Obesogens, through their pervasive presence in our environment, exert insidious effects on metabolic function, including the intricate workings of mitochondria – the cellular powerhouses responsible for energy production. By disrupting mitochondrial function, obesogens can contribute to metabolic dysregulation and, ultimately, weight gain.

Mitochondria play a central role in energy metabolism, converting nutrients into adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the primary source of cellular energy. However, exposure to obesogens can impair mitochondrial function through various mechanisms, including:

• Oxidative Stress: Obesogens can promote the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) within mitochondria, leading to oxidative damage and dysfunction.
• Mitochondrial Biogenesis: Some obesogens interfere with the process of mitochondrial biogenesis, the creation of new mitochondria, which is essential for maintaining optimal energy metabolism.
• Respiratory Chain Dysfunction: Obesogens may disrupt the electron transport chain, a series of protein complexes within mitochondria that generate ATP, impairing energy production.
• Mitochondrial Membrane Integrity: Obesogens can compromise the integrity of mitochondrial membranes, affecting the transport of ions and molecules critical for energy production.

​The disruption of mitochondrial function by obesogens can have profound implications for metabolic health and contribute to obesity through several pathways:

1. Impaired Energy Expenditure: Dysfunctional mitochondria are less efficient at generating ATP, leading to reduced energy expenditure and a propensity for weight gain.
2. Insulin Resistance: Mitochondrial dysfunction can impair insulin signaling pathways, contributing to insulin resistance, a hallmark of obesity and metabolic syndrome.
3. Altered Lipid Metabolism: Mitochondria play a crucial role in lipid metabolism, including the breakdown of fatty acids for energy. Disrupted mitochondrial function can lead to aberrant lipid accumulation and adipogenesis, contributing to obesity.

The impact of obesogens on human health extends beyond weight gain, with associations documented with various health conditions, including:

• Obesity: Obesogens have been implicated in the global obesity epidemic, contributing to excess weight gain and adiposity. This includes being overweight, abdominal obesity (midsection fat), childhood and adult obesity.
• Insulin Resistance and Diabetes: Disruption of metabolic pathways by obesogens can lead to insulin resistance, a precursor to type 2 diabetes.
• Fatty Liver Disease: Chemical exposures, including those to bisphenols and phthalates, have been linked to the development of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD).

Additionally, obesogens are highly related to the following health conditions and physiologic imbalances:

Relatively little is known about the extent to which obesogen exposure programs dysfunctional adipose tissue that may store but not mobilize fat. However, emerging evidence suggests that obesogens may contribute to adipocyte dysfunction, leading to altered fat storage and metabolism. One potential underlying factor is suboptimal liver detoxification pathways due to inadequate micronutrient cofactors.
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Inadequate levels of essential micronutrients, such as vitamins and minerals, can impair liver detoxification pathways responsible for metabolizing and eliminating obesogens from the body. As a result, obesogens may accumulate in adipose tissue, disrupting metabolic function and contributing to weight gain. Additionally, micronutrient deficiencies can compromise mitochondrial function, further exacerbating metabolic dysfunction and obesity risk.​

In the quest for weight loss, many of us often find ourselves fixating on calorie counting, fad diets, or intense workout regimens. However, what if I told you that the key to achieving a healthy weight isn't solely about shedding pounds but rather fixing your metabolism? Enter obesogens – a lesser-known yet influential factor in the obesity epidemic.

As mentioned, obesogens are chemicals found in our environment, ranging from pesticides and plastics to food additives and personal care products. These substances have the uncanny ability to disrupt our body's natural weight-regulating mechanisms, leading to weight gain and metabolic dysfunction. Instead of solely blaming calories in versus calories out, it's essential to recognize the role obesogens play in shaping our metabolism.

2. Consume Micronutrients: Vital micronutrients, such as vitamins and minerals, serve as essential cofactors in metabolic pathways. Ensuring adequate intake of these micronutrients through a balanced diet rich in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and lean proteins can support optimal metabolic function. Additionally, supplementation may be necessary to address any deficiencies and promote metabolic health.
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The conventional approach to weight loss often overlooks the critical role obesogens play in metabolic dysfunction. Instead of solely focusing on calorie restriction or intense exercise, shifting our focus to fixing metabolism through toxin reduction and micronutrient consumption offers a more holistic and sustainable solution to achieving optimal health. By addressing the underlying factors contributing to metabolic disruption, we can pave the way for lasting weight management and overall well-being.

