This is a page that I will be working on for a while, because I want to present a strong case, supported by evidence that points to mechanisms, rather than claims made about "links," "mathematical models," "correlations," "surrogate endpoints, "associations," and other indirect indicators that require that underlying assumptions are correct, which often is not the case. For example, as I will make clear below, a major focus of "modern medicine" is dealing with the consequences of what I will call the arachidonic acid overload syndrome (AAOS). As one "ages" or if one greatly stresses his or her body (as occurs in "AIDS" and many gastrointestinal "disorders), there is no way to avoid AAOS, unless one adopts a diet that is no longer common (I will teach you about this diet below, and may create a new page for it in the future).

Because most "Westerners" today do not eat such a diet, they are somewhat like "ticking time bombs" biochemically speaking. One researcher, who has pointed out the apparent ill health caused by dietary omega 6 PUFAs (which are required to "prime" the body for AAOS) has stated that: "The question may never be conclusively answered not only because prospective dietary intervention trials... are fraught with dosage and compliance problems, but also because of high background linoleate [the most common dietary omega 6 PUFA, which the body makes into AA] consumption." Source: Nutr Metab Cardiovasc Dis 2001 Jun;11(3):181-8. In other words, because just about everyone either has or is "primed" to be a victim of AAOS, there is no way know the answer to key questions about dietary PUFAs. However, it would be easy to do animal experments to determine whether dietary PUFAs are essential or not, and such experiments were done as early as 1948. Why the author does not know about this study is difficult to understand.

I have spoken to friends and relatives about many of these issues, yet they seem to have great difficulty understanding even basic concepts. My conclusion at this point is that unless you are really motivated to understand the material, you will have great difficulty with it. Here, I will "break down" the mechanism involved as simply as I think is possible. I will then present evidence that basically states the same thing, only is a bit more technical. For those who have questions, please post them on the general message board, under the thread entitled, Questions about the underlying cause of "disease."

When a cell is stressed, the most important event in the "disease" context is the release of molecules that generate an inflammatory response. It is this response that often is too strong or goes awry, causing most of the actual damage or symptoms, even in the "common cold." The historical data is interesting in this context and supports this view, and will be addressed below. The important thing to remember here is that you can modulate this inflammatory response, and also that the body does not require much of an inflammatory response to deal with "pathogenic organisms," and that a strong inflammatory response will actually do more harm than good, even when one is "infected" with such organisms. It is only the very rare case of an adult, non-pregnant person in excellent health encountering a deadly “pathogen,�?but this is now viewed as the rule rather than the extremely rare exception (if it has ever actually occurred) �?the “germ theory.�? It may be true that a group of unhealthy people “pass around�?a “bug,�?leading to a more problematic strain of it (though still not deadly, except to the weak), but this is more of a social issue than a scientific one. In a sense, “modern medicine�?is an attempt to circumvent the natural process by which the weak are removed quickly, and thus the healthy are spared the ill health that trying to save the very weak and ill generates.

Therefore, practically speaking, the real question is, how do I make myself as resistant as possible to “disease?�? And here again, there is no reason to worry about “boosting the immune system�?�?instead, avoiding items that inhibit the immune system is best, though if you know that you will be attending a family gathering where many are ill, it might help to do such stimulation beforehand. To date, the evidence for or against this idea is nowhere near conclusive.

Now, I’d like to articulate the evidence for the underlying mechanism of most “disease.�? Whether you are exposed to an "allergen," a "pathogen," or if your cells are stressed physically or chemically, the same thing happens - certain molecules are released and then biochemical reactions occur that are part of "inflammation" and the response of "the immune system." If this occurs in a moderate way and for a short period of time, the body will not be damaged, though you may experience symptoms of an "allergy" or a "24 hour bug." The "immune system" responds to "messy" cell death that can occur if inflammation is too strong or is persistent, or when cells self-destruct due to the effects of "pathogenic" infiltration, and this is often the case if you are experiencing AAOS. If you'd like to read more about "the immune system," I recommend Jamie Cunliffe's web site, which you will find listed on the "Links" page.

