Q&A #27: Rhonda’s Ketogenic Diet—CGMs, Ketone Levels, & Exercise

Hi everyone, welcome to Crowdcast episode 27. This is our 27th Q&A round for the Crowdcast series, which is pretty exciting. For those of you that are new, welcome. I'm excited to have you here. Typically, the way these Q&As go is As you've probably seen, you submit your questions, many people vote on them, and I then go through the questions and choose some questions that are a little more— that require a little more, you know, background research and in-depth answer. And then also I choose questions that I call rapid-fire questions, which are questions that are typically answered with the You know, anywhere between 1 to, you know, 6 or 7 sentences.

So depending on what types of questions we have each month, sometimes we end up getting a lot of rapid-fire questions, which is going to be the case today. So today we will cover a couple in-depth questions and then a lot of rapid-fire questions. And so for, for some people, they like that because that That means their question's more likely to get answered the more questions that I take. So I also go back and get questions that have been asked a couple of times throughout the various Crowdcasts but haven't been answered. So I try to really make sure that people's questions do eventually get answered. So we have 2 questions this round that are a little more in-depth that were from previous Crowdcasts.

And I also circle back to things that I say last time and say, okay, next time I'm going to talk about that. And it's really nice this time someone actually reminded me. So I'll go ahead and get started with that first question, which I think many people are interested in hearing the answer to. And this question was submitted by Corey. And Corey said, last Crowdcast you mentioned a ranking you and your team did for omega-3 supplements that have been tested for quality, oxidation, concentration. And here I'm going to share them this round. So what I typically do to look for quality omega-3 supplements is go to the International Fish Oil Standards site, which is IFOS, International Fish Oil Standards.

And a variety of different companies that sell an omega-3 supplement in some shape, form, or another, you know, whether it's fish oil or macroalgae oil, they will have their, their supplements tested by the, the International Fish Oil Standards third-party testing site, which is international as the name implies. And so they'll— the, the IFOS will take a, a different lot or a batch from a, from, from one of these types of omega-3 supplements. And they will list a variety of their results, including the concentration of EPA and DHA, which are the 2 main marine omega-3 fatty acids that you want to get in your diet or through your supplement. They'll list the total oxidation number, which you want to be less than 10.

They will list other potential contaminants like mercury, arsenic, PCBs, things like that. And so I will give you a list of my top ones, my top omega-3 supplements that I found by doing some sorting, looking for a few things. One, looking for a good total oxidation number, again, something less than 10, in combination with a high concentration of EPA. And, you know, to a lesser extent, DHA. So I was really looking for a higher concentration of EPA and also lower other contaminants like mercury and PCBs and things like that.

So I think we'll also— I put— we put together a spreadsheet, an Excel spreadsheet with many, many different supplements and you can sort of sort through them and we will send you guys an email with that spreadsheet that you can look through and sort of figure and sort through yourself. But keep in mind, this is a sort of real-time type of testing that's done. In other words, you need to check back every like 6 months or so because, you know, you often will find from batch to batch, sometimes the total oxidation will vary. Most of the time it's— I mean, I think if you find a brand, it's pretty solid, but it's still good to check back. And make sure that's still up to date.

So some of the top supplements that I— again, I should mention, and most of you know this, but I don't have any affiliation with any of these supplement brands. I don't have any affiliation at all with any supplement brands at this point. So this isn't something I'm telling you because I'm affiliated with. I'm just telling you based on the the data that I looked through. Some of the top brands I thought were Nutrigold, N-U-T-R-I-G-O-L-D, and OmegaVia, O-M-E-G-A-V-I-A. They're ultra-concentration ones. In fact, those are really cool because you only need one gel for the serving size. So that was actually one of my top favorites, as well as Barlean's Ideal Omega-3. That's B-A-R-L-E-A-N-S by Barlean's Ideal Omega-3, and they're also one gel. They have actually a really great profile.

Another one that was good was Sports Research, and they're also pretty concentrated. Viva Naturals was another one. Viva Naturals. Another great one I thought was Norwegian Gold by Renew Life. And if you're in Europe, a good brand that I thought I found was called Bare Biology, B-A-R-E Biology. And in Canada, if you're in Canada, a good supplement I found was Genuine Health. And that one was actually a liquid. So you do like 5 mL and it's extremely concentrated. In fact, it was pretty awesome. So in terms of like per serving size, you're getting like almost 3 grams of EPA with a total oxidation of 3. So it's pretty stellar. So that was Genuine Health if you're in Canada. So those were some of my top choices. And, um, I, like I said, I don't have any affiliation with them.

I personally am not buying those brands at this point because a friend of mine still gives me his omega-3, which is pretty amazing, but it's not really available for the general public at this point. So, um, if I did not get that, I would probably, I would buy one of these off the list that I just mentioned. So, so keep that in mind. Jack is mentioning in the chat, shouldn't total oxidation be less than 24 and 26? No, in my opinion, it should be less than 10. So, so that is a standard that, that I basically think is the best. It's my personal opinion. You'll probably see other people saying much higher than that, but I think that there's many, many great fish oil supplements with a total oxidation less than 10. And so why wouldn't you get that? That's really my opinion.

Dangella is saying that Google is not being honest because they're saying my favorite brand of omega-3 is Nordic Naturals. So that was— Back in about 2015, I would say, when they were actually— they were submitting some of their supplements for third-party testing. They stopped doing that. And I think some of their quality has decreased in terms of total oxidation. I think as they expanded their supplements, they may have— compromised a little bit of their quality control. I'm not sure. So I'm currently— I like some Nordic Naturals, like their vitamin D zero sugar gummies for my son, some things like that, but I'm not a huge fan of their fish oil supplements at this point.

I do think that they're not the worst of the worst that I've seen, but the ones that I just mentioned today were— are, I mean, the ones that I would go to. And this kind of also— there's a related question I saw here from SC who was saying they were basically traveling to Europe and they wanted to know some— they're vaccinated and wanted to know some other supplements that I would take if I were in that situation. And it really brings up an interesting point because I don't remember if we talked about this last time, but I did do an interview with Dr. Bill Harris. We'll be releasing that next week on the audio only. The video will come a little bit after the audio only. But during that interview— so Dr. Bill Harris is really one of the world-leading experts on omega-3.

He's been studying it for decades, and he was one of the first researchers to come out and start looking at the role of omega-3s in cardiac. cardiovascular health back in like the '80s. So he's, he's pretty, pretty up there on, on the list of like top researchers. So we talked about a pilot study he had done with COVID-19 and looking at COVID-19 mortality and omega-3 blood levels. And he found people with like the highest index of omega-3, which is omega-3 measured— measuring omega-3 in red blood cells, had the lowest mortality rate, of course. I mean, so there's potential confounding factors there, you know. I mean, there's a million things you could say. But what he mentioned to me that was so interesting was a paper, a couple of papers, one that looked at in silico.

