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10/19/09--DETROIT – Autopsies are expected after three half-marathoners died during the Detroit marathon. Officials say:

• 36-year-old Daniel Langdon collapsed at about 9:02 a.m. Sunday between the 11- and 12-mile markers.

• 65-year-old Rick Brown collapsed at 9:17 a.m., near where Langdon went down.

• 26-year-old Jon Fenlon collapsed at about 9:18 a.m., just after finishing the 13.1-mile half-marathon in 1:53:37.

Rich Harshbarger, vice president of consumer marketing for the Detroit Media Partnership, told the Detroit Free Press emergency personnel were on the scene within seconds to no avail. Autopsies are planned

What will the autopsies find?

Nothing, of course, because the medical profession relies on a blood test for magnesium – and looks no further. To find out how much magnesium is within muscle tissue - and the heart is a muscle - an intracellular or tissue test is required.

(Blood tests do not measure the status of intracellular magnesium. The body will pull magnesium from muscle to satisfy blood requirements.)

During his lengthy clinical career, the late Dr. Robert Atkins routinely ordered intracellular magnesium testing and found that 9 out of 10 of his patients were deficient in magnesium. The most likely cause of sudden death during marathons:  deficient intracellular magnesium.

Americans are told to emphasize carbohydrates and exercise. Carbohydrate metabolism uses up magnesium and strenuous exercise causes magnesium excretion. Since doctors are not routinely testing for intracellular mineral deficiencies, Americans on high carbohydrate diets are increasingly exercising to death.

We have all heard of high school and professional athletes dying suddenly on football fields and basketball courts. Now, three marathon runners between the ages of 26 and 65 die on the same day doing what our Dietary Guidelines recommend: 

“Exercise and eat a low fat diet, if that doesn’t lower your cholesterol enough, take a drug for the rest of your life.”

Dr. William Campbell Douglas, MD, says the over emphasis on exercise in the Dietary Guidelines is dangerous. Dr. Douglas sites research from New York University Medical Center that suggests that the more you engage in vigorous exercise, the greater your risk of atrial fibrillation (AF), a condition characterized by irregular rapid heart rate.

The consequences of atrial fibrillation include lethal heart attack or stroke. And, if you have serious, unrecognized heart disease, strenuous exercise may cause your heart to enlarge as you die slowly from suffocating heart failure. Dr. Douglas points out that “the leading cause of exercise-related deaths even in well-trained athletes is coronary heart disease.”

According to the current 2005 federal Dietary Guidelines, Americans are told to exercise 30 to 90 minutes per day in order to maintain a healthy weight or to prevent “unhealthy weight gain.” The Dietary Guidelines recommend:

•    At least 30 minutes of regular physical activity is essential to maintain a healthy weight. 
•    Many adults may require up to 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity on most days to prevent unhealthy weight gain.
•    The amount of physical activity that "weight-reduced adults" need to avoid "weight regain" is estimated to be from 60 to 90 minutes daily at moderate intensity.

To maintain a "negative energy balance," the government scientists want us to exercise to burn calories. For the obese to achieve a “negative energy balance,” the guidelines recommend  60 to 90 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity daily. But, according to Dr. Atkins, the obese are at the highest risk of magnesium deficiency, and intense exercise may increase their hunger, or worse, cause sudden death.

Our faith in physical activity as a method of weight control is enshrined in the official Dietary Guidelines and is reflected in conversations in the gyms and health clubs throughout the nation as approximately 40 million club members ask,  “How many calories did you expend in your latest workout?”

The current culture of physical exercise as the path to weight loss and perfect health began in the early 1970s, but is there any evidence that exercise promotes weight loss? Not according to science writer Gary Taubes, author of Good Calories, Bad Calories. In the definitive book on this topic, Taubes evaluates decades of conflicting science, including the lengthy review of various obesity treatments conducted in 1960 by epidemiologist Alvan Feinstein, published in the Journal of Diseases. Feinstein concludes:

“There has been ample demonstration that exercise is an ineffective method of increasing energy output.”

Feinstein noted, “It takes far too much activity to burn up enough calories for significant weight loss. In addition, physical exertion may evoke a desire for food so that the subsequent intake of calories may exceed what was lost during exercise.”

As Taubes writes, “When we are physically active, we work up an appetite. Hunger increases in proportion to the calories we expend ... The evidence suggests that this is true for both the fat and the lean.”

Government experts and medical authorities are not looking at the the obesity studies Gary Taubes carefully examined. Although it is there charge, the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Commitees have a record, like Ancel Keys, of selecting data. They have learned not to step on the toes of the powerful food company lobbyists who use exercise and physical activity as a smokescreen to hide the harm they are causing with their empty calories food products.

• Obesity is caused by the quality of the calories we're eating - not anyone's lack of exercise.

• Eating and exercise should not be a math problem.

• We're here to enjoy healthy whole food - plant and animal - not count calories.

• We're here to move, shop, swim, walk, and dance - not risk our lives attempting to achieve "negative energy balance” (whatever that really means). 

• Do the governments of Japan, France, and Switzerland put their citizens through this convoluted nonsense?