Welcome to my weekly newsletter. This week we discuss excess deaths, myocarditis, the Friedewald equation and calculated vs directly measured LDL-cholesterol, new weight loss drugs, and a few other things.
Brilliant, I've voted for drivel and I'm one of those who saw the 'subscribe' button and simply did so because it's good value and we've all got to make a crust.
I feel I must apologize for my fellow readers. Considering what I pay for my cable bill each month, five or six dollars a month is a bargain. Substack asked if I wanted to subscribe before the paywall went up so that when it went up I didn't notice any change other than the word Subscriber showing up when I pull up the Arrow.
But I subscribe to the Arrow not because of your years of training and practice, but because I trust your honesty. Which brings us back to the issue a few months ago about Fauci et al, who were well trained and had years of practice but weren't honest.
As for your "introductory material", it helps dispel the ivory tower outlook that many doctors seem to have. For example it is hard to take dietary advice from someone who has never had to struggle with weight problems. It helps to know that you live an ordinary life with successes and disappointments as we all do.
I had no problem connecting to the Childers' link about Australia and covid. I used Safari. But I'm less and less interested in covid.
Peter Attia's book came out a few days ago. Have you had chance to read it? And when you have I would very much like to know what you (and MD) think of it, in particular if you have any disagreements with his conclusions. I read a review in the WSJ and was surprised to read that Attia thinks we should be eating twice the USDA protein recommendation. I seem to remember that he once had indicated that we should reduce protein intake as we age for increased longevity.
I live in LA and share your dismay with the cold rainy winter we have had this year in California. If I wanted miserable weather there are many cheaper places I could live.
Thank you for writing the Arrow. I hope the many who appreciate your efforts outweigh those few that don't.
Thanks for the kind words about The Arrow. I appreciate the support.
Re the Childers link... I also used Safari and got some weird site telling me my Mac was under attack. I used the Brave browser and got a different warning. Same with Chrome. But others have said they didn't have a problem. I'm not tech savvy enough to even guess why I couldn't get through.
I have not had the chance to read Peter's book, but I will. I, too, saw the WSJ review. I think early on in the mTOR game, a lot of people--Peter included (an assumption as I've never spoken to him about it--thought stimulation of mTOR would drive cancer. I was never in that crowd because I had read a lot of research on AMPK, which is upstream from mTOR. And AMPK is activated with a low-carb diet, so I figured it would not modulate mTOR in a bad way.
Now it has become apparent that pulsatile stimulation of mTOR via the amino acid leucine turns on the muscle-making system. So, eating a good chunk of protein a couple of times per day provides enough leucine (assuming we're not talking about plant-based protein, which is low in leucine) to fire off mTOR and make muscle.
Since there is a strong correlation between muscle mass and longevity, I would guess that's why Peter changed his mind.
When have nay-sayers ever improved anything? Please continue with your full dimension expression of what you are thinking. What a joy to know you are not some AI-riven collection of discordant notes. (I am still humming the MTA tune this week too.) Your work fires up all the neurons of our brains so please don't hold back! Besides, any Substack subscriber knows the good stuff is behind the paywall.
Sorry you've run into the "I'm not paying for this" nonsense. I only subscribe to a few publications (yours, Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying's, Matt Taibbi's, and Tara at Slowdown Farmstead) and even being retired I feel as if I can barely keep up. I loved your Picasso explanation - actually it sounds like something he would've said. And loved all the rest of the column, as usual. I may copy out the bit about cholesterol to show my cardiologist who told me "not to be silly and pay for different (i.e. non-calculated" )LDL levels just because I'd read something somewhere. Really pissed me off. She also warned me about salt and saturated fat. She's fairly young but clearly in the statin camp, which I will not become a paying member of. At any rate - keep in good cheer yourself (that haircut must've been done by a mean child when the guy was asleep - maybe?).
Drat - sorry for the miss - but it just proves what I've always said about editing; if you know what it's supposed to say, your mind/eye fixes it for you. Lame excuse, I know, but there it is.
Do check out Tara's website - especially this one where she talks about fasting for five days (among many other things):
Love the column, I look forward to it every week. I don’t mind you writing about your personal stuff, it’s usually pretty interesting. Just upgraded to the paid version, because you convinced me it’s not a huge amount of money for the quality and breadth of information I get.
This week’s column was supposed to have some details about glutamine and cancer, I suppose that was one of the things you had to cut? Looking forward to it next week, I hope!
Mike, the survey box didn't work even though I'm a subscriber, so please keep on with the foibles (losing car keys by the roadside was a favorite!). Just guessing, but I don't think you've missed a week in the two+ years you started The Arrow. We are grateful!
This is what I mean about Substack being kind of difficult to work with. I didn't see anything on the survey that said Paid Subscribers Only. I still can't figure out what happened with that, so I have to way to fix it.
