Seventy-five per cent of the world’s food comes from just twelve plants and five animal species. - Michael Mosley
If you were born by a Caesarean (C-Section) things would have been very different. The first bacteria you would have encountered are those hanging around the operating theatre, those on the skin of people that held you and anything else that you inhaled or swallowed in the first few hours of life. Poo samples taken from babies who were delivered by Caesarean section show that they have a very different gut bacterial population from those who were born virginally. Does this matter? Yes very much so. Thanks to a study done by researchers from the Harvard T.H Chan School of Public Health, we know that babies who are born by Caesarean section are far more likely to become obese children and overweight adults. - Michael Mosley
You’ll arrive at a place where you say no to the cheesecake because you don’t want it, not because you are denying yourself a treat. - Michael Mosley
But surely, I hear you say, that’s crash dieting and crash dieting always fails? You end up putting back on all the weight you lost, and more. Well, no. Like anything, it depends on how it is done. Done badly, a very low-calorie diet will cause misery. Done properly, rapid weight loss is an extremely effective way to shed fat, combat blood sugar problems, reverse type 2 diabetes, perhaps even cure it. - Michael Mosley
Who would have imagined that eating a baked potato would have as big an impact on your blood glucose as eating a tablespoon of sugar? - Michael Mosley
As long as we have plenty of food, our bodies are mainly interested in growing, having sex, and reproducing. So what happens if you decide to fast? Well, the body’s initial reaction is one of shock. Signals go to the brain reminding you that you are hungry, urging you to go out and find something to eat. But you resist. The body now decides that the reason you are not eating as much and as frequently as you usually do must be because you are now in a famine situation. In the past this would have been quite normal. In a famine situation, there is no point in expending energy on growth or sex. Instead, the wisest thing the body can do is to spend its precious store of energy on repair, trying to keep you in reasonable shape until the good times return once more. - Michael Mosley