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The Sugar Doctor's WARNING: The "Healthy" Foods Quietly Destroying Your Body! - Dr David Unwin

Insulin Expert Dr. David Unwin has put 157 patients into drug-free Type 2 diabetes remission using diet alone. He reveals the hidden teaspoon of sugar in your everyday food, the link between sugar and cancer, and why the average person will spend 23 years of their life in poor health. Dr. David Unwin is an NHS GP with over 40 years in general practice, known for his expertise in reversing Type 2 diabetes through dietary changes. He was named NHS Innovator of the Year in 2016 and is the co-author of the most-read paper in BMJ Open, on reversing Type 2 diabetes through a low-carbohydrate diet. He explains: ◼ The "teaspoon of sugar" test that exposes the hidden glucose in your food ◼ Why your liver silently fills with fat for years before anything shows up ◼ Why you can't stop eating certain foods and what food addiction really is ◼ How sugar feeds cancer cells faster and the diet that slows them ◼How Ozempic quiets food cravings and why it's only part of the answer 00:00 Intro 02:20 Why Your Future Health Depends On This One Question 02:44 What It Really Takes To Create The Future You Want 06:50 What Actually Happens Inside Your Body With Diabetes 14:36 The Hidden Truth About What’s Really In Your Food 15:56 The Moment That Completely Changed How He Saw Medicine 17:09 The Real Reason Doctors Are Incentivized The Wrong Way 22:00 How Food Becomes Medicine Or Makes You Sicker 28:59 What Happens When You Truly Transform Your Health 30:04 The Everyday Habits Quietly Destroying Your Health 33:05 Why Most People’s Idea Of Healthy Is Completely Wrong 35:20 Is Dried Fruit Healthy Or A Sugar Trap In Disguise 38:26 These Healthy Foods Have More Sugar Than You Think 45:25 Is Orange Juice Actually Good For You 46:56 The Truth About White Milk And Dark Chocolate 49:28 Why Smoothies Aren’t As Healthy As You Think 52:11 How To Tell If Your Food Is Actually Healthy 55:24 How Your Body Secretly Turns Carbs Into Sugar 57:18 Is Bread Ruining Your Health 59:22 Ads 01:01:25 What Nutrition Labels Aren’t Telling You 01:05:47 Keto Diet Solution Or Hidden Risk 01:10:25 How To Set Health Goals That Actually Work 01:20:35 How To Help Loved Ones Change Before It’s Too Late 01:31:21 The 4 Step Plan To Break Addiction For Good 01:34:50 Why Addiction Leads To Deception 01:35:50 Book Giveaway 01:37:27 Ads 01:39:42 The Link Between Diet And Cancer What This Means 01:45:09 Why Our Healthspan Is Quietly Declining 01:48:21 The Simple String Test That Reveals Your Metabolic Health 01:50:25 Are Supplements Helping Or Hurting You 01:53:04 The Magnesium Story That Will Change How You Think 02:02:57 Guest’s Last Question 02:09:56 A Final Story You Won’t Forget Enter here for the chance to win one of 1000 copies of Dr. Jen Unwin’s Book, “Fork in the Road”: https://link.thediaryofaceo.com/6OxWpCa Enjoyed the episode? Share this link and earn points for every referral - redeem them for exclusive prizes: https://doac-perks.com You can follow David, here: X - https://link.thediaryofaceo.com/5ZMguOY Support his charity, Public Health Collaboration: https://link.thediaryofaceo.com/APtcZJH Independent Research: https://stevenbartlett.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/DOAC-Dr-David-Unwin-Independent-Research-Further-Reading.pdf The Diary Of A CEO: ◼ Join DOAC circle here - https://doaccircle.com/ ◼ Buy The Diary Of A CEO book here - https://smarturl.it/DOACbook ◼ The 1% Diary is back - limited time only: https://bit.ly/3YFbJbt ◼ The Diary Of A CEO Conversation Cards: https://linkly.link/2io2A ◼ Get email updates - https://bit.ly/diary-of-a-ceo-yt ◼ Follow Steven - https://g2ul0.app.link/gnGqL4IsKKb Sponsors: Ketone - https://ketone.com/STEVEN for 30% off your subscription order Stan - Visit https://coach.stan.store/?ref=stevenbartlett&utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=episode6 Cometeer - https://cometeer.com/steven for $30 off your first order Conversation Cards: https://linkly.link/2io2A

Dr. David UnwinguestSteven Bartletthost
May 18, 20262h 11mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 2:20

    Intro

    1. DU

      Your waist should be less than half your height. So half of that string should go around the fattest bit of your belly, and this is a really simple test for everybody at home.

    2. SB

      I mean, it's not loose. [laughs]

    3. DU

      Yeah. You've just done it. You've passed. But fat on your belly is more worrying than fat on your legs or on your arms. And unfortunately, we've started to normalize things like the dad bod without realizing that isn't how you're supposed to be. And maybe a third of all the people in the world with Type 2 diabetes don't even know they have it. But every year that you have poorly controlled Type 2 diabetes, you're losing 100 days of life, and it's because people don't know the truth, being fooled with the packaging and advertising.

    4. SB

      So let's talk about the food we have on this table, because this is how much sugar I would have thought was in all of these things here: cereal, a potato, white rice, a banana, and a chocolate bar.

    5. DU

      So now I'm gonna give you the correct figure. The cornflakes is one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. That chocolate bar is seven and a half. The banana, that's six. And then the potato is actually...

    6. SB

      Oh my gosh.

    7. DU

      And then 150 grams of boiled rice is-

    8. SB

      Oh, [beep] . I thought rice was healthy.

    9. DU

      But each of us has a number of different health futures, and what I'm interested in is how do I get you to pick a lifestyle that will get you the future you want, because my job is about behavior change.

    10. SB

      The floor is yours.

    11. DU

      All right, so off we go.

    12. SB

      This is super interesting to me. My team give me this report to show me how many of you that watch this show subscribe, and some of you have told us, according to this, that you are unsubscribed from the channel randomly. So favor to ask all of you, please could you check right now if you've hit the subscribe button if you are a regular viewer of the show and you like what we do here. We're approaching quite a significant landmark on this show in terms of a subscriber number. So if there was one simple free thing that you could do to help us, my team, everyone here, to keep this show free, to keep it improving year over year and week over week, it is just to hit that subscribe button and to double-check if you've hit it. Only thing I'll ever ask of you. Do we have a deal? If you do it, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll make sure every single week, every single month, we fight harder and harder and harder and harder to bring you the guests and conversations that you want to hear. I've stayed true to that promise since the very beginning of The Diary of a CEO, and I will not let you down. Please help us. Really appreciate it. Let's get on with the show. [upbeat music]

  2. 2:20 – 2:44

    Why Your Future Health Depends On This One Question

    1. SB

      Dr. David Unwin. You were named in 2018 among the top 10 most influential doctors in the United Kingdom. Um, you've got an incredible list of accomplishments, and you're held in the highest regard maybe of all the doctors I've ever had the chance to speak to by many people that I've spoken to. We were talking before we started recording about what's on your mind and what's been bothering you, and so the floor

  3. 2:44 – 6:50

    What It Really Takes To Create The Future You Want

    1. SB

      is yours. What is front of mind for you, Dr. David?

    2. DU

      What's front of mind for me is the, the idea that each of us has a number of different health futures. So you have. So in your future, uh, I don't know, there could be cancer. There could, uh, be multiple sclerosis, or there, there could be many futures. What I'm interested in is how do I get you to pick a lifestyle that will get you the future you want. And I think that's very difficult in the world now to know what is the best lifestyle, 'cause you're given so much conflicting advice. And the particular focus for me in terms of picking health futures is around young people, because they've got the longest time to make a difference, and it's getting harder and harder and harder to make good health choices in your lifestyle. It's really hard. I'd say it's a pandemic of poor metabolic health. Yesterday in clinic, I saw two people under the age of 25 who had poorly controlled diabetes, and one of them was too heavy for me actually to weigh. And this situation is completely new. So when I, when I was a young doctor, uh, and just starting off in practice, that was in 1986-

    3. SB

      Wow

    4. DU

      ... nine... A long time ago, just north of Liverpool in the practice. I'm still there now. Obesity was rare, and we didn't have a single case of Type 2 diabetes in anybody under 55. Not a single case. It was quite unknown. And in fact, Type 2 diabetes had a different name. We've had to change the name because of the epidemic. Used to be called maturity onset diabetes. That meant old people, right? Now we call it Type 2 diabetes because we have to include so many young people. It's really, really serious, uh, because people are losing their life expectancy, and I'm witnessing this. We're all sleepwalking into a metabolic disaster, and the people paying the greatest price, in my opinion, are young people, and it's a scandal, and I'm hopping mad really. I think we've started to normalize the dad bod, you know, the big tummy and haha, without realizing that maybe that isn't how you're supposed to be. So that, that's what's on my mind, young people and their future, and they don't even know.

    5. SB

      You say young people there-

    6. DU

      Yeah

    7. SB

      ... because they've got the biggest opportunity to change the trajectory of their-

    8. DU

      Yes

    9. SB

      ... health future.

    10. DU

      Yes.

    11. SB

      But for the audiences listening that might be in their 50s now, is this advice also applicable?

    12. DU

      Absolutely. So we know from g- government figures, UK government figures, that for every year that you have poorly controlled Type 2 diabetes, you're losing 100 days of life. That's about a third of a year, isn't it? So whatever age you are, if you, uh, have poorly controlled diabetes, you're losing life expectancy and, and maybe a third of all the people in the world with Type 2 diabetes don't even know they have it, because they haven't taken a test, so they don't know.What do you think kills people with Type 2 diabetes?

    13. SB

      Um, is it some cardiovascular issue?

    14. DU

      Yeah. Well done. Well done.

    15. SB

      I've done a lot of podcasts.

    16. DU

      You don't, you see, you've not been to medical school. You don't know.

    17. SB

      [laughs]

    18. DU

      That, most doctors, that's what they'd say because we know, uh, that a high blood sugar over time damages your arteries, so it's a cumulative thing over time. But what you may not know is that actually a rising cause of mortality for people with diabetes is cancer.

    19. SB

      Oh, really?

    20. DU

      Yeah. So eight forms of cancer are strongly associated, uh, with diabetes.

  4. 6:50 – 14:36

    What Actually Happens Inside Your Body With Diabetes

    1. SB

      I wanna just define that term diabetes because I think I went through a lot of my life assuming that diabetes was a disease that some people are born with.

    2. DU

      Ah.

    3. SB

      And because I didn't have it, I thought I didn't need to worry about that.

    4. DU

      Right. That's really important. Yeah. So f- first of all, there's Type 1 diabetes and Type 2. But before I can explain about diabetes, I need to explain about insulin. Uh, this is absolutely key to our whole discussion. So I've already said that a high blood sugar damages your arteries, and in fact there's work to show that a very high blood sugar damages the non-stick lining of your arteries within six hours.

    5. SB

      Oh, wow.

    6. DU

      Really quick. It's called the glycocalyx, the non-stick lining, and, uh, damage is occurring very quickly, so-

    7. SB

      I'm gonna ask you a s- really stupid question.

    8. DU

      Yeah.

    9. SB

      When you say high blood sugar, I get high blood sugar when I eat lots of sugar.

    10. DU

      Okay. So first of all, we're actually talking about glucose.

    11. SB

      Yeah.

    12. DU

      And sugar can mean table sugar, or it could mean many different things, but we're actually talking about blood glucose.

    13. SB

      Which comes from lots of foods.

    14. DU

      Which comes from many foods.

