Elderberry 101: What to Know Before Trying This Herbal Remedy

Cold and flu season comes every year when the temperatures drop. The chorus of coughing and sneezing starts to sound in the office, and at the same time, out come the tea, hand sanitizer, and vitamin C to keep the germs away. The search for anything and everything to boost the immune system starts. One of the latest superfoods touted to help keep you healthy in cold months is the elderberry. "Elderberry recipes" are trending, and the purple berry is popping up in tons of immunity-supporting supplements, from gummies to lozenges to syrups.

Are elderberries actually a legit immunity booster? We asked an RD and a doctor to weigh in on the elderberry's health benefits. "Elderberries are found in North America, Europe, Asia, and Northern Africa," says Seattle-based registered dietitian Ginger Hultin, spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and owner of Champagne Nutrition. "They can be used in cooking, often in desserts like other berries, and also have some medicinal benefits that likely come from their unique antioxidants."

As with other types of berries, elderberries are also rich in vitamin C and fiber. One cup of raw elderberries nutrients contains 10.2 grams of fiber and 52.2 milligrams of vitamin C. The elderberry plant, called Sambucus nigra, has many parts, but it's the flowers and berries that pack the immunity punch.

Elderberries have been found to help minimize flu symptoms in a number of small studies, thanks to their antiviral properties. "There is evidence to show that they can support human immune systems in time of illness, so it's not surprising that they're emerging as a superfood now," Hultin says of the berries.

A 2019 study published in the Journal of Functional Foods found that compounds called anthocyanidin (phytonutrients that give elderberries their purple color) were found to inhibit the flu virus's entry and replication in human cells. Not only that, but it was also found to help strengthen the body's immune response to the flu virus.

Another study published in the Journal of International Medical Research also found that elderberry syrup was effective at shortening symptoms of the flu. The study participants took either a placebo or 15 milliliters of elderberry syrup 4 times a day for 5 days. The group that took the elderberry reported improvement of flu symptoms after 3 to 4 days, while the placebo group reported the same 7 to 8 days into the illness.

There's also a third study that had similar findings. A 2009 study published in the Online Journal of Pharmacology and PharmacoKinetics used elderberry extract lozenges for its study participants. Sixty-four study participants were divided into 2 groups, a placebo group and another that was given 4 doses of elderberry extract lozenges for 2 days. After 24 hours, the elderberry group self-reported significant improvement of their flu-like symptoms. And within 48 hours, 28% of the elderberry group reported they were totally void of all symptoms, while none in the placebo group reported the same thing.

Should you try elderberry supplements? Like all herbal supplements, the FDA does not regulate them, meaning safety and standardization (making sure each batch has the same/correct potency) are up to the manufacturers and distributors. "That doesn't mean there aren't good quality, trustworthy supplements out there, because there are," Hultin says. "Many companies pay for third-party testing to ensure purity and standardization of their products, so that's always something to check for on a label." She suggests checking out the FDA's website for tips on how to find the best dietary supplements.

And while many recipes can be found online for elderberry syrup, it's important to know that it can be extremely risky. "You have to be really careful if you're doing your own at home," says Elizabeth Bradley, MD, medical director of the Center for Functional Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic. "You don't want to be taking in flowers and berries whole and raw. Ingesting uncooked elderberries can lead to poisoning."

Elderberries also contain cyanogenic glycosides, a toxic compound, so they need to be cooked to prevent cyanide poisoning. For that reason, you're better off buying pre-made elderberry products. "I wouldn't recommend anything raw, and I suggest shying away from making your own," says Dr. Bradley. "You should take it if you're being exposed to more people and situations where you might get the flu (like in flu season) but pay attention to dosing instructions to avoid ending up with GI symptoms."

Are there any negative side effects of eating elderberry products? Aside from the risk of cyanide poisoning (which you shouldn't have if you're using a safe elderberry supplement), other side effects of taking too much elderberry include gastric issues, like nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea, says Dr. Bradley.

