Please read these two articles regarding the dangers of soy in your diet. There is a general misunderstanding concerning the claimed health benefits of soy and it is important to read these articles. I encourage you to do your own research on the internet as well. Soy, one of the three big mono crops, has crept into a number of prepared foods. You may be ingesting soy and not even be aware of it. Read the ingredients on all processed foods, especially “health” or “energy ” bars.
Bamboozled By The Soy Hype
Acupuncture Today
January, 2011, Vol. 12, Issue 01
By Marlene Merritt, DOM, LAc, ACN
What I’ve seen in my years of adding nutrition to my practice, is that a lot of people “know” certain things about food. “Know” in the sense that we don’t question the thought anymore. Like we “knew” that low-fat diets were healthy, right? (see my article titled “Big, Fat Lies” in December).
Or that we “know” eggs can raise your cholesterol. So let’s look at a big myth that when you actually learn all the facts, makes you wonder how we got so bamboozled.
Let’s start with the myth that soy is a health food. Years ago, China and Japan planted soy beans, NOT as food for people, but for the sole reason of returning nitrogen to the soil since growing rice was especially nitrogen-depleting. They knew better than to eat soy, as it was particularly difficult to digest, causing gas and bloating. However, at some point someone figured out that if you buried it for six months and fermented it, it didn’t cause those symptoms. And so miso, tempeh, soy sauce, and natto were created.
Soy made its way to the United States in the 1900s, where Dr. John Harvey Kellogg – the breakfast cereal king – championed the health benefits of the legume and railed against the evils of meat. Henry Ford spent $1.2 million in an effort to make soy plastics and a soy car, and Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini were busy promoting soybeans in traditional foods (flours, polenta, etc.) Soy products in the West are treated very differently than they are in the East — soy is a product of the industrial revolution and is an opportunity for science to develop cheap meat substitutes, to put soy in familiar food products, and to produce soy-based pharmaceuticals. Soy wasn’t even seriously considered for food until World War II shortages created a demand for cheap protein. It has been touted as healthy for decades, and the vegetarian population has embraced this, without really knowing the implications of ingesting soy.
Soy Facts
There are a couple of reasonably well-known facts about soy that bear repeating here. One, soy is the second-most genetically modified crop in the United States, with corn being the first. Secondly, it’s very difficult to digest for most people — and why is that?
Soy is the only legume that, despite soaking, sprouting and slow cooking, will NEVER neutralize its “anti-nutrients.” These anti-nutrients include phytates, protease inhibitors, lectins and saponins and are all developed for protection of the seed and plant, but those protections cause a huge number of problems for digestion. What do those anti-nutrients do to you?
Here are some examples:
Phytates — these block seeds from sprouting too early. The high levels in soy bind tightly to calcium, magnesium, copper, iron, and zinc, leading to everything from osteoporosis, anemia, and immune deficiency, among other things.
Protease inhibitors — prevent seeds from being digested, and interfere with pancreatic enzymes, especially trypsin and chymotrypsin. Heat will denature some, but not all,in soy. Protease inhibitors can cause cell proliferation in the pancreas as it becomes overworked to produce the digestive enzymes that are being inhibited.
Saponins — cause the soap-like suds when seeds are in water. They contribute to damaging of the intestinal mucosa, along with lectins, causing “leaky gut,” interfere with digestive enzymes trypsin, chymotrypsin and succinate dehydrogenase, and may also be goitrogenic. They stick like glue to the soy protein and no food processing method will work to remove them.
Oxalates — bind tightly with minerals, especially calcium. While spinach and rhubarb are highest in oxalates, most people will not eat them excessively. High amounts over the recommendation of 10 mg (textured soy protein has the highest at 638 mg per serving) cause kidney stones. Also can be poisonous — for example, the oxalates in sheep’s sorrel will kill you if you eat too much of that plant.
So why is this a big deal? Not enough zinc affects growth, immunity, intelligence, wound healing and 300 other enzymes. Iron deficiency leads to anemia and reduced thyroid function. Claims that plant-based diets provide enough calcium is severely undercut if those diets also include soy, leading to osteoporosis. Yes, adding calcium and zinc to soy milk is ridiculous, and yet the manufacturers say nothing. Eat a little bit here and there, and soy doesn’t pose much of a problem, but more than that, and digestive lining damage occurs, as well as a myriad of other problems.
And what about all that gas? The oligosaccharides raffinose and stachyose are the ones responsible for the flatulence that results when most people eat soy, and again, preparation with soaking, sprouting or cooking does not neutralize them. Beano is a product that contains the enzyme required to break down raffinose and will work for some people, but not for others. Either way, that doesn’t change soy’s interference with mineral absorption.