Thanks for hanging in there two+ years. It's been 116 weeks strait, which is 12 weeks beyond two years.
He almost nails it! The missing nails in this coffin (puns intended) are the temporal harms and deaths, BY AGE GROUP. Something that Prof's Neil and Fenton found in Ukhsa data, while the vax progressed descendent by age groups. As well as harms. They actually saw the expression of first vax harms (see below alberta pictures), but in an unvaxed group, due to the 2 weeks delay in status change from the unvaxed to 1. vaxed. In Alberta, ca. 50% of harms were within that 14 days... and the 2. shot expressed milder wave 70-130 days after, and a major wave of harms 140-200 days afterwards.
The Hermit Kingdom data showed that this age group separation was quite narrow, 30-39 and 40-49 started within weeks to eachother. So maybe you have to look elsewhere to establish this temporal relation to age groups and harms evolution.
Good old Alberta data, fig. 12 in the original and last pictures on this article, shows exactly this temporal delay to vaxes (delta period and calender year data harvest means that 2. shot data is still developing). If you had like a month inbetween the age groups, you can detect the difference. Just by pure eye, you can see something interesting not only related to breakthru infections, but also to hospitalizations and deaths.
I gave the first link a short once over. I need to read it more thoroughly. But I'm not particularly a fan of Bradford Hill's. In many cases, though, that's all we have to go on. When a can grab a bit of time, I'll go through it in more detail. Same with the Alberta literature.
The thing that troubles me about these kinds of stats is that there were a number of unusual events taking place aside from just the vaccines. There were lockdowns and all the BS that went along with that. Plus in Australia they were even locking people up. Those kinds of stressful situations can exacerbate all kinds of underlying problems, many of which can lead to death. There is no doubt about the increase in excess deaths, but the difficulty lies in teasing out exactly what caused them.
Fenton &all saw this with 1st vaxes. Within each age group, the harms evolved right after campaign start. However, unvaxed got the symptoms from interventions they never received.
Dear Mike, you are the one writer I will subscribe to. I don't have time to read (and follow up) more than the details in your weekly posts, and I have found your comments valuable though I disagree on some issues. As you point out, I get two medics for the price of one. Keep going, and keep up the work on PP2 that I hope to have as a Christmas present.
Regarding calculated LDL, since the following paper came out in 2008, I've always "recalculated" my results using the "Persian formula": https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18426324/
I wrote about the Persian paper in my blog post I linked to. I didn't talk about the equation, though. I just used the paper to show other groups had made the same observation I had about the inaccuracy of LDL calculations in the face of low trigs.
Based on some reading I did after I posted that last Arrow, I believe a lot of labs are using other formulas instead of Friedewald, which works pretty well with trigs between ~100 to 400.
I think I got it right. First I calculated TC divided by 1.19 and got X. Then I did triglycerides divided by 1.9 and got Y. Then I did HDL divided by 1.1 and got Z. THEN, I added X and Y together, then subtracted Z, and then subtracted 38. Is that right?
Hi! I am happy to pay a modest fee to read your posts. Why people think everything on the internet should be free is beyond me. You've invested years of your life studying and thinking, and then studying and thinking some more ... and then hours and hours writing and re-writing it so that lay people can understand it. Why should you not be compensated for it? I'm very grateful that you take the time to do this newsletter each week, and I eagerly await the publication of Protein Power 2.0!
I like the "drivel" 😉
Brilliant, I've voted for drivel and I'm one of those who saw the 'subscribe' button and simply did so because it's good value and we've all got to make a crust.
Dr. Eades: YOU are a treasure. Please! You be you! Thank you. bob griffiths
I enjoy the drivel! Please don’t discontinue it.
Drivel is my middle name.
I feel I must apologize for my fellow readers. Considering what I pay for my cable bill each month, five or six dollars a month is a bargain. Substack asked if I wanted to subscribe before the paywall went up so that when it went up I didn't notice any change other than the word Subscriber showing up when I pull up the Arrow.
But I subscribe to the Arrow not because of your years of training and practice, but because I trust your honesty. Which brings us back to the issue a few months ago about Fauci et al, who were well trained and had years of practice but weren't honest.
As for your "introductory material", it helps dispel the ivory tower outlook that many doctors seem to have. For example it is hard to take dietary advice from someone who has never had to struggle with weight problems. It helps to know that you live an ordinary life with successes and disappointments as we all do.
I had no problem connecting to the Childers' link about Australia and covid. I used Safari. But I'm less and less interested in covid.
Peter Attia's book came out a few days ago. Have you had chance to read it? And when you have I would very much like to know what you (and MD) think of it, in particular if you have any disagreements with his conclusions. I read a review in the WSJ and was surprised to read that Attia thinks we should be eating twice the USDA protein recommendation. I seem to remember that he once had indicated that we should reduce protein intake as we age for increased longevity.