    15. SB

      Carbohydrate-heavy foods.

    16. DU

      Yes. Yes, it does. It does.

    17. SB

      Okay.

    18. DU

      So that, that's right.

    19. SB

      Okay.

    20. DU

      But you have the hormone insulin to defend you from poor dietary choices, so the question is what does insulin do with the sugar you just ate? And here's the answer. Insulin, the hormone insulin produced by your pancreas gland, it pushes the sugar, and it pushes it out of the bloodstream inside cells where it can be used for energy for you to run around. But what if you take in, uh, more carbohydrate than you need to run around? Well, then that sugar is turned to fat inside cells because it's safer for you to turn that sugar into fat than it is, is to have it damaging your arteries. So I am somebody with Type 2 diabetes, so we can talk about me. So I had a really heavy biscuit habit. Uh, I was senior partner of the practice, and it's stressful, and I had-- patients used to bring me biscuits all the time as a gift 'cause they, you know, they want the doctor to be happy. So in the drawer, in the top of my desk, was packets and packets of biscuits. So I'm taking in more sugar, and I didn't run around, and gradually my waist got bigger. And what was actually happening was, as I took in more sugar than I needed to run around, my insulin was working to get rid of that sugar, and it was giving me two things. One, a belly.

    21. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    22. DU

      So my, you know, and I thought it's just middle-age spread, you know. And the other was, I didn't know, but my liver was filling with fat. And that's, um, that is very common now, so we have, well, it's a third of everybody in the developed world has fatty liver now. Here we got the wonderful props. Let's talk about these.

    23. SB

      Great.

    24. DU

      So fatty liver. This is the healthy liver here. And you see the color. Look at this one. It's yellow. It's the wrong color, and it's because of fat. So in that case, like has happened to me, over years, my liver began to fill with fat.

    25. SB

      Because it was essentially overworked, and glucose was being stored there.

    26. DU

      Yes. So I was taking in too much glucose. Insulin was doing its good job of taking it out of my bloodstream and forcing it inside cells in my belly but, unfortunately, in my liver.

    27. SB

      Oh, okay.

    28. DU

      And so there's a progressive laying down of fat in the liver. So if we look at actually some proper liver, so this is the-- put on your seat belts now 'cause this is-

    29. SB

      Oh, gosh

    30. DU

      ... somebody's, uh, somebody's actual liver. So then that's the normal liver. But look at this. It's larger.

  5. 14:36 – 15:56

    The Hidden Truth About What’s Really In Your Food

    1. DU

      on.

    2. SB

      One of the things that shocks me is, um, [clears throat] is how little we know about what's in our food.

    3. DU

      Yes.

    4. SB

      You know, 'cause I think we all know that, like, biscuits are a food that has a high glycemic index-

    5. DU

      Well done

    6. SB

      ... which is a term that I've learned from this podcast, which means-

    7. DU

      Yes. Some carbohydrates are more sugary than others. And then so that's the glycemic index. What that is doing is comparing different carbohydrates with pure glucose.

    8. SB

      Okay.

    9. DU

      So you see pure glucose is 100, and then other sugars come further down. But there is, there's something better than the glycemic index, and that's called the glycemic load. The glycemic load takes portions of food and predicts how will that portion of food actually affect your blood sugar.

    10. SB

      And am I right in thinking the glycemic load would factor in the amount of nutrients in the food that-

    11. DU

      Exactly. Yeah, great

    12. SB

      ... so like protein, fiber.

    13. DU

      Yeah, because if you took watermelon-

    14. SB

      Yeah

    15. DU

      ... well, it's mainly water, isn't it?

    16. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    17. DU

      So you have to factor in, you can have quite a lot of watermelon, uh, to equal a chocolate bar.

    18. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    19. DU

      So the density, you're, you're looking at the density of sugar in it as well.

    20. SB

      Okay.

    21. DU

      So that's why the glycemic load is

  6. 15:56 – 17:09

    The Moment That Completely Changed How He Saw Medicine

    1. DU

      better.

    2. SB

      Was there, was there a moment in your career where you started to question what you had been told?

    3. DU

      Yeah. You know, so you start as a young doctor. I wanted to be part of a small community and stay there and make a difference. And then comes the sad bit really. So for the first 25 years, I was trying to do what's in the guidelines. I was trying to be a good doctor. But what I noticed, I noticed two things. Number one, I noticed what I've already said to you, that the health of the population I cared for was deteriorating. It wasn't getting better. So if I'm the doctor in charge of the practice looking after these people and health is deteriorating, am I not responsible? And where's, where is all this difference I was hoping to make? It just wasn't panning out. At the same time, I'd always in my heart felt that prescribing lots of drugs felt a bit wrong. It felt like a mini failure because how is somebody well if they're taking six tablets a day?

  7. 17:09 – 22:00

    The Real Reason Doctors Are Incentivized The Wrong Way

    1. SB

      Was there one particular patient that you met?

    2. DU

      There were two. Two things happened, both to do with very powerful women. The first powerful woman was a lady I'd known for over 10 years. She and her husband, I'd cared for them both. They both had poorly controlled diabetes, and they were both very heavy. At the time, I could monitor how my, how compliant my patients were with their medication. And if I'm to be truthful, in part, that was how I was paid. So part of my payment was to do with are the patients having, in this case, metformin, the most commonly used drug for Type 2 diabetes.

    3. SB

      Part of your payment?

    4. DU

      Yeah. Yeah.

    5. SB

      How, what do you mean?

    6. DU

      Well, because there's a, you're supposed to, the, the government approve of the fact that we give drugs that are needed for Type 2 diabetes, so that you're given a sort of quota where it's ex- it's regarded as good practice that such a, a certain percentage of your patients will be on metformin.

    7. SB

      What?

    8. DU

      Yeah.It's true.

    9. SB

      So is it fair to say that you were somewhat incentivized to give people metformin?

    10. DU

      Yes, that would be true. But I think we should also be fair to say that the body of evidence at the time would say, uh, that it's good practice to give metformin to people with Type 2 diabetes, and conversely, poor practice not to use metformin, but we'll develop that. So the, the backdrop is we're m- we're monitoring the patients who stop taking their metformin because that, uh, is number one, poor practice, and number two, actually costs me. So I wrote to the person, "Dear Mrs. So-and-so, I'm concerned that, uh, you're not-- you don't seem to be taking your metformin. Please make an appointment with me at your earliest convenience." Very British, very polite. Anyway, nothing prepared me for what was gonna happen that morning, and it's changed my entire life on that point. So the lady, w- let's call her Mrs. Jones. That wasn't her name. She marches in, and, uh, she said to me, "You think you're gonna tell me off, don't you, Dr. Unwin? Well, I've got news for you. I'm gonna tell you off." I was scared, like, "What's going on?" She's never been like this before. She's a, a polite person. Anyway, she went on to explain. She said, "When you do my blood tests, you will find that my blood glucose is completely normal despite not taking your metformin." And she said, "I'm wondering if you're actually qualified as a doctor, because in the last ten years, did you ever once tell me that bread was sugar or breakfast cereals were sugar? I had to learn online, uh, that bread is sugar, that rice is sugar, that breakfast cereals are sugar, and when I cut those foods, I don't need your metformin now." And she wa- she made it worse. She said, "This is schoolboy biology. You should have learnt that when you were 16." I was dead scared because, you know, complaints as a GP, it's really bad. They go on for years and years. But mainly I was scared because every word she said was true. And one thing I had learned about when you're an older doctor is you've got to listen to people properly. If they're complaining, don't deny it. Don't defend yourself. Take it. So I said, "Okay, I've got... I, I want to learn what you've-- you know, if this is true, will you meet me again? Let's do the blood test." So we did the blood test. It was true. It was the first case of drug-free Type 2 diabetes I had ever seen. I'd never seen a single case in twenty-five years where people came off medication. I was fascinated because she'd done it like a miracle. But there was another detail I'd just share with you. She was one of forty thousand people online learning from each other how to do it. And when I looked, they were being rubbished by the healthcare professionals. So people like me were telling them, "You'll die. What you're doing is dangerous." And I was ashamed. Really ashamed. And it's complete coincidence, but in the same month, uh, w- we have to introduce my wife, Jen.

  8. 22:00 – 28:59

    How Food Becomes Medicine Or Makes You Sicker

    1. DU

      Is there a photo? Come on, let's see Jen.

    2. SB

      This is Jen.

    3. DU

      Oh, she's probably the cleverest woman in the world.

    4. SB

      [chuckles]

    5. DU

      She's so clever. I love that woman. So Jen, uh, so her back-- she is a, um, a clinical health psychologist, and she specializes, she's fascinated by the role of hope in disease and the difference it can make. And she spent her life researching the difference that hope makes to clinical outcomes. So it just so happened that she was in a supermarket, and she saw some, a discounted diet book. That one.

    6. SB

      Oh, yeah.

    7. DU

      That's the book.

    8. SB

      Escape the Diet Trap by Dr. John Briffa.

    9. DU

      Yeah, Dr. John Briffa. What a lovely guy. So Jen bought that book just around the time I'm telling her about this patient. So she said, "You have to read this book about the low, a low-carbohydrate approach to, um, insulin resistance, to Type 2 diabetes." And in the book, everything that my patient had told me was there and, but it was done in a medical way from-- and I understood. She said, "David, why, why are you sort of failing? Why don't you do one thing before you retire? Why can't you do a cheerful, something you really believe in? Why don't you have a go at this low-carb thing?"

    10. SB

      Yourself.

    11. DU

      Yeah. She said, "Why don't you and me go on this diet, see if some patients would volunteer, and do it with us?" And I mentioned it to the partners, and they said no.

    12. SB

      These are other doctors?

    13. DU

      Yeah. So I'm senior partner.

    14. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    15. DU

      I'm supposedly the boss. Uh, but at the time, low carb was not respectable, and they didn't like it. And they said, "We don't want you to do this." And partly 'cause they said, "Well, how-- i- you know, is that a good use of the, the resources of the practice? Because if you're doing this, David, maybe you're not treating chest infections or other things, and there's pressure on the health service." So this felt a bit, they felt it was a bit self-indulgent. So I go back to my wife and said, "The partners say no."And she said, "I, I, I'll tell you what we're gonna do. We're both gonna work for free, and we'll do it. Why don't we do this in our own time in, on, in an evening when the pra- there's no resources?" So that's exactly what we did. We found 18 volunteers who were interested amongst the patients, and then Jen and I, so that was 20 of us. We started meeting every Monday night, talking about low carb, learning how do you cook stuff, how do you do it. We did it together, and one of the nurses was so excited. Heather is her name. Let's give her a, you know, a thumbs up to Heather. Heather said, "I'll work for free. I'll help you. I'd love to do this. I want to, I want to believe in what I do." And then the magic begins. The results, I couldn't believe it. I could not. You know, I'd never seen anything like it. And the first thing, the first thing I saw was the liver function improving. You see, 'cause I'm doing blood tests 'cause I know I'm doing something weird. I'm doing something that I would be criticized for. So if you're gonna do a weird thing, you need to measure stuff.

    16. SB

      Mm.

    17. DU

      You can't... You know, these are patients, so you can't just experiment and not be, "Am I doing harm? What's happening, what's happening to the cholesterol and the lipid profiles?" So I was monitoring stuff really closely. The liver function, though, Steven. I got people who I thought they were drinking alcohol, and I thought their liver problem was due to alcohol, and they'd had abnormal liver function for 10 years, and suddenly, within weeks, the liver function was improving, often by a third or 50%. I was so excited. Can you imagine? I'm sitting there, and the laboratory results are coming in, and they're like, wow. And then another and another. So that was the first thing. Then the weight. So we're all meeting every Monday night, and we got the scales, and everybody gets weighed every Monday night, and the weight started falling off people. It really did. And then the, all sorts of other weird stuff started happening, some of which I couldn't make sense of for years. First one was people said, "Are you hungry? 'Cause I'm not." And they started saying things like, "Do you have to eat breakfast?"

