The oat industry has done a good job of casting a halo over oats and oatmeal, even lobbying the FDA to allow a “heart healthy” claim because of its ability, via the beta glucan fiber content, to reduce total and LDL cholesterol (which is true). They have been so effective that, despite the huge health and weight loss successes in people following the Wheat Belly lifestyle who reject all grains including oats, people still ask “You mean oatmeal is not okay?” Conventional sources of dietary advice often say things like “There’s no gluten in oats, so oats are healthy.” Even generally respected sources of information can make patently absurd declarations about oats, like this University of Chicago FAQ response suggesting that, because there is no gluten in oats, they must therefore be healthy. So let’s focus on oats and oatmeal.
The biggest problem with oats is the high content of the super-carbohydrate, amylopectin A, responsible for raising blood sugars sky-high after consumption. The glycemic index, or GI, of oats is 55, thereby falling in the medium range of GI. Recall that glycemic index is a wildly misleading concept: high-GI-foods like whole wheat bread and table sugar raise blood sugar to very high levels; medium-GI foods also raise blood sugar to very high levels, just not as high as high-GI foods. Consume a bowl of organic, stone-ground oatmeal, for instance, without added sugar, and a blood sugar of 150-180 mg/dl in a non-diabetic person 30-60 minutes after consumption would be typical. In someone with type 2 diabetes, a blood sugar of 200-350 would be typical. This should come as no surprise when you realize that one cup dry plain oatmeal that is slow-cooked will yield 46 net carbs, more than enough to send blood sugar through the roof. Of course, add some milk, berries, sliced banana, or sugar and the carb count can easily approach 70,80, or 90 grams. Blood sugar levels this high after consuming oatmeal are more than sufficient to contribute to insulin resistance, cause fat deposition and weight gain, and glycate the proteins of the body, the irreversible process that leads to cataracts, heart disease, eroding joint cartilage and arthritis, skin thinning and aging, and dementia. This is why diets such as paleo, ketogenic, and my Wheat Belly and Undoctored programs all agree: no oats.
As if that weren’t enough, there are other problems with human consumption of oats that includes:
- Oat consumption has been associated with type 1 diabetes in children–While the evidence is observational, it is consistent with higher quality evidence with the gliadin protein of wheat and the zein of corn as provocateurs of this lifelong disease. The effect is likely due to the closely related avenin protein of oats, similar in structure and amino acid content to the proteins of its other grain brethren. And if avenin, similar to gliadin and zein, can initiate type 1 diabetes autoimmune destruction of pancreatic cells, what other autoimmune conditions can oats provoke?
- Fungal contamination of oat products is common, occasionally at potentially toxic levels, as detected in this Consumer Lab analysis. While the fungi themselves are not the source of the problem, the mycotoxins they produce can exert neurotoxic, carcinogenic, liver toxic, and other effects.
- Some people with celiac disease will wage an abnormal immune response against the oat counterpart to wheat gliadin, avenin. Once again, this is not about whether or not oats are gluten-free; it’s about the avenin protein that resembles gluten/gliadin.
- Oats, like wheat, contains phytates that bind positively-charged minerals, such as calcium, iron, zinc, and magnesium, making them unavailable for absorption and adding to deficiencies.
- Consistent with other foods that are not meant to be part of the human diet, oats provoke a variety of allergies including atopic dermatitis in children when oat-containing creams and other products are applied.
Oats are admittedly not as offensive to human health as wheat. But oats are not without their own considerable problems. Conventional celiac discussions continue to debate the overly-simplistic issue of whether or not oat products contain gluten, while the structural similarity of avenin with wheat gliadin is largely overlooked. The role of oats in a gluten-free diet therefore remains a matter of debate. But, just as with wheat and other gluten-containing grains, conventional thinking about oats begins and ends at its gluten-like properties, not considering the substantial issues discussed above.
In the Wheat Belly lifestyle, we reject the idea that humans were meant to consume the product of the seeds of grasses, “grains,” regardless of whether they are refined or whole, as the unhealthy components are truly little different, despite the repeated and over-the-top claims made by the grain industry and agencies that took the bait of the misleading findings and flawed logic of epidemiology. It’s actually kind of a shame, because there are some healthy components in oats, such as beta glucan. But the whole is a combination of good with the bad and there is simply no way to make oats a part of your life without paying a health price.