That difficulty in digestion would be avoided if soy were fermented. The problem is, most people are not ingesting fermented soy — they’re taking it in as soy milk, or tofu, or textured vegetable protein (TVP) or as an additive to other foods. And that’s just talking about the digestive problems with soy — there are other significant problems as well.
Beyond Digestion
For babies, the effect of soy is especially damaging — it has been linked to pediatric and autoimmune thyroid problems, aluminum toxicity, and early puberty. As I said earlier, as a trypsin inhibitor, it affects protein digestion and pancreatic function. Soy increases the requirements for vitamin D, reduces the bioavailability of zinc, iron and the other minerals as mentioned earlier, and lacks cholesterol, which is vital for brain development (breast milk has six times the daily amount of adult requirements). And yet, soy is used in a huge percentage of baby formula — why? Well, where are you going to put a “health” food that is our second largest crop?
Adults also get detrimental physiological effects of soy. The thyroid is very negatively affected by soy — this has been known for over 60 years. Hypothyroidism and goiters are directly associated with intake of soy, and its isoflavones. While hypothyroidism can be caused by deficient iodine intake, as well as from adrenal stress, if a patient is ingesting soy, it must definitely be removed from the diet before any improvement can occur.
You may have patients who have had breast cancer and their oncologists have recommended against ingesting soy. Or their health food store “expert” said it was helpful for hot flashes. That’s because soy is a phytoestrogen (it’s particular type is isoflavones) — it gives SOME estrogen response in the body. It’s argued that it binds to the estrogen receptor sites, preventing stronger estradiol from causing damage, and it’s also argued that phytoestrogens are estrogen modulators, but either way, there’s an estrogenic effect that needs to be taken into account.
How about accelerated brain aging? It’s being hypothesized that the isoflavones are contributing to diminished cognitive ability, doubling the chances of being clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, and has shown brain atrophy and lower brain weights. This particular study is considered by fellow researchers not on the soy industry payroll “one of the more robust, well-designed prospective epidemiological studies generally available.”
Counter-Intuitive
All of this seems crazy, in the face of the happy families drinking soy milk on television, doesn’t it? If you were to believe the marketing, you’d think you can’t get enough of “healthy soy.” I’ll say this again, and again — don’t fall for marketing.
Regarding soy lecithin — lecithin is a vital nutrient that protects cells, reverses liver damage, improves brain function and memory AND the best source for that is egg yolks. While soy lecithin is a waste product coming from soy oil production, it’s not usually a problem, even for people allergic or sensitive to soy. It’s probably more important to avoid soy protein and soy oil than the occasional product with soy lecithin.
Take a look at the ingredient list next time you’re at a grocery store. Soy is mixed into other oils (good luck finding a salad dressing, even in health food stores, that doesn’t use soy oil), soy protein isolate and textured vegetable protein are used in imitation foods, commercial baked goods, diet beverages, meal replacements and fast food products. Check your bread the next time you buy some from the store — and don’t be surprised to find soy in it. Soy is used extensively in school lunch programs, senior citizen centers, and any other program that uses processed, industrial-developed food. Please protect your health and the health of your family — educate yourself fully on what you eat, even if you think you really “know” it’s good for you.
For more information about the damaging effects of soy, read “The Whole Soy Story” by Dr. Kaayla Daniel, PhD, CCN.
Soy Dangers Summarized
From Mercola.com
Soy Dangers Summarized
Here we dispel the myths of the “Diet Dictocrats” and reveal the scientific validity behind our wise ancestors’ nutrient-dense diets.
Myth: Use of soy as a food dates back many thousands of years.
Truth: Soy was first used as a food during the late Chou dynasty (1134-246 BC), only
after the Chinese learned to ferment soybeans to make foods like tempeh, natto and tamari.
Myth: Asians consume large amounts of soy foods.
Truth: Average consumption of soy foods in Japan and China is 10 grams (about 2 teaspoons) per day. Asians consume soy foods in small amounts as a condiment, and not as a replacement for animal foods.
Myth: Modern soy foods confer the same health benefits as traditionally fermented soy foods.
Truth: Most modern soy foods are not fermented to neutralize toxins in soybeans, and are processed in a way that denatures proteins and increases levels of carcinogens.
Myth: Soy foods provide complete protein.
Truth: Like all legumes, soybeans are deficient in sulfur-containing amino acids methionine and cystine. In addition, modern processing denatures fragile lysine. Myth: Fermented soy foods can provide vitamin B12 in vegetarian diets.
