Alzheimer’s Prevention Is the Cure: Patrick Holford on Brain Health, Biomarkers & Big Data
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YouTube Timestamps (Concise & Key Points):
00:00 – Intro & Alzheimer’s Day
00:57 – Why Alzheimer’s is Preventable
03:30 – Myths About Amyloid & Genes
06:20 – Systems-Based vs. Reductionist Medicine
08:00 – Problems with Evidence-Based Medicine
12:00 – Citizen Science & Big Data
15:45 – Role of Biomarkers (Homocysteine, Omega-3, etc.)
20:00 – Blood Test Technology & Accessibility
28:30 – The Omega-3/Omega-6 Balance & Evolution
34:00 – Marine Foods, Soil, and Nutrient Density
42:00 – Vegan Brain Health & Nutrient Deficiencies
50:00 – Food for the Brain: Citizen Science Movement
58:00 – Final Thoughts & Global Translation Rollout
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Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:00:00 ] Hello and welcome to Unstress Health. My name is Dr. Ron Ehrlich. Well, today, the 20th of May, 2025, is International Alzheimer’s Day. And to celebrate that, we are focusing on Alzheimer’s prevention is the cure. You are the masters of your brain’s future health. Learn how to dementia proof your diet and lifestyle. That is the book published by today’s guest. Patrick Holford, CEO of Food for the Brain. Now, Patrick has written, oh, I’ve lost count. It’s certainly over 20 or 30 books. I’d have to check the exact number, but they are books on health and nutrition. So join us as we explore this vital connection between nutrition and brain health and discover strategies for cognitive wellbeing. I hope you enjoy this conversation I had with Patrick Holfford. Welcome to the show, Patrick.
Patrick Holford [00:00:56 ] Great to be back.
Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:00:57 ] Yes, back. I love getting people back, and particularly you, to fill us in on your new book, Prevention is the Cure. You are the master of your brain’s future health. I mean, my goodness, there’s something in the title that gives it away. But can you walk us through the most the sort of compelling evidence that supports the shift in the paradigm from treatment to prevention, and also, why is the message, why has it been so hard for mainstream medicine to accept this and incorporate it into policy and research?
Patrick Holford [00:01:36 ] Well, the first thing is I wrote this book because I really needed to put all the content together and dismantle the fundamental belief, which is that Alzheimer’s is the buildup of amyloid plaque, a protein in the brain. And that in order to cure it, you have to dismantle that amylaid plaque and also to make it clear that prevention is, for most people, and we’re talking about 99% of people, is entirely possible. And I was very pleased when leading neurologists in the US, five times New York Times bestseller, Dr. David Perlmutter wrote a quote on the front which says, becoming an Alzheimer’s patient is almost always a choice. This book explains why. In fact, I was just doing a Tv news programme, and they said this statement could be rather offensive. And I said, look, anyone with Alzheimer’s, anyone going through that terrible demise, which I guarantee we do not need to have, you may die without your hair, but not without your memories. It’s not necessary. Our teachers like Dr. Abram Hoffer, for example, Dr. Linus Pauling, they were sharp as a razor until the end. Uh… Uh… Somebody with alzheimer’s they would want nothing more than to know that their family and friends do not need to get this and just like diabetes and heart disease you know once you’ve got it you know god i wish i had known how to not get alzheimers so i wanted to present the evidence that amyloid is not alzheimers which is the first chapter And the genes are not primarily driving this. Um, less than 1% is in the genes, considerably less. And we can talk about that and even predictive genes like APOE 4, which a lot of people have, and are very worried about, um, the, the impact of, of APO E4 can be eliminated with the right diet and lifestyle. And that’s very clear. And the next point I really, um wanted to make is that Alzheimer’s is not a sort of mysterious disease caused by one thing. It’s a sort systems breakdown. And we see this in so much health. It’s total load. There isn’t just one way to get dementia, Alzheimer’s. It’s combination of factors. And a simple example of this is that, you know, in the UK we’ve had some really brilliant, bright news reporters. You know, who have very active mind, which is one part of it. They get dementia. So it’s not just about using your mind. We know that the structure of the brain and omega-3 particularly and B vitamins which are required to get that omega- 3 into the brain, that affects the structure. We note the function of neurons depends on things like an appropriate glucose supply. So the weird thing, and we can go into that, is that too much sugar actually leads to sugar starvation in the brain. So a fuel supply problem. And by the way, whenever you make energy, you make oxidants, so smoking, air pollution, they are risk factors. So it’s a combination of something going wrong in the structure of the brain, the function of the the brain and the utilisation. In other words, it’s a systems-based total. Breakdown as most diseases are but that model does not work well if you want to have a single blockbuster drug or nutrient that everybody takes so those were the points that number one it’s largely preventable number two it isn’t purely a function of this amyloid protein number three genes play a very very small part and number four it’s systems-based things that we can change and therefore not develop. Cognitive decline as we get older.
Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:05:59 ] I mean, gee, when we talk about a systems based approach versus a reductionist based approach, we may as well be talking about an integrative approach versus an allopathic approach or the traditional medical approach, because so much of modern medicine is reductionist, is it not? So much of Modern Medicine is looking for that blockbuster drug.
Patrick Holford [00:06:23 ] Well, it’s true, and strangely, and we owe this to Professor Gerald Raven back in the late 80s, maybe 90s, 90s who developed the concept of metabolic syndrome. And basically what was happening there was a lot of people getting heart disease and getting diabetes and being chronically overweight had the same pattern of results in blood tests. They had… High cholesterol, or more importantly, low HDL cholesterol, high blood fats, triglycerides, sugar problems measured one way or another, very often by the glycosylated haemoglobin Hba1c. Some say that raised homocysteine, which we should go into because it’s so important, is part of that. And he called this metabolic syndrome, and that is a systems-based approach. And that’s probably, I think, the only kind of systems-based lens, you know, that has been applied. And I was looking at a study of almost two million people that came out two weeks ago, and it showed that people with metabolic syndrome have a 22% increased, you know, risk of dementia. So, yeah, we don’t think. In a systems based way and we need to.
Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:07:52 ] I mean, the the other problem