“Advice to fat people: do not eat, - fast!
Advice to lean people: - do not eat fast!”
From MAD magazine. sixties.
MODERATOR ADDS:
LINK TO COLUMN : Update: Is fasting good for your health? - The Straight Dope
LINK TO PRIOR COLUMN (from 2006) BEING UPDATED BY 11-Jul-2014 COLUMN: Does fasting rid the body of toxins? - The Straight Dope
And LINK TO PRIOR THREAD (by Quint) that provoked today’s column: Cecil on Fasting - Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports - Straight Dope Message Board – CKD
Ramadan is associated with low birth weight, fewer male babies, and disabilities. See http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1144209
Reported for either needing a link, or being in the wrong forum.
Coarc: I’ve added a link to what I presume is the column you’re commenting on. For future ref, such links in the opening post of a thread help other readers by saving searching time and (mostly) helping avoid repetition of what’s in the column. Yes, it’s today’s column and so on the front page, but in a few weeks, it will slip into the depths and be more difficult to find. If I’ve guessed wrong and you meant something different, let me know by email or PM and I’ll fix.
chiroptera: thanks for reporting it, much appreciated.
Quint: Congrats on having your post selected as the “launch” of the update on fasting!
a 2013 BBC2 Horizon documentary (sidenote BBC2/BBC4 has great documentaries) called “Eat Fast Live Longer” sums up the general state of research + there’s a book called “5:2 diet” by Michael Mosley, the book companion to the documentary.
gist: basically a 60-min. version of what Cecil wrote w/video and first-person trial of intermittent fasting.
to paraphrase Michael Pollan: eat real food, mostly plants, not too much, for 5 days a week and on the other 2 days try surviving on 500 calories…but take it easy when you first start.
the video is available via your favorite search engine.