So this is something that's not done in people or anything, but they found that DHA, the omega-3 DHA was able to keep the, what's called the receptor binding domain of the spike protein. So there's about 26 spike proteins on each viral particle. And that's kind of what gives the name of the, of this virus coronavirus, because they look like a crown. It's like 26 of them and they're like in a circle around, around the viral protein. And each spike protein has something called a receptor binding domain, RBD, it's usually abbreviated as.

And the receptor binding domain is the part of this spike protein that latches onto the ACE2 receptor, which is the receptor that allows the spike protein and the viral— which is attached to the viral particle, SARS-CoV-2 particle, to get into the cell, but the receptor binding domain swings between these 2 positions, open and closed. So when it's closed, it's like this. When it's open, it has like a little latch that kind of swings out. And if you guys are watching this right now, and it has to be in the open position to latch on and bind to the ACE2 receptor. When it's closed, it can't do that. It can't bind.

And so what this in silico study found was that the omega-3 fatty acid DHA keeps the receptor binding domain of the spike protein closed, suggesting it's possible that having a constant stream of, you know, DHA in your system, if you are exposed at some theoretical point to the spike protein from SARS-CoV-2, that it may keep it in this closed position so that it wouldn't latch onto ACE2. That's all a big, big, big theoretical risk or theoretical chance of that happening. That has not been shown in animal studies or hasn't been shown in humans.

But again, you kind of piece that together with other data showing that people with the highest omega-3 blood levels have the lowest— oh, they not only have— another study found— They were— look, this was a study that was from World Health Organization data that looked at countries with the highest omega-3 intake. And the countries with the highest omega-3 intake had the lowest, not only mortality rate from COVID-19, but also infection rates. People were not getting infected. And remember, if the theory that DHA keeps the receptor-binding domains on spike protein closed, Then you would imagine people would become less infected because the virus is not able to get into the cell. Big, big, big theoretical here, but super interesting to me.

And I know that Dr. Harris is trying to explore this possibility, and I'm hoping that our interview gets this idea out to other researchers who are watching the podcast or listening to the podcast. Because someone needs to do these experiments. If that's true, that could be a really big, big finding with just world-changing implications. So to get back to the question, personally, I am— even now, I'm trying to keep a constant stream of omega-3 in my system. So I take my omega-3s in the morning and I take them again in the evening. So that it's just constant amount of it in my bloodstream. So I really think it's super important for overall health, for longevity, but in particular, I think it's even more critical right now during this pandemic and for multiple reasons.

In addition to that potential reason I just mentioned, omega-3s also have been shown to have a very profound effect on lowering the risk of thromboembolisms and like blood clots and, you know, these things that are associated with, you know, negative outcomes of COVID-19, as well as negative outcomes with the adenoviral vector vaccines. And even just the fact that the omega-3s resolve inflammation. They resolve it. In other words, they— after inflammatory processes are activated, which essentially you want to happen, you know, when you're trying to fight off a pathogen. The problem is, is when the inflammation is out of control and doesn't get resolved. Well, we have— the omega-3s have resolvins, protectins, and specialized pro-resolving mediators, SPMs.

All of those metabolites of the omega-3s resolve inflammation. In other words, so that they don't get out of control and cause things like a cytokine storm or cause things like potentially even some of the negative effects of activation of the immune system from vaccines. I mean, that's a big theory, but I mean, the fact that it resolves inflammation to me suggests really broad health effects, downstream health effects that I think that only can be positive. So I really think, you know, I'm just— all my friends and family, they're all— I've told them like the main things, please, omega-3 and vitamin D are like some of the main Like, if there's anything that you can take, it's those. So that's really kind of my thoughts on omega-3, particularly right now.

Isabella is asking if there's any specific time of day that's more beneficial for omega-3s. Not to my knowledge. I'm currently— like I said, I'm currently taking it in the morning and the evening just to kind of keep a constant. my— a constant level of omega-3 in my blood, um, in my circulation. So that's kind of my, my, my current protocol right now. D is mentioning that last time I mentioned the Carlson's Max 2000, it was a It was a very specific brand of Carlson's. Not all of their fish oil supplements are high enough quality. Yeah, that one's still pretty good, but the ones that I mentioned today are like my favorite in terms of like highest EPA concentration, lowest total oxidation, and lower serving size, so like one gel.

So you can take 2 of these and like have a much more concentrated. omega-3. So these are really my top choices, the ones that I mentioned today. Oh, and Neil's bringing up a really important point about bioavailability with omega-3s. So interestingly, and Dr. Harris mentioned this, that a lot of omega-3 supplements that are in ethyl ester form, particularly the ones that are like Vascepa, uh, Lovaza— these are the prescription form only. Yeah. Omega-3s, their ethyl ester form, they have to be taken with food or their bioavailability is shot. Personally, I like to take my omega-3s with something for that reason. Even if they're in triglyceride form, I think that it's important.

And to be honest, the supplements I mentioned today, I actually didn't look at whether or not they were in triglyceride or ethyl ester form. So that is something to keep in mind because ethyl ester form is absolutely— it has to be taken with food. Extremely important. And I personally take my omega-3s with something, whether it's an avocado or anything. I know we're spending a lot of time on omega-3s, but Lanice is asking in the chat about A bleeding risk and omega-3s, particularly if you're like going to have a C-section or some sort of surgery. I talked about this with Dr. Harris in the podcast, so please listen to this. It's coming out on audio next week.

He does not think there's a risk at all, and he talks about why and what some of those early studies— and in fact, it was his early studies that sort of spurred some of the misconception about that. So he actually thinks there's zero risk for that. So please listen to that podcast. Okay. I'm going to go on to another question. This question was submitted by Teresa. And Teresa says, I've started wearing a CGM, which is a continuous glucose monitor, And now I have more questions about my blood glucose than answers. For example, how is an energetic crisis defined in concrete terms? How, how low does your blood glucose have to go before you're in crisis and ketones kick in? Do you have to completely deplete your liver glycogen stores?

What metabolic factors determine whether your body produces ketones Versus activates gluconeogenesis? I think these are really great questions, and I'm not sure every single question can be answered with empirical data, but I'll give you my thoughts. So generally speaking, ketones kick in, you start to make ketones and ketone bodies like beta-hydroxybutyrate when your liver glycogen has been Deplete it. And that really varies for everyone. It's— there's a lot of individual variation there. There can be— there's a genetic control over it to some degree. And there's also a degree of, well, how many carbohydrates do you eat and how much exercise do you do? Because all of those factors will determine whether or not you deplete your liver glycogen in 9 hours versus 16 hours.

