Habits and Hustle
Episode 412: Dr. Mark Hyman: How Ultra-Processed Foods Are Fueling America's Obesity Epidemic
Fri, 03 Jan 2025
Listen to the full episode here: https://youtu.be/NHgsW0l4mf8?si=MXfk9odHeMwBEGRX Have you ever wondered why America is the fattest country in the world, with 75% of the population overweight and 42% obese? In this Habits and Hustle bonus episode, Dr. Mark Hyman shares eye-opening insights into the root causes of this epidemic. We discuss how ultra-processed foods disrupt our biology, leading to cravings and overeating as our bodies search for missing nutrients. We also discuss the staggering healthcare costs of metabolic dysfunction and chronic diseases driven by the Standard American Diet. Mark Hyman, MD is a practicing family physician and an internationally recognized leader, speaker, educator, and advocate in the field of Functional Medicine. He is the founder and director of The UltraWellness Center, Founder and Senior Advisor for the Cleveland Clinic Center for Functional Medicine, a fifteen-time New York Times best-selling author, and Board President for Clinical Affairs for The Institute for Functional Medicine. He is the founder and chairman of the Food Fix Campaign, dedicated to transforming our food and agriculture system through policy. He is a co-founder and the Chief Medical Officer of Function Health. He is the host of one of the leading health podcasts, The Doctor’s Farmacy with 150+ million downloads. Dr. Hyman is a regular medical contributor to several television shows and networks, including CBS This Morning, Today, Good Morning America, The View, Fox, and CNN. What We Discuss: Ultra-processed foods and weight gain America's obesity and chronic disease crisis Metabolic dysfunction prevalence in the U.S. Economic costs of preventable chronic diseases Fad diets vs. eating real, quality foods Reversing cognitive decline and Alzheimer's disease Rising rates of Alzheimer's and its root causes Toxins in the food supply and environment Differences in food regulations between the U.S. and Europe …and more! Thank you to our sponsors: AquaTru: Get 20% off any purifier at aquatru.com with code HUSTLE Therasage: Head over to therasage.com and use code Be Bold for 15% off TruNiagen: Head over to truniagen.com and use code HUSTLE20 to get $20 off any purchase over $100. Magic Mind: Head over to www.magicmind.com/jen and use code Jen at checkout. Air Doctor: Go to airdoctorpro.com and use promo code HUSTLE for up to $300 off and a 3-year warranty on air purifiers. Find more from Jen: Website: https://www.jennifercohen.com/ Instagram: @therealjencohen Books: https://www.jennifercohen.com/books Speaking: https://www.jennifercohen.com/speaking-engagement Find more from Dr. Mark Hyman: Website: https://drhyman.com/ www.functionhealth.com use code HUSTLE100 to save Podcast: The Doctor’s Pharmacy
Chapter 1: What is the impact of ultra-processed foods on weight gain?
The NIH study by Kevin Hall looked at this very carefully, and he did what we call a crossover trial, which is one of the best types of study designs, where he took the same people, gave them a diet, and then let them have a break, call a washout period, and then give them another diet for a few weeks, and then measure what happened. First part of the diet was eating real food.
Matched for protein, fat, carbs, calories. Then they gave them ultra-processed food. then they can eat whatever they want. Eat whatever you want, eat as much as you want, there's no restrictions. When they were eating ultra-processed food, they ate 500 calories more a day because their biology was dysregulated. Kids who are iron deficient will eat dirt.
The body is going to crave more food and want more food because it's looking for nutrients, but we're looking for love in all the wrong places, right? And so what happened is that you get dysregulated. I mean, think about that. 500 calories a day in a week is 3,500 calories. That's a pound of weight gain. if you don't offset it with exercise.
In a year, that's 52 pounds of weight gain if you eat ultra-processed food. Why is America the fattest country in the world? Like, we have 75% of us that are overweight, 42% are obese. It's increased, you know, fourfold since I was born. And You've seen diabetes increase 400%. I mean, in the last 30 years, it's insane.
Chapter 2: Why is America facing an obesity crisis?
And, you know, the metabolic dysfunction, even if you're not overweight, because you could be skinny fat. In other words, you look thin, but you're actually fat on the inside.
Right, your percentage is fat.
Yeah, your body fat, where the fat is, if it's in your belly, visceral fat. That's 93.2% of Americans have metabolic dysfunction. That means that 6.8% of us are healthy. And what does that mean?
