.

It's really the seizures that compounds her autism.

We're counting, on average, about 50 a day,

so she's getting a great big cocktail of garbage.

This stuff's pretty mild compared to this stuff.

This is called Onfi.

This stuff here is-- it's over $1,000 a bottle.

My insurance covers 70%, so...

I get the joy of only paying over $300 a month

-just for this stuff. -

Have you noticed any improvement with it?

We have. Otherwise, believe me--

For over $300 a month?

She would've been off of it a long time ago.

The whole situation makes me mad,

but mostly just because how many six-year-old kids

are these neurologists putting on these heavy narcotics?

I mean, this is as bad

as if you were to go buy heroin off of the street,

and that's the first thing

that these doctors are trained to offer the kids.

That's it. Good job.

I hate it.

The lump in my throat

as I was reading the side effects, man.

I mean, "May cause harm to yourself or others.

"May have rashy, irritated skin.

May cause sleeplessness."

And, like, I've seen my daughter

have some of these side effects.

We're gonna need a lot of help for sure. I just...

I have no idea.

-I have no idea how we're gonna do it. - Do what?

Switch her diet.

She refuses just about everything except for, like...

the Goldfish and Doritos.

So...

I just don't know. I don't know what

it's gonna be like. I may get overwhelmed with it.

- -

But I'm truly at a point in my life

where I'm afraid.

I'm afraid that my chips have run out.

You breathe it in, and then you hold it,

and then you breathe out.

That's how that works.

I'm scared. I'm genuinely scared.

Debbie, you're about to change your diet.

-What are you most afraid of? -Failure.

-B-b-b! -

B-b-b!

Wishing for luck...

Yes.

We are all physiologically

and genetically hunter-gatherers.

We've only been consuming an agriculturally-based diet now

for maybe 500 generations or so

versus more than 100,000 generations--

not 100,000 years, but 100,000 generations--

on a largely meat- and fat-based diet.

We have the brains that we do because of the enormous amount

of fat that we consumed as a species throughout our evolutionary history.

Suddenly now, we're eating a carbohydrate-based diet,

and in the last 13 or so generations,