Does anyone have a faux oatmeal recipe that IS healthy?
That was a good video you put on YouTube today, however do not foods like spinach also have high levels of Phytates ? Also nuts and seeds, so should we be cutting them out too !
Terry Flores wrote: «…do not foods like spinach also have high levels of Phytates? Also nuts and seeds, so should we be cutting them out too!»
Here’s a similar question in August.
Here’s Dr. Davis on nuts in 2013.
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I’d really like to see a study on oats raising blood sugar sky high. I’m not trying to be rude or anything, but you’ve said the same thing about bananas raising blood sugar sky high and my blood sugar barely budged after a large banana. I’ve heard of the same thing with other people as well. I’m not a thin person either so I wouldn’t imagine my insulin sensitivity is that great. Blood sugar responses to meals seem to be highly variable among different people. Also, if oatmeal raised blood sugar very high, wouldn’t I later be hypoglycemic, fatigued, irritable, hungry, all due to low blood sugar from insulin over responding ? (I also melt some dark chocolate squares with sugar into my oatmeal) I always feel great all day after oatmeal (I understand this isn’t always a reliable indicator because health problems can happen below the threshold of awareness). I’m never hungry, or have any of the symptoms of low blood sugar after eating oats for the rest of the day
I think the other problems with proteins in oats could be mitigated or eliminated if we had decent gut health in this day and age. Many people don’t, and I think that speaks as to why we might react negatively to oats and other previously healthy vegetables
DLM wrote: «I’d really like to see a study on oats raising blood sugar sky high.»
They probably exist, but are hard to find in search, because the results are drowned in agenda-driven studies and trials trying to prop up the human market for this horse feed. It’s not just horses that “feel their oats”. Many trials carefully avoided comparing oats to, say, bacon&eggs: “Meals composed either of raw rolled oats, oatmeal porridge or a mixture of raw rolled oats with raisins were served.”
So mostly what happens is people figuring this out for themselves, such as this on WebMD: “Why does oatmeal raise my blood sugar?”
The postprandial BG response curve, of course, is going to be affected by the general metabolic status of the consumer. It’s apt to not be terribly pronounced in someone with uncontrolled diabetes, but would be expected to be peaky in someone with FBG, HbA1c, TG and Small LDL-P within Undoctored program targets, and somewhere in between for someone in between.
There are lots of reasons to avoid oats. Being 56% net carb merely tops the list.
re: «…my blood sugar barely budged after a large banana.»
How long after consumption was the fingerstick done?
The glucose content of a banana varies dramatically depending on how ripe it is. Green unripe bananas are no problem at all. Bananas developing dark spots might as well be candy. Same consumer status considerations arise.
re: «Also, if oatmeal raised blood sugar very high, wouldn’t I later be hypoglycemic, fatigued, irritable, hungry, all due to low blood sugar from insulin over responding?»
That would be expected, unless there are other factors spreading the response out in time, like adding fats to the recipe — or the BG is high all the time anyway, and the oats or ripe bananas are just keeping it that way. This is not to be confused with health, of course.
re: «I think the other problems with proteins in oats could be mitigated or eliminated if we had decent gut health in this day and age.»
Grains are a major contributor to dysbiosis (and not just because they are grains — residual field pesticides, and transport/storage fumigants also fumigate your gut).
re: «…why we might react negatively to oats and other previously healthy vegetables…»
People with food reactivities tend to presume it says something about the food. Nope. Usually it’s speaking volumes about an acquired response in the person, and more particularly distortions in their microbiome.
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You do have a point…….. many of us can eat a Banana and it NOT raise blood sugar level , but then others do eat a banana it it might , WHY ? because they have a metabolic syndrome !