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We’ve built an entire economy, not just in the United States but the entire Western civilization, on healthcare. For thousands of years, real control over populations has been around their food. Today, with billions of souls on the planet, controlling food has become a massive business and a means of ultimate political control. Between 1982 and 2000, something changed in our environment, overwhelming the immune system of the population. Diseases in different organ systems started going epidemic simultaneously, challenging the notion of a thousand different diseases.

In the late 1800s, we changed the way we farmed, leading to a disrespect for crop rotation and soil health. This disrespect for soil health resulted in the Dust Bowl of the 1920s and 30s, pushing us to outsource our food production and rely on imported food. After World War II, with a surplus of petroleum, we started producing chemical-based fertilizers, leading to the Green Revolution. While plants turned green due to nitrogen and phosphorus, they lacked essential nutrients and medicine.

This deficiency weakened plants, making them susceptible to diseases and pests. The chemical industry introduced pesticides and herbicides (including #Glyphosate), creating a co-dependent relationship between farmers and chemical solutions. Similarly, in healthcare, we’ve become dependent on drugs to manage symptoms, creating a cycle of side effects and more medications. The epidemic rise in diseases like autism, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and autoimmune disorders signals a deeper problem, challenging our understanding of the root cause of diseases.

It’s time to reconsider our approach to health, starting with understanding the importance of soil health and nutrition. Just as respecting soil is crucial for healthy crops, prioritizing our body’s nutritional needs is fundamental for overall well-being. Let’s shift our focus from symptom management to addressing the root cause, promoting a holistic approach to health.

Zach Bush, MD is triple board-certified physician specializing in internal medicine, endocrinology and hospice care. He is the founder of Seraphic Group, an organization devoted to developing root-cause solutions for human and ecological health in the sectors of big farming, big pharma, and Western Medicine at large. And he is also the founder of Farmers Footprint https://farmersfootprint.us/, a non-profit coalition of farmers, educators, doctors, scientists, and business leaders aiming to expose the deleterious human and environmental impacts of chemical farming and pesticide reliance - while simultaneously offering a path forward through regenerative agricultural practices.

The environment that we live in is toxic. It is worrisome to think that the status quo has occurred with the help of corporations knowingly dumping harmful chemicals into the environment.

The Environmental Working Group (EWG) has studied the current state of our world in great detail and has discovered that before a child is even born they already have approximately 287 toxins in their blood and tissues. These results came from 10 newborns whose parents gave permission to have their toxins measured at birth.

The results of this study indicate that an average of 200 chemicals was found in each newborn. Of the toxins tested, 47 were consumer ingredients such as cosmetics, 212 were industrial and pesticide byproducts. In this study, only around 400 total chemicals were actually tested for - thousands of others may have been found if larger parameters were used.

Many of the toxins measured in the newborns included plastics, flame retardants, and other chemicals that disrupt brain function, IQ, hormones, and the nervous system of the child. Some of the toxins observed like DDT, have actually been banned since 1972 (over 3 decades ago), but are still being measured in laboratory samples. Certain chemicals never fully degrade in the environment.

So, there is not question about it, the environment we live in is toxic. All of us have disease-creating toxins inside of our bodies, the question boils down to which ones and how much.

But there are some solutions: lab tests and detoxification.

Pesticides are stressors that have received considerable attention, and among these no single class has received more attention than the neonicotinoids. These insecticides are acutely toxic to honey bees, environmentally persistent and mobile in the environment (Long & Krupke, 2016).

A recent large-scale, real-world field study, published in the journal Science, evaluating neonicotinoid pesticides has been added to a growing body of evidence suggesting that these agricultural chemicals are indeed harming bee populations to a unprecedented level.

Researchers investigated three different bee species across 33 sites in the United
Kingdom, Germany and Hungary, and found that exposure to neonicotinoid-treated crops is associated with a reduced capacity of bee species to establish new populations in the year following exposure.

