Can Pesticides Make Insulin Resistance Worse?

The Environmental Working Group released their latest Dirty Dozen and Clean 15 list for pesticide contamination today. So how did low carb veggies and fruits do?

Can Pesticides Make Insulin Resistance Worse?

Non-starchy vegetables and low-glycemic and botanical fruits, such as avocados and tomatoes, are the mainstay of a healthy, low carb diet.

High in fiber and nutrients, low in carbohydrates and calories, they help to keep blood glucose levels from spiking too high.

However, many people find it difficult to meet the high cost of organic produce.

Since the path to diabetes is paved with:

• insulin resistance
• fatty liver disease
• autoimmune problems
• and beta cell damage or death

There’s much more at stake for ignoring the part pesticides play in your metabolic issues than just cost.

If you're wondering which low-carb vegetables and fruits are clean enough to go conventional, this post is for you.

The Real Danger of Environmental Contaminants

A low-carb diet is designed to lower fasting and post-meal blood sugar levels, allowing the body to return to a healthy metabolic state.

But pesticides, herbicides, and insecticides can increase or impair insulin secretion and damage your beta cells.

Environmental contaminants like:

• PCBs
• arsenic
• dioxin
• cadmium
• bisphenol A
• and mercury

can interfere with the body’s metabolic processes. This means your low-carb diet won't work as well as it could.

While most organic vs. non-organic arguments come from the perspective of what feeding your family organic produce would cost, many scientific studies clearly show that environmental toxins are associated with an increased risk of diabetes and metabolic syndrome.

That danger is of special interest to those on low-carb diets because 1 out of 3 dieters already have some degree of insulin resistance, and eating extra produce that is contaminated with pesticides could make insulin resistance worse.

The Worst Low Carb Veggies and Fruits

The Environmental Working Group releases the stats of what types of produce is most likely to have high-residues of contaminants, and which types of produce are clean enough that you don't really have to buy organic to reap the benefits if you don't want to.

Most low-carb dieters zero in on how many carbohydrates a particular vegetable or fruit has per serving, while ignoring everything else.

But if you look at the Environmental Working Group’s updated “Dirty Dozen” list published in 2011, you’ll find many low-carb diet staples are loaded with pesticides:

• celery
• strawberries
• spinach
• bell peppers
• blueberries
• lettuce
• kale and collard greens

Those strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries that low carbers hold up to the world as proof that yes, we do eat fruit, could actually be doing you more harm than good if you aren't purchasing organic berries.

The EWG found 13 different pesticides detected on a single sample of strawberries, and raspberries were even worse – they had a whopping 51!

Celery weighed in at 13 different chemicals and came in at #2 on the dirty list, the produce you need to buy organic or avoid. Bell peppers had 11 and collard greens had 10. But cucumbers, another low-carb salad staple, contained as many as 68.

The lettuce and spinach greens themselves? 66!!!

So what about those famous can’t live without Jalapeno Poppers?

The Dirty Dozen only lists sweet bell peppers, not hot peppers. However, according to the EWG’s website, farmers might treat hot peppers with as many as 97 different pesticides, and if you minced them into a bowl of homemade salsa with cilantro, the cilantro adds even more.

Avoiding the Dirty Dozen isn't just about each individual fruit or vegetable. When you combine them in a recipe, even low residues can skyrocket.

The Best Low Carb Veggies and Fruits

Onions, corn, and asparagus had no detectable pesticide residues on 90% or more of the samples.

The others on the list were very low, so if you can’t afford to go completely organic, the following list is a great place to cut corners:

• onions
• corn
• avocado
• asparagus
• sweet peas
• eggplant
• domestic cantaloupe
• kiwi
• cabbage
• watermelon
• sweet potatoes
• grapefruit
• mushrooms

While most low carb dieters generally shun corn, peas, and sweet potatoes, starchy vegetables and tubers have their place on the Atkins Carbohydrate Ladder and make good pre-maintenance or later-on OWL additions to the diet, once you can afford to spend more carbohydrate grams.

For those on Atkins 40, they are acceptable diet choices from day one.

Benefit of Eating Pesticide-free Vegetables and Fruits

When you eat organic produce, pesticide levels in your tissues begin to drop. That creates less stress on the body, and less risk for getting diabetes and other metabolic problems.

Some pesticides are endocrine disruptors. They:

• disrupt beta cell function
• interfere with carb metabolism
• are toxic to the immune system
• impair mitochrondria function
• can cause intestinal inflammation
• impair insulin secretion
• cause pancreas to over secrete insulin
• destroy beta cells

Because of how hormones work, endocrine disruptors can have opposite effects, depending on the dose. Pesticides can be accumulative, although, some studies show damage from a single exposure.

While most beta cell death is actually caused from glucose toxicity (blood sugar levels higher than 140 mg/dl), pesticides' insulin secretion impairment can lead to that toxicity.

Granted, pesticides are not the only chemicals that can harm your endocrine system. Meds like:

• cortisone
• prednisone
• SSRI’s

also can contribute to metabolic issues and diabetes, so always consider their potential for harm when choosing which low-carb veggies to buy and eat.