Once things get beyond this point, there are various pathways, which determine the "disease" your doctor might diagnose. And there are various "cures" that might be helpful, but not addressing the underlying cause, AAOS, means that there is no way to know if the "cure" will last or if it will do more harm than good in the long run. One thing that I hope you are asking yourself at this point is, "I've heard to avoid sugar, eat more fiber, have the fillings taken out of my mouth, do more exercise, and all kinds of other things, so why should I get excited about AAOS?"

At this point, you shouldn't. I did an enormous amount of research before I came to this conclusion, and I doubt if more than a few people on the planet would devote the time that I did to this endeavor. I will assume that you have no intention of doing this, and so all I can do is to present the best evidence and point out that you can do your own research much quicker these days by using www.pubmed.com and "regular" internet searches (which will often lead to the same studies). Keep in mind that the key is finding the underlying cause, provided that it is easy to remedy, which is true of AAOS. Thus, once this is accomplished, it is likely that almost all "chronic disease," and the vast majority of the "infectious diseases," will be a concern mostly for those who stress their bodies to outrageous degrees. Even in these cases, AAOS makes the "disease" much worse than it would otherwise be. Moreover, understading AAOS will hopefully lead to a greater appreciation for how important it is to avoid cellular stressors, even if one does not have AA in one's cells.

If you are eating a typical Western diet, you are consuming large amounts of omega 6 PUFAs, which is a major constituent of many plant-based oils (such as soybean, corn, safflower, sunflower, vegetable, canola, etc.), but is also in various animal fats in fairly high amounts. Once you eat a threshold amount of omega 6 PUFAs, a long chain fatty acid called arachidonic will be incorporated into the outer portion of cells, which will then be released when cells are stressed, leading to the making of new molecules (metabolites) that possess medicine-like qualities. If you ate only trace amounts of any PUFAs, your body would make its own PUFA, an omega 9 called the Mead acid (technically named eicosatrienoic acid). If a cell with Mead acid but no omega 3s or 6s in it is stressed, the Mead acid is released and the metabolites made are much less potent than ones made from arachidonic acid, so much less that the difference can mean the difference between "disease" and health.

If you'd like to see how dangerous the metabolites of AA are, go to pubmed.com and search for PGE2 cancer or LTB4 cancer. LTB4 and PGE2 appear to be the most dangerous metabolites of AA that are made by enzymes. If you do this search, you will find a huge amount of studies such as: Carcinogenesis. 2005 Apr;26(4):785-91. Epub 2005 Jan 20. "Increased 5-lipoxygenase expression and induction of apoptosis by its inhibitors in esophageal cancer: a potential target for prevention." Other molecules that have not been made with enzymes may be even more dangerous.

Furthermore, when your body is constantly exposed to something that provokes an inflammatory response, there is a synergy between a very dangerous molecule called tumor necrosis factor alpha and arachidonic acid, for example: J Cell Physiol. 1989 Oct;141(1):85-9. "Tumor necrosis factor causes amplification of arachidonic acid metabolism in response to interleukin 1, bradykinin, and other agonists." Some research scientists have made the connection between a general aging phenomenon and the accelerated version of this that is called "AIDS," for example: BMC Immunol. 2001;2:10. Epub 2001 Oct 8. "HIV infection and aging: enhanced Interferon- and Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha production by the CD8+ CD28- T subset." These researchers point out that another molecule, IFN-gamma, also appears to be part of the process, but they also speak of "...a natural 'endpoint' in CD8+ T cell differentiation induced after a lifetime of immune activity (toward viruses, etc) in the aged, and after a massive accelerated response to HIV..." Thus, while TNF-alpha, IFN-gamma, and other inflammatory molecules appear to be the ones doing the damage, they key is to avoid stressors that generate these molecules. Arachidonic acid, though, is so biochemically active that it takes little stress for its dangerous metabolites to be generated, and since it is not necessary to have in cells anyway, it appears that ridding the body of it would result in a considerable attentuation of "aging" and various "diseases" (if one ever succumbs to them without AA in the body).