    18. SB

      [chuckles]

    19. DU

      Where, and I also, I wasn't hungry. I wasn't hungry. They were telling me the truth 'cause I was experiencing this with them. Why are we not hungry? That's so odd. And I was starting, I, not bothering with breakfast, so I didn't eat it. You don't have to have it, and my, and my belly went away. Next thing was I noticed when I stood up from my desk, I felt dizzy. Weird. Now, I hadn't told anybody, but I had m- moderate high blood pressure for years. But I didn't like to be a patient.

    20. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    21. DU

      So I never went to a doctor. I just put my head in the sand. So I had high blood pressure for years. When I took my blood pressure, it was low, normal. Why? I didn't know. But on the patients as well, I'm doing that as well. I'm measuring all the blood pressure, and it's improving. So it's getting weirder and weirder. Liver function improving, weight going down, blood pressure improving. In those days, we were-- the blood test that we, we did was a thing called a hemoglobin A1C. The A1C in America. This is the average sugariness of your blood for the preceding three months, so the results take a while.

    22. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    23. DU

      But then when the, uh, hemoglobin A1C came in, there it was. We were getting really spectacular improvements in, in average blood sugar. And that's so-- that's kind of how it began. So that's 2013, so that's 13 years ago, and, uh, the rest is history. But that, I was completely blown away, and I was full of curiosity about all these other things and how was it. Why were these things improving?

  9. 28:59 – 30:04

    What Happens When You Truly Transform Your Health

    1. SB

      So in those 13 years, how has your fitness, your health changed?

    2. DU

      My mental powers were much greater. I could concentrate better. I wasn't fretty. So I noticed that. Uh, the next thing I noticed was I needed a lot less sleep. So yeah, in the beginning, I used to have to have a little sleep on my doctor's couch every lunchtime. So I'm a senior partner, so you press Do Not Disturb, and you put the curtains round and have a little nap on my own couch for 20 minutes. It was the only way I could get through the day. I didn't need that nap anymore. I was less sleepy. I needed an hour's less sleep a day. I could think better. I was m- I could cope with the same problems. And this is so weird, but mentally I was stronger. It was like being a younger man, um, the way... I don't know. Y- I think you have a sense of mental horsepower.

  10. 30:04 – 33:05

    The Everyday Habits Quietly Destroying Your Health

    1. SB

      Going back to the top of this conversation, you talked about how everybody listening right now has a variety of different health futures.

    2. DU

      Yeah. Yeah.

    3. SB

      And which, which health future they end up in is gonna be determined by the everyday decisions they make.

    4. DU

      Yes. Yes.

    5. SB

      So I want to really zoom in on some of those everyday decisions.

    6. DU

      Yeah.

    7. SB

      We talked about you and your biscuits, and at the time you said you were, you were probably quite sedentary as a doctor.

    8. DU

      Yeah.

    9. SB

      Sitting in a chair, patients coming in.

    10. DU

      All day long. Yeah.

    11. SB

      You weren't doing exercise.

    12. DU

      No, um, I didn't fundamentally believe it would make that much difference.

    13. SB

      Hmm.

    14. DU

      And this is such a great point. You've, you've... A really great point. So let's think about weight loss. So I would give advice on weight loss to my patients, and I would say, "Eat less and move more." And I'd even sometimes say that Belsen thing. You know, the no fat people came out of Belsen.

    15. SB

      W- I've never heard that before.

    16. DU

      That's, but it's a horrible thing to say to a patient, isn't it?

    17. SB

      What's Belsen?

    18. DU

      Well, that, that's in World War II where they all starved to things.

    19. SB

      Oh, okay.

    20. DU

      So the, the point is you're saying to somebody with an obesity problem-

    21. SB

      It's their fault

    22. DU

      ... it, yes, you're blaming them. That's exactly the point, and that's what I did. And it's worse than that because I give them that advice and it just about never works. I did a horrible thing. I used to say to them, "Right, so why don't you just have two tablespoons of All-Bran a day?"

    23. SB

      Oh, breakfast cereal.

    24. DU

      Yeah. Uh, with skim milk, and I would advise a few multivitamins and, uh, a couple of pints of skimmed milk a day. That was my advice. And then when it didn't work, who do you think I blamed?

    25. SB

      Them.

    26. DU

      Yeah. And this was all part of my epiphany. I never joined the dots that the failure was not theirs, it was mine. And that's horrible, isn't it? Imagine 25 years of I was blaming patients for their failure to lose weight, and it was my failure because I didn't give them w- advice that worked. And if you keep giving the same advice to people and it doesn't work, shouldn't I have questioned? But isn't that happening in society overall? How are we doing? How are we doing with health? How's it going? It's a disaster, isn't it? So we need to do something different. But for me, for 25 years, I did not believe that lifestyle was key, and now I do.

    27. SB

      Hmm.

    28. DU

      And that's why I didn't, I didn't think that the biscuits made that much difference. Obviously, I knew basic nutrition, so I made sure there's protein and there's iron and stuff. I fundamentally believed that drugs is what I should be using, medication, and that lifestyle was a sort of add-on.

  11. 33:05 – 35:20

    Why Most People’s Idea Of Healthy Is Completely Wrong

    1. DU

      Isn't that terrible?

    2. SB

      I, I think this is so important because it really gets to what I believe the average person thinks as well.

    3. DU

      Yeah. Yeah.

    4. SB

      Um, we were talking before we started recording about some of my friends. They are... There's, there's two friends I mentioned. One of them is a very, very successful businessman. Um, everybody knows who this person is, and they asked me this weekend, "Is pizza healthy?" And I just couldn't believe. I, it, it shook my-

    5. DU

      It's gobsmacking. It's like-

    6. SB

      It-

    7. DU

      ... "Oh, what? Pizza? Oh, what?"

    8. SB

      'Cause they were choose, trying to choose between, uh, they usually have a big 12-inch pizza-

    9. DU

      Yeah

    10. SB

      ... for lunch, and, and he was asking me, "What's healthier, Steven, uh, Nando's chicken or this 12-inch pizza" he was gonna get. And I literally looked at him like I was looking at a ghost. I was like, "Are, are you winding me up?" And he was genuinely serious. He's what? Almost 60 years old now, and he doesn't know if a chicken breast is healthier than a 12-inch pizza. And the other example that I mentioned to you before we started recording is a very famous Premier League football superstar legend, who you would assume had gone through those-

    11. DU

      Yeah

    12. SB

      ... sort of 15, 20 years as-

    13. DU

      Yes

    14. SB

      ... of being a, an academy player and then a, a pro athlete, knows what has sugar in and what doesn't. And he was asking me, "Is, is a big spaghetti carbonara, is that healthy? Is that health food?" Because he said to me during his football years, they were told always to carb load. And again, this, it, it gave me a huge amount of empathy because it made me realize how even though there's podcasts like this where we talk so much about health-

    15. DU

      Yeah

    16. SB

      ... and even though there's the internet now, the a- this information is not getting through to the average person s- for some reason. And they too, I believe, b- think exactly what you just said, that health is, you know, it's this sort of accessory where my fate is determined anyway, and if I do this health stuff, which is a bit of an inconvenience 'cause these Percy Pigs taste great-

    17. DU

      Yeah

    18. SB

      ... um, or these, these, these candies taste great, then I might be able to look a little bit better, a little bit more aesthetically pleasing.

    19. DU

      Yeah.

    20. SB

      But my fate is determined.

    21. DU

      Yeah. The simple point, yeah, nutrition, we're not teaching it. So there's only three macronutrients. There's only protein, fats, and carbohydrate, and yet your friends there haven't even got the three macronutrients, and they are successful, intelligent people.

    22. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    23. DU

      So somewhere we're going badly wrong, aren't we?

  12. 35:20 – 38:26

    Is Dried Fruit Healthy Or A Sugar Trap In Disguise

    1. SB

      Someone came in and pitched a fruit snack business, and it's basically dried out fruit pieces. Now, I looked at the back-

    2. DU

      Okay. I'm loving this already. Yeah.

    3. SB

      Yeah. I looked at the back-

    4. DU

      Yes

    5. SB

      ... and it said, "In the range of 60 to 70% sugar." Because what they've done is they've taken exotic fruits like mangoes-

    6. DU

      Yeah

    7. SB

      ... dried them out, and now you have this little chip, which is this just piece of mango, 60, 70% sugar. So I'm looking at the back of this thing thinking, "This is candy."

    8. DU

      Yeah.

    9. SB

      "This is basically candy."

    10. DU

      Thank you.

    11. SB

      But I'm looking around and every-

    12. DU

      Yeah

    13. SB

      ... 'cause it, 'cause it uses the word fruit-

    14. DU

      Yes

    15. SB

      ... people have this sort of halo assumption that if the word fruit is on it, fruit juice-

    16. DU

      It's good

    17. SB

      ... fruit snacks.

    18. DU

      It'll sell.

    19. SB

      Yeah. [laughs]

    20. DU

      And who, and also it's a sort of who cares about the consequence, but we'll make a pile of money-

    21. SB

      Yeah

    22. DU

      ... selling dried up fruit, and they miss what you read on the back.

    23. SB

      Yeah. And it said-

    24. DU

      They don't read

    25. SB

      ... 60, 70% sugar. I was like, "This is not healthy."

    26. DU

      Is that okay?

    27. SB

      Yeah. [laughs]

    28. DU

      How's that? You know, what if somebody had Type 2 di... What? For kids, this, we'll just give them... Yeah. And I... You've touched on another, another thing about what's going wrong. So when we look at my practice and this-Epidemic. And really, as I've said already, it's not an epidemic, it's a pandemic. It's everywhere. I go all over the world and obesity, Type 2 diabetes, uh, poor metabolic health is in... It's everywhere. It's everywhere. And I think one of the things, touching on what you just said, is so you, you wake up and you have your cereals for breakfast

    29. SB

      Which we've got some here

    30. DU

      ... which we have some cereals there. And then, uh, you'll have, why don't, why don't you have a big glass of fresh orange juice as well? Great idea. And then, uh, y- y- okay, that's your breakfast. But then on the way in, you have a little snack be- and people do. They buy a bar or some crisps or something like that. And then even at school they might get a muffin mid-morning. Fair enough. They might then have an apple. At lunchtime you're gonna have some sandwiches, and then you've eaten your sandwich, so you'll, I don't know, you might have, might have a cake or something or some ice cream. Then you'll go home, and then it's time for your, you know, maybe your chips or your pizza. What you've actually done is have sugar with your sugar, with your sugar, sugar, sugar, sugar, sugar all day long. There's hardly any protein. Going back then to those micro- Where was the protein to grow you? You know, and that, that's the thing, that that's changed over time, that we are, the snacking. So I've, I come across a lot of young people and their mother is saying, "I can't get him to eat any proper food. He just eats snacks all day long, and he, he won't... I can't..." They can't get protein in them, and some of them are actually thin kids. They're not all fat.

  13. 38:26 – 45:25

    These Healthy Foods Have More Sugar Than You Think

    1. SB

      have on this table. Now, I just wanna caution that we do have some people that are probably out walking their dog listening and can't see, so we're gonna have to do a bit of a voiceover-

    2. DU

      Okay

    3. SB

      ... as to what's going on.

    4. DU

      All right. Yeah.