Because many elderberry products come in syrup or gummy form, you'll want to pay attention to sugar content, too. Dr. Bradley recommends looking for gummies or syrup with less than five grams of sugar per serving. Of course, elderberries are no substitute for medical help if you truly have a bad case of the flu.

Michael Shermer with Richard Dawkins — Outgrowing God: A Beginner’s Guide

In 12 fiercely funny, mind-expanding chapters, Richard Dawkins explains how the natural world arose without a designer — the improbability and beauty of the “bottom-up programming” that engineers an embryo or a flock of starlings — and challenges head-on some of the most basic assumptions made by the world’s religions.

In this wide-ranging conversation Shermer and Dawkins discuss:

• how Outgrowing God encapsulates his life’s work in two broad areas: (1) science, reason, and evolution theory; (2) God, Religion, and Faith. A “Dawkins 101” book and a perfect gift to friends and family.
• his commitment to the truth, as best explained by science.
• Is the Bible a “Good Book”?
• Is adhering to a religion necessary, or even likely, to make people good to one another?
• why religion is over-determined
• separating religion from God beliefs
• Is religion and belief in God an evolutionary adaptation or a byproduct (or both)?
• Why we don’t need God in order to be good
• How do we decide what is good?
• human nature: selfish/selfless, violent/peaceful, better angels/inner demons
• breaching the Is-Ought barrier
• the future of atheism
• career advice for young scientists and scholars
• getting courage from science
• the multiverse: “You Cannot be Serious!”

Richard Dawkins is a fellow of the Royal Society and was the inaugural holder of the Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University. He is the acclaimed author of many books, including The Selfish Gene, The God Delusion, The Magic of Reality, Climbing Mount Improbable, Unweaving the Rainbow, The Ancestor’s Tale, The Greatest Show on Earth, and Science in the Soul. He is the recipient of numerous honors and awards, including the Royal Society of Literature Award, the Michael Faraday Prize of the Royal Society, the Kistler Prize, the Shakespeare Prize, the Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science, the Galaxy British Book Awards Author of the Year Award, and the International Cosmos Prize of Japan.

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Fitness Habits: How long does it really take to create them?

by Tom Venuto (from the “Burn the Fat” e-zine)

Experts have been saying for years that it takes 21 days to form a habit. However, for major physical, health and life-transforming habits, the latest research says it usually takes quite a bit longer than that.

It was a study from University College in London where psychologists discovered that, at least when it came to eating behaviors, it took anywhere from 18 to 254 days to form a habit to maximum strength (they also found that habit strength peaked and hit a plateau at a certain point).

That's a huge range of time, and it does indicate that some habits could be formed in 21 days as the old wisdom suggested. The scientists said that how long it takes depends on the type of habit. Desired new habits that are more difficult, such as training at 6 am every morning in the gym, are likely to take longer. 

A most fascinating statistic was this one: On average, it takes 66 days to form a habit. As such, the old 21 days advice may not be totally wrong, but it should probably be re-phrased to something like this: 

"It takes a minimum of 21 days to form a habit, usually 3 times that long for major habits, and in some cases, even longer before a habit reaches full strength."

There were even more interesting findings in this study, which was written up in the European Journal of Social Psychology. One was that the repetitions of a behavior in the early phase can produce a larger increase in behavior automation.  This means that while you may not have established a habit to full strength yet after only 21 days, those early weeks are a very, very important part of the process. If you get through the early phase, you are more likely to get over the hump, so to speak.

The problem is, we all know how notoriously difficult it is to even get started on new fitness and health habits, as well as how hard it is to get momentum going, (let alone keep it going).

The good news is that, based on this research, if you miss a day, you do NOT get sent back to zero. What happens is you simply *DELAY* the automation of your habit.  If you are always inconsistent, yeah, it's going to take you a long time, but if you miss once or twice here and there, no biggie, you just get back on the track.

