Seeing the words "gluten-free" stamped onto a box of cookies, crackers, or Twinkies is not a green light that sends you on the road to healthier living. Now that the availability of gluten-free junk foods is legitimized by appearance in "common" large grocery chains, and product offerings expanded faster than waistlines, misinformation about these allergy-friendly foods is increasing.

Oh yes, large packaged food companies are listening to the siren scream of customers for more gluten-free foods choices. But like much in the past history of food companies' service of public wants, it's demand begetting inferior (from a healthful perspective) supply. As more shoppers load their grocery carts with gluten-free pretzels and pasta, grocery suppliers and stores expand their gluten-free aisles. According to a survey conducted by the NPD group in January 2013, approximately 30% of adults in the United States reported trying to reduce or exclude gluten from their food intake.

Despite the fact that a gluten-free diet is beneficial only to folks allergic or intolerant to gluten, many perceive gluten-free foods to be healthier and associated with weight loss. The real truth: gluten-free does not equal sugar free, healthful, skinny, or low fat. In fact, gluten-free foods often are less healthy and more expensive than their healthier, less sugared, whole wheat counterparts. You need to do what is best for your health and your budget—so here's the gluten-free 411.

Recently on the YOU The Owner’s Manual Radio Show, we featured a top medical story about how to prevent 80% of chronic disease. It related to food choices and portion size.

Wait! Don’t stop reading!

It really does get more interesting, because if each of us paid as much attention to restaurant menus as some my friends do to NBA scoring, we could save 600 billion a year at least. A year!

That would make North America as competitive for jobs as for energy independence. You’d be patriotic. And we are being helped. Most fast food restaurants have added an additional column of numbers on their menus. The new column contains the calorie content of the food items. However, apparently not too many people have taken an interest in the new information provided to help Americans get healthier.

A new study published in May 2013 highlights the ineffective attempt to encourage people to moderate calories. Nearly 2/3 of adults, adolescent, and school age children underestimated the number of calories in their fast food meal....and not by a little.

From a recent behind-the-scenes discussion about red meat on YOU The Owner’s Manual Radio Show:

I said "It’s changing your microbiome." "Your What?" she said. "Your Microbiome, or the bacteria inside you." "Ugh" she said "That’s disgusting." "Maybe" I said, "but there may be something you could take or just avoiding it that could give you more energy for many years, as well as keep you healthy, and that’s invigorating."

You see, on a recent radio show, a guest with great expertise in this area, Adam Bernstein, MD,SciD, reviewed the hazards of eating red meat - and, yes, pork and bacon are red meats - a 20% increase in risk of stroke and type 2 diabetes for every 4 ounce portion you have a week. That is a doubling of risk for 5 servings (or one big portion, if you eat big at a place like Morton’s or The Heart Attack Grill. Yes, there is such a place).  

Yes, you are literally committing suicide by eating red meat.

I exercise every Saturday morning listening to the Fox News business block to catch up on all the stuff I miss in news that will effect the health of our nation’s economy.  

I know so little, that I think they are “gods of finance”. But when they talked about medical costs recently, they knew so little and had their facts so confused, that I thought they must be shills for that true, but unrelated to the real problem, 16 page piece on medical costs in Time Magazine.

How could the Forbes and Fox gangs have it as wrong as Time did, when their own newspaper (Murdock run, like Fox) pointed out the folly of the Time piece?  The Forbes gang just didn’t give it to you straight on this topic…and it makes me wonder …should I stop watching them on Saturday mornings? Maybe just watch the recorded Oz shows, instead?

Let's get it straight.

There are three new headlines (and the rest of the stories we tweeted about in the most recent YOU The Owner’s Manual Radio Show), that juxtaposed perfectly with our most recent great guest, who is the author of The Alzheimer’s Prevention Cookbook.  

The headlines I'm talking about are:

1. Alzheimer's fastest-growing health threat in USA, report says
2. Mediterranean Diet can prevent over 30% of  strokes (brain loss) in already optimally managed patients
3. Survey Finds That Fish Are Often Mislabeled

The synergy here is interesting.

I often say on the show: YOU get a Do-Over and YOU can achieve 5 normals. And if you did you'd live 30% longer and with 30% less disability than the usual North American. And if 70% of us did it, we could pay you a 2000 rebate each year and we'd not have a budget deficit or a problem competing for jobs.

Let me tell you the background, our healthcare costs are twice developed Europe's and four times those of Mexico, China, India and Japan only because we have twice the chronic disease of Europe and four times that of MCIJ. Your choices, not your genes cause that. Almost our entire deficit (actually it is our entire deficit but that seems outrageous, but is actual) is caused by our lifestyle choices and their effect on Medicare, Caid, Federal and State direct healthcare costs (for employees, retirees etc).