Why so much chronic disease? To keep it simple, we would boil it down to these four causes:
- Unhealthy Food Choices: History tells us when the trading ships started carrying sugar and white flour to populations around the world, chronic diseases cropped up in their wake. A sugary diet leads to a depressed immune system, elevated insulin levels, obesity, cancer – to name a few. “Bad fats” and fried foods lead to inflamed arteries, thick and sticky blood, and heart disease. Processed convenience foods are devoid of vitamins, minerals and enzymes needed for health.
- Environmental Toxins: Our toxic world weakens our immune systems. In 2005, a landmark study by the Environmental Working Group found 287 chemicals in umbilical cord blood, of which 180 cause cancer in humans or animals, 217 are toxic to the brain and nervous system, and 208 cause birth defects or abnormal development in animal tests. The chemicals included stain and oil repellants in fast food packaging, clothes and textiles; dozens of widely used brominated flame retardants; and numerous pesticides. So today’s babies begin their exposure to toxins in utero, then grow up in a world that bombards them daily with carcinogenic radiation, hormone-disrupting industrial chemicals, fluoride and chlorine in the water.
- Physical Inactivity: Today’s sedentary lifestyle makes it harder to burn the excess calories we eat. It means we don’t strengthen our heart muscle or our bones. It also means we don’t detox as well as we could.
- Poor Dental Health: Growing evidence links low-grade, chronic infections and chronic diseases with periodontal pathogens. Mercury fillings and root canals are a constant source of infectious material.