So once that does happen, then you start to release fatty acids that are stored as triglycerides, you know, in adipose tissue. Those through lipolysis start to be released into the bloodstream, and then you break down the triglyceride and fatty acids, free fatty acids make their way to the liver. They are then oxidized in mitochondria, used for energy, and ketone bodies are made as a byproduct. So, you know, that does take many hours to occur if you're talking about like a fast or someone that's not on a ketogenic diet. So that again can take anywhere between 9 to 14 or 16 hours. I think typically it's 11 to 13 is like the real average. And once that happens, you know, your blood glucose levels do start to dip.

Now, at what point gluconeogenesis kicks in, I don't know that there's like an empirical cutoff. I mean, I can tell you that I have done, you know, high-intensity workouts and my blood glucose goes down into the 70s. And I can see it like happen, go down, and then all of a sudden while I'm still exercising, it— I get a big spike and it goes really like much higher than even what my baseline was before exercising because gluconeogenesis kicked in and I started to make some glucose. So I think there could be a variety of factors. Stress is one, like exercise. Like if you are fasting and doing exercise like I typically do, you you will kind of kick— you can kind of kick your body into a crisis with the stress of exercise to kick in gluconeogenesis.

Other factors that regulate it are also amino acid intake as well as, you know, how much of the triglycerides you're, you know, starting to break down because the triglycerides have a glycerol backbone and the glycerol backbone can be used also to make glucose. So I, you know, I think one of the main things I've noticed in my experiment with doing a ketogenic diet is too much protein will start to get my glucose levels up and not having enough fat— like too much protein with not enough fat intake will do it.

But, you know, I don't know that there's a real empirical number and I think that in terms of energy crisis, Really, the energy crisis for actual ketone production, if we're talking about a fast, we're talking about basically just lack of ATP, lack of substrates that are giving you energy. So lack of food, lack of carbohydrates, lack of everything. That's going to start the energy crisis because your body needs to make energy. And so that's when you start to use up your glycogen stores in your liver. Your body starts to use that. And once that happens, once that goes through that, then it starts to get the fatty acids that are stored in your adipose tissue, your long-term reserve, so to speak, whereas the liver glycogen is kind of the short-term reserve, the easy thing to get.

So I think those— the energy crisis is kind of, you know, basically the lack of food and causing you to go through those energy reserves. That's the energy crisis. Alan is asking in the chat, are my interviews going to be in video form later? Yes. So we are— for every interview that is coming out as audio, the video will come soon. We've been working really hard on this process of trying to get it expedited, the video production process, and we've succeeded to some degree. We're trying something even new again this coming round. To expedite it even quicker. So the Mark Mattson one will probably be coming out either this week, coming week, or the next week. This is a 2.5-hour podcast, so you can imagine how long video edits took.

I mean, they took quite, quite some time for a 2.5-hour podcast. So that one will be coming really in the next week or two. The Ashley Mason one is the sauna one that's now out on audio. That'll be coming, I would say, in the next month. For sure, because it's shorter and we already have a lot of slides. So that'll be coming out really soon, and the Bill Harris one as well. So we're really trying really hard to— and we've been making a lot of changes. And so I just want you guys to know that I've really been focused on getting a lot of interviews out, and I've been putting them out on audio because it takes— the video takes so long that, you know, I kind of want to get some of this to you guys.

And I know that many of you are going to probably go back and watch the video because you're going to have all the slides. And you guys get the Google Presentation slides. So you guys will have that on your dashboard. That's from myfitness.com/dashboard. So be able to have hundreds of slides from each podcast. So you can go back and get the references and see the information presented in a visual form, which a lot of people like as well. So, so yes, we will be having those. Those videos will be coming shortly after the audio. Barbara's asking for an update on my keto experiment. I can tell you, and I'm planning on reaching out to Dr. Dom D'Agostino because he's very experienced with, you know, has a lot of practical experience with doing ketogenic diets.

He's been doing them for years for himself. It's been very, very challenging, and I think the biggest challenge is that— and the biggest misconception is that you can get into ketosis by just doing a really low-carb diet, and that's just not true. You really have to just— you have to have a lot of fat. Like, you can't— it's not enough to just eat very, very, very, very low carb. And even in some cases, like complete carb restriction still doesn't do it. Like I'm finding that every meal I have to drench it in some kind of olive oil or like you have to have it just tons of fat. You have to put it in your coffee. You have to like, you have to keep getting just an enormous amount of fat. It's a really hard diet, to be honest.

I don't think everyone is measuring their blood ketones like I do every day. Because if they were, I think they would realize that it is— it's more than just not eating carbohydrates. It's eating large, large quantities of only fat. And not just high-fat foods, but like dairy and stuff, because there's carbohydrates in those. But like literally only fat, like oil or butter or like coconut oil. Like these things that are called fat bombs. It's actually like it's you have to you have to take like the only fat like it's it's crazy I can't even believe it like how important that is and again like I'm I am measuring my blood ketones every day and so I can see how just it's like oh I'm so sick of like drenching everything in olive oil it's like if you don't do it and then all of a sudden your ketones just go down so um so I think that it's it's really It's really just a hard diet to do.

And if you're really going to do it, I really recommend getting a Precision Xtra, X-T-R-A, and the ketone strips and measuring your blood ketones every day, like actually measuring blood ketones. There's nothing more accurate than blood. And so I really recommend doing that because If you're really wanting to try it, you'll see, as I have, that it's not just like if I stop if I stop eating my like my avocados and like drenching everything in olive oil, like I just even though I'm not eating the carbs, I like my ketone levels go way way way down. So I'll go from like 2.7 millimolar down to like 0.4, and so it's just incredibly frustrating, incredibly. It's a really hard diet to. To do. And I don't know if it's going to get easier.

And that's some of the stuff I want to talk to Dom about because it's like, well, geez, you know, like how long do you have to like keep putting so much oil on your food? Like, can you just get to a point where you're, you know, just restricting the carbs more? So I'm going to find out some more about that. But also Some people are asking in the chat about advantages of being in like mild ketosis versus moderate ketosis. So here's the thing, you know, being like 0.9 to 1, you know, 0.9 millimolar, I can get— I can, you know, like you can do severe carb restriction and not have to do all the tons and tons of just fat, like the oil and stuff. And get in between, you can get into mild ketosis.

So you could get, you know, 0.4 to 0.9. To really get into the moderate ketosis levels, I'm finding you have to just, like I said, you just have to take in an incredible amount of just fat only, not like high-fat foods, but like oil or butter. And I think In my opinion, the reason I'm trying to get to that level is because of the amazing effects of beta-hydroxybutyrate as a signaling molecule in lowering inflammatory biomarkers and increasing brain-derived neurotrophic factor and making mitochondria work so much more efficiently where they're producing less reactive oxygen species. Literally, potentially, potentially, you delaying processes that can accelerate the aging process and do accelerate the aging process. And so that's one reason.

