Why fasting can be harmful to health?

a recent studymade by the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinaiannounced that the fast can have Negative effects in the fight against infections and increase the possibility of suffering diseases cardiac.

The work is one of the first to establish the connection between the brain and these immune cells during fasting.

Fasting can be harmful to health: what the study is about

The investigationwhose results were published in the February 23 issue of immunityfocused on mouse models and is one of the first to show that skipping meals triggers a response in brain that affects negatively at cells immune. The specialists maintain that the results could lead to a better understanding of how chronic fasting can affect the body in the long term.

“We identified a fasting-induced change in leukocyte migration that prolongs monocyte lifespan and alters disease susceptibility in mice,” the authors of the paper noted in publishing their conclusions. We show that fasting during the active phase induced the rapid return of monocytes from the blood to the bone marrow.”

The researchers tried to better understand how fasting, from a relatively fast short of a few hours to a more severe 24-hour fast, affects the immune system. He study consisted of separating two groups of mice: one ate breakfast immediately after waking up and the other did not. From this they were made blood samples when the mice woke up, then four hours later and eight hours later.

When they looked at the results there was a clear difference between the two groups. Specifically, the researchers saw a difference in the number of monocytes, which are white blood cells that occur in the bone marrow and they travel through bodywhere they play many functions criticsfrom fighting infections to diseases heart and cancer.

Filip Swirsky is the lead author of the study, Ph.D., and director of the Institute for Cardiovascular Research at Icahn Mount Sinai, remarked that “there is increasing awareness that fasting is healthy and, in fact, there is abundant evidence of the benefits of fasting.” fast”. “Our study offers a caveat, as it suggests that fasting may also come at a cost that carries a health risk,” he noted. This is a mechanistic study that delves into some of the fundamental biology relevant to fasting. The study shows that there is a conversation between the nervous and immune systems.”

This study is a pioneer to identify the connection between the brain and the immune cells called monocytes during fasting. The researchers found that certain areas of the brain regulate the monocyte response during fasting, suggesting that the Hunger triggers a stress response in the brain which causes the migration of these white blood cells from the bone marrow into the bloodstream. When food is reintroduced, the monocytes return to the bone marrow.

“The study shows that, on the one hand, fasting reduces the number of circulating monocytes, which could be thought to be a good thing, since these cells are important components of inflammation. On the other hand, reintroducing food creates a sudden increase in monocytes flooding back into the blood, which can be problematic.” swirski.