TV Presenter Dr Hilary launches major new campaign to boost Britain’s Metabolic Health and help prevent disease

Dr Hilary Jones is on a mission to get Britain healthy by boosting our metabolism with a secret compound called sulforaphane which helps tackle preventable diseases

TV presenter Dr Hilary Jones has launched a major new campaign to help boost our metabolism and keep the nation healthy.

More and more Britons are suffering and dying from a range of diseases related to lifestyle.

These have been called ‘the four horsemen of the west’ – heart disease, dementia, cancer, and type-2 diabetes. Collectively, these diseases cause over two-thirds of all deaths in the UK. Yet, many of these are preventable but require lifestyle changes which most of us find difficult to stick to.   

Dr Hilary Jones wants the new government to make our nation’s health a priority and he has launched the Boost Britain’s Metabolic Health Campaign to highlight the need to protect the nation from these killers by helping people take simple steps to improve their metabolic health; which could ultimately help to rescue the NHS by saving billions.

The Boost Britain’s Metabolic Health campaign is centred around a little known compound, sulforaphane, obtained naturally in cruciferous vegetables such as cauliflower and Brussel sprouts, but its best source is broccoli.  However standard varieties deliver very little and its benefits can be destroyed by cooking.  

Dr Hilary, an independent adviser to SmarterNaturally, growers of a super-broccoli which aims to boost metabolic health, said: “Our metabolism converts food into energy and creates the building blocks we need to repair our bodies, grow, and thrive. When this process malfunctions, our bodies become prone to chronic inflammation, internal imbalances like high blood sugar or cholesterol levels and weight gain. This dramatically increases our risk of serious health conditions, jeopardising our lives and health.

“Smoking, alcohol, being overweight and eating the wrong foods can all damage our metabolism but another cause is simply time. As we age, our metabolism naturally becomes less efficient. This is one reason why it gets harder to stay slim and why our risk of things like heart disease, dementia, cancer, and type-2 diabetes increases with age.”

Making lifestyle changes is tough, and can be expensive – especially with the cost of living impacting our ability to source a range of healthy foods. But recent research shows that consumers are prioritising healthy foods and as a result they said they were feeling healthier.  However the nation’s health data doesn’t support this feeling.

Dr Hilary recommends that whilst it’s important to have a healthy diet and to take exercise you can help your metabolism by giving it a boost of sulforaphane.  There are a range of supplements available but it is difficult to know how effective they are.  

One of the best sources is a government funded, science-backed, super broccoli called GRextra.  This is now available in SmarterNaturally soup which provides your body with a high level of this super compound which the data suggests you just have once a week to get the benefit.   Clinical trials indicate that it can lower blood sugar, a key risk for type-2 diabetes, cholesterol, a key risk for heart disease and could help weight loss. 

But repairing our metabolism could help with all kinds of age-related health conditions, including lowering high blood pressure, alleviating osteoarthritis, and reduce risk of some forms of cancer. SmarterNaturally are working to do more clinical trials in these areas and others to explore how their super-broccoli could support all of us to stay healthier for longer as we get older by reducing our risk of these conditions.

Sulforaphane turns on anti-oxidant genes in our cells which can help maintain a healthier metabolism, particularly as we age. These genes are regulated by the protein NRF2, involved in blood sugar control for example. Stored sugar is drawn out of the body and we are prevented from laying down more sugar, so that blood glucose levels are lowered when the high levels of sulforaphane delivered by this unique broccoli is consumed weekly.  It’s like taking your car for a service, you’re not going to get a new car but you should get a car that performs better.  

Understanding diet and metabolic health. Our bodies evolved to stay healthy on ancient diets. When we eat lots of fresh veg, fruits, nuts and fish, we give our bodies all the vitamins and minerals they need. Some of these foods also offer natural health-boosting molecules that help maintain and repair our metabolism, such as omega-3 from oily fish or sulforaphane from broccoli. And plants are generally a good source of fibre, which is good for our gut, metabolic health and helping us to feel fuller for longer. So getting plenty of these foods into our daily diet can give our health a huge boost and help keep us slim too!

