Potential strategies for addressing these ultimate causes may include counseling, education, group meetings. Some ultimate causes for alcoholism may include: The underlying problem is, why is the alcoholic drinking so much in the first place? We need to dive deeper, past the proximal cause and into the ultimate cause of why the alcoholic is drinking so much.

This solution is clearly not an effective strategy for combating alcoholism because taking away alcohol from an alcoholic does NOT address the underlying problem. The solution to the proximal cause (the closest factor to the problem) is to reduce alcohol intake. The proximal cause of alcoholism is drinking too much alcohol. Fung uses alcoholism to further explain why focusing on fixing the proximate cause is not as effective as focusing on the root ultimate cause. We want to get to the root of the problem.ĭr. When thinking of effective strategies to solve the problem, focusing on the proximal cause is NOT as effective as focusing on the ultimate cause.

Think of the ultimate cause as the root cause of the problem. The ultimate cause is the factor that is responsible for the chain of events that eventually lead to the problem. The proximal cause is the factor that is immediately responsible for the problem. Fung argues that calories are a proximal cause to obesity and not the ultimate cause. We assume that obesity happens when we take in too much of this caloric energy and do not expel enough.ĭr. We expel this calorie energy through metabolic functions such as breathing, building new muscle/bone and storing fat. Why should we not focus on calories as a strategy for combating obesity?Ī calorie is a unit of food energy used by the body for multiple functions such as breathing, building new muscle and bone. For this summary, I will break down the main points of Dr. He argues that obesity can be cured by balancing these hormones through changing what and when we eat. When insulin runs too high for too long, it will create insulin resistance and obesity. Fung argues that obesity is a hormonal disorder of too much insulin. The book unpacks why our preconceptions about what drives obesity are wrong, why this happened, what drives obesity and proposed solutions to this problem. Jason Fung, a Canadian Nephrologist and expert in intermittent fasting and low-carb diets.

Dr jason fung's book the obesity code