That 93.2% has either high blood sugar, high blood pressure, abnormal cholesterol, all, by the way, caused by too much starch and sugar in our ultra processed diet, or they've had a heart attack or stroke, or they're overweight.
Chapter 3: What are the economic costs of chronic diseases in the U.S.?
Yeah, that is unbelievable.
Yeah, it's unbelievable. And so we're killing ourselves, and it's the costs are staggering. I mean, the government, the U.S. government pays 40% of the national health care bill, which is now $4.9 trillion. Probably a good $2 trillion of that is totally preventable. And it's now being added to our federal deficit every year.
And imagine what that $2 trillion can do for the economy, what we could do with social programs, how we could improve our infrastructure, how we could improve so many innovation, how we could fund different kinds of research. I mean, we're wasting that money. And most people don't realize that. You know, it's one out of every three taxpayer dollars is for health care.
What I find to be unbelievable is that everyone seems to look for these quick fad diets or quick fixes, but yet what you're saying is pretty basic, right? It's the same things that if they watch what they eat, quality of the food, inflammation. It's not that hard. It's not that hard, but yet people are trying to over, or they're overwhelmed with like all this like noise, you know?
Chapter 4: Are fad diets effective compared to real food?
The other thing I wanted to ask you about Ozempic or any of these, or Govees or whatever, can your body acclimate over time anyway? And so you end up even eating what you ate before you even started to eat?
Sometimes. These drugs affect people differently. I had a patient who, I didn't prescribe it, but he was telling me he lost, you know, he did Ozempic for six months. He lost two pounds. It didn't really make him feel great. He had all these side effects. He switched over to what I told him to do. He lost 60 pounds and he's reversed his diabetes and, you know, he's on his way back to full health.
You keep on saying patients. Do you still see patients?
Yeah, I saw two this morning. I had a whole patient day yesterday. Yeah.
So you actually still see like one of them.
I'm a doctor, yes. I don't just play one on TV. No, you don't just play one.
Listen, this is very refreshing. I thought of all the people, of all the doctors, you wouldn't have time because do you know how many times I've seen doctors sit in the same chair you are and they are doctors. Yeah, I guess they have a certificate, but they don't practice. They write books and they like to do media and they like to do all these other things.
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Chapter 5: How do medications like Ozempic work for weight loss?
It keeps it real. It keeps you humble. It keeps you learning.
But people don't like to do it. Like it's impossible to find, like the big joke is I can't find a doctor.
I love it. I mean, I love taking care of people. It's so, I mean, it's amazing.
You actually are like, would you take another, another patient? I need a doctor because there is such a shortage of doctors.
You're lying girl. I know.
Like what is the waiting list for that? Like, do you have like a crazy waiting list?
I wish I could see everybody. I really wished. I mean, it's the heartbreak of my life and I can't tell you, I probably get five to 10 texts, emails, requests every day. my mother this, my friend this, I'm sick this. And like people who are close to me and I'm like, I just wish I could help everybody and I can't. And so that's really why I co-founded Function Health.
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Chapter 6: What is the importance of continuing to see patients?
Right, to give people that.
Was to take what I know and make it accessible, not to a few hundred or thousand people, but to millions and millions. We have an 8 billion person problem.
That's exactly true.
And what we're creating at Function is something that is revolutionary. It's why we're the fastest growing healthcare company in the world. We're creating something called medical intelligence. You know, you have ChatGPT and all this. But think about where you take all your own data and all your data is sorted through with the use of technology.
Because now we can process, I mean, just in your microbiome alone, there's 100,000 terabytes of data. I don't even know what a terabyte is, but it's a lot of information. It's a lot, I guess. Yeah, I would say. So no human mind can comprehend all that.
So we're able to take all this data and actually understand what's happening to you and input it all into the system and then give you a predictive model of where you are in the trajectory from wellness to illness, because things don't happen overnight, right? For example, we were mentioning some of these Alzheimer's tests like PTAS 217 or AD4240 or neurofibrillary light chain.
There's other biomarkers. And we're now able to see from a blood test that You know, you could be developing early, early cognitive injury, brain injury that you don't even know about because you're not symptomatic. You can tell with brain imaging up to 30 to 40 years before you get Alzheimer's that you're starting to get trouble in the brain. But now with these blood tests, we can detect it.
And then you can do something to intervene and actually reverse that trajectory. That's never been possible before.
How is it even possible? I thought there was no cure.
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