And also having the high levels of GABA really depend on being in more of a moderate ketosis level, which is why a lot of children that are like, you know, that have drug-resistant epilepsy, they benefit from a real true ketogenic diet. And part of that is because of the high levels of GABA, which is that inhibitory neurotransmitter, which helps with some of their seizures. So children really have to do a strict ketogenic diet, and you can imagine how hard that must be. I mean, it's incredibly challenging to get up into that level, the 2.73 millimolar level from doing a ketogenic diet. At least I have found— maybe I have some kind of wonky gene that's making it incredibly challenging for me. But I don't have any of the ones that I know about, so there could be something else.

But I'll tell you, I do think that the moderate ketosis— I think that mild ketosis is beneficial. So it's not like there's no benefit from being in levels between 0.4 millimolar to like 0.9, but I really think And I've— what I have noticed, like some of the biggest effects for me, and I haven't done a lipid panel yet. I haven't looked, measured any of my cholesterol or any of that stuff yet. The only thing I've done is measured my ketones and felt the way I felt. And what I've felt is that I don't have any energy crashes throughout the day. I don't have any of that postprandial Sleepiness, you know, after you eat something that has carbohydrates, even something that has like just like healthy carbohydrates. Like I still can get that postprandial kind of sleepy.

It's like, oh, I wish I could drink some coffee right now. I don't have any of that. I'm pretty even keel energy all throughout the day. I've noticed that my anxiety level is pretty substantially decreased. It could be the GABA. It could be, I don't know, but it's noticeable. And I really like it. I really, I quite like it because, you know, who wants to be anxious? So those are 2 of the main things in terms of like the cognitive benefits as well. I do feel like also mental endurance has improved. So, um, So that's one thing. Oh, another thing that I've noticed is if I'm only in mild ketosis and not like moderate ketosis, so mild ketosis, you know, 0.4 to 0.9, that going for a 3-mile run or 3.1-mile, so a 5K run, is incredibly challenging for me if I'm only in mild ketosis.

And I don't know if that's just because I don't have enough ketones to supplement the lack of glucose for the energy. You know that I'm the energy crisis that I'm causing with my exercise, but I am like noticeably having a more difficult time doing my 5K runs if I if I'm only in mild ketosis. It's like really frustrating. So that is a another potential drawback. But I don't think I could keep this diet up because it's just. It's just really hard. And I feel like I'm restricting my micronutrient intake so much. I was hoping, and maybe this will, maybe after a couple of months you really do adapt and you can add a lot more greens and stuff. But right now I'm finding I can't. And I feel unhealthy, like in my brain.

I'm like thinking about like not getting some of the stuff that I'm used to getting in my greens and stuff. And I sometimes kind of feel gross, you know, and so we'll see when I get a blood panel done, you know, but I do feel like I'm just missing out on a lot of important nutrients and who knows, maybe my blood panel is going to look terrible and I'll say, okay, I'm not doing this anymore. But all right. So another Deep dive question was submitted by James, and James asks, I think Dr. Sinclair says it's healthier to limit protein intake. Meanwhile, a dietitian I once saw encouraged protein in every meal because we need to rebuild our body's muscle continually. How much protein should a person consume as to not accelerate aging?

So there's a lot of points or factors that are important in this kind of loaded question. So let's kind of take a step back and just start with where the aging protein intake association came from and why people like David are talking about it in general. There's been a lot of animal studies and studies in lower organisms. Those are usually Drosophila, which are fruit flies, or C. elegans, which are nematode worms, as well as there's been some rodent studies that have looked at, for one, caloric restriction, dietary restriction it's sometimes called, and lifespan and how it can extend lifespan of lower organisms. And to a lesser extent, some rodent studies Particularly, you know, it seems to be a little bit more of a robust effect in males.

And it's not super clear that it's translated to even non-human primates, let alone to humans. So it's really not something that's even, I would say, a sure thing for humans. There have been— the studies that have done the caloric restriction have then tried to figure out if there is Could they mimic the caloric restriction by basically doing protein restriction or even further doing certain amino acid restriction? And so there have been studies again in lower organisms and in some instances, some animals, some rodent studies looking at protein restriction or methionine restriction, for example. And there's to some degree a lifespan-extending effect in lower organisms. With, with the, with the protein restriction.

So there's this idea like, oh, well, you know, maybe this protein restriction is something that's, you know, controlling longevity. When, when you look at the mechanisms by which this occurs in animals, in rodents, it's typically— there's a lowering of the IGF-1 signaling pathway. And that is something that can be detrimental during development. And oftentimes these studies are done during development in animals to get the effect. And in fact, if you only do it in adulthood, you don't see the effect. And that's kind of concerning because IGF-1 is an extremely important growth factor during development. It's what makes you grow taller. It's not something that you want to limit during development because then you're going to stunt growth dramatically.

And there's humans that have the growth hormone receptor polymorphism where they do have the stunted growth or really, really short. And they do have less— their prevalence of type 2 diabetes and cancer and neurodegenerative disease and a lot of these age-related diseases are lower, but they have a higher incidence of like dying from accidental sources, like reasons, which is kind of weird. Um, is, is the risk-taking higher? I don't know. There's a lot of speculation as to why that is. But, um, so it's not like their lifespan is necessarily increased because they, they do seem to be dying, dying earlier, in fact. But they do have less of an incidence of these age-related diseases for the ones that do not die of accidental sources.

The IGF-1 for humans, one of the main reasons you'd want it to be lower in adulthood is because it allows the growth of precancerous cells to form a tumor. And so that is one reason why people do want to lower their IGF-1 levels during adulthood. Protein, particularly protein from animals like methionine and leucine, these essential fatty— these essential amino acids are very potent activators of IGF-1. In fact, IGF-1 is mostly regulated by protein intake, not by anything else. Growth hormone, on the other hand, is regulated by stress response, and so growth hormone is often increased, like when you're fasting, for example, because it causes a stress response. So IGF-1, we talked about some of the bad things.

It really does allow precancerous cells to override death signals that would usually kill them off and then potentially form tumors. However, IGF-1 is also very important for muscle growth, for muscle repair, repair of damaged muscle. It's important for the growth of new brain cells. IGF-1 crosses the blood-brain barrier, gets into the brain, helps you to grow new brain cells, helps to keep synapses robust. So you do want IGF-1 in certain tissues like the brain and muscle. It's not like you don't want it at all. There's a lot of observational studies often referred to as epidemiological studies.

These are studies that have looked at protein intake in humans and looked at a variety of different mortalities, all-cause mortalities, cancer mortality, and compared, okay, well, people that have a lower protein intake, particularly, for example, proteins from animal sources, like, you know, vegans typically have a lower protein intake and they certainly have a lower amino acid profile from the essential amino acids that are activating IGF-1 than people that eat meat do. And so there's a variety of studies out there looking at that and showing that vegans or people that have a lower protein intake do have less of a cancer incidence. They're less likely to die from cancer. They're more likely to live longer.