I live in LA and share your dismay with the cold rainy winter we have had this year in California. If I wanted miserable weather there are many cheaper places I could live.
Thank you for writing the Arrow. I hope the many who appreciate your efforts outweigh those few that don't.
Thanks for the kind words about The Arrow. I appreciate the support.
Re the Childers link... I also used Safari and got some weird site telling me my Mac was under attack. I used the Brave browser and got a different warning. Same with Chrome. But others have said they didn't have a problem. I'm not tech savvy enough to even guess why I couldn't get through.
I have not had the chance to read Peter's book, but I will. I, too, saw the WSJ review. I think early on in the mTOR game, a lot of people--Peter included (an assumption as I've never spoken to him about it--thought stimulation of mTOR would drive cancer. I was never in that crowd because I had read a lot of research on AMPK, which is upstream from mTOR. And AMPK is activated with a low-carb diet, so I figured it would not modulate mTOR in a bad way.
Now it has become apparent that pulsatile stimulation of mTOR via the amino acid leucine turns on the muscle-making system. So, eating a good chunk of protein a couple of times per day provides enough leucine (assuming we're not talking about plant-based protein, which is low in leucine) to fire off mTOR and make muscle.
Since there is a strong correlation between muscle mass and longevity, I would guess that's why Peter changed his mind.
When have nay-sayers ever improved anything? Please continue with your full dimension expression of what you are thinking. What a joy to know you are not some AI-riven collection of discordant notes. (I am still humming the MTA tune this week too.) Your work fires up all the neurons of our brains so please don't hold back! Besides, any Substack subscriber knows the good stuff is behind the paywall.
Strange. I'm still humming the MTA tune as well. It's a real ear worm.
Sorry you've run into the "I'm not paying for this" nonsense. I only subscribe to a few publications (yours, Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying's, Matt Taibbi's, and Tara at Slowdown Farmstead) and even being retired I feel as if I can barely keep up. I loved your Picasso explanation - actually it sounds like something he would've said. And loved all the rest of the column, as usual. I may copy out the bit about cholesterol to show my cardiologist who told me "not to be silly and pay for different (i.e. non-calculated" )LDL levels just because I'd read something somewhere. Really pissed me off. She also warned me about salt and saturated fat. She's fairly young but clearly in the statin camp, which I will not become a paying member of. At any rate - keep in good cheer yourself (that haircut must've been done by a mean child when the guy was asleep - maybe?).
Only two small typos. . . .
"the most adverse events at all"
most adverse events of all?
"And apparently is has in animal models."
apparently it has
Best,
Marcia
Hey, I'm in good company with Bret, Heather, and Matt. I'll have to give Tara a look. Thanks for the recommendation.
I fixed the typos. Thanks. And BTW, I even found one you missed as I was going through.
Drat - sorry for the miss - but it just proves what I've always said about editing; if you know what it's supposed to say, your mind/eye fixes it for you. Lame excuse, I know, but there it is.
Do check out Tara's website - especially this one where she talks about fasting for five days (among many other things):
https://www.slowdownfarmstead.com/p/in-my-kitchen-around-the-farm-cd1?utm_source=substack&publication_id=486237&post_id=111916553&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&triggerShare=true&isFreemail=false
Hope the link works . . .
Cheers
Hoping the “drivel” vote continues to be the majority, and can we get the hilarious story about the power outage scam next week?
Since you twisted my arm, I write about the power outage and the bizarre scam next week.
Love the column, I look forward to it every week. I don’t mind you writing about your personal stuff, it’s usually pretty interesting. Just upgraded to the paid version, because you convinced me it’s not a huge amount of money for the quality and breadth of information I get.
This week’s column was supposed to have some details about glutamine and cancer, I suppose that was one of the things you had to cut? Looking forward to it next week, I hope!
tried to vote but "something went wrong". please keep the drivel
Mike, the survey box didn't work even though I'm a subscriber, so please keep on with the foibles (losing car keys by the roadside was a favorite!). Just guessing, but I don't think you've missed a week in the two+ years you started The Arrow. We are grateful!
This is what I mean about Substack being kind of difficult to work with. I didn't see anything on the survey that said Paid Subscribers Only. I still can't figure out what happened with that, so I have to way to fix it.
Thanks for hanging in there two+ years. It's been 116 weeks strait, which is 12 weeks beyond two years.
Dr. Eades
The excess deaths is an interesting topic. Wilson Sy tried a Bradford -hill approach to Australia.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/368426122_Australian_COVID-19_pandemic_A_Bradford_Hill_analysis_of_iatrogenic_excess_mortality
He almost nails it! The missing nails in this coffin (puns intended) are the temporal harms and deaths, BY AGE GROUP. Something that Prof's Neil and Fenton found in Ukhsa data, while the vax progressed descendent by age groups. As well as harms. They actually saw the expression of first vax harms (see below alberta pictures), but in an unvaxed group, due to the 2 weeks delay in status change from the unvaxed to 1. vaxed. In Alberta, ca. 50% of harms were within that 14 days... and the 2. shot expressed milder wave 70-130 days after, and a major wave of harms 140-200 days afterwards.
