Post update 15th October 2021:
Doctor van der Merwe also serves on the National WHO International EMF Project IAC – ZA and ISC committee. https://drive.google.com/file/d/139vTDdQO-Me9yE16sSW6lFcNb_Gck3C8/view
13th August 2018
Dr Pierre van der Merwe is a practicing neurologist at Netcare Blaauwberg Hospital, Cape Town. Office tel: (021) 554-3032. He also functions as a Neuropsychiatrist after completing his Med Psychiatry. However, after his own personal health failure and dedication to his Hippocratic oath, he made strong changes within his own personal life. This leads him to lose weight, increase his energy levels and better care for his patients.
Part of his message: “People don’t decide their futures, they decide their habits and their habits decide their futures.”
He talks about the importance of sleep, morning rituals, and intermittent fasting. These were effective strategies for mitigating health pitfalls.
Some of the supportive science on what Dr. van der Merwe speaks about:
Some risks with night shift workers (or binge-watching) If it was midnight, the brain would be forwarded a couple of hours to 2 a.m., which matches what scientists expected from previous research. But they found signs that the clocks in the gut, liver and pancreas were much further ahead as if it was noon. The mounting research and recent Nobel gave for work in circadian biology have researchers astounded by how important this is. If your circadian genes are disrupted throughout your body, diseases like cancer, neurodegeneration, and diabetes will inevitably be the result.
More on chronobiology (2017 Nobel Prize) “Scientists have been working for decades to help the body’s circadian system readily re-synchronize to variable work and eating schedules and flights across multiple time zones,” Güler said. “Finding this connection between dopamine-producing neurons and the circadian centre allows us to target these neurons with therapies that could potentially provide relief of symptoms for travellers and shift workers particularly, and possibly people with insomnia.”
Sleep disorders and abnormal circadian rhythms affecting the brain and other organs can worsen many pathologies involving aberrant dopamine neurotransmission, Güler said, including Parkinson’s disease, depression, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and drug addiction. [ https://medicalxpress.com/news/2017-08-neurons-brain-body-clock.html ]
Over the recent years, increasing studies into melanopsin show it as a photon/light-sensitive protein in our body. It’s in our eye, brain, and skin. The light you are exposed to matters, immensely! We evolved under sunlight and moonlight/fire for millions of years. Non-native EMF (artificial light) is still very new for us from an evolutionary perspective and the spectrum can and does differ greatly from what nature provides. As Dr. van der Merwe discusses, meal timing is important – we are designed to eat during sun and this has impacts on metabolism as well as our clock genes. Focus on actions to align your circadian rhythm for optimal health and disease prevention. http://www.cbc.ca/radio/quirks/night-shifts-put-your-brain-and-gut-clocks-out-of-whack-1.4744868
nnEMF (blue light) exposure thins your retina because of the melanopsin/retinol mechanism. Wearing sunglasses increases that risk. When you practice the action of nnEMF exposure (blue light) day and night, plus wear sunglasses in the day, you get neurodegeneration. The following paper supports why modern humans are afflicted with these diseases now https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaneurology/article-abstract/2685869
Finally, melatonin is not only a sleep story. More sunlight = more melatonin (from AM sunlight + darkness at night), ups the efficiency of respiratory proteins (shortening their distance) in mitochondria. What does that mean? Better electron tunnelling = increased fuel efficiency and a faster spinning ATPase because H+ is in the matrix and deuterium is denied access. A breakdown in the melanopsin/retinol systems lowers melatonin and allows deuterium to infect the KREB’s BICYCLE.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21355880
Melatonin is made by UVA-IR-A light. Melatonin lowers mitochondrial heteroplasmy rates. Defects in the blood-brain barrier are a risk factor for a neuro-degenerative disease because this barrier protects the brain from protons, bio-molecules, and any other inflammation-causing process between the brain-gut axis. Check out the chronobiology link explaining the link between melatonin and neurodegenerative diseases [ https://www.chronobiology.com/the-link-between-melatonin-and-neurological-diseases/ ].
Super Dads – Dr. Pierre van der Merwe – growing your neurological greenhouse