Um, however, those studies have then later been shown to be confounded by healthy or unhealthy lifestyle factors. In other words, people that do consume a lot of protein from meat sources but don't have any unhealthy lifestyle factors like smoking, excessive drinking, obesity, and being sedentary— if they don't have any of those unhealthy lifestyle factors, they have the same cancer mortality and all-cause mortality as people that ate a lower or took in a lower amount of protein vegans, you know, for example, or vegetarians. So the question becomes, do you really need to lower your protein intake or do you really need to not have unhealthy lifestyle factors if you have a high protein intake?

And to further add to that, do you need more protein if you are doing a lot of resistance training and exercise? And I think the answer is that, yes, you do if you want to build more muscle. And we know that building more muscle protects against sarcopenia, which is the age-related, you know, muscle atrophy that leads to frailty, and frailty does increase mortality risk. We know also from studies done by colleagues of Valter Longo and including Valter Longo that protein intake protein intake after the age of 65 should be increased to improve longevity. And in fact, people with lower protein intake after the age of 65 have a higher all-cause mortality because they're probably more frail.

So I think it is my understanding and my opinion that protein intake does not need to be lowered for people that are physically active, not obese, or not trying to lose weight, you know, so people that are actively trying to like not have unhealthy lifestyle factors, um, you know, I don't, I don't necessarily think protein intake needs to be lowered. Someone like myself, for example, and certainly people like our parents should be increasing their protein intake. And recent studies show even to further optimize that, it's not necessarily the only thing, but If you're really trying to optimize— like, I'm trying to optimize my father, who is 72, his muscle mass because he seems to be losing a lot of it.

And so morning protein intake seems to be even better for building muscle than taking protein later in the day because there's some kind of circadian control to the way we're absorbing amino acids and the way we're incorporating them into muscle tissue and things like that. So there's a— again, I don't think it's the only thing. I mean, I think resistance training in combination with protein intake is the best thing you can do. But if you're trying to just like do every little optimization thing you can for a person, particularly someone over the age of 65, I think even timing that, giving them the protein. So like what I've been doing with my dad is I got him some egg white protein powder to add to smoothies in the morning.

So, um, so that's like another added sort of bolus of protein that he gets in the morning. But ultimately, I think that this is a really complicated answer to a question that is a lot more complicated than it may have seemed. Um, and, and that is ultimately— oh, by the way, we— there is a— we're going to be sending out our digest, our news digest that we send out. Every 2 weeks, which is a list of about 10 or so new studies or studies that I think that are really interesting or really important for people to know about. The next one is coming out next week on Friday, and it's going to include a new study that I haven't dived into yet, but we're going to, about a new sort of methodological or mathematical modeling that was done to find the optimal protein intake for for an individual.

So it's like all these individualized, you know, inputs that they consider and they come up with this mathematical model to kind of figure out what a person's ideal protein intake should be based on a variety of factors. And so that'll be interesting. That's coming out in next Friday's Science Digest. Owen is asking what egg white protein powder I use. I use one, it's from like the— it's Paleo, it's called Paleo, and I think it's from like some kind of Julian place. So Google that. Paleo Thin, it's called Paleo Thin from Julian Bakery. That's what I use. Okay. The next question was a little bit of a deep dive. This was from Jennifer. She asked us a couple of months ago about taking strontium for bone health, S-T-R-O-N-T-I-U-M.

And Just for a background, it's an element that has similar properties to calcium. They're basically both alkaline earth metals that have the same positive 2+ charge. Seafood, fruits, vegetables, they're primary sources of the strontium. The average human has an intake of about 2 milligrams a day, and the bioavailability of it really depends on the GI absorption. And it can be anywhere from 90% to like 10%, depending on the person and their age. Generally speaking, I would say looking at the data that there's risks for taking in strontium, like from not dietary sources. So there's like risks for blood clots, venous thromboembolism, pulmonary embolism, heart attacks. I would say, and it definitely can be toxic for children.

Really, I would— the risks do not outweigh the benefits, to be honest, in my opinion. And I think the best way to improve bone density is exercise, both aerobic and weight-bearing exercise. So strength training. I also think that getting an efficient— having optimal vitamin D blood levels between 40 to 60 nanograms per milliliter. And because that increases the dietary absorption of calcium, like you absorb like anywhere between 40 to 60% more. Vitamin K2, important because that also makes sure that the calcium is going to the bones. And I think for people that are older, also taking some— having some calcium along with that, with the K2 and the vitamin D. That's really my go-to and I would really kind of stay away from the strontium stuff unless it's in your food.

Some rapid-fire questions. Stephanie asks, what is your opinion on consuming peanuts and natural peanut butter as a source of good fat? There seems to be some conflicting evidence on whether peanuts are healthy or not. I think peanuts are great. They're not like the best. They don't have the best micronutrient profile in terms of other nuts. So they're fun to eat, but personally, if you're really trying to get some of the best micronutrients, like for example magnesium, nuts are a good source of magnesium. But peanuts only have like 26 milligrams per serving, whereas almonds have 45 milligrams per serving. So I typically buy almond butter for my son, you know, and vitamin E profile is better as well.

And so I typically like to do almond butter as opposed to peanut butter just because it's like if you're going for the micronutrients anyway, then why not get the best of it? And that would be— Almond butter compared to peanut butter. There's also been some studies looking at overall cardiovascular health and like a variety of nuts improved it, but peanuts were not were not on the list. It was like the one nut that didn't didn't do it, probably because it just doesn't have as good of a micronutrient profile. And some of these some of these micro some of these almonds also like I mean some of these other nuts also have. have the plant omega-3 ALA, so like pecans and walnuts and things like that. I sort of shortened his question.

He asked about moringa and the timing of moringa powder and exercise and if we need to worry because of the antioxidants in moringa. So typically, My major concern with the timing of antioxidants and exercise have to do with high-dose direct antioxidants. These are things like vitamin E, particularly vitamin E, and to a lesser extent vitamin C. Like, even doses up to like 250 milligrams haven't been shown to blunt exercise-induced adaptations with vitamin C, but vitamin E is a big one that does. And so what I mean by direct antioxidants are these are antioxidants that have a reducing group on them. They have a hydrogen molecule that directly reduces, is added on to an oxygen that has a negative charge, a free radical oxygen. And so that's a direct antioxidant.

Moringa, sulforaphane, these things are indirect antioxidants. So they typically activate genetic pathways like NRF2, for example, that increase the expression of genes like different glutathione-related genes, glutathione transferase, glutathione peroxidase, for example, or manganese or MNSOD. So these compounds are not directly scavenging your free radicals that are generated from exercise. They're activating genetic pathways. And so there's a little bit of a difference of a timing in that as well. So I'm not sure that taking it— it's not like taking it right away is going to to activate those genetic pathways immediately. Like, it's not something that I typically worry about too much, but I do tend to take my Prostafane. I take my Prostafane.

