
Ketogenic diet helps tame flu virus in mice - conse_lad
https://news.yale.edu/2019/11/15/ketogenic-diet-helps-tame-flu-virus
======
jdkdnfndnfjd
PSA: keto appeared to cure my psychosis.

A while ago I experienced a traumatic event. Immediately I had sleep
disruption and slowly I began to have textbook symptoms of psychosis. It was
horrible and unpleasant. I went on keto and the symptoms went away. I stopped
due to side effects and the symptoms came back. I went back on and the
symptoms went away immediately. And on and off for a long time, with a perfect
correlation between the two. The doctors who diagnosed me with psychosis don’t
care that keto does this. I told them that I have figured out how to cure my
symptoms and they just give me a blank look. They prescribed me an
antipsychotic which I have never had to take although I have come close to
needing it a few times. I tell them there are other people who have written
about similar experiences and they don’t care. So I have to get the word out
like this.

The psychosis is curbed within 24 hours of starting keto. Sleep disturbance
persists for about five days. After five days it’s as though nothing had been
wrong at all.

I get a really bad rash after a couple of days of keto. This is a well known
side effect of keto although it is uncommon. I’ve tried various things, the
only one that worked was applying drysol prior to keto, preventing the rash-
prone areas from sweating. This gives a clue about the rash, which is
important because no studies have been done and its cause has not been
determined. If I didn’t get this rash I would happily stay on keto forever.

There’s never been a study about ketosis and psychosis. There’s one being done
in Finland right now, although the sample size leaves much to be desired. I’m
in contact with the primary researcher and the paper might be released as
early as one *year from now.

~~~
bad_user
Ketogenic diets have been used to control seizures in people suffering from
epilepsy. It has reportedly been used for controlling migraines and possibly
other neurological conditions.

Ketones being an alternative fuel for the brain, it can relieve neuronal
starvation from cognitive hypoglycemia. Whether there's some other magical
property of ketones at play, or it's simply that in some people glucose
metabolism in the brain is broken, it's all speculation at this point.

Note that for epilepsy patients, the classic ketogenic diet isn't something
that people can adhere to, being something that's normally done under medical
supervision.

\---

Btw I tried the ketogenic diet for several months and I noticed cool effects
like my face acne almost disappearing.

However the beneficial effects persisted after switching to a moderate carbs
diet made of whole foods. The standard diet is a disaster for health, being
very inflammatory and obesogenic, but you might want to also experiment with a
whole foods diet, made primarily from fresh plants and animal products cooked
at home.

You might discover the same benefits. And if you eat at maintenance, or with a
caloric deficit, you'll naturally cycle in and out of ketosis daily anyway.

But if what you do is working for you and you feel great, then good for you,
keep doing it.

~~~
agumonkey
Hi, interesting comment, do you know solid websites (or Books or places) about
keto diet and diet in general ?

~~~
bad_user
I recommend this one:

[https://examine.com/store/keto-guide/](https://examine.com/store/keto-guide/)

------
bad_user
In mice.

Also unfortunately the study failed to control the protein. Control group had
a diet made of 24% protein, keto group ate 10% protein.

Protein restriction has been shown to have profound immune modulatory effects.

Protein restriction is a massive confounder in such studies. Caloric deficit
is often another. These often go hand in hand.

------
DanielleMolloy
My scientifically unverified pet theory:

Ketosis is the body's winter state. When no carbs are growing outside fat
resources need to be used up and the brain needs to work well on a steady
stream of ketones as it is more difficult to find food in winter. This immune
system boost is also helpful during winter as there are less vitamine sources
available. For some reason you also need less sleep.

When carbs are available in summer, the body tries to gather weight, and for
this the carb addiction pattern is quite helpful. A high-carb diet is the
summer state.

