Many people are told Type 2 diabetes is for life and will only get worse, but that is only part of the truth. For most people, diabetes can be reversed, although not by a simple pill. This article explains why diabetes exploded so quickly, what research (including Roy Taylor’s work) reveals about fat in the liver and pancreas, and why gut biology and modern food chemistry matter. It finishes with a practical path forward: real food, low toxins, and personalised glucose monitoring.
What the Doctors Say (and Why It Feels Hopeless)
Every day people go to their doctor after a routine blood test and are told they have diabetes. They are often told it is for life, not reversible, and will get progressively worse. The message usually continues: pills can manage blood sugar for a while, then stronger pills will be needed, eventually insulin injections, and likely an early death—often from a heart attack. People are also warned about blindness and limb amputations if they do not take the pills.
Most people hearing that news feel frightened, but they also feel trapped. A common reaction is to decide to “enjoy life while it lasts” and keep eating and drinking what they like, because the story makes the outcome feel inevitable. But while there is some truth in the doctor’s warning, it is only part of the truth. For the vast majority of people, diabetes can be reversed or even cured, but not by a simple pill. People deserve the facts so they can make their choice.
The Almost Unbelievable Story: Why Diabetes Exploded
Diabetes is not new. There are references going back to ancient times, but historically it affected very few people—typically those who were highly sensitive—less than 1% of the population. What changed is that diabetes is now part of a wider explosion of chronic, non-communicable diseases. Heart attacks were among the first to receive major study after the 1950s, but heart attacks are a “zero–one” event, so science had to rely heavily on population correlations rather than clean experiments.
Low Fat vs Low Carb: A War That Missed the Real Complexity
Ancel Keyes observed that people who died prematurely from heart attacks often carried a lot of body fat and concluded that fat caused heart attacks. This view became widely promoted and helped drive a low-fat craze. The food industry loved low-fat messaging because it enabled foods to be built around low-cost carbohydrates and sugar—ironically becoming a major contributor to the diabetes epidemic.
Later, writers such as Nina Teicholz and Gary Taubes challenged the “fat is bad” paradigm, contributing to the rise of keto and other low-carb approaches and fuelling the “low fat vs low carb” war. But this battle has become dated because it often oversimplifies how the human body works. Eating fat does not automatically mean that fat enters the bloodstream as fat, and the body can convert carbs into sugar and then sugar into fat. Oversimplification is dangerous because it makes people fight over slogans instead of mechanisms.
Professor Roy Taylor: The Mechanism That Changed Everything
Professor Roy Taylor of Newcastle University is recognised for moving our understanding forward and showing something that should have triggered a true paradigm shift: Type 2 diabetes is not necessarily a “forever” disease. Yet many practitioners still tell patients it is not reversible, which the document describes as a social tragedy, because it leaves people feeling doomed when they may have a strong chance of recovery.
Taylor’s explanation is simple and practical. We eat food that contains fat or is converted into fat. The body stores this fuel first in the liver, which acts like an energy tank—storing when fuel is available and releasing when fuel is needed. This is normal and healthy. Problems begin when that fuel tank overflows. Excess fat begins to spill into places it should not be, including muscles, where it blocks sugar (in plain language) from entering muscles properly. This is an early stage of diabetes: there is still plenty of insulin, but it does not work well. The important point is that this stage is readily reversible.
Stage two is more serious: the pancreas stops making sufficient insulin. Older descriptions called this “beta cells burning out,” but Taylor’s team used MRI techniques to show a different picture. Fat overflows from the liver into the pancreas and floods it with fat, stopping beta cells from working. The breakthrough was showing that a restricted diet can clean the pancreas of excess fat and allow insulin production to restart—“bye bye diabetes.” Michael Mosley has suggested it may not be necessary to restrict diet as harshly as Taylor’s experimental protocol and that a lighter Mediterranean style approach may be adequate for some people.
If Diabetes Can Be Reversed, Why Did It Rise So Fast?
Proving diabetes is reversible and describing the mechanism is a major step, but it opens up deeper questions: why do some people suffer diabetes while others seem immune, and why did diabetes increase exponentially in such a short time? A simple answer is genes, but genes do not change that fast. Epigenetics is sometimes suggested, but it still does not neatly explain the speed and scale of change. So we must look for another explanation.