I haven't been doing moringa as much anymore because I haven't been doing my smoothies because I'm doing this keto experiment. That's why I was like thinking about the moringa, but my Prostafane I usually take with dinner, which is at night. So if you really want to be safe, I think the best thing to do is take your antioxidant stuff at night. Are there any particular dietary or supplements that can protect against autoimmune disease which may be triggered by COVID or other causes such as a stressful event? I don't know about, you know, things triggered by COVID, but just generally speaking about autoimmune disease, One of the best things that a person can do for autoimmune disease would be to improve the T regulatory cell profile.

And, um, you know, the T regulatory cell profile, um, is something that has been shown to improve by short-chain fatty acids, which are increased by Prebiotic fibers and by probiotics as well in the gut. And in fact, a recent study by Justin and Erica Sonnenburg at Stanford showed that people that ate foods that were high in probiotics—kimchi, sauerkraut, kefir, brine—all these fermented foods. I think there was some yogurt. Yeah, yogurt. The fermented foods after after just like I think it was like four weeks or six weeks something something very short. They increased their— the T regulatory cell number. So that is pretty profound. And I think that optimizing gut health is one way to do that. And that would be through the intake of prebiotic fibers and probiotics as well. All right.

So Another question, rapid-fire question. This was from Stephanie. Stephanie says, hi Rhonda, when trying to eat more monounsaturated fats versus saturated fats when trying to do ketosis, what other foods have you discovered outside the go-to foods such as avocado, olive oil, nuts, and olives? I would say my go-to foods, again, I've already talked about this earlier, you really have to drench everything in olive oil. Sardines and salmon and lamb and filet mignon and everything has to be drenched in olive oil along with an avocado. Like every meal has an avocado and olives. And the only nuts that I'm really able to eat are pecans and macadamia nuts.

Chris asks, My thoughts on taking supplements to optimize apoptosis during a prolonged fast or a fasting-mimicking diet, and if I could comment on these supplements, which ones that I think that would basically, you know, potentially optimize. Personally, I think the ones that would make the most sense would be the fasting-mimicking the fasting mimics or the caloric restriction mimics, as Dr. Guido Kroemer calls them. And that would be resveratrol, spermidine, and hydroxycitrate. I'm not sure if hydroxycitrate is even available as a supplement, but I know that spermidine and resveratrol are. I think those would be the ones that I would think that would make the most sense. And then of course, like, making sure you're not like making yourself sick.

as well, because sometimes taking supplements on an empty stomach can do that. So that's also important. And I have had people tell me that taking the resveratrol and spermidine has helped them in terms of help them with some of their prolonged fasts. Marley asks, are there any updates on black coffee breaking a time-restricted eating fast? I listened to the Satchin Panda interview and he didn't mention it. And, um, people with work schedules and wanting after-gym workouts, many clients find it impossible to not have their last meal at 7:30 or 8 PM. So I would say, uh, basically, um, you know, black coffee is probably not something to worry about as much as you know, coffee with cream. So, um, you know, go for it.

Tom asks about, in my last JRE interview, the subject of arsenic and canned sardines came up. Have you looked into it? If so, what's your takeaway? Yeah, so basically arsenic typically is a— when you get that measured, it's really reflective of like your most recent food intake. So it's not like a long-term exposure thing. And so if like if you just had something, you know, with, with high arsenic in it shortly before doing the test, that it's going to show up much higher. And it's not necessarily that you're like long-term arsenic levels are high. So, so keep, keep that in mind. Um, the other thing is ConsumerLab lists a variety of sardines that are low in arsenic. So you can take a look at their site and look at their There's sardines and stuff that are low in arsenic.

So I'm not too concerned. But I am going to do another— I'm going to do an arsenic test with my urine. Another rapid-fire question. Alyssa asked about the importance of not eating dairy with cocoa beverages because of the salivary A-binding protein that binds to the polyphenols and flavonoids and makes us unable to absorb them. She asks, does this apply to coffee? So in theory, yes, it does, because there are polyphenols in coffee as well and flavonoids and stuff in coffee. But to counter that, like all these epidemiological studies coming out showing that coffee is beneficial, it's associated with a lower, you know, type 2 diabetes risk or cardiovascular mortality or all-cause mortality or all these things.

Most people put cream in their coffees and they're not controlling for that factor. So, you know, take it, you know, it's kind of one of those things. Well, maybe just a little bit of cream isn't like blunting everything. Maybe you're still getting enough that it matters. But if you wanted to be super anal about it, then you would use MCT powder or something like that in your coffee. Christian mentioned Oh, I just kind of talked about this in another question. It has to do with the antioxidants and taking like a supplement like vitamin C during a workout. And he wants to know, should you also be avoiding fruits and foods altogether with vitamin C on workout days? No, absolutely not.

The studies that have shown anything— first of all, the only studies that have shown something with vitamin C have always been in combination with vitamin E, and it's always been a really high dose, like 1,000 milligrams. Which is just— the amount of vitamin C in foods wouldn't even come close to anything that could even potentially blunt your exercise-induced adaptations. So I wouldn't worry at all about that. Another rapid-fire question was from Jen. And Jen was asking my thoughts on booster shots. There seems to be some conflicting opinions. And she wants to know if there's been any research in this area. So my thoughts, these are my thoughts, and this is not medical advice. I mean, please talk to your primary care physician about anything related to COVID and vaccines.

But my personal opinion is looking at some data, that recent data that's come out, there's been There's been a lot of concern about the fact that neutralizing antibodies wane over time. So there's 2 factors there to consider. One, the first factor is which type of vaccine did you get? Because the Moderna vaccine has 3 times as much mRNA than the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine does. And so people have— and this is actually a study that just came out like yesterday or something. Where people that have gotten the Moderna vaccine actually do have higher neutralizing antibodies than people that got Pfizer, which is not a surprise because it has 3 times as much mRNA. And so you're getting a much more robust immune response. That's the first thing to consider. The second thing to consider is age.

People that are older do not have as strong as an antibody response to vaccines than people that are younger. And this is a universal thing to all vaccines. I can tell you anecdotally looking at my antibody levels and comparing them to my mother's, it's like night and day. The antibody test that I'm doing is like one of those little pregnancy tests where like a line next to the IgG shows you've got the antibodies and no lines, nothing, you don't, and there's a control line that shows up. So like both me and my husband Our lines for the IgG are super powerfully potent and high, whereas my mother, her line was like barely detectable. So, and we all got Pfizer. And so, but my mom also, not only is she older than us, she also had her shot like 2 to 3 months.