    5. SB

      But you said wake up in the morning, you have your cereal.

    6. DU

      Yeah.

    7. SB

      Now, cereal growing up I thought was a health food.

    8. DU

      Me too.

    9. SB

      Yeah.

    10. DU

      Me too.

    11. SB

      How much sugar is in the average standard bowl of, let's say, frosted cereal?

    12. DU

      Well, we can do this different ways, Steven.

    13. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    14. DU

      This is actually like a test for you laid out here.

    15. SB

      Oh, gosh, is that for... Okay.

    16. DU

      Yeah. Th- this is a test for you, and I'll describe it.

    17. SB

      Okay.

    18. DU

      So what you've got, you've got, um, a bowl of, we'll call them f- they're cornflakes.

    19. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    20. DU

      Then you've got a potato, a baked potato. It isn't baked yet, but you could bake it if you want. You've got 150 grams, and this is boiled rice. So it's not dry, it's boiled rice. You've got a very ripe banana. And at the end there you've got a delicious-looking chocolate bar.

    21. SB

      Yeah.

    22. DU

      So you've got there, uh, some cubes of sugar, and this is the test bit-

    23. SB

      Okay

    24. DU

      ... you see, as to how I'm gonna give you, we'll score you in the end.

    25. SB

      Okay.

    26. DU

      So what I'd like you to do is consider these relatively, and each of those cubes of sugar represents a four gram teaspoon of sugar.

    27. SB

      Yeah.

    28. DU

      So if you could now just go along these and put beside each food what you believe to be the equivalent in terms of teaspoons of sugar, and then I'll give you a score and see how you do.

    29. SB

      Okay.

    30. DU

      And, uh, those are the answers, so I'm going to turn it down so you don't cheat.

  14. 45:25 – 46:56

    Is Orange Juice Actually Good For You

    1. DU

      Yeah

    2. SB

      ... gave me orange juice.

    3. DU

      Yeah.

    4. SB

      And I used to think that orange juice was a health food. So I would literally, I'd go to the fridge, I'd get open the Sunny Delight or whatever it was-

    5. DU

      Yeah, Sunny Delight. Yeah

    6. SB

      ... and I would drink that.

    7. DU

      Yeah, yeah.

    8. SB

      And I'd think I'm gonna be strong and big-

    9. DU

      Yeah

    10. SB

      ... and my body's gonna love me.

    11. DU

      Well, let's-- So the, there's a lot of sugar in orange juice. There's a lot of sugar in orange juice, and you've taken away all the... Once you take it from the fruit, as it was meant to be, and you juice it, the sugar hit is fast.

    12. SB

      Mm.

    13. DU

      So what that does is, if you think, if we go back to insulin again, um, so you, you, you drink the orange juice, your blood sugar goes up rapidly, so your body responds rapidly with insulin. Then you, what happens? Your blood sugar falls, but then you're kind of hungry again, and that's what happened to me with the biscuits, wasn't it? I ate biscuits. My blood sugar is up. Then insulin comes in, heavy and slow, but too much. Then I thought I was having a panic attack 'cause I had low blood sugar. And what's the answer to that? More biscuits, and round you go. Round. And that's how, without thinking, you'd start the day. Starting the day with a sugary breakfast without enough protein in it is driving hunger. And then you wonder why you're ravenously hungry at 10 o'clock.

    14. SB

      There was a few others that shocked me. One of them was, um, I was in Peru-

    15. DU

      Yeah

    16. SB

      ... and obviously Peru's quite

  15. 46:56 – 49:28

    The Truth About White Milk And Dark Chocolate

    1. SB

      famous for chocolate 'cause of the cacao and all that stuff.

    2. DU

      Yes. Yeah.

    3. SB

      And so we went to a chocolate-making class and, um, he told us to make dark chocolate, normal chocolate, and then white chocolate.

    4. DU

      Yeah.

    5. SB

      And when I made the white chocolate, this guy got me this big glass cylinder, and he goes, "Here's some white sugar." He goes, "Pour it in." So I, you know, I get it and I pour some in-

    6. DU

      Yeah, yeah

    7. SB

      ... and I, and he goes, "No, no, no, no, my friend. Pour it in."

    8. DU

      Yeah.

    9. SB

      And I pour it and pour it and pour it and pour it and pour it and pour it and pour it. And I'm not kidding you, I feel like, and I have to check the facts here, so community, you know me on the screen, Diary of a CEO team, I feel like I poured into this huge glass cylinder-

    10. DU

      Yeah

    11. SB

      ... 80% of white sugar.

    12. DU

      Yes, you would.

    13. SB

      And then-

    14. DU

      It's true.

    15. SB

      Yeah. And then he-

    16. DU

      I know this and it's true

    17. SB

      ... and then he said, "Put some syrup in." I went, "What?"

    18. DU

      Syrup.

    19. SB

      I said, "This is, this is white sugar." It was like some syrupy stuff-

    20. DU

      Yeah, yeah

    21. SB

      ... some oil stuff. And I was like, so white sugar, um, so white chocolate is, like, 80%-

    22. DU

      It is

    23. SB

      ... white sugar.

    24. DU

      Yeah.

    25. SB

      I've never eaten white chocolate since.

    26. DU

      Yeah.

    27. SB

      Ever.

    28. DU

      You-- That's so important. So very often people think they're a chocoholic.

    29. SB

      Mm.

    30. DU

      That's really common that people say to me, "I'm, I'm addicted to chocolate." If you look at, if you actually look at how much sugar there is in milk chocolate, uh, you know, there's many teaspoons of sugar in milk chocolate. If you eat 90% dark chocolate, there's only about two teaspoons of sugar in a bar. And what you find with the chocoholics is, I say, "Well, if you're addicted to chocolate, why don't you get a bigger hit and have the dark chocolate?" And they say, "Oh, I couldn't eat that, it's too bitter." What they're actually addicted to is the sugar. What they're a- So I've done a, there is, for the, the folks at home, there is one of these sugar infographics onChocolate in, on that subject of chocolate, because I want people to understand the consequences of what they do.

  16. 49:28 – 52:11

    Why Smoothies Aren’t As Healthy As You Think

    1. DU

      Yeah. No. They're the... You know, I'm on X or Twitter quite a lot, and that's the kind of thing fills me with rage, and I have to take a photo with, like, my f-

    2. SB

      [laughs]

    3. DU

      "Look at the sugar." Uh, there was... Yeah, it fills me with rage. I've got another thing. This is fun. I've got another, I've got a question.

    4. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    5. DU

      Right. Steven, why don't we, we could take all the blood out of me-

    6. SB

      Mm-hmm

    7. DU

      ... right? There'd be five liters. We could bleed me out right now. There would be five liters of blood in me. Let's get it in a bucket, all right? Five liters of blood. How much sugar would be in that five liters of blood?

    8. SB

      I have no idea. I don't-

    9. DU

      But it's an interesting question, isn't it? Because it relates to the consequences of eating some of these things. So I would just like you to estimate, so if let's say my blood sugar is normal.

    10. SB

      Yeah.

    11. DU

      Um, if you have a normal blood sugar, I would like you to guess how much sugar is there in my entire blood system.

    12. SB

      Uh, one, one cup like this.

    13. DU

      Thank you. No, the answer is this. Let me show you. That is all there is.

    14. SB

      You're joking.

    15. DU

      I am not. And you see immediately-

    16. SB

      One sugar cube

    17. DU

      ... that's all, and I'll do it on Twitter for you, X. I can show you the calculations. So you see, if I have a banana, and I have diabetes, th- there's too much sugar for me. You see, because glucose is, number one, vital, but number two, toxic if you have too much of it, the level of it in my blood is controlled minutely.

    18. SB

      Wow.

    19. DU

      It's controlled to this extent, and I think that single fact, you didn't know that, did you?

    20. SB

      No, I did not. I didn't.

    21. DU

      And it im- it immediately shows you how it's so easy to have more sugar than you actually need, given that. You know, so-

    22. SB

      And if your insulin stops working-

    23. DU

      Yeah. So for me, I've done an awful lot of this. So I monitor my blood sugar with a continuous glucose monitor, and I get my blood sugar up on my phone, so I can check at any time what my blood sugar is, and we'll do it in a minute and see. But you see, if I, if I eat a banana, it doubles my blood sugar because I can't regulate my blood sugar.

    24. SB

      Because of the diabetes.

    25. DU

      Yeah. So a whole banana is far too much for me and will double my blood sugar because you see, f- if I'm only supposed to have this much, and I have that much-

    26. SB

      Gosh, yeah, it's what, six times

    27. DU

      ... it's too much for me.

    28. SB

      Yeah.

    29. DU

      And I feel ill.

    30. SB

      Given, you know, I go out into the world, and I speak to the people that listen to the show, and they're, like, taxi cab drivers. It's a lot of taxi-

  17. 52:11 – 55:24

    How To Tell If Your Food Is Actually Healthy

    1. DU

      Yeah.

    2. SB

      Do you know, I wonder, I, I've got this bias towards thinking that everybody that listens is a taxi cab c- I've got this bias towards thinking that everybody that listens is a taxi cab driver because I really only spend my time in the office or in a taxi. So I get lots of feedback from these cab drivers.

    3. DU

      Yes.

    4. SB

      And the average person out there listening now, they don't know how to check if the food they are eating is good or not because the labels on these foods, I, I've got so obsessed by the marketing.

    5. DU

      Yes. Yeah.

    6. SB

      And, um, you know, I was looking at this bag of sweets the other day, and it said, "Made with real fruit juice." And they put it front and center, and I-

    7. DU

      Yeah

    8. SB

      ... I, I was almost tricked. [laughs] So I can't imagine someone who, like me, who doesn't spend, I can't imagine someone who doesn't spend their time interviewing health experts how easily the general public is being tricked. So what is your advice in terms of spotting this stuff? Like, what do I look at?

    9. DU

      Yeah.

    10. SB

      'Cause right now, I spend a lot of time looking at the sugar part.

    11. DU

      Yeah. That's great. There's different ways we can do this, and obviously, this is how I spend every clinic. That's, I'm in clinic yesterday. This is what I'm doing. I'm trying to help people understand. It's sometimes easier to talk about what maybe what you would eat rather than what you wouldn't eat. So I, for somebody with insulin resistance or Type 2 diabetes, I would tend to say, "Well, why don't you base your meal on protein? So what have you got in the fridge? Could it be chicken? Could it be eggs? What would it be?" So that's your protein. Have loads of it. Then I'm thinking, right, green veg. Will you, what green veggies would you tolerate? What green veg could you buy? Might be frozen beans, or it might be salad or whatever. And then I'm saying, "How would you make that green veg tasty?"

    12. SB

      Pour barbecue sauce on the top.

    13. DU

      Ah, no. Full-fat mayo.

    14. SB

      [laughs]

    15. DU

      Full-fat mayo or butter or olive oil or whatever so that-

    16. SB

      I say barbecue sauce because when I looked at the back of mine, I had the shock horror of realizing that there's-

    17. DU

      It's a common one

    18. SB

      ... 30 sugar cubes in a bottle, a standard bottle of barbecue sauce.

    19. DU

      There you go. Yeah.

    20. SB

      It's just pouring sugar on top.