This means that you don't have to be perfect, but one of the habits you must form is the habit of getting back on track quickly any time you've gotten off track. (I can't even emphasize how important this is!)
 
Even if it takes two months or more for a habit to reach full strength, if you were steady and consistent for even just the first several weeks, then new healthy daily habits will take root, at least some degree.

Curiosity Depends on What You Already Know

Humans have a drive to eat. We have a drive to drink. We have a drive to reproduce. Curiosity is no different, says George Loewenstein, a professor of economics and psychology at Carnegie Mellon University. Our insatiable drive to learn—to invent, explore, and study ceaselessly—“deserves to have the same status as those other drives.”

What’s curious about curiosity, though, is that it doesn’t seem to be tied to any specific reward. “The theoretical puzzle posed by curiosity is why people are so strongly attracted to information that, by the definition of curiosity, confers no extrinsic benefit,” Loewenstein once wrote. It makes sense for organisms to seek food, water, sex, shelter, rest, wealth, or any of the other myriad nourishing and pleasant things in life. But what is the good of deducing the nature of gravity, or of going to the moon?

Read the full article

The Persistence of Memory… and of the Memory Wars

BY CAROL TAVRIS

You can’t keep a bad idea down. Bury it in here, and it pops out over there. Drive a stake through its shriveled heart, and it sprouts three more arms and four new toes.

Are you old enough to have a memory of the memory wars? They were sparked by a debate that began more than 30 years ago, raging at a fever heat during the 1990s, dividing along a key issue: Do people commonly “repress” their memories of traumatic experiences, memories that can then be “recovered” in therapy, often with the help of hypnosis, dream analysis, and other probing techniques?

Yes they do, claimed many psychotherapists, and they testified to that effect in hundreds of court cases in which an adult came to remember, usually in therapy, having been sexually abused years earlier by a parent, teacher, or neighbor.

No they don’t, replied most psychological scientists, whose experimental research demonstrated the power of therapeutic suggestion in creating memories that often grew in implausibility. The problem for many people who have undergone a traumatic experience, they said, is not that they forget what happened to them, but that they cannot forget; memories intrude in waking life and nightmares. Richard McNally, a clinical scientist and professor at Harvard, reviewed the evidence in his book Remembering Trauma, and famously concluded: “The notion that the mind protects itself by repressing or dissociating memories of trauma, rendering them inaccessible to awareness, is a piece of psychiatric folklore devoid of convincing empirical support.”¹[…]

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Why You Should Put Your Hands On Your Knees When Gassed (Instead of Over Your Head)

from The Stack e-zine, no author cited

If you ever played a sport growing up, chances are you heard a coach yell, "Get your hands off your knees!" while you and your teammates were gasping for air.

Said coach would then insist you put your hands on your hips or on top of your head, instead. Their reasoning was that one, standing tall allowed their team to open their lungs and take in more oxygen, and two, bending over is a sign of weakness to be avoided at all costs.

The funny thing about this is that a recent study found bending over to be the superior recovery posture compared to the classic "hands on the head" pose.

The study (Michaelson et. al, 2019) compared two postures ("hands on knees" vs. "hands on head") to see how they impacted athletes' recovery from high-intensity interval training. The study found that the "hand on knees" posture resulted in superior heart rate recovery and greater tidal volume (the amount of air inhaled into the lungs with each breath) compared to the "hands on head" posture.

How could this possibly be? After all, doesn't having your hands on your head "open up your lungs" while bending over close them off? Not quite.

The problem with the hands on the head posture is that it flares your ribcage upwards, extends your back, and closes off your posterior ribcage so it cannot effectively expand during inhalation. The posterior ribcage actually contains a large volume of your lung tissue, so closing it off is far from ideal. This inhibits the diaphragm, the primary muscle of inhalation, from working effectively. To overcome this, many of your back and neck muscles will try to make up for the lack of diaphragm function during inhalation.