Please see this video from the EXCELLENT Dr Robert Lustig……https://youtu.be/zx-QrilOoSM
So look at it this way ……..Alchohol is OK in very small doses and infrequently, the body can deal with that, also the body can deal with a bit of a binge very occasionally, like when you go to a wedding etc……..it is the same with SUGAR , the body can deal with very small doses infrequently, the body can deal with that, also the body can deal with a bit of a binge very occasionally……….but like alcohol, if you abuse it, if you give your body too much to often there will be problems. We do not need to add sugar to our diet, FULL STOP !
The problem with processed food is that it is abusing our body, not only does it add sugar to our diet, but when combined with all the precessed sugar in sweets, cakes etc……then we are going to have a problem…..Dr Lustig also shows how Froctose is a major contributor, just watch the video.
So the same with bread and oats , IF you continue to eat a fair amount, you will have problems, if you occasionally have some bread (yes I said the dirty word) and if you occasionally have some oats , and I mean REAL bread and REAL oats, WITH THE FIBRE, then your body is OK with that.
If we all to get back to eating REAL FOODS and cut out the processed poison that we are served up, then we would all be better.
The other thing to look at is the amount of heavy processed corn oil, rapeseed oil and sunflower oil we are getting in our diet…..processed food and junk food has these TERRIBLE oils in abundance ! Look at the labels on processed foods and just about everything has it in.
Now keep in mind that these heavily processed and UNSTABLE oils are high in OMEGA 6 which is a PRO-INFLAMMATORY ! A nd most diseases are inflammatory diseases . Now, OMEGA 3 is a anti-inflammatory and the ration is suggested to be a “1 to 1 ” ratio, but I can tell you that due to the fact that most processed foods have these processed oils high in omega 6 in them our ratio is going to be a average of around 16 to 1 in favour of the omega 6 which is going to cause a BIG problem. So you either increase your omega 3 intake by a HUGE amount, or decrease your omega 6 intake ………it is much better to decrease the omega 6 intake, and increase your omega 3 with foods high in omega 3 such as salmon etc…….
So TWO excellent reasons to cut out the processed rubbish….1) It will reduce the sugar and fructose intake , and 2) will lesson the omega 6 intake.
This would be much better than worrying about the occasional bowl of real oats or the odd slice of real bread !
One last point on the OMEGA 6 issue , when cooking with rapeseed oil, if you over heat it or you let it cool down and then cook with it again and again, it becomes very unstable and OXIDISES ! Now we all know what oxidisation does in the way of FREE RADICALS don’t we !
Hope this helps
Terry Flores wrote: «…many of us can eat a Banana and it NOT raise blood sugar level…»
Apart from individual metabolic status, and when the postprandial BG was checked, bananas vary dramatically in sugar content. They make a terrible test item for glycemic response.
re: «…REAL bread and REAL oats, WITH THE FIBRE, then your body is OK with that.»
The beta-glucans in oats might be their only benefit (and the researchers doing oats trials likely have little idea why), but it doesn’t compensate for the other problems, which only begin with metsyn. The program here counsels avoidance of all grains, and not just due to gliadin, zein, avenin proteins, and toxic lectins. Our net carb goals allow so little of even relatively benign pseudo-cereals, that there’s little point in messing with them.
re: «If we all to get back to eating REAL FOODS…»
How far back? Bread, for the most part, goes back only 20,000 years (dawn of settlements), matching the decay of oral health in the fossil record. We might think of bread as the original processed food.
re: «…it is much better to decrease the omega 6 intake, and increase your omega 3 with foods high in omega 3 such as salmon etc…»
Dr. Davis lately wrote about the ω6LA situation: Clarity on omega-6 fatty acids
re: «One last point on the OMEGA 6 issue , when cooking with rapeseed oil,…»
Rapeseed oil might make a fine biodiesel, but is not a safe human food, at all, due to the erucic acid (and the ω6LA). Mutating it to canola only addressed one of its problems. I personally avoid using any oils that are more than about 15% linoleic acid. I concur that high temp cooking with these oils exacerbates their hazards.
