While the naturopath Éric Gandon was prosecuted on Thursday and placed in pretrial detention after the death of a woman during a “water cure” course, a doctor and scientist warns of the high health risks of these long fasts.
“The risk is getting sick,” says Cécile Bétry, a specialist in endocrinology and professor at the University of Grenoble Alpes, for BFMTV.com.
Less than 300 kcal per day
The principle of these “practices” or “cures”: a fast based on water, herbal teas and sometimes juices, broths and soups. But in very light doses: no more than 300 kcal per day. A food restriction often associated with physical activity: some estancias offer fasting while walking ten kilometers a day.
The problem, Cécile Bétry points out, is that prolonged fasting forces the body to adapt by reducing its metabolism:
“It’s as if he went into hibernation,” specifies this hospital doctor. “Therefore, he will start his reserves, in particular of vitamins, phosphorus or even potassium, and more if he is forced to do physical exercise.”
This can present considerable risks. She takes the example of vitamin B1.
“We have an average of two weeks in stock. As the body draws on its stores, the needs will increase significantly. However, a deficiency in B1 can lead to potentially serious and irreversible complications with confusion, neurological or eye disorders, and paralysis. .”
As for potassium deficiency, “the risk is cardiac arrest,” he adds. Complications that can also occur long after fasting. Éric Gandon is also the subject of another complaint for the death of a sexagenarian who had done an internship the previous month when he presented terminal cancer.
“You start your health capital”
If the organizers of these courses and the fasters themselves praise and congratulate each other for losing weight, it would be short-term, illusory and not without risk, Cécile Bétry points out again.
“The body is built in such a way that during rapid weight loss, it will do everything possible to regain those lost pounds as soon as eating resumes.”
In addition, this researcher specializing in weight loss diets explains that prolonged fasting forces the body to produce energy. Ketone bodies, a kind of compensatory energy from carbohydrates that are not provided by food and that have the particular effect of reducing the feeling of hunger. “As the appetite decreases, you can imagine from the second day that everything is fine. But it’s not like that”.
Because if the body must turn to fat tissue to produce these ketone bodies, muscle mass also begins. “It may not seem like a big deal at 30. But with multiple bouts of prolonged fasting each time reducing your muscle mass, not to mention the fact that muscle inevitably declines with age, you’re entering the health capital of your future.” , when you are 60 or 70″.
For Cécile Bétry, there is no scientific or medical justification to promote prolonged fasting, just like short-term fasting. “Fasting for one or two days is not a major complication but also no benefit, except running the risk of starting again, and this time for a little longer.”
In a note on fasting for preventive or therapeutic purposes carried out with Inserm, the Ministry of Health recalls that “any significant fast, whether total or partial (with a daily caloric intake of less than 300 kcal), must not be carried out solely within a structure medicine to avoid the occurrence of serious adverse effects.
“Regeneration” and “purification”?
Some of these organizers of one, two or three week fasts promise “deep regeneration”, “purification” and “total cleansing”.
“The idea of purifying your body, in terms of health or medicine, doesn’t mean anything”, slices Cécile Bétry. And it is even the opposite what happens.
“By fasting, the body takes advantage of muscle and fat tissue. This releases all the pollutants that were stored there into the bloodstream. So you end up with more toxins in your body.”
Some organizers also boast of an “improvement of symptoms linked to certain pathologies” and ensure that this type of fasting is “effective” to “relieve” “cirrhosis, liver cancer, tumors.”
“No, it’s extremely serious to say that,” worries Cécile Bétry, a nutrition researcher. “It’s not based on anything scientific or medical.” And she adds, in the case of certain diseases, that a weight loss, on the contrary, would only aggravate the pathology and start up the patient’s chances of survival.
“Someone who suffers from cancer or diabetes already has an organism altered by the disease. Fasting is getting sick a little more. Fasting is a major stress for the body.”
The Inrae network of research in nutrition, physical activity and cancer, who has carried out an expert opinion on the matter, also concluded that “there is no evidence in humans of a protective effect of fasting and restrictive diets in primary prevention or during illness.”
“Abuse of weakness” and “sectarian excesses”
Christian Gravel, president of the Inter-Ministerial Mission to Surveillance and Fight against Sectarian Deviations (Miviludes), denounces on BFMTV the risk of “therapeutic and sectarian deviations” and “abuse of weakness”, in particular with people who already suffer from health problems, sometimes serious.
“We are facing an already vulnerable public (…) which constitutes an ideal base for mental influence professionals, who take advantage of the circumstances and sell them miraculous recipes that can lead to tragedies.”
The president of Miviludes claims to register “an increasing number” of abuses related to naturopathy. “Not all naturopaths are criminals or cult predators, but unfortunately many are.”
“They are not just charlatans but criminals,” insists Christian Gravel, from Miviludes.
The naturopath Éric Gandon is being prosecuted for homicide, abuse of weakness, endangering the lives of other people and illegal exercise of the professions of doctor and pharmacist.
Source: BFM TV