    21. DU

      It is. It is. You have to be so vigilant, and I, I think to do it successfully, I'm quite interested in the idea of could you eat real food that's not in a packet. It's, it's, it's Russian roulette food out of packets, and yet I understand my patients north of Liverpool. You know, where are they gonna buy this stuff? So I try and help them with, "You could do it that way-If you're not, if you're gonna eat stuff out of packets, you have to wise up and you have to look at the carbohydrate content. And bear in mind every four grams is broadly equivalent to sugar. So if, if, if there's a, if there's, if something's got 100 grams of carbs in it, I've already said carbohydrate varies in how sugary it is, but it gives you an idea it's very sugary. So you see the, the area made with the cornflakes-

    22. SB

      Mm-hmm

    23. DU

      ... is there's no sugar there, but it's all carbohydrate.

    24. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    25. DU

      And it, it's a very sugary carbohydrate. So-

    26. SB

      I think we need to just explain that for, for people, which is-

    27. DU

      Yes

    28. SB

      ... when I looked at those cornflakes,

  18. 55:24 – 57:18

    How Your Body Secretly Turns Carbs Into Sugar

    1. SB

      the question I asked you is they're not frosted, so there's no sugar on them.

    2. DU

      Yes.

    3. SB

      But what the body is doing is it's converting the carbs into glucose.

    4. DU

      Right. I've got a good way. So we have to think of starchy carbs as actually glucose molecules holding hands.

    5. SB

      Okay.

    6. DU

      And then digestion comes along and breaks down. They're, they're not holding hands anymore, and they become free sugar again.

    7. SB

      'Cause we think if it's not sweet, it's not glucose.

    8. DU

      Exactly. Exactly. I don't know whether when you went to school, was this thing where you chewed bread for ages and then you could see if it became sweet or it turned into sugar.

    9. SB

      I didn't have that.

    10. DU

      It's a schoolboy experiment that's done a lot to prove that, uh, the amylase, the enzyme in spit, uh, turns starch into sugar. But that's the point, starch is soon to be sugar.

    11. SB

      It's glucose holding hands.

    12. DU

      Yeah.

    13. SB

      And when it holds hands, it's not sweet, but then when you digest it-

    14. DU

      Exactly

    15. SB

      ... it's no longer holding hands.

    16. DU

      Perfect. And that is, is broadly what, and you're not alone because didn't I make that error? Isn't that what the lady in 2012, that's what she was so furious that I was make- So here, here we are, senior partner of a large practice had forgotten, uh, that starch was sugar, and we come full circle because, and so many other people, they, they-- patients say to me, "Dr. Unwin, I know, uh, not to have sugary things. I've given up sugar in my tea and coffee, and I don't understand why my blood sugar is so high." People say that very often. And then, of course, we use the teaspoon of sugar equivalence or a continuous glucose monitor to really show them what's going on.

    17. SB

      Something that a lot of people have is bread.

    18. DU

      Yes.

    19. SB

      Um, white bread. So

  19. 57:18 – 59:22

    Is Bread Ruining Your Health

    1. SB

      I, I did some research and it said a single slice of white bread contains about 0.5 sugar cubes, but a full loaf can pack up to 12 cubes of sugar in it.

    2. DU

      That's true, but it doesn't, it doesn't include the fact that the wheat that makes the bread will turn into sugar as well.

    3. SB

      Okay.

    4. DU

      So on my teaspoon of sugar equivalent, even a small sl- slice of brown bread is about three teaspoons of sugar.

    5. SB

      Is there a healthy bread?

    6. DU

      That's a really great, great question. And of course it depends how well your insulin's working. So if you're young and you take a lot of exercise and your insulin's really good, then maybe brown bread is f- is okay.

    7. SB

      I would-

    8. DU

      If you're like me though, with insulin resistance, there i- it would have to be a low-carb bread. So I wouldn't normally eat bread under any circumstances, but I might have low-carb bread.

    9. SB

      I, uh, did some research that said sprouted grain bread, never heard of that before, or 100% whole grain rye are the healthiest options because they contain zero added sugar and high fiber, so-

    10. DU

      Right. I mean, what I'd say to people, again, it depends. How much exercise do you take? How do you know? Have you had your fasting insulin measured? Do you know if you're insulin resistant or not?

    11. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    12. DU

      Um, if you're healthy, take lots of exercise, sounds good. Fair enough. If you s- if you're beginning to develop a tummy, well maybe not so good. And if you don't know, I'm a great one for experimenting, and that's where I come back again to consider, uh, buying a continuous glucose monitor. The thing you wear on, I've got one on me now, and it tells my phone how is my blood sugar so I can experiment then. I could try your bread and within an hour I would know.

    13. SB

      This has had probably the single biggest impact on my office.

  20. 59:22 – 1:01:25

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    1. SB

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  21. 1:01:25 – 1:05:47

    What Nutrition Labels Aren’t Telling You

    1. SB

      look at the back of everything I eat.

    2. DU

      Yes.

    3. SB

      Um, and I'm building, I guess, a mental model of the different levels of carbohydrates and sugar content and fiber-

    4. DU

      Yeah, yeah, yeah

    5. SB

      ... and all those other things, and proteins, et cetera. But I always seem to zoom in on the sugar.

    6. DU

      Yes.

    7. SB

      The added sugar.

    8. DU

      Ah, right. There is an error there.

    9. SB

      Okay.

    10. DU

      So y- that's brilliant, and you... The fact you're interested and trying is great because you'll learn so much more. Because of course, the sugar is one thing, but you must also look at the carbohydrate.

    11. SB

      Okay.

    12. DU

      The carbohydrate content. Now, um, this is done differently in the United States from here, confusingly. Here, we talk about carbohydrate separately from fiber, so that in the UK when it says carbohydrate, that turns into sugar. In the States, you've got, uh, the carbohydrate including fiber, so it makes it more complicated for you because you need to know which... how much of that carbohydrate are you gonna absorb. Well, let's go back to the three macronutrients. So you should be interested in protein, how much you want. You want, you want to be a muscly kinda guy, so you want your protein. Uh, the carbohydrate, well, why do you need that, I'm wondering. And then fats, well, you might need those for fat-soluble vitamins. So those are the, uh, the three things so that you become more sophisticated. And if things have a lot of preservatives, if they have an awful lot of ingredients, I'm immediately suspicious.

    13. SB

      I think one of the things that people, that I've come to learn through interviewing people like yourself, is that it's not just the direct consequence of having a big, uh, glucose spike or, uh, uh, you know, having high blood sugar. It's also the fact that when I eat things like Mars bars or the white rice here, I then get more hungry later.

    14. DU

      Exactly.

    15. SB

      Which means I eat even-

    16. DU

      Yeah

    17. SB

      ... more sugar that same day.

    18. DU

      Exactly.

    19. SB

      And the next day, and the next day.

    20. DU

      And of course, that's what my patients right back in 2013, it was the absence of hunger they found fascinating.

    21. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    22. DU

      And I did 'cause I'd been hungry all my life, because all my life I'd been, uh, carb heavy, and I didn't realize that the more carbs you eat, the hungrier you become. I don't know, have you ever tried fasting? I bet you have.

    23. SB

      Oh, my gosh. Yeah.

    24. DU

      Right.

    25. SB

      I fast most days, to be honest. I'm, I haven't eaten today, and it-

    26. DU

      Yeah

    27. SB

      ... what, what time are we? We're what? I don't know, uh, 1, 1 PM. And during the Dragon's Den filming, I, I don't eat often until the evening, so.

    28. DU

      Great. So isn't that interesting? So I used to, I used to have a model which was, um, that if I didn't eat, I was hungry, right?

    29. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    30. DU

      So if I didn't eat for even twice as long, I'd be twice as hungry.

  22. 1:05:47 – 1:10:25

    Keto Diet Solution Or Hidden Risk

    1. DU

      Wow, that's a f-... Oh, that's a big question, isn't it? And don't you think we need to begin with what you want? So I think we need to begin with your goals and hope. Why would... Is it, are you wanting to lose weight? Are you wanting to sort out type 2 dubi- diabetes? Or I'm f-... I mean, Georgia Ede, Dr. Georgia Ede is a close friend.

    2. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    3. DU

      And nutritional psychiatry is really growing, and the, this Ian Campbell in Edinburgh University is doing some amazing work with bipolar disorder and other things. So why are you doing it? That's, so that's my first thing because this is... I see it as there is a spectrum of carbohydrate that you're on. So I try and find out where are you now, and I, you know, approximately where are you now? And then I'd say, "Well, could you, could you give up bread or reduce it?" And then I'd say, "Let's, let's measure whatever parameter we want," which might be blood work or weight or whatever. Then we say, "How are you doing?"Are you happy now? Is this, is it? Or do you want, would you like to go a bit lower? And what I've discovered with my patients over 13 years is they tend to go lower over time because when they experiment, when they go keto, what they like is the brain thing.

    4. SB

      Oh, gosh, yeah.

    5. DU

      And that's what I'm... That's, right.

    6. SB

      Yeah.

    7. DU

      So I would say to you now, 'cause I'm interested-

    8. SB

      Yeah

    9. DU

      ... why would you go keto? What are you after?

    10. SB

      Um, so I'm gonna put the brain thing at the top of the list, which is just the clarity of thought. Obviously in my job, I have to sit here with very smart people-

    11. DU

      Yes

    12. SB

      ... like you.

    13. DU

      Yes. Yeah.

    14. SB

      And I have to talk sometimes for three, four hours, whatever it might be. But also I'm on television a lot now, and I'm speaking, um, you know, cameras, nine cameras rolling, BBC One, and I've got to think of something smart to say to this entrepreneur stood in front of me on-

    15. DU

      Yeah

    16. SB

      ... that's pitching to me. And then also I'm in meetings. You know, I'll leave this conversation now, and I'll go straight downstairs, and I'll have two hours of straight meetings about very, very complicated things about buying companies. I'll be meeting founders, interviewing people, and what I've noticed profoundly, because so much of my job centers on speaking and articulation, is there is this wild, wild, wild variance that I hate. And what I mean by that is some days I'm on it-

    17. DU

      Yeah

    18. SB

      ... and some days I'm almost embarrassed by my inability to string a sentence together.

    19. DU

      Yeah.

    20. SB

      Today I'm, I, I'm almost testing myself now by trying to speak really, really fast and seeing if my brain is connected to my mouth.

    21. DU

      [laughs]

    22. SB

      That's like, that's actually like what I do.

    23. DU

      Yeah.

    24. SB

      I try and see if I, if it flows out.

    25. DU

      Yeah.

    26. SB

      Today I'm okay.

    27. DU

      Yeah.

    28. SB

      Um, but there are days where I'm stumbling over myself.

    29. DU

      Yeah.

    30. SB

      And I go, "What's, what's causing this? What's the causal factor, and how do I prevent this?"

  23. 1:10:25 – 1:20:35

    How To Set Health Goals That Actually Work

    1. SB

      able to... Hmm. What I'm really, I think, scared of, I'm just gonna be completely honest-

    2. DU

      Yeah

    3. SB

      ... is I'm scared of having the same health profile as my dad.

    4. DU

      Ah. Right. Yes.

    5. SB

      Because I've seen, we have the same, you know, we have a lot of the same genetic profile.

    6. DU

      Yes.

    7. SB

      So I think a lot of us look at our parents and go, "Is that my future?"

    8. DU

      Yes. Yeah.

    9. SB

      And to make it even more specific, I remember walking down some stairs. I've said this once before, but I, I remember walking down some stairs in Bali.

    10. DU

      Mm.

    11. SB

      Long, steep set of stairs down to go whitewat- water rafting with my fiancée.

    12. DU

      Yeah.

    13. SB

      And I remember as I walked down those stairs recalling that my dad loses, can't walk up a single flight of stairs without problems. And I remember thinking, "Oh, my dad wouldn't have been able to come white water rafting, because we've got to walk back up these stairs."

    14. DU

      Yeah.