In other words, once a threshold of damage done by inflammation is reached, "disease" results and the "immune system" begins to fail (because vital cells are depleted). I disagree that "HIV" is causing this problem, because it cannot be detected doing this directly, and because such damage can be detected in all other similar situations, such as "heart disease." Rather, the markers that are assumed to be signs of "HIV" infection are markers of enhanced cell destruction, free radical activity, antigenic exposure, and exposure to toxins. If "HIV" does exist and causes such damage, it would need to be kept active by excessive biochemical reactions in the body, which can be generated with strenuous exercise, for instance. "Co-factors," such as too much iron in the body, a diet very low in antioxidants, drug use (legal or otherwise), etc., can greatly enhance biochemical activity as well. But again, especially in an accelerated form that the researchers note is true of "AIDS," it would be detectable. I suspect that if "AIDS researchers" followed those with "HIV infection" around, testing them for the right markers, they would find that it was something the people ingested that caused enhanced TNF alpha production, etc.

I've been reading such studies for years now, and it is incredible how AA overload is directly connected to just about every "disease" you can think of, even conditions associated with "natural aging," such as "osteoporosis." Basically, doctors only look at the clinical syndrome - that is, what it looks like in terms of symptoms, what drugs have appeared to be useful in treating those symptoms, what usually happens to the people "afflicted," etc., but are often totally ignorant of the molecular mechanism involved. In fact, nearly 40% of doctors in a recent survey did not know a basic and key biochemical fact; they thought that saturated fatty acids were more susceptible to free radical attack than PUFAs, when in fact they are highly resistant, unlike PUFAs.

At this point, I hope you are asking yourself something like, "does all this mean that I am doomed to affliction with one or another disease?" Actually, if one looks at the historical data, one finds that some common diseases today were rare in the early twentieth century (prostate and colon cancer), whereas stomach cancer was the most deadly cancer in the USA, and is now rare here. Thus, there are clearly mechanisms that one can manipulate.

One can, for example, take steps that will result in AA being removed from your cells and replaced with the Mead acid. I began this intervention in 2001 and have seen only benefits, but it does take a couple of years for the full transition (different kinds of cells will "lose" the AA at different rates). In the meantime, you should eat a diet rich in safe antioxidant foods, such as organic berries and dark chocolate, and using organic butter or coconut oil as your major fat sources.

Now I hope you are asking the question, "how much better is Mead acid that I should change my diet is a substantial way?" Here again, I was surprised at how clear the evidence is, though there is not as much of it as there is on AA (probably because research scientists are looking for a "great discovery" rather than advice about allowing the body to do as it sees fit). For example:

FASEB J. 1991 Mar 1;5(3):344-53. "Unique fatty acid composition of normal cartilage: discovery of high levels of n-9 eicosatrienoic acid and low levels of n-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids."

Adkisson HD 4th, Risener FS Jr, Zarrinkar PP, Walla MD, Christie WW, Wuthier RE.

Department of Chemistry, University of South Carolina, Columbia 29208.

"We report here the finding that normal, young cartilages, in distinction from all other tissues examined, have unusually high levels of n-9 eicosatrienoic (20:3 cis-delta 5,8,11) acid and low levels of n-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-6 PUFA). This pattern is identical to that found in tissues of animals subjected to prolonged depletion of nutritionally essential n-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (EFA)...

Previously, EFA deficiency has been shown to greatly suppress the inflammatory response of leukocytes and rejection of tissues transplanted into allogeneic recipients. Because eicosanoids, which are derived from EFA, have been implicated in the inflammatory responses associated with arthritic disease, reduction of n-6 PUFA and accumulation of the n-9 20:3 acid in cartilage may be important for maintaining normal cartilage structure."

In other words, "essential fatty acid deficiency" is the healthy condition, whereas what is assumed to be "normal" leads to chronic inflammatory problems, eventually resulting in one "disease" or another. In the future, I will present even more evidence for those who are interested in how much there is, but for now, I can't answer the question you may be asking yourself, "how could billions of dollars be given to the greatest minds in the world for decades and yet nobody has made such a clear and direct case as you have here?" Again, I suspect that those who see themselves as "scientists" hope to make a "great discovery," and often overlook the obvious and simple. I am not the first to make the point, and if you want to read more about historical precendents, read the page entitled, "The Contributions of Hans Selye and others."