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I agree…..bread is one of the original processed foods, but does not mean that it is going to account for all the ill-health, after all the French have one of the lowest heart disease levels in Europe, but they do eat bread, they love their french bread and pastries !……………..Like I mentioned before, ALCOHOL is a poison if taken regularly, so really we ought to remove it TOTALLY from our diet , but if low enough it is not usually going to cause damage , So to with wheat !
When you look at Dr Lustig’s video (as above) then you get to see that it is NOT ONLY wheat which has changed in the western diet in the last 50 years but also sugar consumption in other stuff such as the increased consumption of soda beverages in the last 50 years…… So, we have Dr Davis showing that in the last 50 years metabolic Syndrome has increased in the last 50 years and he blames it on whet, then we have Dr Lustig who shows that soda consumption with the huge amounts of sugar and fructose syrup has grown side-by-side with the increase in
obesity & diabetes ! So who is right, Dr Davis or Dr Lustig ? Well it has to be BOTH !
Also , there is a slight problem with the emergence of wheat and “tooth decay” …..
Firstly , the main reason why tooth decay MAY of come along with the eating of wheat would more than likely been because back then the wheat bread they ate was a very coarse bread which would grind down the teeth , the roman armies for example would have their own supply of wheat and there own portable wheat grinders, which did not work very well and resulted in VERY course wheat flower, this would grind down the the teeth and cause decay.
I live very close to a 2,000 year old roman settlement name in a place called “Silchester ” in Hampshire England, and I can tell you that when you look at their skulls, why is it that there teeth are near perfect ??? Because they ate very finely ground flower !
Also , why is it that when they unearth a mummy form ancient Egypt there teeth a in really good condition ???
There are to many variables to blame it entirely on WHEAT as there are to many other factors to take into consideration! ……….Here in England tooth decay really became a real problem when they introduced SUGAR into the diet ……..!
So to use wheat as the scapegoat is nonsense , otherwise people who live in counties who have more of a high carb diet and eat REAL BREAD with a REAL FOOD diet and do not have any introduced sugars or processed foods have very good teeth !
So Mr Davis is partly correct but not entirely !
Terry Flores wrote: «…bread is one of the original processed foods, but does not mean that it is going to account for all the ill-health…»
The WB program doesn’t claim that it is. The so-called diseases of civilization (DoCs), have a long list of suspected contributory causes:
• full-time glycemic diets (grains, cheap sugar),
• adverse proteins/lectins (most grains),
• key modern deficiencies,
• industrial grain and legume oils,
• low fat mania,
• dysbiosis from multiple causes (not all enumerated),
• low salt mania, and
• particular industrial and agricultural toxins.
Despite the name, this program is by far not just about wheat, although people who haven’t gotten past the title often assume otherwise.
These optional DoC ailments, curiously, are almost entirely absent in extant hunter-gather cultures. So, why are the settlers putting up with them? The DoC problem has now gotten so aggravated that it’s obvious to everyone except nutritional policy setters, medical guilds, and the processed food industry.
re: «…after all the French have…»
We are to a large extent, covering old ground here. Take advantage of the blog search feature on key words of interest. Here’s one result: Debunking the French weight myth
re: «Like I mentioned before, ALCOHOL is a poison if taken regularly, so really we ought to remove it TOTALLY from our diet , but if low enough it is not usually going to cause damage…»
With alcohol, a case can be made that there’s an inverted-U response (with respect to all-cause mortality), with perhaps peak benefit at about 1-2 glasses of organic dry red wine per day. Perspectives on that can be expected to evolve over time. I’m not aware of any such response curve for wheat (no peak benefit — it’s all downhill). Such beneficial elements as wheat has (prebiotic fiber) can be had from other sources, without the baggage.
re: «When you look at Dr Lustig’s video…»
Fructose in particular has been on the radar here for a long time, more recently here: Fructose—A wolf in sheep’s clothing
re: «…the main reason why tooth decay MAY of come along with the eating of wheat…»
My vote is the amylopectin A polysaccharide, for which humans have an enzyme (amylase), which causes this carb to turn to cleaved glucose before we even swallow it. Switch your kids from candy to whole wheat crackers, and expect no reduction in the (entirely needless) dental bills.