    15. SB

      And so my dad would have lost out on one of the great joys of life, which is doing enjoyable things with friends and people you love, because his health is now, hi- in that regard, is gone. Um, so I, I've always thought of that. And then generally, like I, I remember when I was younger, my dad used to play, like, football with us and-

    16. DU

      Yes, yes

    17. SB

      ... and all these things, and he's unable to do that now. Um, and so I'm tr- and because I've done this podcast so many times with health experts, I've realized that the decisions I make at 30, which is where I am now, exist on this really interesting, quite predictable curve of inevitable decline. However, not, like, inevitable, uh, loss of lifestyle. What I mean by that is I just have this picture in my head of all these graphs I've seen, where, like, your peak is around maybe 2030-

    18. DU

      Mm

    19. SB

      ... and then you're going down, which we all accept. But how far you go down is determined by decisions you make right now.

    20. DU

      Absolutely.

    21. SB

      The decisions I make now will end me at 70, 80 years old in either the inability to walk or the ability to run.

    22. DU

      Yeah.

    23. SB

      And it's all about what I do now.

    24. DU

      It is. So that, let's just refine that. So we've, we've, we've... I've got your goal-

    25. SB

      Yeah

    26. DU

      ... now. So let, let's park your goal. Now, the next thing we've got is, in the past, what have you done that's worked?... towards those goals. So you probably tell me some stuff you've done that's worked

    27. SB

      Um, l- things like going to the gym?

    28. DU

      Yeah, yeah, anything.

    29. SB

      Okay.

    30. DU

      Anything quickly that you did that worked that im- that was, is, is a, is a first, you know, helped that you did and you remember that worked. So tell me anything. One thing.

  24. 1:20:35 – 1:31:21

    How To Help Loved Ones Change Before It’s Too Late

    1. SB

      and they've-

    2. DU

      Yeah, yeah

    3. SB

      ... got the sort of basics, they go, "Do you know what? I understand this stuff and I'm making good progress, but I live with or love someone-

    4. DU

      Yes

    5. SB

      ... who I, I am, I'm scared they're going down a slippery slope."

    6. DU

      Yes. Yeah.

    7. SB

      "And I don't know what to do. Do I intervene? Do I hide their sweets? Do I blame? What do I do?"

    8. DU

      That is so hard, isn't it? That's so hard. I think you can.

    9. SB

      Weren't you in that po- position to some degree?

    10. DU

      Yes. Uh, yeah. So, uh, my first wife had a very severe addiction problem, so I lived with that for 12 years, and she's unfortunately died now. Um, so I lived with very, very serious addiction for 12 years, and what you're doing then is you're living with uncertainty, serious uncertainty. Uh, you never, you cannot say what you'll come home to. You have no idea. No idea. It brings chaos into your life. It's very, very hard.

    11. SB

      Addiction.

    12. DU

      Yes.

    13. SB

      Are, are you able to say what kind of addict? Was it a food addiction or a drug addiction or?

    14. DU

      It was a, it w- m- nearly everybody concerned has died now, so I don't know whether I can say or not, but it was very serious multiple addictions, I will say that.

    15. SB

      Okay.

    16. DU

      And she ha- she died some years ago. And it doesn't, it, it, it actually wasn't food addiction.

    17. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    18. DU

      But it brings, I have so much sympathy with dealing, how s- how hard it is to deal with uncertainty and not be able to... You love somebody and you can't do anything. It's very hard. There are things you can do. I think, um, if you can engage people in, in that talking about goals, that can help. Uh, what we will do now is we'll change that conversation to, to the current Mrs. Unwin, which is what we laughingly say. This is Jen. So we, we've been together for 30 years now. And Jen's story is that she actually is an ultra-processed food addict, genuinely. And what that means is, I didn't unders- neither of us understood what that was. Even though she's a consultant psychologist, she didn't realize that she was an ultra-processed food addict. What she saw it as was a weight problem, and all her life she's, she's been boomerang dieting, so she'd be a big woman and then a little woman and a big woman, and I used to watch it all. "What's going on?" And then she would, there'd be tray bakes. Like, she's trying to lose weight and making tray bakes, saying it's for the children, and then scoffing the lot herself. So then I'd, because I loved her, and I think blokes, we try and solve problems, don't we?

    19. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    20. DU

      We're like cavemen. I wanted to rescue her. So I'm s- I'm either throwing the food away or I'm tackling her, and then she, we're having such arguments 'cause she's defensive and cross. I, I couldn't understand with an intelligent woman what's going on. But then, uh, this is only a few years ago, she understood for the first time, this is addiction. When you have intelligent people, highly, highly intelligent people doing stuff that harms their health repeatedly, is this not like cigarettes? Is it not like alcohol? That is ultra-processed food addiction. And there's a patient I'd like to tell you about that is, explains it even more clearly, and this patient has consented for me to tell you because he wants to help the world. So this is a guy who's a very successful guy. He runs, um, he's a wealthy person with a successful business. He's not stupid. He has Type 2 diabetes. He's fifty-five. He has Type 2 diabetes. He's very much overweight. Unfortunately, he needs really serious surgery because both his knees have been so destroyed by his weight that he can hardly walk because he's in real agony. But his Type 2 diabetes is so bad, his blood sugar control is so bad, the anesthetist won't touch him. So he's trapped. He can't get the op because his blood sugar is high. He can't run his business easily 'cause he can't hardly walk. So obviously what we do is we say, "You need to go low carbAnd it works for a bit and he loses some weight, but then he gains the weight again. And this goes on for four years while I see him so regularly every month. "What's going on? What's going on?" Oh, excuses, the grandchildren. Um, I've got a holiday, Christmas. It goes on. Anyway, then his wife came to see me and she said, "Dr. Unwin, I need to level with you. You need to understand what's going on. I find that my husband is getting up at 4:00 in the morning and eating bread out of the fridge. So what I do now, what I started doing was at the end of every day, I put all the bread in the bin if it hasn't been eaten that day. But then I discovered my husband was going in the bin to eat the bread." Then what she does, she's a, a, a very formidable woman. She started putting detergent, liquid detergent on any bread that goes in the bin, but he still eats it. He's getting up at 4:00 in the morning, rummaging through the bin to eat the bread with the detergent on. So then she tries something else and she says, "This is the only thing that will stop my husband from eating bread if it's there. I spray bleach on the bread and leave the can of bleach by the bin so he knows don't even look." Okay? What I've described to you is addiction. This is an intelligent person, and imagine his self-esteem, how it was to live like that, concealing what he was doing and not telling his doctor, 'cause I'm trying so hard for him for years, and he, he's so s-sweet to me now, and he often, uh, shakes my hand and gives me a hug. He said, "You tried. You really tried." Anyway, my stories have a happy ending always. What I did for him in the end, he needed everything, so low carb. Then I got him using a continuous glucose monitor-

    21. SB

      Mm-hmm

    22. DU

      ... so that he would get feedback immediately and see that spike. And also I could see the spikes as well, 'cause he had to come and show me his tracings. And on top of that, I did something unusual. I gave him a low dose of the new GLP-1 drugs.

    23. SB

      Ozempic.

    24. DU

      One of those.

    25. SB

      Yeah.

    26. DU

      Um, and the three together, he managed to not... He couldn't moderate, but he could abstain, and then he could do it. The Ozempic helped reduce the noise, the cravings in his head. The feedback from the CGM helped him know how he was doing, and the support he got from me and the low carb pulled together. And all three, and he's had his operation now. And so it's a happy story, but he's got maintenance. All his life he's gonna have to sort that out. Um, and it's a wonderful example because I think we trivialize this. We call it carb creep like it doesn't matter. But there are many people listening to us right now and they know, they know they're addicted to various foods. They know because when you ask them, they often burst into tears. Often I-- somebody will say, "I've never told anybody in my entire life about..." And bread is a common one. And if you're not addicted to bread, you can't imagine it. But if you are addicted to bread, they say, "This sounds so stupid. I'm so embarrassed to tell you I can't control how I eat bread."

    27. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    28. DU

      And so it's not great for your self-esteem, is it?

    29. SB

      No.

    30. DU

      But people might be addicted to many things and, uh, my wife's published many papers on this and written a book and this, that, and the other. Um, and she would say about 14% of the population has some aspects of ultra-processed food addiction. Um, and it, it kind of explains so much. Why are intelligent people eating foods they know do them harm? I've got another example. One of my patients with Type 2 diabetes, we got drug-free remission. Hooray. I've done that now 157 times. So every one of them I'm cheering when it happens. So this guy, we did it, drug-free remission. Then he vanished for a while and, um, came back with two dead toes and he had to have them amputated. Now what-

  25. 1:31:21 – 1:34:50

    The 4 Step Plan To Break Addiction For Good

    1. SB

      in control, they're out of control-

    2. DU

      Yes

    3. SB

      ... they're in control-

    4. DU

      It can vary

    5. SB

      ... they're, you know. I've been there. Um, what is step one today? So they're listening to you, they're going, "Fucking hell, I don't wanna lose my toes," and all of these problems.

    6. DU

      Yeah.

    7. SB

      What is step one now?

    8. DU

      Now, are we talking about for somebody with Type 2 diabetes or somebody who can't control what they're eating?

    9. SB

      For someone that can't control what they're eating.

    10. DU

      Great. Right. So step one, we just did it. I think step one is acknowledging that is your problem. Because if you don't, if you're not honest about your problem, how are you ever gonna sort it out?

    11. SB

      Honesty.

    12. DU

      So the first thing is honesty, and that's very hard for people. All of us have made excuses. You know, me and my biscuits. I believed the, the... It was easier for me to think that that was stress and a reasonable reaction to the stress of running a practice than it was to say, "I've got a..." You know, biscuits for me, it took me a year to give them up. A year. How pathetic is that? I was so driven, it took me a whole year.

    13. SB

      How did you give them up?

    14. DU

      Um, I did it by weaning myself off, a bit like methadone. So I went from, um, I like chocolate ginger biscuits, and then I went to digestive plain, and then I went to oat biscuits, and then eventually I went to almonds.

    15. SB

      Why didn't you just do it all at once?

    16. DU

      I should have done. And, uh, Jen, Jen's a great believer in cold turkey, like, "What is the thing? Stop it." I wasn't man enough for that, and it took me a whole year. So the first, the first thing is be honest. Truth. Be honest with yourself, even if you can't tell other people. Be honest with yourself. A- is there an addictive potential there? Could that be? Does that fit? Number two, specifically which foods is your problem? And be honest. Um, because if you, if you're not honest, then y- you... Number three is have a plan for abstinence.

    17. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    18. DU

      Because if you, if, if there is an, a, uh, if you have got an addictive potential, um, y- it won't be one biscuit. And we all... Who, you know, how many of us have said, "I'm gonna give up ice cream," or biscuits, or pizza, or whatever it is.

    19. SB

      And then you have a shit day and-

    20. DU

      You do. W- or you have a drink or whatever.

    21. SB

      Yeah.

    22. DU

      You think, "Tomorrow."

    23. SB

      Work stresses you out.

    24. DU

      Yeah. Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow. So it's very important to be specific about the foods, and then to have a plan for how you are going to do it. And another thing is sometimes it's helpful, you know the people around you that love you-

    25. SB

      Mm-hmm

    26. DU

      ... maybe share with them that it's, it's, that it's important and that I need, I might need some help. Please be tolerant with me. Like cigarettes. Please be tolerant if I'm short-tempered. I'm gonna try and do this thing 'cause it's important. The difficulty, it depends whether the person that loves you can be gentle or if they're heavy-handed. If you confess this and then they police you-

    27. SB

      Judgemental

    28. DU

      ... yeah, it doesn't help.