She was complete, her fully vaccinated 2 to 3 months before I was. So time, of course, is also a factor there, but age as well. And then the other thing is that another study came out showing that even though neutralizing antibodies wane over time, neutralizing antibodies are the main thing that prevent you from becoming infected, from having a breakthrough infection. They are not the main thing that's preventing you from getting sick and having a severe type of COVID Those typically are happening from other types of immune cells, like T memory cells, as well as some of your B memory cells, which then make antibodies after you're exposed to the virus. And so these types of immune cells do fight severe disease, and if that is the major concern, then it's not really a concern.

Most people that are not super, super high risk, like they don't— they're not diabetic with high blood pressure and obese and old, that, you know, someone like myself, like I'm not sure I'm going to get a booster shot. I'm not really in a rush to for sure because I'm not really high risk and I still have neutralizing antibodies. And on top of that, I have these other long-term immune cells like the T memory cells and the B memory cells that I feel pretty confident are going to protect me. from a severe type of COVID So I think things to consider there are, are you immunocompromised? Because immunocompromised people do have a hard time fighting off COVID even if they're vaccinated.

So that would be something to definitely consider, as well as people that are high risk with a lot of different, you know, risk factors like diabetes and high blood pressure and obesity and things like that. Those are also people that might consider whether or not a booster would make sense for them or not. So that's really sort of my thoughts on the booster. I don't really see convincing evidence for everyday people like myself that are not high risk that have already gotten vaccinated to like run and get it, to be honest. And certainly people that have gotten Moderna that already, you know, Moderna has been shown to still be like 78% effective at preventing infection, it's really still pretty good compared to Pfizer, which is 42%. So again, there's a lot of factors to consider there.

Dan's asking if there's any downsides to getting a booster. I would say that we don't have a lot of data at this There's data coming out of Israel. They've mostly done people that are immunocompromised or older, and I think now they're doing people that are 40 and older. So far, the data seems to suggest that actually the third dose might be even milder than the second dose in terms of side effects, but it's really, really too early to know. So I would say we don't really know. We don't have data to suggest there's a downside. There could be, or there may not be. We really don't know. And I would say that for people that are super high risk, the risk-benefit would make more sense to get a booster.

Like, if you're someone that's immunocompromised, for example, I mean, then it seems pretty clear that you would benefit from a booster. But outside of that, it's really not— there's really no data for us to really know whether or not there's a downside to getting the booster or not. D is asking whether or not there's data to suggest that people who have had COVID need to get the vaccine. I would say, so this data is changing every day. So literally, like, you know, a couple of days after I went on Joe's podcast, last week, the week or week before, whenever it was, August 24th is when I went on there. All the data up until that point for Delta, the new data on Delta suggested that people that were vaccinated had a similar protective effect as people that had natural immunity.

But I think as we got more data, like the sample, this was like data from just July because that's when Delta became pretty dominant in both the US and in the UK. But as more data came out, like in Israel, there's a new study that came out like last week showing— it's a preprint, but nonetheless, it showed that people that had natural immunity were much less likely to become reinfected than a person who had been fully vaccinated with Pfizer. Keep in mind, that's all they use in Israel is Pfizer. They haven't done Moderna. Moderna is is much better at protecting against SARS-CoV-2 Delta infection than Pfizer. I just told you 78% versus 42%. So it's twice as good pretty much.

So if you're just comparing Pfizer, then people with natural immunity have anywhere between like 9— it's like 9 times better, in some cases maybe even more. And then they also looked in the Israel study, they looked at people that have been fully vaxxed, that had had COVID and then got one dose of Pfizer. And they had something called hybrid immunity, and it was even more protective, but it was not statistically significant, meaning the sample size was too small. However, the studies in the UK and a study out of the Mayo Clinic, which was multi-state, many different states, and it was for the month of July, showed that people that had had natural immunity and got— and also did get a shot of the mRNA vaccine had even more protection than people that had natural immunity alone.

So I think there's, with the hybrid immunity, it's like for people that are like just super high risk, maybe they had like terrible, terrible COVID or whatever, and they just like want superhuman immunity, then probably, you know, getting one mRNA shot after having natural immunity would make sense. But I think by and large, for most people, the data suggests that they're pretty protected with natural immunity, and it doesn't really— people don't really actually even really need to get that booster or that mRNA shot unless they really want it, to be honest. So that seems to be what the data suggests so far. But again, like every day something new comes out where, you know, it's just like, oh, we thought this, but now this. You know, so I can't promise you that won't change.

Okay, so another rapid-fire question that was submitted was, Was from James. James was asking, this is also relevant to vaccines. He was saying, I recently received my first shot of Pfizer, but with all the information coming out that Moderna is more effective against Delta, would it make sense to get Moderna for the second shot? No, do not mix the mRNA vaccines. In fact, I don't think you're even allowed to. So I wouldn't try to be sneaky and try to do that. It's not a good idea to mix the mRNA vaccines. So if you start with Pfizer, follow up with it. Kenny asks about xylitol gum being safe for kids. He saw on some sites that it wasn't recommended for them. Also that you have to wait 20 minutes after eating to chew gum.

I would say that if a kid, if a child is safe and is old enough to be safe to chew gum, Forgot what the age range for that is, but like there's, you know, like my son still can't chew gum. But once they're safe enough that they can chew gum, xylitol gum is safe for them and it's good for their teeth. So I would recommend that. I also use xylitol in my son's toothpaste. I have not heard anything about, I haven't seen any data suggesting you have to wait 20 minutes after eating to chew gum. So That sounds like a wives' tale to me, to be honest.

Jen asks about my thoughts on research showing viral loads from the Delta breakthrough, Delta variant infection, and as long as well as just the Delta being much, much higher than the old strains of breakthrough infections and general infections as well. They are. They're like, it's like thousands more viral particles and It's, it's one of the main reasons why the Delta variant is so much more transmissible, and it's one of the reasons why the Delta variant is also more damaging. It's more virulent because oftentimes more viral particles can translate to worse pathology. So unfortunately, that seems to be the case. So I had a phone call with Dr. Roger Seheult, some of you probably caught our interview, ooh, last January, I think, or February.

I forgot when we released it, early last spring. But him and I are recording another interview on Thursday of this coming week. He's going to post it on his channel and I'm going to post it on my channel. And we're going to talk about vaccines, all about vaccines. And he's been, of course, he's a frontline healthcare worker. He's in the ICUs treating COVID patients. And he was telling me that Delta is bad. It's way worse than the Beta variant was, which was the dominant strain, the dominant variant before Delta came in, came in in July. He said he's intubating 20 and 30-year-olds with essentially no comorbidities, like maybe slightly overweight, like slightly. And I mean, like, the 20 and 30-year-olds are dying in his care. It's awful.

These are people that even have like normal levels of vitamin D. He said it's just, there's too many, like, and they're all unvaccinated, unfortunately. They're all unvaccinated. So it's really kind of, he calls it a Swiss cheese model where there's lots of things that are contributing here. And he does see that this variant is more dangerous in terms of the pathology and mortality. And it's— So it's really something to keep in mind. So I'm looking at some other rapid-fire questions talking about fasting-mimicking diets and things like that. One thing to keep in mind though, because I see people talking about it with respect to immunity, is that fasting temporarily Depresses, like while you're doing it, it depresses immunity. And so, you know, you really like need to be super cautious.

