by William Dufty
book report by Liz Pavek (c)2002
This is the old standby, a classic in health-related publishing. It was written more than thirty years ago, when sugar in the diet was nowhere near the problem it is today. The book would have to be considered more of an "expose'" than a diet-related book, although, of course, sugar in the diet is probably the main reason it was written. But as a history book and discussion of the place of sugar in many cultures, this little book covers a lot of territory. If you are interested in tracking sugar's effect on the world in the last millennium, this book is probably one of a kind and it is still used as an authoritative reference. (Dufty has several axes to grind besides the evil effects of sugar on the world, and goes to great lengths to grind them in the early part of the book. If you aren't interested in this, skip it.)
Dufty wrote this many years ago. I think my first-edition paperback is dated 1973. Things haven't changed too much since then, except for the fact that there is so much more refined sugar in all the foods in the stores these days that I don't think Dufty could even have imagined it in his worst nightmare. Refined sugars in several forms are sneaked into virtually every package, bottle, box, or bag of store-bought foods these days. I suspect that if he had known this would happen, his book would have been much longer.
There has been so much information and research done on this topic in the last thirty-odd years on the place of simple sugars in the diet that came out after this was written that if Sugar Blues had been any less carefully researched, it would be severely out of date. As it is, the statistics he mentions are old and only of use historically. But all of the history he researched still stands, of course...
An excerpt:
The discovery of insulin was the kind of modern medical miracle which the diseasestablishment [love this word] knew how to exploit. Production of insulin was and is a boon to the pharmaceutical industry. Patients with diabetes presented a captive market, a million people in the early 1900's. The surge of sugar addiction in the 1920's ensured that this profitable market would increase annually. Insulin injections were expensive but manageable palliatives, not quick or cheap cures in any sense. Millions of diabetics would become dependent on insulin for the rest of their lives. Insulin was something that could be packaged and sold over the counter in drugstores--together with the attendant hardware, such as needles. It captured the imagination of a vaccination-happy, drug-oriented society. So diabetics were kept alive by the injection of insulin extracted from the pancreatic glands of animals from abattoirs. Many people who might have died survived--if they could afford insulin--to breed diabetic-prone descendants of their own. The classification of varieties of diabetes multiplied. Diabetes mellitus--honey inflammation causing copious passage of urine--was superseded by modern, symptomatic terminology: hypoinsulinism (underproduction of insulin).
Then, in 1924, a year after the discoverer of insulin was awarded a Nobel prize, a professor of medicine discovered the complementary antagonist of hypoinsulinism. Inevitably, doctors and patients experimenting with insulin in its early years took too little or too much. An overdose produced symptoms of what came to be known as insulin shock. Dr. Seale Harris of the University of Alabama began to notice symptoms of insulin shock in many people who were neither diabetic nor taking any insulin. These people were diagnosed as having low levels of glucose in their blood; diabetics have high levels of glucose.
Dr. Harris officially reported his discovery that year: Low levels of glucose in the blood were declared to be a symptom of hyperinsulinism: excessive insulin. Up to that time, patients with symptoms of hyperinsulinism had been treated for coronary thrombosis and other heart ailments, brain tumors, epilepsy, gall bladder disease, appendicitis, hysteria, asthma, allergies, ulcers, alcoholism, and a variety of mental disorders.
A Nobel prize was not awarded, however, to Dr. Harris. His discovery was an embarrassment to the diseasestablishment, not a boon. The remedy he suggested for hyperinsulinism or low blood glucose was not a glamorous new miracle drug that could be packaged and sold across the drug counter in a bottle or licensed to the pharmaceutical industry as a billion-dollar business.
Dr. Harris pointed out that the cure for low blood glucose or hyperinsulinism (also commonly and misleadingly called low blood sugar) was something so simple that nobody--not even the medical practitioners--could make any money out of it. The remedy was self-government of the body. The patient with low blood glucose must be prepared to give up refined sugar, candy, coffee, and soft drinks--these items had caused the troubles. Patients with hyperinsulinism could never be made dependent for a lifetime on anybody else. They had to fend for themselves. A doctor could merely teach them what not to do. Hyperinsulinism or low blood glucose therapy was a do-it-yourself proposition.
Predictably, the medical profession landed on Dr. Harris like a ton of bricks. When his findings were not attacked, they were ignored. His discoveries, if allowed to leak out, might make trouble for surgeons, psychoanalysts, and other medical specialists. To this day, hyperinsulinism or low blood glucose is a stepchild of the diseasestablishment.
Dufty hit the nail on the head here. As a self-appointed gadfly on behalf of taking responsibility for one's health and a strong proponent of REAL NUTRITION, I enjoyed seeing my own opinions so clearly stated by a pro and realizing that this understanding of hyperinsulinism was announced (and ignored, of course) so long ago.
Another thing about Sugar Blues that impressed me was how well it was written. It seems that many of the books--whether on diet or anything else--are just thrown together. Dufty's writing style proves that he really learned something in journalism school, and he demonstrates it repeatedly in this offering. He adds wit to his facts, and makes the book very readable.
Some of it is, as stated above, dated, and some is diatribe. But in spite of these minor problems, the little Sugar Blues book is still timely, and you might enjoy it if you like a sharp, sarcastic edge to your history books. It is still in print, and is available at amazon.com.
Read it, and believe me, you will go through the house, book in hand, and throw out everything you have that is sugar-loaded. It has that effect on people. There is not much chance that Sugar Blues will go out of print very soon.