    29. SB

      Yeah, yeah, yeah.

    30. DU

      What you're asking for is gentle support and tolerance. And that's-

  26. 1:34:50 – 1:35:50

    Why Addiction Leads To Deception

    1. SB

      into their health-

    2. DU

      Yeah

    3. SB

      ... that it made me start to hide when I was eating bad. I would-

    4. DU

      Exactly.

    5. SB

      Yeah.

    6. DU

      Thank you for that. That's, that's what happens.

    7. SB

      Mm.

    8. DU

      And you see that people become deceitful.

    9. SB

      Yeah.

    10. DU

      So the m- if you police somebody you love, the result is deceit.

    11. SB

      I was hiding the wrappers of the things-

    12. DU

      Yeah. Yeah

    13. SB

      ... I was eating.

    14. DU

      Jen did that with me. She would, uh, she sh- she knew that I was monitoring, so she starts hiding the wrappers, or then I'd find them in the car.

    15. SB

      Mm.

    16. DU

      And then, but then we have a situation that we can no longer talk about it, because... So the... If, if somebody, if you're forcing somebody to become deceitful, you have to back off a little bit-

    17. SB

      Yeah

    18. DU

      ... because that deceit then affects self-esteem, and that can make them worse.

    19. SB

      Yeah.

    20. DU

      And you didn't want to make them worse.

    21. SB

      And then they're lonely 'cause they-

    22. DU

      Yes

    23. SB

      ... they can't share the bad days.

    24. DU

      Yes. Yeah. It, it's really good. I wonder, please could we show Jen's book at this point?

    25. SB

      Of course.

    26. DU

      So can I just explain the book? So this,

  27. 1:35:50 – 1:37:27

    Book Giveaway

    1. DU

      this is Jen's book, and the most important thing is Jen doesn't make a penny out of this book. So it's Fork in the Road, with the idea that in your journey, which one are you gonna pick?

    2. SB

      Mm.

    3. DU

      Do you see? So it's Fork in the Road. She doesn't make any money from this. Every penny goes to a charity that she's set up helping people with food addiction. It's available on Amazon and self-published on Amazon.

    4. SB

      How m- how much does this book cost? It's not a lot, is it?

    5. DU

      It's about 15 pounds. Or no, it's less. I think it might be 10. 10 quid.

    6. SB

      Okay, I'll tell you what I'll do.

    7. DU

      Yeah.

    8. SB

      I'll buy a thousand of them.

    9. DU

      Fabulous.

    10. SB

      And I'll put a link below in the comment section. And so I... all you've got to do is, if you've really enjoyed this conversation and you'd like to get Jen's book, um-

    11. DU

      Fork in the Road

    12. SB

      ... A Fork in the Road. Maybe we can even get some of them signed. Not all of them, 'cause that would break her hand.

    13. DU

      We could. Yeah. [laughs]

    14. SB

      But hopefully get a couple of them signed.

    15. DU

      Oh, that is brilliant.

    16. SB

      Click below and, um, we'll send 1,000 of them out, and that's just a thank you from, from me to both you and Jen, but also to the community who tune in for these conversations. And it's so great that people can get such simple information that's so accessible and so, um, rigorous in its scientific credentials, um, in a way like this that they can... that could change some people's lives.

    17. DU

      Great.

    18. SB

      Isn't that a wonderful thing, you know? That a, a simple book like this, which isn't long either. It's only 100 pages.

    19. DU

      No, it's not a big read.

    20. SB

      Could change some people's lives. That's such a wonderful thing.

    21. DU

      Steve, what are you doing?

    22. SB

      Uh, just making myself a

  28. 1:37:27 – 1:39:42

    Ads

    1. SB

      delicious coffee

    2. DU

      From the freezer?

    3. SB

      From the freezer. Have you not heard about Cometeer?

    4. DU

      No.

    5. SB

      Oh my gosh. This is gonna change your life. I invested in this company called Cometeer last year, and they're now one of the sponsors of this podcast because they've taken a pretty revolutionary approach to making coffee. Every coffee is precision brewed at 10 times the strength, and then they flash freeze it with liquid nitrogen to lock in the flavor and freshness, and then it's delivered to you on dry ice in these recyclable aluminum capsules, still frozen like a little ice cube. All you have to do is pop the capsule out, add some hot water, and then you stir it, and you are good to go. You can also make delicious iced coffee drinks as well. Just pour it in, stir it up. And for anyone that hasn't tried it, you can get $30 off your first order of Cometeer Coffee if you go to cometeer.com/steven. I've done almost 700 interviews with some of the most interesting people in the world, and one of the things you learn, which is unexpected, is that vulnerability is the doorway to connection. And after sitting here for two, three hours with a guest, I feel a deep sense of connection to them. And as they leave, what I get them to do is to write a question in The Diary Of A CEO. We've taken all of the questions from The Diary Of A CEO. We have put the question here on this card with the name of the person that wrote it, so you can sit at home, as I do with my fiancée and my colleagues at work and other people in my life. Whenever we get a minute, we play The Diary Of A CEO Conversation Cards, and it is incredible what happens. These are great if you're in a romantic relationship and you want to connect your partner more. These are also great if you're in a team and you want to bond your team together. And I have to say they're also great for families that wanna learn more about each other and that need a good excuse to spend some time in a digital world, in the analog environment, connecting human to human. It is remarkable what the right question at the right time can do. Go to thediary.com, and you can get these Conversation Cards right now. You said something earlier on about the link between, uh, sort of your di- dietary choices and cancer.

  29. 1:39:42 – 1:45:09

    The Link Between Diet And Cancer What This Means

    1. DU

      Mm-hmm.

    2. SB

      I've actually got a friend of mine who used to work for me who is going through a, a cancer process at the moment. She's very, very young. She's actually younger than I am.

    3. DU

      Wow.

    4. SB

      And she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She's a really good friend of mine. Um, and she was my, actually my manager for a couple years. She's called Katie. She's very public about this, so she's posting her journey online, so I can, I can say her name. And, um, I've been following her, and she's, she's, you know, she's removing a lot of the, the foods we've talked about today from her diet. So she's very front of mind for me at the moment, and I was looking at some of the stats around the link between our dietary choices and cancer outcomes, and I'm gonna read them.

    5. DU

      Great.

    6. SB

      Now, my team might cut some of them out, but I think they're worth hearing because hearing them, I think, is quite, um, enlightening. A massive French study found that drinking just 100 mil of sugary drinks per day, which could be, you know, a third of a can of soda, is associated with a almost 20% increased risk of overall cancer. Women who consume two or more dietary drinks daily have over double the risk of early onset coloral cancer compared to those who drink less than one a week. High consumption of sugary sweetened beverages is linked to a 78% higher risk of estrogen-dependent endometrial cancer in women. Drinking 20 ounces of sugared, of sugary soda daily is linked to shortening your telomeres, which are the protective caps on your DNA, equating to 4.6 years of extra biological aging, which is a major risk factor for cancer. High sugar intake causes chronic hyperinsulinemia.

    7. DU

      Chronic hyperinsulinemia.

    8. SB

      [laughs]

    9. DU

      Can I-

    10. SB

      It's not a word

    11. DU

      ... so that is when I'm saying when the insulin levels are high-

    12. SB

      High insulin

    13. DU

      ... which I explained at the beginning.

    14. SB

      Which can inhibit apoptosis-

    15. DU

      Yeah

    16. SB

      ... the natural process where damaged or cancerous cells self-destruct.

    17. DU

      Yes. Yeah.

    18. SB

      Wow. Two more. Fructose is processed in the liver and converted into lipids, which are fats, which is what we were talking about earlier, which recent studies show certain tumors directly consume to build their cell membranes.

    19. DU

      Yeah.

    20. SB

      And lastly, diets high in added sugars chronically elevate C-reactive proteins called CRPs, an inflammation marker that is heavily correlated with tumor progression and metastasis.

    21. DU

      Yeah. So what I'd like to s- this is, that is so interesting, and it brings to mind a really important point. We talk so much around the world about treating cancer, but i- what about prevention? Because for your friend, that's a life sentence, and she's living with uncertainty and fear. And when I tell patients they have cancer, you know, you feel it right here because you just took away so much. And it's interesting, do we try hard enough? If we know that, are we trying hard enough to prevent cancer? Because that's what we should be doing, 'cause we know a lot that I think after smoking-

    22. SB

      Hmm

    23. DU

      ... diet is the next commonest cause of cancer. And, you know, how serious does it have to get when we-- you, you just gave all those references then, and, uh, uh, I know that, uh, junk food is linked to all-cause mortality. It's linked to so many things. Uh, what, what are we prepared to sacrifice for enjoying, you know, treats and snacks? It's kind of, when you look at it like that, it's really bonkers.

    24. SB

      Yeah.

    25. DU

      Really bonkers.

    26. SB

      This sounds a bit crazy, but sometimes I imagine receiving the diagnosis.

    27. DU

      Yeah.

    28. SB

      And I do a bit of, I guess they might call it pre-mortem, um, a pre-mortem not a post-mortem, where I imagine on that dayThe decisions I wish I would have made. And I'm not saying all cancer is linked to what we eat, because that's not the case. But I'm, I'm imagining like the worst diagnosis I could ever be given, and the doctor telling me that my lifestyle choices contributed to that over the last five, 10, 15 years.

    29. DU

      Yes.

    30. SB

      And in that moment, is there any-

  30. 1:45:09 – 1:48:21

    Why Our Healthspan Is Quietly Declining

    1. SB

      can both waste less time but also have more time, and when I learned about the difference between like lifespan and healthspan-

    2. DU

      Yes

    3. SB

      ... that also added to this equation.

    4. DU

      Yeah.

    5. SB

      You know, people will still live to 80 years old, but-

    6. DU

      It's not worth it

    7. SB

      ... they're only healthy for like 30, 40 years.

    8. DU

      And that's a very imp- the idea of healthspan is very important because we know in the UK it's going down.

    9. SB

      Oh, is it?

    10. DU

      Yes. Um, uh, it, it, they're looking at that now. Lifespan is hanging out there as sort of stuttering along, but healthspan is going down in the UK, and it's worth thinking why that is.

    11. SB

      Well, I, I would hazard a guess it's, uh, relates to all the things you've talked about today.

    12. DU

      I think it may do.

    13. SB

      In England, you're totally right. It says in England, the situation is particularly alarming. Healthspan is actively declining even as overall lifespan slowly creeps up. Recent 2024 to 2026 data from the Office of National Statistics, the ONS, and the Health Foundation paints a stark picture of the UK's widening sick years gap. Over the last decade, healthy life expectancy in the UK has fallen by roughly two years. As of the latest data, men in the UK can expect to spend about 60 years in good health and women about 60 years of good health as well. Because overall life expectancy Eng- in England is rising, um, people are now spending roughly up to 23 years at the end of their lives with poor health and in sickness. This means the average person spends nearly a quarter of their life managing chronic illness and/or disability. Wow.

    14. DU

      And that's exactly the point, isn't it? That's exactly the point, and it relates to another thing I'd like to tell you about as well. This is, um, government figures. Every taxpayer in England pays an extra £7,000 tax per year for the consequences of ultra-processed food.

    15. SB

      Hmm.

    16. DU

      Everybody's paying tax, extra tax, £7,000 a year, and this is because it's not just the cost of the drugs. The bigger co- bigger cost is the s- is the people not paying tax themselves and not able to work because they're ill, and that is, that's two-thirds of the cost is the lack of revenue because so much of our population isn't well enough to work, and that's very, and a lot of it's young people too. It's very serious.