But eating too much sugar, salt and high-calorie processed foods has the opposite effect. Our body has not evolved to live on a modern diet, and so struggles to process these foods properly. This leads to things like high blood sugar, blood pressure, cholesterol and putting on weight – all of which suggest our metabolism is suffering and put us at risk of developing more serious conditions like type-2 diabetes or heart disease.

Choosing Functional Foods. Some foods are not just healthy, but contain natural active ingredients which work magic on our metabolic health. Examples include turmeric, which seems to help fight inflammation, and broccoli, which contains a powerful active ingredient called sulforaphane that repairs our metabolism. Scientists are particularly excited by sulforaphane, since adding a lot of it to your diet has been linked to reducing the risk of everything from dementia to heart disease to diabetes to cancer.

Getting enough sulforaphane from normal broccoli is almost impossible, since broccoli only provides a small amount. So Dr Hilary has become an Independent Advisor to SmarterNaturally, who grow a super-broccoli (GRextra) that delivers five times more sulforaphane than normal varieties. Clinical trials indicate that eating just one portion of this super-broccoli a week can help to repair and maintain our metabolism, reducing our risk of a huge range of diseases.

Drinking & Smoking Less. Alcohol and smoking have the opposite effect on our metabolism from these health-boosting functional foods. They cause damage to our body, disrupting our internal balance and driving chronic inflammation – giving us a greater risk of developing serious conditions like heart disease or cancer.

Every drink and every cigarette do a bit more damage, so even cutting back just a little will help give your metabolic health a boost.  

Trying a Sauna or a Cold-Water Swim. Following in the footsteps of those healthy Norwegians, Finns and Swedes, it turns out that both saunas and cold-showers or cold-water swims can be great for our metabolic health too. They work in a similar way to exercise: when we get very hot or very cold it kick-starts our body to start repairing any internal damage.

Lead scientist for SmarterNaturally, Professor Richard Mithen, said: “SmarterNaturally Soup aims to help keep our metabolism young. Research suggests that eating one bowl a week could deliver enough sulforaphane and other healthy nutrients to help people maintain a healthy metabolism, which is associated with a reduced risk of developing age-related health conditions like type 2 diabetes, cancer and heart disease.”

The special broccoli was discovered growing wild in Sicily by professor Richard Mithen. After more than four decades of research, it’s now finally available to people looking to stay healthier as they get older.

One bowl of delicious SmarterNaturally Soup provides the same amount of sulforaphane as eating 5+ heads of raw broccoli, and at a similar cost (£5).

Cooking broccoli can destroy the benefits from broccoli so how it is processed and provided as a consumer product is very important.

Supplements do exist, but eating one bowl of SmarterNaturally Soup is equivalent to taking 14 supplement tablets in one go– or taking two pills every single day, rather than eating just one bowl of soup a week, and at a similar cost (£5 a week). SmarterNaturally soup also contains many other vitamins, minerals and health nutrients from eating broccoli which are absent in supplements.  It is considered that the once-weekly high level of sulforaphane kick-starts your cells into action, rather than a smaller daily amount which your body would become immune to. 

Dr Kingsley Betts is a general practice doctor said “There is growing scientific evidence that a diet rich in sulforaphane can help reduce oxidative stress and when eaten weekly for 4-6 months potentially has lots of general health benefits, which include improved blood sugar, cholesterol, blood pressure, prostate and other organ health. It could even help the ageing process.  SmarterNaturally Soup is the best source of sulforaphane I’ve come across, which makes it a really exciting new way for people to look after their health – particularly as they get older.”

Dr Karen Irvine, GP, said: “Most pre-diabetics are simply told to change their diet and take more exercise, but figures show that compliance is low and that 20% go on to develop diabetes within 5 years. So, if we can use a simple food product, that tastes good and needs to be eaten just once a week to reduce the risk of populations developing Type 2 diabetes, it can have a hugely positive impact on the individual and society worldwide.”

SmarterNaturally – A Science Based Approach

“We are really excited about the possibilities that our new GRextra broccoli, research and clinical trials could unlock for metabolic health, the diabetic community and the possibilities for other chronic conditions.” Laura Knight, CEO SmarterNaturally.

SmarterNaturally brand is owned by The Smarter Food Company, a spin-out from one of the UK’s leading food and health research organisations, the Quadram Institute.