Giulia Enders and the Gut: The Under-Rated Organ
The document points to Giulia Enders and her book about the gut as a major influence. If you are already immersed in gut biology you may know it, but the point here is not just that the gut contains many organisms, but that it behaves like a complex decision-making system. We can describe what gut microbes do in mechanical terms (species, roles, digestion), and science is progressing quickly there using DNA testing. But there is a deeper question: how does the gut “decide” what to do with food—use it for energy now, store it for later, or send it out?
We know some key facts that matter for diabetes. There are at least a thousand different species in the gut, and if subspecies are included, over six thousand. Each person’s gut biome can be very different, which fits with why people respond differently to the same foods. These organisms breed rapidly, so they can adapt quickly. They also have something called horizontal gene transfer, where living microbes can exchange genes in real time. It is an astonishing capability, and it suggests that the gut ecosystem can change quickly under new pressures, for better or worse.
Insulin, Leptin, and the High-Speed Slide
Insulin is at the heart of diabetes. Most people know the term “insulin resistance,” even if the inner detail is unclear. The document also calls insulin the “fat hormone” because higher insulin encourages fat storage. Here is the trap: fat storage increases insulin resistance, so the pancreas produces more insulin to force sugar into muscles, which increases fat storage further. This creates a slippery slope that accelerates over time.
At first glance the solution seems simple: eat less so there is no surplus to store. But it is not that simple because hunger and satiety signals can be disrupted. Leptin is described as a hormone that tells us we are full and should stop eating. Some people remain slim easily because their “stop” signals work well. But just as we can become insulin resistant, we can become leptin resistant. This is a double hit: we store fat more easily and we also feel hungry even when we are already overloaded with stored fuel.
Toxins, Excesses, and What Changed in a Few Decades
The document argues we need another Roy Taylor-level breakthrough to fully explain gut decision-making, but that is an incredibly complex problem and people need practical options now. So we look back: only a few decades ago, gut systems appeared to be working far better for most people. Since then, we have seen excessive use of chemicals in food production—chemicals designed to kill bugs. If our gut health depends on microbes, then chemicals that kill bugs in the field may also harm the “bugs” in our bodies when we eat the crops.
Diet has also changed dramatically. Many common foods are loaded with sugar. Even fruit and vegetables can be described as a double problem: chemical residues and low levels of essential trace minerals. People may believe they can wash chemicals off the surface, but the document warns that some newer approaches build toxins into seeds so the entire plant carries them, making removal impossible. A small bright spot is suggested: because some of these chemicals also harm bees, governments may eventually be forced to ban them.
The Port in the Storm: A Practical Path Forward
So where is the bright light? The document proposes combining the core mechanism from Roy Taylor (reducing fat overload so insulin function returns) with a better food strategy. Instead of meal-replacement shakes, the idea is to feed people real food—largely but not exclusively plant food—grown in biologically active soils. The aim is to restore gut biology to a healthier state, reducing both insulin and leptin resistance over time.
The second practical step is to stop chasing a single general solution that applies to everyone. For now, the better approach is to accept that people (or at least their guts) are different. That means fitting people with continuous blood sugar monitoring so we can see the direct effects of specific foods and routines, and then tailor a diet to the individual. Personalisation is not a marketing slogan here; it is a practical response to real human variability.
Links Mentioned in the Source
The original document includes a series of video links to support the ideas discussed above. For convenience, they are listed here as plain links:
- YouTube link 1
- YouTube link 2
- YouTube link 3
- YouTube link 4
- YouTube link 5
- YouTube link 6
- YouTube link 7
- YouTube link 8
- YouTube link 9
- YouTube link 10
- YouTube link 11
- YouTube link 12
Citizen Research and the Yangtou Village Option
The document closes with a practical invitation. Members of the Gbiota club may be willing to participate in citizen research, but the Yangtou village farm stay project offers the possibility of a more controlled project. The goal is simple: remove toxins where possible, rebuild food quality through biologically active soils, use the best current science to reverse diabetes for most people, and use continuous monitoring to tailor the solution to the individual.
Colin Austin — 9 July 2018.
