An up and coming "health" crank to deal with

So we have an up and coming "health" crank to deal with.  Like many, I have yet to determine whether this character is Poe, delusion, or scam; all three or just ignorant as to the nuance of science as a whole.  His crank seems to fall in the area of diet and nutrition with some physiology thrown in.

Taken at face value this is a noble cause, but yet he is selling a detox plan.

Sorry to say that is what your liver and kidneys already do, for free. And, weight loss is not detox!!

Although Brillat-Savarin’s writings contain much rumination about food and health from an observational view of a non-scientist, my understanding of his original quote is that he was commenting on how food choices reveal character traits, rather than one’s well-being. Sure, in the framework of biochemistry, his quote is also true, but not without glaring caveats.

The beauty of metabolism is that our bodies can take in a load of foodstuffs combined with a single gas from the air and generate energy and other compounds that form our tissues. We have very complex systems that regulate these processes. More or less, scientists have a grip on these inputs and outputs–it takes the chemicals that constitute food, breaks them down, makes new chemicals, and uses these to sustain life. Oddly enough, this is why a vegan is still composed of meat! The body does not care if a bit of carbon came from organic kale or a Snickers bar. We are what we eat to an extent, in that our bodies are incredibly good at processing food into other biological stuff, including energy.

Unfortunately, self-appointed health gurus take “You are what you eat” to mean that we consist of the essences of our food that is matched in purity and quality of dietary inputs. In their eyes, what we put into our bodies will affect all aspects of health maintenance and disease processes. A cheeky variation on this idea is similar to what computer programmers say about writing code: “garbage in, garbage out.”

What it boils down to, you are paying a man for something your body already does on its own.  There is nothing in the scientific, medical literature to affirm that the body needs an outside source to cleanse itself or boost the immune system.  If you really thought long and hard about "boosting your immunity" you may want to think again.  Too much immunity (autoimmune disorders) can lead to allergies, tissue damage, and even anaphylaxis. Too little immunity (chemo, radiation or leukemia), and you're at risk of deadly infections that most people clear with ease.

“Let’s be clear,” says Edzard Ernst, emeritus professor of complementary medicine at Exeter University, “there are two types of detox: one is respectable and the other isn’t.” The respectable one, he says, is the medical treatment of people with life-threatening drug addictions. “The other is the word being hijacked by entrepreneurs, quacks and charlatans to sell a bogus treatment that allegedly detoxifies your body of toxins you’re supposed to have accumulated.”

If toxins did build up in a way your body couldn’t excrete, he says, you’d likely be dead or in need of serious medical intervention. “The healthy body has kidneys, a liver, skin, even lungs that are detoxifying as we speak,” he says. “There is no known way – certainly not through detox treatments – to make something that works perfectly well in a healthy body work better.”

I don't even know where to start, his science claims are just that bad.  What I will say concerning his religious beliefs and what may stem from them is this.

Yada belongs to a group of folks who are often referred to as “hoteps." A hotep, originally defined, is an Egyptian term, but it has come to represent "spiritually enlightened" people in the black Hebrew Israelite community.

,,,it's important that we're paying attention to who we're getting our information from, and where they're getting their information from, too.

Whether it affects his science I don't know.  I am only interested in his health claims.  I don't care beyond that; although it is difficult to separate some of his claims from his socio-religious world view.  End of story.

As for medicine? It drips with pseudoscience, as you can see from the top image. Periods are unnatural, cauliflower doesn’t contain carbon, relaxers get into your brain, single mothers make their sons gay, and so on.  Essential oils can cure everything, white science developed AIDS to depopulate black people…

According to an assistant Yada holds a PhD in theology but chooses the title minister as opposed to "Dr."  to avoid confusion.

Because of the nature of his beliefs - for lack of better word - they are very entwined in his health practices and the crap he disseminates.  While he talks of diabetes, heart disease and obesity being rampant, his practices - as related to diet, nutrition, and other fields - to alleviate said problems are counter to science.  Reading his page, I gather it is from, not understanding science as a whole.  If DAW and the Food Boob had a child, Yada would be it.  He is trying to simplify into trite, pithy sayings that which can not be simplified.