~~~
wil421
Didn’t people evolve out of Africa near the equator?

~~~
DanielleMolloy
Humans won’t be the only creature that finds adaptation to seasonal food
resources useful.

Anyway, this thought is probably difficult to study. We seem to be engineered
to grab carbs when we see them though.

------
wpietri
Whoa. When I'm sick, that's when I most crave refined carbs. Could the virus
be evolved to trigger that? Kind of in the same way colds are evolved to make
me sneeze so I spread them?

~~~
firethief
The drive to maintain caloric balance is sufficient to account for that.

[https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111...](https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1365-2435.2010.01815.x)

> metabolic rate may rise as much as 55% when fighting severe infections

~~~
wpietri
No, not in my case. I have very specific cravings.

------
samfisher83
They don't seem to provide the tables with the data just graphs. There is a
lot more variance with keto group than the other groups. However its still
better than the carb group, but not that much better than high fat group/ Also
they only used ~20 mice and didn't make the groups the same for example they
have 5 in carb group. I wish studies would do better job of providing tables
so you can look at data.

------
shadykiller
One more positive from Keto apart from the health and longevity benefits
(studied in mice)

------
ThrowawayIP
In mice.

~~~
tarr11
I love this account:

[https://twitter.com/justsaysinmice/status/119661435015448576...](https://twitter.com/justsaysinmice/status/1196614350154485760)

~~~
ryanisnan
Seems like it's already been IN MICE'd.
[https://twitter.com/justsaysinmice/status/119582327375131852...](https://twitter.com/justsaysinmice/status/1195823273751318529)

------
darkerside
I'm curious how long it takes for the inflammasome effect to set in. Can you
start going keto when you get the sniffles and shorten the duration of
illness?

~~~
loceng
There's definitely research out there showing that you heal faster when
fasting - whether that is inflammatory reduction related or not, I'm not sure.

------
LordAtlas
I'm sure all the mice reading this must be happy.

------
infradig
Chicken soup anyone?

~~~
paulcole
Only if you use cauliflower noodles.

------
tempsolution
Wow, revolutionary. It's not like its been known for years already that sugar
acts as an effective immune suppressant.

It's always funny to see how school medicine tracks the state of the art by 20
years into the past and then another 40 before it hits the actual doctors and
their patients (for the latter part, ongoing re-education requirements might
help as to avoid people like my grandma who still thinks after being 30 years
out of practice that what she learned after the second world war in her
studies is the state of the art of medicine).

For the first part, I have no answer. Something is utterly broken with the way
school medicine "innovates".

I would love to be able to write this while drinking my extra large soda and
next to it a piece of chocolate cake. Yeah, cancer here I come.

~~~
bad_user
> _It 's not like its been known for years already that sugar acts as an
> effective immune suppressant._

Interesting, any references?

AFAIK that's not true, no, sugar does not act as an immune suppressant, what
acts as an immune suppressant is whatever inhibits autophagy and that's
primarily protein, or calories in general. High levels of the IGF-1 hormone is
also associated with higher risk of cancer and all cause mortality, it's just
a weak association, but note IGF-1 seems to also be stimulated by a protein.

This isn't to say that we should restrict protein. In truth we need a lot of
protein to remain healthy and these associations have confounders, in truth
vilifying any single macro nutrient is just stupid and unsupported by existing
evidence.

It's not the sugar in the soda or in the chocolate cake that's going to get
you, but the overall _caloric surplus_ ... since after a soda and a chocolate
cake you'll still feel hungry. Everything breaks loose on a chronic caloric
surplus. And interestingly any study that doesn't control the calories or the
protein is flawed, as these are massive confounders.

> " _Something is utterly broken with the way school medicine "innovates"._"

The problem is that nutrition is a hard science, because obviously you can't
dissect people or lock them in cages and feed them crap for the rest of their
lives to see how they react :-)

That said the anti-establishment propaganda coming from the low carb camp is
increasingly worrying. I've even seen prominent LCHF supporters being or
affiliating with anti-vaxxers as well.

~~~
wtetzner
My understanding is that both carbohydrates and protein inhibit autophagy
through different pathways.