Truth: The compound that resembles vitamin B12 in soy cannot be used by the human body: in fact, soy foods cause the body to require more B12
Myth: Soy formula is safe for infants.
Truth: Soy foods contain trypsin inhibitors that inhibit protein digestion and affect pancreatic function. In test animals, diets high in trypsin inhibitors led to stunted growth and pancreatic disorders. Soy foods increase the body’s requirement for vitamin D, needed for strong bones and normal growth.
Phytic acid in soy foods results in reduced bioavailabilty of iron and zinc, which are required for the health and development of the brain and nervous system. Soy also lacks cholesterol, likewise essential for the development of the brain and nervous system.
Megadoses of phytoestrogens in soy formula have been implicated in the current trend toward increasingly premature sexual development in girls and delayed or retarded sexual development in boys.
Myth: Soy foods can prevent osteoporosis.
Truth: Soy foods can cause deficiencies in calcium and vitamin D, both needed for healthy bones. Calcium from bone broths and vitamin D from seafood, lard and organ meats prevent osteoporosis in Asian countries—not soy foods.
Myth: Modern soy foods protect against many types of cancer.
Truth: A British government report concluded that there is little evidence that soy foods protect against breast cancer or any other forms of cancer. In fact, soy foods may result in an increased risk of cancer.
Myth: Soy foods protect against heart disease.
Truth: In some people, consumption of soy foods will lower cholesterol, but there is no evidence that lowering cholesterol with soy protein improves one’s risk of having heart disease.
Myth: Soy estrogens (isoflavones) are good for you.
Truth: Soy isoflavones are phyto-endocrine disrupters. At dietary levels, they can prevent ovulation and stimulate the growth of cancer cells. Eating as little as 30 grams (about 4 tablespoons) of soy per day can result in hypothyroidism with symptoms of lethargy, constipation, weight gain and fatigue.
Myth: Soy foods are safe and beneficial for women to use in their postmenopausal years.
Truth: Soy foods can stimulate the growth of estrogen-dependent tumors and cause
thyroid problems. Low thyroid function is associated with difficulties in menopause.
Myth: Phytoestrogens in soy foods can enhance mental ability.
Truth: A recent study found that women with the highest levels of estrogen in their blood had the lowest levels of cognitive function; In Japanese Americans tofu consumption in mid-life is associated with the occurrence of Alzheimer’s disease in later life.
Myth: Soy isoflavones and soy protein isolate have GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) status.
Truth: Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) recently withdrew its application to the FDA for GRAS status for soy isoflavones following an outpouring of protest from the scientific community. The FDA never approved GRAS status for soy protein isolate because of concern regarding the presence of toxins and carcinogens in processed soy.
Myth: Soy foods are good for your sex life.
Truth: Numerous animal studies show that soy foods cause infertility in animals. Soy consumption enhances hair growth in middle-aged men, indicating lowered testosterone levels.
Myth: Soybeans are good for the environment.
Truth: Most soybeans grown in the US are genetically engineered to allow farmers to use large amounts of herbicides.
Myth: Soybeans are good for developing nations.
Truth: In third-world countries, soybeans replace traditional crops and transfer the
value-added of processing from the local population to multinational corporations.
Babies fed soy-based formula have 13,000 to 22,000 times more estrogen compounds in their blood than babies fed milk-based formula. Infants exclusively fed soy formula receive the estrogenic equivalent of at least four birth control pills per day.
Male infants undergo a testosterone surge during the first few months of life, when testosterone levels may be as high as those of an adult male. During this period, baby boys are programmed to express male characteristics after puberty, not only in the development of their sexual organs and other masculinity traits, but also in setting patterns in the brain characteristic of male behavior.
In animals, studies indicate that phytoestrogens in soy are powerful endocrine disrupters. Soy infant feeding — which floods the bloodstream with female hormones that inhibit testosterone — cannot be ignored as a possible cause of disrupted development patterns in boys, including learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder.
Male children exposed to DES, a synthetic estrogen, had testes smaller than normal on maturation and infant marmoset monkeys fed soy isoflavones had a reduction in testosterone levels up to 70 percent compared to milk-fed controls.
Almost 15 percent of white girls and 50 percent of African-Americans girls show signs of puberty, such as breast development and pubic hair, before the age of eight. Some girls are showing sexual development before the age of three. Premature development of girls has been linked to the use of soy formula and exposure to environmental estrogen-mimickers such as PCBs and DDE.
Intake of phytoestrogens even at moderate levels during pregnancy can have adverse affects on the developing fetus and the timing of puberty later in life.
For those seeking scientific references please see my earlier artticle
Excerpted from Soy Dangers Summarized http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/12/04/soy-dangers-summarized.aspx