    17. SB

      I know, I think about 30, 40% of our listeners are in the United States.

    18. DU

      Yeah.

    19. SB

      So I've got some bad news for everybody in the United States as well. The US-

    20. DU

      Oh, yeah. How is it there? [laughs]

    21. SB

      The US currently holds a rather grim record. It has the largest healthspan-to-lifespan gap on Earth. Despite the United States having lower overall life expectancy than almost all of its peer nations and premature death rate that is nearly twice the average of comparable countries, its healthspan stats sit as the worst in the world. So if you're in the United States, as things stand, you will be sicker for longer, um, or have less of a healthspan.

    22. DU

      We're tr- we're, we're trying to keep catch up though, aren't we? We're do- you know, we're doing our best in the UK.

    23. SB

      We're doing our best.

    24. DU

      Yes.

    25. SB

      You know? We're doing our best to catch up. Um, I have this piece of string here-

    26. DU

      Yes

    27. SB

      ... um, which is, uh,

  31. 1:48:21 – 1:50:25

    The Simple String Test That Reveals Your Metabolic Health

    1. SB

      I guess a mechanism you use to figure out if-

    2. DU

      I do

    3. SB

      ... people's waist and, I guess, fat levels are too high on the, on the belly.

    4. DU

      I think it's bigger than that.

    5. SB

      Okay.

    6. DU

      So I'm interested in low-cost ways for people to find out, well, how are you, how are you doing? How are you doing?

    7. SB

      Yeah.

    8. DU

      And so one recognized way looking at metabolic health is your waist should be less than half your height. So if we have a piece of string, which we have there, I believe you're six foot one.

    9. SB

      Yes.

    10. DU

      And you've, you've marked halfway. So half of that string should go around the fattest bit of your belly.

    11. SB

      People come up to me all the time, you know, and they go, "Oh, my God. You're so much taller than I thought."

    12. DU

      Yeah. [laughs]

    13. SB

      Because they've only ever seen me sat down.

    14. DU

      Yeah, yeah, yeah.

    15. SB

      My entire career is people watching me on TV.

    16. DU

      So that's right. Cut it in half.

    17. SB

      Okay.

    18. DU

      And then let's see, will it go around your belly, yes or no?

    19. SB

      Okay. So I've cut the, the string in half.

    20. DU

      Yes.

    21. SB

      Which part of my belly? 'Cause-

    22. DU

      The fattest part.

    23. SB

      The fattest part. Okay.

    24. DU

      Yeah. So be honest about the fat part.

    25. SB

      Okay.

    26. DU

      Can I look?

    27. SB

      Yeah.

    28. DU

      You did it.

    29. SB

      Yeah.

    30. DU

      Is that...

  32. 1:50:25 – 1:53:04

    Are Supplements Helping Or Hurting You

    1. DU

      Yeah.

    2. SB

      What's your, what's your point of view?

    3. DU

      Right. So my point of view is, if you can, my, my gut reaction is to try and use diet to give you what you need, if you can.

    4. SB

      Which diet?

    5. DU

      A lower, a real food, low-ish carbohydrate diet is my preferred thing, with plenty of protein in there, and healthy fats. I'm very interested in farming and regenerative agriculture and all that kind of thing, and what I know is that the nutrient profile of crops grown today is not nearly as good as it was 100 years ago. So we have some problems, and it, it's to do with the soil. If you keep just adding nitrogen and harvesting crops, those crops do not contain as much zinc or magnesium particularly. And so the tragedy is that although my aim would be to have you healthy with a real food diet, there are some things you cannot get in the diet now that your grandparents could, and one of them is magnesium. It's very, very difficult to get enough magnesium in your diet without supplementation. And as you get older, you absorb the magnesium less and less. Also, a lot of medication interferes with magnesium absorption, particularly drugs for, um, acidity. So magnesium supplementation for most people.

    6. SB

      Okay.

    7. DU

      In myself, it was magic at getting rid of muscle cramps. I sleep a lot better. I think we also need to talk about magnesium, which magnesium, 'cause it varies a hell of a lot. And, uh, this bit's embarrassing. Depends on your bowels.

    8. SB

      Okay.

    9. DU

      Right? Have you got fast or slow bowels? You don't need to tell, tell me. If, if you're, if you tend to be a bit constipated, magnesium citrate is very good. It helps. It's more laxative, and it, you're ab- you absorb some of it anyway. If your bowels are not a problem, and particularly if you're wanting better sleep or mood, magnesium glycinate or threonate is, actually crosses the blood-brain barrier but won't help with constipation. So that's a very quick thing on, uh, magnesium. Have you, have we got time for me to tell you about the first cow I ever bought?

  33. 1:53:04 – 2:02:57

    The Magnesium Story That Will Change How You Think

    1. SB

      Go ahead.

    2. DU

      And it's relevant to magnesium.

    3. SB

      Go ahead.

    4. DU

      Right. So my wife and I, my wife Jen, we have this idea that if you love somebody, then gifts are, you should try and think what would that person like. Don't buy somebody a present you would like.

    5. SB

      Yeah.

    6. DU

      And it was Jen trying to get me to grow up.

    7. SB

      Yeah. [laughs]

    8. DU

      Right? And this is how she did it. So she said to me one day, "Right. Get a coat and a pair of Wellingtons. I'm gonna take you out." And she drove me into Lancashire, and there was a field of cows, and she said, "I have bought you any one of those cows," 'cause I'd always wanted a cow, and we had a field. And she... How, what a woman is this? She knew I wanted... She went to the farmer in advance and prepaid for any cow and said, "This field, I've, I, I bought a cow. You just pick which one you like, and he'll transport it home." How does this relate to magnesium, you're wondering? Well, it does, because the farmer said, "You can have whichever cow you like, but I've lost 15 cows, uh, to a thing called the staggers this year, and you cannot have the cow unless you promise me you'll buy magnesium supplements," because the grass is now so short of magnesium that, uh, cows die fitting if you don't give them a magnesium supplementation.

    9. SB

      Wow.

    10. DU

      But it's better than that. At the same time, I had a patient that I couldn't work out why he was fitting. I was really fond of this guy, and I kept being called out and admitting him to intensive care, fitting, and we couldn't work out. It wasn't a brain tumor. Why was he fitting? And I expect you've joined the dots. It was magnesium deficiency because of medication he was on.

    11. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    12. DU

      And that's the first time I ever seriously thought about magnesium. It's a most interesting subject, very important, and the modern diet is most people are magnesium deficient. And, uh, problem is, you can't measure it. So your blood magnesium, the serum magnesium, um, doesn't reflect what's going on because magnesium is mainly inside your cells. So in the... You have to get the intracellular magnesium level. But do you know what? It's just easier to try a magnesium supplement and see how you feel.

    13. SB

      Yeah.

    14. DU

      So do you take magnesium?

    15. SB

      I do, because the guests, the experts on my podcast have told me that magnesium is one of my five. Uh, uh, for me, I've said to myself, "I'll take five supplements a day." Um-

    16. DU

      Five? Okay.

    17. SB

      Yeah, I'll take five. So vitamin D, because I'm inside all the time.

    18. DU

      Vitamin D, so yes, definitely.

    19. SB

      And I'm Black, so that, you know.

    20. DU

      Well, that combined, but everybody, and particularly in theWe-- Most people just don't get enough sunshine. It'd be better if you could do it with sun. But yeah, vitamin D is very, very important.

    21. SB

      I take magnesium.

    22. DU

      Yeah.

    23. SB

      'Cause people like you have told me how important it is.

    24. DU

      Which magnesium do you take?

    25. SB

      That's a great question. I think it's citrate, citrate.

    26. DU

      Right.

    27. SB

      But I actually think it varies depending on what my team get me.

    28. DU

      Yeah. Yes, yeah.

    29. SB

      Um, but that's good to know 'cause I'll think about my bowels.

    30. DU

      Yeah.

  34. 2:02:57 – 2:09:56

    Guest’s Last Question

    1. SB

      a question for the next, not knowing who they're leaving it for, and the question left for you-

    2. DU

      Yeah

    3. SB

      ... is, I'm sure the guest will figure out who left this one. Um, if humanity organized to make contact with a more intelligent species-

    4. DU

      Yes

    5. SB

      ... who should represent humanity and why? [scoffs] Funny.

    6. DU

      Oh, God. That's a brilliant question. Who should... The first person, this is a person I'm going to nominate. What about David Attenborough?

    7. SB

      [laughs] Yeah.

    8. DU

      You know, he's 100 years old, and he spent so long, um, thinking about the planet, and wouldn't he be a wonderful ambassador? And because I am passionate about biodiversity, I'm passionate about sustainable agriculture and sustainable food, I pick David Attenborough.

    9. SB

      I think that's a wonderful choice.

    10. DU

      Mm.

    11. SB

      I think the aliens would really like him.

    12. DU

      I-- They would.

    13. SB

      Yeah. [laughs]

    14. DU

      They would. That's my answer.

    15. SB

      Thank you so much for what you do. Um, you're really remarkable in a way that's quite rare, and listen, I would know because I interview a lot of-

    16. DU

      Oh, give me the feedback. I love feedback. That's good.

    17. SB

      No, you really are remarkable. You're really remarkable in a way that's very rare, and I don't say this to all of my guests-

    18. DU

      Yeah

    19. SB

      ... but you are for v- for a variety of reasons. Okay, I'm gonna give you all of the feedback.

    20. DU

      Thank you.

    21. SB

      The first w- the first, the most notable, is you're a very kind human, and y- the way that you speak is very nice to listen to.

    22. DU

      Good.

    23. SB

      And again, rare. The other thing that I noticed is you're very, very, very natural and good at telling stories. And listen, why does this matter? Because the human brain, from what I've discovered from doing this podcast, is really orientated towards stories. Now, you could sit here and say banana bad-

    24. DU

      Yeah

    25. SB

      ... or you could say magnesium good, but I'll never forget the cow story.

    26. DU

      Yeah.

    27. SB

      You know? I'll never forget the cow story. I could have r- I could have forgotten that-

    28. DU

      [laughs]

    29. SB

      ... magnesium good, magnesium bad, but the, the way that you tell these stories is so captivating that it enables me to learn in a way that is engaging, and that is rare. Very, very rare. And the other is just, um, your, your depth of experience, your humility, your willingness to admit when you were wrong, which means that I trust you so much with what you're telling me because you're, you're saying, "Listen, I'm, I'm an imperfect human too. I've made mistakes both in myself-"

    30. DU

      Mm.

  35. 2:09:56 – 2:11:18

    A Final Story You Won’t Forget

    1. DU

      Um, so Type 2 diabetes is, is brand new as a problem for pediatricians.

    2. SB

      What is a pediatrician?

    3. DU

      So a pediatrician is a doctor who specializes in the diseases of children, people under 16 years old. And the, the, the international problem is that children everywhere are now suffering from Type 2 diabetes. Okay? But the pediatricians have had no training because it's a new disease. So, um, a large group of pediatricians sent for me and said, "Please do a keynote and teach us what to do," because they, although they're specialists, they haven't experience in Type 2 diabetes. This is a new disease of children. What we doing? What we doing? Leave it at that. We didn't show the foie gras, but I'll eat some of that later.

    4. SB

      [laughs] Dr. David Unwin, thank you. We're done.

    5. DU

      Fabulous. I enjoyed that.

    6. SB

      YouTube have this new crazy algorithm where they know exactly what video you would like to watch next based on AI and all of your viewing behavior, and the algorithm says that this video is the perfect video for you. It's different for everybody looking right now. Check this video out, and I bet you, you might love it

Episode duration: 2:11:19

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