The Hermit Kingdom data showed that this age group separation was quite narrow, 30-39 and 40-49 started within weeks to eachother. So maybe you have to look elsewhere to establish this temporal relation to age groups and harms evolution.
Good old Alberta data, fig. 12 in the original and last pictures on this article, shows exactly this temporal delay to vaxes (delta period and calender year data harvest means that 2. shot data is still developing). If you had like a month inbetween the age groups, you can detect the difference. Just by pure eye, you can see something interesting not only related to breakthru infections, but also to hospitalizations and deaths.
https://metatron.substack.com/p/alberta-just-inadvertently-confessed
Worth digging a bit more. The coffin is almost finished, just a few nails... (coffin = vaxes are also deadly)
JR
I gave the first link a short once over. I need to read it more thoroughly. But I'm not particularly a fan of Bradford Hill's. In many cases, though, that's all we have to go on. When a can grab a bit of time, I'll go through it in more detail. Same with the Alberta literature.
The thing that troubles me about these kinds of stats is that there were a number of unusual events taking place aside from just the vaccines. There were lockdowns and all the BS that went along with that. Plus in Australia they were even locking people up. Those kinds of stressful situations can exacerbate all kinds of underlying problems, many of which can lead to death. There is no doubt about the increase in excess deaths, but the difficulty lies in teasing out exactly what caused them.
Thanks for your answer.
This is why age group temporality is so useful.
Week 1 vax 60+ , harms peak week 26
Week 3 vax 50+, harms peak week 29
Etc.
Fenton &all saw this with 1st vaxes. Within each age group, the harms evolved right after campaign start. However, unvaxed got the symptoms from interventions they never received.
https://wherearethenumbers.substack.com/p/possible-systematic-miscategorisation
Rgds JR
Dear Mike, you are the one writer I will subscribe to. I don't have time to read (and follow up) more than the details in your weekly posts, and I have found your comments valuable though I disagree on some issues. As you point out, I get two medics for the price of one. Keep going, and keep up the work on PP2 that I hope to have as a Christmas present.
Thanks for writing. We, too, hope (desperately) to have it available by Christmas.
Good man. If it has to be later that's OK too.
Regarding calculated LDL, since the following paper came out in 2008, I've always "recalculated" my results using the "Persian formula": https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18426324/
Now I see there is a new "Martin/Hopkins" formula for estimating LDL. Haven't had a chance to dig into that formula. https://www.acc.org/latest-in-cardiology/articles/2019/04/02/13/21/understanding-strengths-and-limitations-of-different-methods-of-ldl-c-estimation
I think the Iranian researchers had identified and addressed the issue 10-12 years earlier.
I wrote about the Persian paper in my blog post I linked to. I didn't talk about the equation, though. I just used the paper to show other groups had made the same observation I had about the inaccuracy of LDL calculations in the face of low trigs.
Based on some reading I did after I posted that last Arrow, I believe a lot of labs are using other formulas instead of Friedewald, which works pretty well with trigs between ~100 to 400.
Jim, can you post here (or maybe Dr. Eades could) the actual Persian formula? I had it at one time and misplaced it.
Yes. See here: https://www.docsopinion.com/ldl-cholesterol-overestimated-lchf
By my notes (for mg/dL measure as in US):
LDL Cholesterol = [Total Cholesterol]/1.19 + Triglycerides/1.9 - [HDL]/1.1-38
I hope that doesn't cause confusion with order of operation.
I think I got it right. First I calculated TC divided by 1.19 and got X. Then I did triglycerides divided by 1.9 and got Y. Then I did HDL divided by 1.1 and got Z. THEN, I added X and Y together, then subtracted Z, and then subtracted 38. Is that right?
Hi! I am happy to pay a modest fee to read your posts. Why people think everything on the internet should be free is beyond me. You've invested years of your life studying and thinking, and then studying and thinking some more ... and then hours and hours writing and re-writing it so that lay people can understand it. Why should you not be compensated for it? I'm very grateful that you take the time to do this newsletter each week, and I eagerly await the publication of Protein Power 2.0!
Hey, Kathy. Good to hear from you. And thanks for the support. MD and I also eagerly await the publication of PP 2.0.
I'm in Australia and have no problem searching for or seeing the Umbrella article, amazingly given the level of censorship here.
Maybe I'm the only one in the world who couldn't see it. Oh, and MD, too. I had her try.
Maybe because you’re in California? ;-)