Under the old medical scientific paradigm, evolution is the result of mutations—changes in the DNA code itself— that accumulate over millions of years. But that idea is not consistent with new scientific findings. Epigenetics refers to DNA regulation—which genes are switched on or switched off—and these changes are responsive to environmental stimuli like the amount and type of food that is available.
High sugar levels in the blood produce dozens of epigenetic changes that shorten our lives and increase the risk of heart attack, stroke, and dialysis. If a person with diabetes lowers the glucose in the blood below the diabetic range through diet and exercise, that is a great accomplishment and it is helpful. Even so, increased risk of heart attack and stroke remain. That is the most likely cause of “metabolic memory.”
“Moreover, epigenetics has also been implicated in the phenomenon of metabolic memory observed in clinic trials and animal studies, in which prior episodes of poor glycemic control can confer continued risk of complications despite subsequent glucose normalization.”
That statement means that the companies that advocate reversing diabetes with diet with the express purpose of stopping medications, including metformin, are hurting people. Metformin and medications like empagliflozin block the effects of epigenetic changes that cause heart attack, stroke, and faster aging. If you have ever been diagnosed with of type 2 diabetes, you should be on metformin no matter what the sugar level is now. Of course diabetes is a carbohydrate disease, and lowering sugar and carb intake is critical to success, but continuing metformin is at least as important.
Optimal medical therapy (OMT) in diabetes for eight years provides extra protection against cardiovascular events over the next decade even though both groups of patients were on OMT during that period. The offspring of starving mothers who have a low birth weight have a lifelong increased risk of heart attack and stroke. The effects of diet on cardiovascular risk can last two generations, but it is highly likely it can last much longer than that.
The Galapagos Islands are famous for Darwin’s studies on evolution there. The 14 distinct species of birds on the Galapagos Islands are all descended from a common ancestor that arrived two or three million years ago. There are striking differences in body size and beak shape and size. In this study, investigators looked at the number of DNA mutations vs epigenetic changes to account for the differences in these species. There were more epigenetic changes than DNA mutations and the investigators concluded: “epimutations are a major component of genome variation during evolutionary change.” The more epigenetic mutations there were, the more difference there was between species…the number of epigenetic changes continues to accumulate over long periods of evolutionary time.” There was less correlation between DNA mutations and the evolutionary distance between species.
So why does that matter to me? Our food and exercise patterns are much different than they were 100 years ago when we ate real food and were much more physically active, especially as children. Now our kids are eating lots of fast food, sugar, processed food, and they are watching television and playing video games. Too many of them are overweight and it is all happening before they have children themselves. It is likely they are creating a family history of diabetes, heart attack, and stroke.
Hi, Bill. The implications of your able summary of the effects of epigenetics upon evolution are sobering and fit into a pattern of human disregard for and degradation of our planet’s natural bounty in all its myriad forms, including our own bodies, our own metabolisms. Epigenetic suicide, one might label this phenomenon, as we are no doubt lessening the ability of our future generations to adapt to change.