TED'S TAKE: OMEGA-6 AND THE BIGGER PICTURE OF HUMAN HEALTH

Things are dynamic. They change all the time. We must adapt. Be resilient.

Medicine is Changing: In many ways, eastern medicine -- from acupuncture for pain to meditation for mental health -- is merging into our traditionally western, more scientific, medicine. The result could be very profound if we let it.

The body as a system is very complex, impacted by both its internal and external environment. Some of the external pieces we understand like exposure to too much sunlight can be detrimental, but we do need select amount of vitamin D/D3 which we get from limited sunlight exposure. Sunlight also impacts our mental outlook. Therefore, balance is needed. Most of us understand that sunlight is a better source of vitamin D/D3. Balance.

Imagine if we had a model of the entire human body – a total body system. We could identify and anticipate things that might affect us and then model that to understand the impact and adjust for the believed effects.

Consider nutrition. I’m talking about more than eating your vegetables. We know that what we eat has an impact on our body. The microbiome and how our body evolves and adjusts (or not). Additives and how our body reacts (or not).

The need for a total body system was driven home to me with a recent report on Omega 6. For decades, many of us were told that beef, or red meat, was bad for us. It caused clogged arteries and led to strokes, heart attacks and other circulatory disorders. That was based on studies looking at cardiovascular and circulatory systems. This provoked a shift to chicken, or white meat, as a source of protein in lieu of red meat. Well, the recent Omega 6 study found most chickens are being fed corn and soy, which causes a big increase of Omega 6 fatty acids. This means that chicken is now worse than the red meats and beef we previously were told to stay away from. We never knew this shift was happening. IF we had a total body system model, could we have see

n this shift coming as chicken feed changed?

Of course, a total body system model would need to have a longitudinal dimension that could track and anticipate things over time. Changes in the environment including what we eat will inherently impact our body over time.

If pursued, we need a better understanding of the human body, its cells, their communications, etc. To do that, we need more research which today is grossly underfunded. The way things work, the why and the how need to be known in a much greater way than we do at present.

This is why funding research that asks these fundamental questions is so critical, yet few invest there. Why? There’s no direct credit and little chance of a return on investment.

Most organizations merely want credit or want to show progress toward their individual goals; to show their relevance as opposed to truly showing progress for some greater good. The government should do this, but sadly it does not.

The JKTG Foundation is one of the few that invests in why and how.  For progress to be achieved, we need more funders to join our approach.