I have had a few clients ask me lately….”What’s so bad about beans?” so I figured if they wanted to know I am sure many of the other readers and clients I work with would like to know as well.
So here is the beef that I have with beans aka Lectins ……
This definition is taken from http://www.earth360.com/diet_paleodiet_balzer.html
Lectins are natural proteins that have a large variety of
roles. They are amongst the most fascinating and stimulating of all biological
compounds, and I have no doubt that they play a major role in many “unexplained
” diseases. I think of them as “Hannibal Lectins” as they remind of the devious
criminal mastermind in the shock horror movie “Silence of the Lambs.’ Lectins
are like master code-breakers. The cells of our bodies are studded with
receptors which are like code pads to ensure stimulation only under the correct
circumstances. Lectins have the ability to crack these codes and stimulate the
receptors causing a variety of responses covering basically the full repertoire
of the cell and even tricking the cell into doing things it normally cannot
do.
They also have a knack for bypassing our defenses and
“getting behind the lines”, and then they can travel all over the body causing
harm. They can, for example:
–strip protective mucus off tissues,
–damage the cells lining the small intestine disrupting
the microscopic fingers called villi and microvilli,
–get swallowed whole by the small intestine cells
(“pinocytosis”)
–bind to cells including blood cells causing a clot to
form (hence they were initially called “haemagglutins”)
–make a cell act as if it has been stimulated by a hormone
–stimulate a cell to secrete a hormone
–promote cell division at the wrong time
–cause growth or shrinkage of lymphatic tissue (“outposts”
of white blood cells)
–cause enlargement of the pancreas
–cause cells to present codes (HLA’s) that they normally
should not use
–cause cell death (apoptosis)
Lectins break down the surface of the small intestine,
stripping it of mucus and causing the cells to become irregular and leaky. Some
lectins make cells act as if they have been stimulated by insulin. Others cause
the pancreas to release insulin. Others cause immune cells to divide in the
wrong way, causing growth of some white blood cells and breaking down the
control of the immune system. Others cause cells to present the wrong codes
(HLA’s) on their surface, tricking the immune system into thinking that
intruders have been found and activating the immune system inappropriately thus
leading to “autoimmune disease” where the body’s tissues are attacked by its own
immune system.
Autoimmune diseases are incredibly common and increase
every year that a person gets older. A disordered immune system also has a much
harder job recognizing and attacking the real intruders invading germs and
cancer cells (you may have heard that scientists think that most people generate
many cancer cells in a life time but that the immune system cleans most of them
up).
It is not known whether lectins can cause cancer- this is
one of the most important questions in medicine today. They certainly affect
colon cells in the test tube. I feel that they are likely candidates as they can
stimulate abnormal cell growth and they also cause disorder in the immune
system.
Lectins have many other roles besides defending seeds. For
example in beans, lectins act like a glue to enable nitrogen-fixing bacteria to
bind to the roots of the plant. Many important lectin families are found in
animal tissues, but as we are carnivores, we have evolved to be able to deal
with these- just as birds that live on grains have evolved to be resistant to
grain lectins.
It is ironic that the lectins were discovered more than
100 years ago and yet so many questions remain unanswered the same was true of
the immune system until the 1980’s. I hope that there is more research done into
lectins as they hold a whole world of disease mechanisms of which most of the
medical community is blissfully unaware.
Now that we know the truth about beans, we see why they are called “The musical fruit”. So now not only will the people around you be happy with your free diet, so will your stomach!
Fit Chic