This is a textbook example of inefficient breathing.

A more optimal position would be to place your hands on your knees and look slightly upward. Looking up, you’re in a more efficient position for your airway, as the cervical extension would allow proper airflow into your lungs.

There's a reason your body naturally gravitates to the "hands on your knees" position when you're absolutely gassed during a workout. When you're really tired, your body will want to bend over and put your hands on your knees. The body knows best when it comes to these things, so why fight it? With your hand on your knees, your lungs are allowed to fill with a greater volume of air. This in turn supplies more oxygen to the working tissue so you can more quickly clear the oxygen debt you've accumulated through exercise. Your oxygen debt is essentially the specific amount of oxygen you need to recover when fatigued post-activity.
When coaches yell for athletes to get their hands off their knees, they're really taking them out of their optimal recovery position. Now, the question is whether they care more about efficient recovery or "looking tired."

If you're of the mind that what the opponent thinks is irrelevant, then athletes should be allowed to put their hands on their knees as they catch their breath, as this is the most optimal way for them to recover. Suboptimal recovery means a more fatigued athlete.
In my mind, the answer is clear. I'll leave it to the competition to recover in an inefficient manner, while my team will be ready for the next play before they are.

HIIT For Cardio & Fat Loss: Science Research Review

by Tom Venuto

Have you ever heard this: "If you do cardio workouts hard enough (with enough 'intensity') - using interval training (short bursts of hard work), you can burn a ridiculously huge amount of fat in just minutes! A 10-minute high intensity interval cardio session, or even 7-minutes, or yes, even 4-minutes (Tabata), will burn fat like crazy!"

Perhaps a trainer told you something like this, or you read it in a fitness book, magazine or website. If you haven't heard this, then rest assured, thousands of others have. High intensity interval training, aka "HIIT", has been promoted heavily for years, and often by well-known, well-credentialed trainers and PhD scientists.

The problem is, most of the claims about HIIT are, at best, a misunderstanding of what the science on HIIT actually says, and at worst, total B.S. A new study was published this year (2019) which uncovered everything exercise scientists know so far about interval training, specifically as it applies to fat loss (41 individual studies reviewed). I've summarized the findings here for all our readers. Take a look.

1. The new British Journal of Sports Medicine study on interval training and fat loss found that both types of cardio (steady and interval) are effective for fat loss and both reduced body fat percentage in similar amounts. However, the interval workouts were shorter, so promoted more fat loss per unit of time invested.
 
2. Interval training may be slightly more effective for fat loss, depending on how the program is designed, but it's not a magic bullet for fat loss. Interval training may, however, be a legitimate magic bullet for time efficiency, especially for fitness and health benefits. In just minutes, you really can get cardiovascular improvements.

3. Cardio, whether steady state or interval training, will not help with fat loss at all if nutrition is not controlled and adherence to the program is not consistent. (Read that one again!)

4.The interval training appeared slightly more effective overall for reducing total absolute fat mass (in lbs), but the amount of fat loss was not large and neither was the difference between the interval and steady state groups.

5. There is still no consensus about whether a single type of interval workout is the best for fat loss. There are many different interval protocols that can work. However, there are some general guidelines that must be followed or fat loss will be minimal, even with intervals.

6. Much of the previous research on interval training studied fitness and health benefits and didn't even measure fat loss. Many people, including respected trainers, are mixing up interval training for fat loss versus interval training for health and fitness benefits (they are not the same thing). Unfortunately, you don't burn diddly squat body fat with just a few minutes of intervals, no matter how intense they are.

7. Super short interval workouts can increase cardiovascular fitness and health, but the duration of interval training was a major factor that influenced decreases in body fat. The length of high intensity interval training (HIIT) protocols that resulted in the most significant fat loss was 28 minutes on average (compared to 38 minutes for steady state cardio).