Simplification in itself does not make something wrong, but it does present a conundrum when it goes against the scientific consensus. For example,

First, to the comment I will say this, you are very WRONG concerning pH.

In other words, normal blood pH in humans is between 7.35 - 7.45.

Although the general sentiment concerning the WBC in the preceding statements by Yada is not incorrect (ignoring the racial overtones), it is the comment that follows that is off the rails. (Since I have leukocytosis,  meaning I have too many leukocytes circulating in the blood, it is something I am well aware of.  Although not life threatening per se, the "cause" could be; prior heart attack.)

Plain and simple, without WBCs we would be very ill.  The five types (neutrophils, lymphocytes, eosinophils, monocytes, basophils) are the backbone to our immune system with the normal range between 4500-10,000/mcL.  So, we better have more than 1 WBC.

Sadly, Yada offers no science to counter said ignorant claim and is under the assumption the an alkaline state is natural.

As the above graphic notes, a pH of 14 and we be dead.  But to Yada’s earlier point concerning lemons,

Again in this thread, no offer to present his “evidence” nor a basic understanding of how the body metabolizes. [Is he claiming he can cure the common cold?]

If you remember my post concerning the acid/alkaline fad, I wrote:

In other words, our stomach is an acidic environment (a pH of about 3). Food enters the stomach (regardless of its acid or alkaline-producing qualities) and is immediately combined with hydrochloric acid (HCL) before it enters the digestive tract.  Very bad for the body IF there wasn't a naturally occurring means for the body to reduce/eliminate that acidity. Lo and behold, guess what the pancreas does, it secretes a slurry to cancels out the acid the stomach has just introduced into the rest of the body. So, regardless of the food you have just eaten, it will be combined with a highly acid substance and then subsequently a highly alkaline substance.

Let’s get a bit more sciencey,

Blood pH is not directly effected by the food we eat.  Acidic food will cause increased secretion of alkaline components into the digestive tract to neutralize the excess acid this causes a fall in the bicarbonate ions concentration in the blood.  The body compensates by excreting H+ ions in the urine. Thus urine becomes more acidic. There is also hyperventilation with the excretion of CO2 also causing elimination of H+ ions.

HCO3- + H+ ----> H2O + CO2

In the case of alkaline foods, the stomach acid itself would be partly neutralized by the alkali present in food. Only minimal bicarbonate ions to neutralize the remaining acid are expended.  In alkalosis, the body compensates by decreasing the respiratory drive (conserving more H+ ions) and excreting more bicarbonate ions through kidneys.

[Think I got that right!!]

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That is acid/base homeostasis in a nutshell.  The idea that lemon (citric acid) does not effect pH urine has been around for a long, long time.

Ingestion of citric acid in addition to a constant diet did not affect the pH or the total nitrogen of the 24 hour urine collection.

While his claims are not out right deadly, they are dangerous. Here he claims to have fasted for 40 days and 40 nights with only just water.

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Overall Yada’s page comes across as your typical anti-science page with the standard of cherry picking data, misinterpretation of conclusions, and misinformation - zika.  There is a twinge of conspiracy as well - big pharma, Monsanto, flouride, and chemtrails.

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To quote a friend concerning charlatans in general,

On one side you have people who hand out life-threatening advice to avoid proper care in favor using there supplements and "nature" and who have no responsibility for the negative outcome or cleaning up the mess.

And on the other side you have doctors who will assume your care, should something truly go wrong, even if that "something" was caused by following the other side. [Edited to fit this conversation better as the original dealt with vaccines.]

I have a hard time with people who claim to cure disease.  It is a bold statement from one who has no science, medical or training in a related field.  Yet some of his 170k+ followers lap it up with no critical thinking what so ever.

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There is more, a lot more.  Almost every posting from this guy is filled with health related clap-trap.  Whether it be his own or a copy-pasta.

What’s that saying, “buyer beware”.