re: «…“Silchester” … when you look at their skulls…»
Got site to cite? A quick search didn’t turn up any images with fully intact teeth.
re: «…when they unearth a mummy form ancient Egypt there teeth a in really good condition…»
Again, got a cite for that? This 2013 blog article has lost its images, but notes: “The Egyptians, among the earliest of civilizations of Homo sapiens, famous for their wheat, barley, and corn consuming ways, were the first to have dentists, some of whom developed techniques to drill into the mouth to remove cavities.”
re: «So to use wheat as the scapegoat is nonsense…»
It’s not a scapegoat. Another aspect of the program is that it was focused on heart disease up to about 2006, and had already gone low/no sugar. When Dr. Davis suggested to his patients that they try discontinuing wheat, they began marching in and reporting the disappearance of multiple DoCs — the non-infectious non-injury chronic ailments that consensus medicine pretends to have treatments for. This led to writing another book, with a familiar title.
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Yes I agree, it is a case of the “whole is greater than the sum of its parts” So yes there are a long list of what contributes to modern disease especially inflammatory disease !
Listen to Dr Davis and he is focused on wheat being the driving cause, and yes he has a point ! Listen to Dr Lustig and he is ALL OUT on added sugar especially fructose and the way the body metabolises it !
Then listen to another top Dr and they are all out on refined veg oil, especially “rapeseed” ……………..So yes all 3 are right and all 3 have really kicked in since the 1950.
For example, when Ancel Keys but the blame on saturated fat in the 50’s he got funded for the emerging American Heart Association by PROCTER & GAMBLE who were making this stuff called margarine , and so PUSHED this as a alternative! Now we all know how made industrial processed oils are a an INFLAMMATORY, and how over the years MORE AND MORE is seeing it’s way into our diet ! You only have to look at proceeded food and to read the label and you will see that is is in everything, and it is no coincidence that most modern diseases are INFLAMMATORY !
I would rather eat a bag of wheat or other grains like oats than consume a half cup of rapeseed oil, ANY DAY !
The bottom line, you could get really hung up on trying to establish wheat as being the main driver, or the oils, or the increase in added sugars, but truth be known it is more than likely a combination of all three.
I just DON’T like the way Dr Davis shows these charts of how disease and obesity have increased in the last 60 years and then draws a chart showing how wheat has increased simultaneously ! You could make the same chart with the increase use of veg oils to try and prove that it must be oils which are the main driving force, or could do the same with sugar or high fructose corn syrup….!
I would like to see his 5 point plan on how to get back to good health the “undoctored way” focus a little more on getting rid of processed veg oils. YES, concentrating on “bowel flora” is great, as is giving attention to magnesium, vitamin D, Omega 3 etc…..getting rid, TOTALLY, of the processed oils is imperative !
As for you point about the Silchester skulls (Roman settlement) then come to the UK and I will take you to our small museum where you will see the skeletons of these 2,000 year old people and you will see that there teeth are SUPERB, even after all this time ! And what did they have back then WHEAT, what did they NOT HAVE back then, sugar (added) and veg oils !
Sorry but the proof of the pudding is in the eating ….. Not saying that they did not have problems with teeth, but keep in mind that there was other sources of sugar and tooth decay OTHER than wheat back then, and they did not have good oral hygiene . The Egyptians had lots of sweet foods other than wheat !
Terry Flores wrote: «Listen to Dr Davis and he is focused on wheat being the driving cause…»
Have you gotten further than the book title? It’s not even the focus of this 2011 summary (which itself is not the current program).
re: «So yes all 3 are right and all 3 have really kicked in since the 1950.»
The list of contributors to our modern malaises is way longer than 3.
Trans-fats, for example, go back to 1911, and we’re not clear of them yet (watch out for hydrogenation on the lard label).
Dysbiosis alone (a 2014 topic in the program) has its own very long list of suspected enablers, including unintended consequences of the antibiotics that brought some serious diseases under control early last century. You may have noticed a series of articles on this blog lately regarding foundational gut flora. With any luck, we haven’t driven key ones to extinction yet.
re: «…Ancel Keys…»
Yep, we’re familiar with Ancel’s Antics™.
re: «I would rather eat a bag of wheat or other grains like oats than consume a half cup of rapeseed oil, ANY DAY !»