8. Supervised training was associated with increased fat loss, which suggests many people doing interval training on their own have not been reaching the intensity thresholds needed to optimize results.

9. Jogging and running were forms of exercise that favorably influenced fat loss in interval training programs, but more than a few short sessions of running per week can interfere with strength and muscle gains when done concurrently every week with intense weight training, especially in the legs. No impact exercises like cycling, are more forgiving on leg muscle retention.

10. In sum, this study confirms that high intensity interval training (HIIT) and sprint interval training (SIT) is more time-efficient than lower intensity steady state cardio.

I hope you found this enlightening and it helped clear up some of the confusion about intervals and fat loss.

Michael Shermer with Neil deGrasse Tyson — Letters from an Astrophysicist

Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson has attracted one of the world’s largest online followings with his fascinating, widely accessible insights into science and our universe. Now, Tyson invites us to go behind the scenes of his public fame by revealing his correspondence with people across the globe who have sought him out in search of answers. In this hand-picked collection of 101 letters, Tyson draws upon cosmic perspectives to address a vast array of questions about science, faith, philosophy, life, and of course, Pluto. His succinct, opinionated, passionate, and often funny responses reflect his popularity and standing as a leading educator. Tyson’s 2017 bestseller Astrophysics for People in a Hurry offered more than one million readers an insightful and accessible understanding of the universe. Tyson’s most candid and heartfelt writing yet, Letters from an Astrophysicist introduces us to a newly personal dimension of Tyson’s quest to explore our place in the cosmos. Shermer and Tyson discuss:

• killing Pluto
• killing God
• science and religion
• why he takes a relatively conciliatory approach to religion
• why he takes a hard-line against science deniers in religion (and elsewhere)
• progress in science
• how vs. why questions
• race and racial progress
• why the arc of the moral universe still bends toward justice
• race and IQ and the curious letter he received about how to address this sensitive subject
• his middle name and why one correspondent objected to it
• Neil’s father and why he ends the book with a eulogy.

Listen to Science Salon via iTunes, Spotify, Google Play Music, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, and Soundcloud.

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Michael Shermer with Deepak Chopra — Metahuman: Unleashing Your Infinite Potential

In this conversation long-time adversaries and now friends Michael Shermer and Deepak Chopra make an attempt at mutual understanding through the careful unpacking of what Deepak means when he talks about the subject-object split, the impermanence of the self, nondualism, the mind-body problem, the nature of consciousness, and the nature of reality. Shermer also pushes Deepak to translate these deep philosophical, metaphysical, and psychological concepts into actionable take-home ideas that can be put to use to reduce human suffering and help people lead lives that are more meaningful and purposeful.

In the book Deepak includes a survey called Nondual Embodiment Thematic Inventory (NETI), final scores of which range from 20 to 100, on “how people rank themselves on qualities long considered spiritual, psychological, or moral.” Shermer scored a 62, which Chopra said is “not bad”. Take the test yourself in the book or Google it online to read more about it.

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Exactly What Do You Mean By “Processed Foods”?

by Mya Nelson for the AICR e-zine

Do you eat a lot of processed foods? Your answer would probably depend upon how processed foods are defined. One of AICR’s cancer prevention recommendations is to limit the amount of fast and processed foods that you eat. You probably know that chips, frozen pizza, brownies and hot dogs are considered processed. But what about that canned tuna, bread or boxed pasta, and what exactly does “a lot” mean anyway?

Scoring how processed foods are categorized is one of the more challenging tasks, according to the authors of a new paper that proposes a standardized scoring system for the AICR/WCRF’s cancer prevention recommendations. The paper, published in Nutrition, aims to improve comparisons between studies and ultimately, help to better understand how adhering to the recommendations link to cancer risk across various populations. You can read more about the paper here. It was led by researchers at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) in collaboration with experts at AICR, World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF), and in Europe.

