Medical Evidence Matters with Liz Tucker

This is the second of two repeated podcasts that were aired a while ago, which are being re-released. This one with Dr Robert Lustig  was particularly popular with listeners. Dr Robert Lustig  argues sugar is fuelling an epidemic of chronic and metabolic disease, from diabetes and strokes, to cancer and heart disease costing hundreds of thousands of lives. He says in a view that some have seen as controversial that we need to see sugar not just as empty calories,  but as a chronic, addictive toxin. In this podcast, Rob reveals just what sugar does to our bodies. And he claims that while modern medicine has been highly effective in treating acute illness, it has failed in its treatment of chronic conditions, only able to treat the symptoms rather than curing the diseases. In his words: “You can’t fix healthcare until you fix health. You can’t fix health until you fix diet. And, you can’t fix diet until you know what the hell is wrong”. Rob explains what he thinks it is essential to eat to stay healthy  and contends that  prevention is not just better than cure it is the cure.   Dr Robert Lustig is a Professor emeritus of Pediatrics, at the Division of Endocrinology at the University of California, San Francisco. He has written a number of best selling books about the dangers of sugar, refined carbohydrates  and metabolic illness. And his research and clinical practice have focussed on childhood obesity and diabetes. If you would like to support this podcast you can do so via Patreon at or via PayPal. The host of the podcast, Liz Tucker is an award winning medical journalist and former BBC producer and director.  You can follow Liz on X and read further information about the podcast on her Substack newsletter. Medical Matters with Liz Tucker has been selected by Feedspot as one of the top 15 UK Medical Podcasts https://blog.feedspot.com/uk_medical_podcasts/

Over the holiday season, I'm releasing a couple of previous podcasts that were particularly popular with listeners. This first one is an interview I did with GP Dr David Unwin. David  has been a pioneer in the UK developing and promoting a low-carb approach for treating type 2 diabetes. In 2016, he won the NHS innovator of the year award for his work. His treatment approach has been so successful that  he has put around half his type 2 diabetic patients, who follow a low carb diet, into remission. And as a result, his practice, spends far less on diabetic medication than any of the surrounding GP surgeries. The potential cost savings if this approach was adopted nationally and internationally, would be huge for health services across the world. We tend to think that unless we have a form of diabetes that we don’t really need to be concerned about our blood sugar levels, but nothing could be further from the truth. As we get older, all of us unless we change our diet and lifestyle, will see our blood sugar levels rise, this causes our bodies to produce more and more insulin, which can lead to insulin resistance. If we eat a diet high in carbohydrates, this is likely to exacerbate the problem. And that matters because insulin resistance isn't just linked to type 2 diabetes but a wide range of illnesses including high blood pressure, heart disease, Alzheimer's and some cancers too. In the podcast, David discusses the Public Health Collaboration, a charity that he set up with colleagues, which aims to promote metabolic health and so prevent many chronic diseases. Here's a link to it: https://phcuk.org/ And here is a link to David’s most recent paper published in BMJ nutrition, also discussed in the podcast: https://nutrition.bmj.com/content/6/1/46   If you would like to support this podcast you can do so via Patreon at or via PayPal. The host of the podcast, Liz Tucker is an award winning medical journalist and former BBC producer and director.  You can follow Liz on Twitter at https://twitter.com/lizctucker and read her Substack newsletter about the podcast at https://liztucker.substack.com Medical Matters with Liz Tucker has been selected by Feedspot as one of the top 15 UK Medical Podcasts https://blog.feedspot.com/uk_medical_podcasts/

Professor Tony Avery,  National Clinical Director for Prescribing for NHS England, discusses safer prescribing of medicines. He highlights the changes he would like to see to enable patients to make genuinely informed decisions, which may also sometimes mean that they decide not to go ahead with a treatment. Tony describes how he believes doctors and patients can work together on initial prescribing decisions,  so that patients can be confident that the benefits of the selected approach outweigh the risks. You can find out more about this podcast on its website and if you would like to support it you can do so via Patreon at or via PayPal. The host of the podcast, Liz Tucker is an award winning medical journalist and former BBC producer and director.  You can follow Liz on X and read further information about the podcast on her Substack newsletter. Medical Evidence Matters with Liz Tucker has been selected by Feedspot as one of the top 15 UK Medical Podcasts https://blog.feedspot.com/uk_medical_podcasts/

Neuropsychiatrist Dr Alastair Santhouse discusses his concerns  that the huge increase we are seeing in mental health diagnoses across the western world, is now medicalizing emotions and feelings that have previously been seen as part of the normal human experience. He argues in a new book No More Normal – Mental Health in an Age of Over-diagnosis, published by Granta  - this is leading to an increasing number of people taking psychiatric medication. Today in England alone over eight million adults take an antidepressant every year. This is creating an unprecedented demand on health services, increasing waiting lists, which most worryingly of all, risks leaving those with severe mental illnesses, who really need the support unable to get it. You can find out more about this podcast on its website and if you would like to support it you can do so via Patreon at or via PayPal. The host of the podcast, Liz Tucker is an award winning medical journalist and former BBC producer and director.  You can follow Liz on X and read further information about the podcast on her Substack newsletter. Medical Evidence Matters with Liz Tucker has been selected by Feedspot as one of the top 15 UK Medical Podcasts https://blog.feedspot.com/uk_medical_podcasts/

Dr Kevin J. Tracey reveals the extraordinary impact the vagus nerve, which connects every organ in the body to the brain, has on our health. Kevin has been a pioneer in the use of bioelectronic devices to stimulate this nerve  to treat a range of auto-immune illnesses and he is the author of a new book The Great Nerve, The New Science of the Vagus Nerve and How to Harness its healing reflexes, published by Penguin Life. Patient trials have shown that remarkably, we can electrically stimulate the vagus nerve to ameliorate the symptoms of conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis. While Kevin is clear the treatment won’t work for everyone, for some patients the results have been truly remarkable enabling them to  walk unaided again for first time in decades and get back a quality of life they thought was gone for ever. And for all of us, it now appears that lifestyle interventions such as cold showers, meditation and how we breathe, may offer critically important strategies to effectively regulating our vagus nerve and so maximises its  impact on our health. You can find out more about this podcast on its website and if you would like to support it you can do so via Patreon at or via PayPal. The host of the podcast, Liz Tucker is an award winning medical journalist and former BBC producer and director.  You can follow Liz on X and read further information about the podcast on her Substack newsletter. Medical Evidence Matters with Liz Tucker has been selected by Feedspot as one of the top 15 UK Medical Podcasts https://blog.feedspot.com/uk_medical_podcasts/