Excuse me, excuse me. If you're, um, if you are doing a fasting or a prolonged fast or a fasting mimicking diet, um, while there's a surge right now with the Delta variant, because it does, it does lower your immunity. So that is something to To keep in mind, you know, for people that are, that are doing these. I'm reading any— some more of these, these questions in the chat. There was a sulforaphane question from Xavier asking about the methodology for heating the broccoli sprouts to 70 degrees for 10 minutes. And that is something that after I spoke with Dr. Fahey about that, that was from another person's lab. He says that that is not necessary at all. And he doesn't even think you should do that. which makes it a lot easier. I personally haven't been doing my broccoli sprouts.

I've been taking Prostafane, but I think that— and I think moringa powder is probably just as good as Prostafane, and it's cheaper, and it's also got micronutrients. It has iron and things like that in it. So I think getting Kuli Kuli is the brand, and I think that Whole Foods sells it. That's where I get mine. You can get it from Amazon as well, but I think they're really Moringa powder is a great alternative to prostaglandin, and it's something that you just put— it's a powder and you just put it in your smoothie. Some people put it in their tea. It really— it has that gross broccoli sprout taste where it's like kind of spicy, you know? So you really do need to kind of be careful about that.

And, um, but I think it's— it also just sort of— if you like the broccoli sprouts, like I do like them, I like them on my salads, I like them on, you know, I like putting them on foods and stuff. So if you really enjoy doing that, then I don't think that you have to heat them or anything. You just grow the broccoli sprouts and then harvest them and use them. Tim D is asking, how often do you test your blood and what What companies do you use? Not often enough, particularly with this pandemic. I, like everyone else, for a long time was staying away from doctors' offices or even labs because I didn't— I think at minimum, you want to do it every 6 months, at minimum. I think that twice a year is a good place.

I personally like doing WellnessFX because It avoids the doctor, and if things don't show up the way you want, like like like I'm doing this ketogenic experiment, for example. Let's say in theory my cholesterol was going to go through the roof and all that. That's that stays on your health record. You know your health insurance when you reach a certain age. If your cholesterol levels are a certain number, your your insurance rates go up. They want to like push you on a statin. There's all sorts of reasons why I personally like to see my stuff before the doctor. So I like WellnessFX because of the privacy reason for that. And I also just like that they do— they use the Omega-3 Quant, which is Bill Harris's way of measuring omega-3.

So they use— a lot of companies will measure omega-3 in plasma, which is really a short-term marker of omega-3. It's just kind of biomarking what you ate like in the last week versus red blood cells, which is really— You know, it's a 28— your red blood cells turn over every 28 days, so it's like a month. And so it's really a marker of long-term omega-3, much like HbA1c is a marker of long-term blood glucose levels versus just measuring it with your continuous glucose monitor or your Precision Xtra finger prick one, you know. So WellnessFX uses that. They also— I like their performance test, which is something that you would do either twice a year or once a year because it's quite expensive. It's like $1,000, but they do— I mean, they do everything.

All these— all the lipids, you know, all the small dense, all the different sizes of HDL, different sizes of LDL. They do a lot of hormones. They do the omega-3s. They do micronutrients. They do a variety of different tests, and it's something that you don't have to do like every quarter. But at least once a year, I think that would be good to do once a year. And if you can, twice a year. Another company I do like that you can kind of do more of an individualized thing where you want to kind of pick and choose what you want to do would be like Life Extension. They have blood tests and they usually go through, I think, Quest Labs.

And you can like choose, okay, I want to do this heavy metal, and I want to do this, you know, small dense LDL, and I want to do— so you can kind of mix and match and choose those as well. Um, I think some of the, some of the companies that I like going through with, with my physician, because you need a doctor's prescription for, is like Genova Diagnostics. So they'll have like, they'll do like a metabolic panel, which is like a urine test, but it like, it measures all these different metabolites and stuff like that that I, that I like. So that would be Genova Diagnostics. Boston Heart does a lot of good blood tests that your doctor can— you can ask your doctor to use. So they're another good one as well. Ashley's asking if I've been approached by anyone to promote the vaccine.

No, I have not been approached by anyone to promote the vaccine. I have no conflicts of interest. I am not getting paid in any way at all. In any— there's no— there's no one that has talked to me about promoting it, nothing like that. It is all of my own reading and all of my own experience and all of my own opinion. So we'll definitely talk about that in In the Roger Schwelt podcast coming up next week, I'm seeing if there's any more last-minute questions. Bob is asking about the genetic testing. I still like 23andMe, to be honest. I think that they. I've repeated my test a couple of times and it's been repeatable. I know that there are some errors, of course, but I do think that they're generally speaking, you can use a lot of third-party sites like ours.

Since you're a member, you have unlimited access to our genetic report, which is really quite awesome. It has a lot of information there. 23andMe is one of the ones that we really do a lot of compatibility with. So, I really think that they're a pretty good— still pretty good source of information, genetic information. Sue is asking in the chat if there's been any studies regarding vitamin D levels and getting COVID-19. So, there have been studies showing that people with higher vitamin D levels in some cases have are less likely to test positive and less likely to have severe COVID. I don't think that once you have COVID, vitamin D is going to fix it. I think that's not going to happen.

But having it, having, you know, good levels of vitamin D before being exposed, in my opinion, only can be beneficial. And I think it is important. I think it's very important. Okay. I think I'm— I think I've covered all the questions for this round. I really appreciate you guys and all your questions. So if you guys enjoy these chats, if you guys enjoy these members' Q&As, please tell a friend, tell a friend and see if they want to join. Again, if you want to listen to this podcast or this Q&A, it's going to be on your private podcast feed. We call that the Aliquot. If you have not downloaded that, you really, really should. It can be found on your members dashboard at foundmyfitness.com/dashboard. You can also check out the replay of this video. You can play it again on Crowdcast here.

Or we will be sending out an email next week sometime with a timeline and a replay of this video as well. So our timeline usually has some references and it takes you to the time point in the video if you don't want to watch the whole hour and a half and just kind of skip to a point. So you guys can catch those replays either way, but please make sure you have downloaded the private podcast feed. We'll be sending out the Bill Harris audio only next week. And as I mentioned, we're going to be ramping up our interviews and getting these videos out sooner. So thank you so much for all of your support. It's really helping FoundMyFitness get high quality and good information out there. And I think that you guys are enjoying some of the benefits and perks as well.

So I really look forward to your questions next time. Please leave it in the right section, the, the ask a question section, vote on the questions. And, um, I look forward to talking to you guys next month. Thank you so much. Talk to you soon. Bye. Bye.