Processing – the adding and more adding: Many foods are processed, everything from frozen peas to a cake mix, but the extent and type of processing can have dramatic effects on the healthfulness of those foods. AICR recommends limiting consumption of fast-foods and processed foods high in sugars, fats and starches. These are the foods that cause weight gain, overweight and obesity, which contributes to the development of 12 types of cancers.
“It’s important to remember that not all foods with some processing are unhealthy. The AICR recommendation focuses on foods considered highly or ultra- processed,” says Alice Bender, MS, RDN, the Director of Nutrition Programs at AICR and one of the study authors. Canned and frozen vegetables, for example, are classified as minimally processed, and these are part of a cancer-preventive diet.

“In general, ultra-processed foods are those that have been changed in ways that remove or diminish nutrients like fiber and vitamins. Then, fats, sugar and salt are added which turn an otherwise healthy food into a high-calorie, low-nutrient food putting you at risk for hypertension, weight gain and unhealthy fats in your blood,” adds Bender.

That’s why a box of whole wheat pasta or brown rice – which keeps its natural fiber and nutrient content – would be considered minimally processed. But a box of flavored or seasoned white rice with added salt, fats, or sugars would be categorized as ultra-processed. Homemade mashed potatoes are more processed than a plain baked potato. However, a potato chip, with large amounts of added fat from the deep fat fryer and a large portion of salt, that is an ultra-processed food.

“You can compare the fat, saturated fat, and sodium to the percent Daily Value (%DV) on the Nutrition Facts Label: anything 5% or less is low; a number 20% or above is high,” says Bender. “Added sugars don’t have a Daily Value, but keep in mind that 4 grams of added sugar equals 1 teaspoon of sugar. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends consuming less than 10% of total calories from added sugar – less than 10 teaspoons for a 1600 calorie diet.”

Food-based approach: The AICR recommendations purposefully take a food-based approach so the first decision for standardizing the AICR recommendation was to focus on whole foods, not food components such as sugars and fats, says Jill Reedy, Ph.D., M.P.H., R.D, a Program Director in NCI’s Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS) and senior author of the paper.

Given the challenges of defining fast or processed foods, the authors decided to adapt a well-known food classification tool called NOVA (not an acronym). NOVA assigns foods to 4 categories, from unprocessed to ultra-processed. The next step was to define 3 groups of ultra-processed food intake within a population – low, medium, and high. The authors recognized that depending upon the country, low, medium, or high intake will vary, said Reedy. “We know that different countries have different levels of processing. If you look at Brazil, for example, the proportion of these foods the population consumes is lower than what we have in the United States.”

Setting the 3 categories allows studies to divide their population between these groups no matter what population they’re from. This approach also accounts for variation in how each study collects data.

Lowering your score: The authors note that this is a starting framework, future work is planned. While the research on how to score fast and processed food intake is continuing, consider how much of these foods you eat.

If you’re like the average American, chances are that too much of your daily diet comes from ultra-processed foods. A study last year found that about 60 percent of an average American’s calories come from ultra-processed foods. In fact, Americans’ consumption of ultra-processed foods shows no signs of slowing. Over the course of this study, from 2007 to 2012, American consumption of these foods increased slightly each year. These ultra-processed foods included sugary drinks, packaged breads, chicken nuggets and instant noodle soups.

“If you’re used to purchasing and eating a lot of boxed goods and frozen highly processed foods, begin to look for ‘convenience foods’ that are closer to their nutrient rich origin,” advises Bender. “For example, instead of a frozen fried chicken meal, purchase a prepared roast chicken, frozen brown rice and frozen mixed vegetables.”

Remember, what’s important is to start making changes. Find new ways to reduce ultra-processed foods by substituting with minimally-processed foods. This way you can enjoy the flavors and textures of less processed foods and create a diet with more cancer-fighting punch. The occasional order of small fries or rich dessert can fit in if your plate consists of mostly whole foods like vegetables, whole grains, fruit with small to moderate amounts of animal foods.”