Well, sure, but that’s a false dichotomy. Eat neither. No deficiencies will arise by switching to an enlightened ancestral (pre-agricultural) diet. Dairy is optional, but avoid eating the seeds of grasses, however processed, unless you have a rumen.
re: «…you could get really hung up on trying to establish wheat as being the main driver…»
And the program doesn’t. There is no single driver. There is a priority list, which evolves, but I suspect that grains are going to own the top spot for the foreseeable future. It is sometimes impossible (celiac), but always needlessly difficult to implement a productive diet if grains stay in. Wheat gets the focus because it’s the enabler/ringleader: I Ate One Cookie and Gained 30 Pounds!
It’s so addictive that I wonder if it drives people to post grain advocacy comments on low carb blogs.☺
re: «I just DON’T like the way Dr Davis shows these charts of how disease and obesity have increased in the last 60 years and then draws a chart showing how wheat has increased simultaneously !»
It’s a correlation, and it’s real. Yes, similar charts exist for the fake fats, cheap sugar, certain pesticides, and, I shouldn’t be surprised: fake flavorants & colorants. All of which, of course, defines processed food-like substances. Over 98% of what passes for food in the modern market is unfit for routine human consumption. Wheat accounts for only 80% of that junk.
On the Lustig theme, grain carbs are sugar (plus extra hazards). Table sugar (sucrose) is only 50% glucose. HFCS is usually only 45% or 55% glucose. Wheat is 60% glucose, presented in a trivially-cleaved polymer form. People who wouldn’t dream of directly consuming a teaspoon of sugar are completely oblivious to the comparable hazards of a similar weight of artisan crackers, or some clueless crunchie from the gluten-free aisle (with the non-gluten starches presenting the same glycemic hazard, plus WGA if rice flour).
re: «I would like to see his 5 point plan on how to get back to good health the “undoctored way” focus a little more on getting rid of processed veg oils.»
It’s been there all along, just lately in: Clarity on omega-6 fatty acids
re: «…and they did not have good oral hygiene…»
Pre-neo humans had no dental hygiene, and no dental problems. Why did the early Egyptian need it? The cultures studied by Weston A. Price in the early 20th still didn’t. Existing H-G likewise don’t — until the convenience “foods” arrive.
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I also eat oatmeal five days a week and I gain so much weight now I understand whyi gain all that weight
“Over 98% of what passes for food in the modern market is unfit for routine human consumption”
No offense, but that’s a bit of an extreme statement. I guess extreme statements win the hearts and minds of people using the internet these days though
DLM wrote: «No offense, but that’s a bit of an extreme statement.»
It is indeed, and the main question being: is it true?
The number is derived from Wheat Belly Total Health (2014), page 137 of the print edition. 1000 acceptable items out of 60000 leaves 59000, or 98.3% unacceptable. These figures are repeated in the later 10-Day book and Slim Guide.
Actually, before Dr. Davis wrote that, my personal estimate was a bit lower (perhaps 87% unacceptable). I was doing an eyeball estimate. I suspect he did an actual survey.
Entire aisles don’t even need a visit: bread, cereal, candy, snacks, pop, sports/energy junk, processed meats, frozen meals/pizza. Then eliminate everything else that contains wheat, rye, barley, other grains, hi-gly starches, added simple sugars, artificial sweeteners, added ω6LA grain and legume fats, food coloring, emulsifiers, preservatives, antibiotics, most of the GMOs, a lot of CAFO, too many high sugar fruits; and there’s not much left (but there is stuff left, and the choices are growing).
I’m sometimes the family shopper, and I know what we don’t buy, which is an astonishingly high percentage of the food-like substances in modern markets (most of which flat out didn’t exist a mere century ago — those treats come with price beyond what the bar code rings up as).
re: «I guess extreme statements win the hearts and minds of people using the internet these days though»
No, but with any luck, they get attention, and independent thought. The average roadside convenience store might have only two items safe to consume: string cheese and spring water in glass.
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