For honey bees, the researchers found both negative (Hungary and United Kingdom) and positive (Germany) effects during crop flowering. In Hungary, negative effects on honey bees persisted over winter and resulted in smaller colonies in the following spring (24% declines). In wild bees (Bombus terrestris and Osmia bicornis), reproduction was negatively correlated with neonicotinoid residues (Woodcock et al., 2017).

Bayer and Syngenta, makers of neonicotinoid pesticides, promptly disputed the researchers’ conclusions—even though they partially funded the study (Gardner, 2017).

The amount of research pertaining to the effects of neonicotinoids on bees is overwhelming. Here are some of the results gathered from various studies conducted evaluating the effects of neonicotinoids on bees:

• Small bodied species show greater sensitivity to neonicotinoids.
• Dosed bees were significantly less likely to return to the nest than control bees.
• Bees in the two neonicotinoid treatments grew significantly more slowly and had an 85% reduction in the number of new queens produced when compared to control colonies.
• Concentration of thiamethoxam (a neonicotinoid) in pollen significantly negatively predicted both colony weight gain and production of new queens.
  
• Field-realistic doses of neonicotinoids (<3.5 ng/g) resulted in sublethal impacts on their ability to successfully build nests and provision offspring.
• Field studies using bumblebees demonstrate that exposure to neonicotinoid-treated flowering crops can have significant impacts on colony growth and reproductive output depending on the levels exposed to.

Given the vast farmlands devoted to crops and concerns about worldwide pollinator decline, researchers set out to to determine how (that is, plant species) and when (that is, time in season), pollen-foraging honey bees are exposed to a range of pesticides in agricultural landscapes, with an eye towards clarifying potential high-risk compounds and identifying common combinations of pesticides encountered in field environments.

The most common pesticide types detected in pollen samples across all sites were fungicides and herbicides. Honey bees visited a diverse assemblage of flowering plants, collecting pollen from up to 30 plant families during the 16-week sampling period (Long & Krupke, 2016).

It is evident that bees and other non-target organisms inhabiting farmland are routinely exposed to far more complex cocktails of pesticides than any experimental protocol has yet attempted to examine. Since researchers typically study the effects of only one chemical at a time, a major challenge for scientists and regulators is to attempt to understand how chronic exposure to complex mixtures of neonicotinoids and other chemicals affects wildlife, including humans.

The results from this research are particularly important because many crops globally are insect pollinated and without pollinators we would struggle to produce many foods. Across crops, years and biogeographical regions, crop-visiting wild bee communities are dominated by a small number of common species, and threatened species are rarely observed on crops. Researchers have observed that a small number of species dominate the contribution of crop production. Across 90 studies, the researchers observed that 2% of bee species account for almost 80% of all crop visits (Kleijn et al., 2017).

Do you support the use of these pesticides? If you are purchasing products that are contaminated with these neonicotinoids, you are contributing to this problem. If you refuse to buy foods contaminated with pesticides, the companies taking these short cuts will stop producing these products. These companies function on a corporate, patent-driven agricultural model that involves monoculture crops dependent on high chemical inputs. This creates a positive feedback loop where pest plants and insects become resistant to herbicides and pesticides, prompting companies to make other, more toxic chemicals. This ever-growing dependence on chemicals, which threatens natural ecosystems and human health, is highly profitable to companies like Bayer, Syngeta and Monsanto.

It is up to everyone of us to source foods that we know how they are grown and produced - easier said than done when shopping at a supermarket. Try shopping at your local farmer's markets, where you can meet the farmers in person and know how they are growing the food you purchase. You should know what is in your food. Collectively, we have the power to choose what we as consumers want.

The ideal solution to this problem is to grow your own food in an organic garden! Both flower and vegetable gardens provide good honeybee habitats. It's also recommended to keep a small basin of fresh water in your garden or backyard, as bees actually do get thirsty. Be very mindful of pesticide use, and think twice whether such chemicals are really necessary before you spray them (this goes for flea repellents, mosquito sprays and more). You can take bee preservation a step further by trying your hand at amateur beekeeping. Maintaining a hive in your garden requires minimal time, benefits your local ecosystem, and you get to enjoy your own homegrown honey.

As for pesticides in your body, your best bet for minimizing health risks from herbicide and pesticide exposure — including both the active and "inactive" ingredients — is to avoid them in the first place by eating organic as much as possible.