I'm sorry to tell you this,
but Australians are fatter than Brits.
Okay, fuck you.
So when you get time with a world-reknown health guru,
naturally you take him out for wine and cheese.
You don't hate cheese, do you?
Oh I love cheese! And cheese has been demonised
like so many other dairy products.
But actually the evidence is very strong now
that cheese is pretty good for you.
So I can eat the cheese in front of you?
It's not going to be awkward?
I'd probably push the crispy breads to one side instead.
Go away, bread. Go away bread.
You see, cheese got demonised
because of the whole thing around saturated fat.
We know about the saturated fat argument
it's been running now since the 1980s.
But actually when you look at studies like in Sweden,
what they found was people who consumed
moderate amounts of cheese,
they had less obesity and less risk of Type-2 diabetes
than those who ate the low fat versions of them.
So we've been completely brainwashed with the idea
of low fat, and I think there's a big revolution coming.
So around about the 1980s,
there was the birth of fat-free everything
and everything was low fat.
But with that came an unexpected side effect, didn't it?
Yes. What happened is, obviously,
you know, we started eating other junk instead,
because if you get rid of the fat then you get hungry.
So what did food manufacturers do,
because once they'd removed fat from things like milk
it tastes ghastly - you've got to do something to it.
So what they did was they stuffed it full of sugar.
Because you took the muffin, you removed the fat,
you would not eat it - it would taste absolutely revolting.
So what they did is they stuffed it full of sugar instead.
And actually what happened is, for example,
you buy a muffin, it's a fat-free muffin,
but the calories are around 480 calories
there are more calories in that muffin
and there are maybe 9 or 10 teaspons of sugar in them.
It was fat-free. People thought,
hey, I'm not going to get fat,
actually it meant you were going to get fatter.
And it's since the 1980s that we have seen
a massive growth in obesity, and a
massive growth in Type-2 diabetes around the world.
We completely buggered up pretty well
every country on earth,
and by 'we' I actually mean the Americans.
It was done for the best possible reasons.
and it had a truly unfortunate side-effect.
It was the biggest, least controlled
dietary experiement in history,
and it ended up in disaster.
So the reason I got into this whole
Type-2 diabetes thing anyway,
is because four years ago
I discovered that I was Type-2 diabetic.
I had a blood test for something completely different,
and the GP says to me,
I've got bad news - I'm afraid you are Type-2 diabetic.
We need to start you on medication.
AndI said, no. I don't want to do that - I want to find out.
I got hold of scientists, and some of them said to me,
why don't you try something called intermittent fasting?
So I said okay, and I'll make a film about it.
Andi made this film called Eat, Fast, Live Longer.
And that led to the whole 5:2 thing.
So I lost 10 kilos in 12 weeks,
reversed my diabetes,
and it's been fine ever since.
I wrote a book, the Fast Diet,
it became a worldwide phenomena,
but that got me really interested in Type-2 diabetes.
What is it that causes it? Why is it on the increase?
What else can you do about it?
and that's led me to the current book.
Conventional wisdom is that once you get diabetes,
the only way you can fix it is with pills.
You get it, and you're stuck with it for life,
you're on pills for life.
The radical thing - and it is radical -
is that you're proposing that you can reverse it,
in eight weeks,
which is one of those things that you expect to hear
that in an informercial, right?
Why should we believe you?
Okay, this is not something that I invented
on the back of a cornflake packet.
And why would you do it on cornflakes?
They're filled with sugar!
This is based on studies by a guy called
Professor Roy Taylor at Newcastle University in the UK.
And he is one of the world's foremost diabetes experts.
He's been working on this for 20 years.
So the 8 week, 800 calorie diet is based on
his studies.
So, what he has found,
and he's recruited patients to do this,
Type-2 diabetics,
and he put them on this 800 calorie diet,
it is a very low calorie diet,
you lose weight really fast.
But you also lose vwhat's called visceral fat.
The fat that was kind of clogging up
you liver and your pancreas.
The fat I'm covering right now, sitting in this position.
And it melts away really rapidly,
and what he found in his trials
is that the patient loses around 15 kilos over 8 weeks,
almost all of it is fat,
most of it is visceral fat,
in his machines he can measure what is happening
to the fat in your liver and pancreas
and you just see it disappear,
literally in front of your eyes.
My dad was a Type-2 diabetic,
he developed it around my age,
his diabetes got worse, he went on to more medication,
he died.
If I'd known what I know now I could have saved his life.
He would be with us now, he would have seen
his grandkids grow up.
And that makes me really angry,
but it also makes me quite sad.
What's the strangest...
Half our office did the 5:2,
and two days a week people nearly got into punchups.
Luckily they were so weak from the fasting
they didn't do much damage,
but it's hard - the fasting days are hard.
What's the strangest story you've heard
about what people have done on a fasting day?
What they've done on a fast day, the strangest thing...
Um, I haven't heard any...
Well, come to our office,
we'll tell you some stuff.
There is kind of an easier version of it,
I should let you know...
Now you tell us?
Now?
which is essentially to cut your carbs two days a week.
So there has been a study which came out
since I wrote the book,
which essentially says that simply
cutting your carbs two days a week
is also an effective way of doing it.
It almost means no alcohol for those two days.
That's it, I quit!
Give that a go - give your office a go,
let me know how you get on.
We will.
Dr Michael Mosley,
a, it's a pleasure to meet you,
and b, can I please eat the cheese now?
Yes, absolutely.
Help ourselves.
Which one is the Stinking Bishop?
I don't know...