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Starve a Fever?

By Stuart Buck

I fortuitously stumbled across this study, the purpose of which was to show that eating simple carbs (such as sugar) brings down the body's ability to scavenge for harmful bacteria (namely, Staphyloccus epidermidis, a very common bacteria that causes fevers or even fatal meningitis). Notice the last sentence of the abstract, which shows that a 36- or 60-hour fast also improved the body's ability to fight off staph bacteria: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol 26, 1180-1184, Copyright © 1973Role of sugars in human neutrophilic phagocytosisAlbert Sanchez, J. L. Reeser, H. S. Lau, P. Y. Yahiku, R. E. Willard, P. J. McMillan, S. Y. Cho, A. R. Magie, and U. D. Register1 From the Departments of Nutrition, Biostatistics, and Environmental Health in the School of Health, and the Department of Microbiology, Pathology, and Anatomy in the School of Medicine, Loma Linda University, Loma Linda, California 92354This study was designed to test a) whether carbohydrates other than glucose decreased the phagocytic capacity of neutrophils in normal human subjects, b) the duration of this effect, and c) the effect of fasting on neutrophilic phagocytosis...continue to full post

Full post as published by The Buck Stops Here on April 29, 2008 (boomark / email).