The main secret of the aksakals

The article offered to the attention of the most honorable public is a real rarity. In the ten and a half years that have passed since its publication (now either already deceased, or still comatose "Spark" No. 11 of 27.03.2000), an article about the Main Secret of centenarians of all times and peoples in Runet was distorted or retold only 50 times, of which only about half of the cases – to laugh.

But there are also idiots in the world who take this Secret Knowledge, proclaimed by a mad professor, seriously. Although, if you Google it for a short time, it is not difficult to find out that nowhere, except for this pre-April Fools' Day issue of Ogonyok and reprints/retellings of his article, neither Professor Yuri Lozovsky nor the California Institute of Public Health are mentioned.

UPD: 
A year after the publication of this investigation, one of our readers unearthed some kind of Public Health Institute with headquarters in Oakland, California. But no "Works ..." could be found on the website of this non-profit public organization, but there was such a line: Since our founding in 1964... And since the annual issues are numbered in Roman numerals, they are still far from the 67th issue... So this is undoubtedly just a coincidence. And for your attention – thank you, dear unknown friend Sasha!

But in the text there is a key phrase "... at the end of the experiment, calculated until April 1 next year." Good joke comrades! Probably, this joke will be on the Internet for a long time and confuse alternative-thinking fans of healthy lifestyle.

Enjoy too!

BODY WASH – DO NOT LIVE LONG!Some time ago, in the "Proceedings of the California Institute of Public Health" (issue LXVII, 1998), an article by Professor Lozovsky appeared on the causes of aging of the human body, which caused gossip and controversy among scientists.

Mr. Yuri Lozovsky, a former compatriot of ours, was invited to speak in England at the congress "Cultural Traditions and Human Health at the turn of the Millennium". Our correspondent Alexander Gorbovsky met with the scientist and was convinced that his conclusions were sensational. Judge for yourself.

THE LONG-LIVER TO THE LONG-LIVER DISCORD– Yuri Yakovlevich, the circulation of "Works", where your publication was, seems to be only two hundred copies.

There is no electronic version of the collection. Would you be kind enough to start by introducing readers briefly to the essence of the matter?

– Willingly. How did it all start? As you know, extensive research was conducted in the Soviet Union on the problems of longevity. The Institute of Gerontology was established at the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, materials appeared in the press (in particular, in Ogonka), documentaries were filmed. The conclusions were mostly quite superficial. Caucasian, Siberian and other centenarians live, they say, for so long, because they do a lot of physical labor in the fresh air, eat rationally, their lives are emotionally balanced.

If we had managed to discover the "elixir of youth", we would still be living under Brezhnev today. But the infirmity of the "Kremlin elders" had to be fought with medicines, mostly imported, which gave some results, but did not prolong their lives.

We tried to find something in common among different centenarians – and did not find it. Some of them, for example, were vegetarians, but others ate meat, some drank wine, and others did not, some of them smoked, and others never. Some have always lived with their wives or even married young people in their old age. And others were ascetics in general. Add to this the difference in climatic conditions, the social status of centenarians, religious and ethnic characteristics. In short, there was no common sign that could be taken out of brackets.

Until I noticed one feature more or less common to everyone. Just let your readers take a deep breath before reading the interview further...

THE WORST HABIT– The fact is that all the people who lived for 120-150 years, how should I say it, did not really follow traditional hygiene standards.

In short, they rarely washed, and if they did, it was without soap, which is understandable in rural areas, where, as a rule, they lived. At first, we did not attach much importance to this. Well, a resident of the city is used to washing often, but a resident of a mountain village is not used to it... And then my colleagues and I started thinking.

– It is clear from your story that you have conducted quite convincing experiments.– That was later.

At first we did think about it. Because someone suddenly recalled a long-ago, 30-ies, but sensational story at the time: when the Soviet government finally got to the very outskirts, young teachers, Komsomol members began to actively preach a healthy lifestyle, and immediately a demographic catastrophe occurred among the northern peoples. Among the Evenks, Chukchis, Nenets, who were forced to wash with soap, colossal mortality began. Doctors threw up their hands, but they quickly found out that the soap destroyed the natural protective fat layer that always protected the skin of aborigines, and now it turned out to be defenseless against microorganisms.

The human skin has three vital functions – suction, excretory and protective. During millions of years of biological existence of the ancestors of man and his own functions were adjusted to the accuracy of the clockwork. Continuing the analogy, imagine if someone decided to get into the clock mechanism with a washcloth and soap. It turns out that we do something similar every time we take a bath on our body. First of all, the excretory function is blocked. This is caused by the reaction of the epidermis to hot humidity and, most importantly, to the composition of detergents. The body automatically turns on protective mechanisms that are not provided for by all previous experience of evolution.

The protective function provides two levels of protection – biological and energy. Special glands cover the surface of the body with an extremely thin fat film. This coating is a kind of spacesuit that protects the body from an aggressive external environment. And we live in it. In ordinary urban air, 5-7 million microorganisms account for 1 ^cm3 and about twice as many dust particles. We strip off this biological spacesuit every time we wash our body with a washcloth. Complete restoration of the coating requires from 24 to 48 hours. Energy protection is such a charged surface of the body that repels micro–objects that fill the living space around us. The usual positive charge of the body surface repels them, preventing them from settling on the skin. But after a person has taken a bath, the surface charge of the skin changes to the opposite, and microorganisms, bacteria and dust particles simply stick to the surface of our body for 18-20 hours. That's why so often we get sick after we have washed, and not because of hypothermia at all.

And finally, the last: the suction function of the skin. Unfortunately, she does not suffer in the process of washing at all. Unfortunately, because its activity at this time increases by 8-12 times. And all the toxins that the body has previously isolated, together with the soap solution, are absorbed into the muscle tissues, and then into the blood. For a while, this almost halves the immunity. Numerous experiments have confirmed this.

THE EVIL ROBBER MOIDODYR– And who else has investigated this problem?

– Foreign scientists were engaged in similar work in the 70s and 80s, having come to similar results independently of each other.

In Poland, this is Prof. O. Duhmovsky from the Institute of Health Protection, in Germany – Dr. H. Schroeder, University of Munich, in the USA – Prof. D. Albert, Harvard University.

– If so, why has this point of view not been properly disseminated both in scientific circles and in society?– The results of the research were hushed up because they affected the interests of the entire industry for the production of all kinds of detergents, and these international corporations are among the richest in the world.

Only tobacco and wine and vodka concerns can be placed next to them: although science has managed to prove all the harmfulness of their products, there is a health warning on every pack of cigarettes, this has not shaken their bastions at all. Similarly, the production of detergents brings multibillion-dollar sustainable revenues, provides millions of jobs.

The force of habit is triggered. Just as people are accustomed to ruin the heart and lungs with tobacco, and the nervous system and liver with alcohol, in the same way we were taught to wash ourselves with all kinds of chemicals, which is detrimental to the results. According to the World Health Organization – data from twenty years ago – if alcohol and tobacco consumption were excluded in economically developed countries, life expectancy would increase by 18-26% there. But who remembers these numbers? And who cares about them? Refusing to use chemicals when washing, if it does not make us all long-lived, in any case, it will lengthen the life of today's generation by more than one decade.

A RITUAL THAT HAS BECOME A VICE– The use of detergents is a product of European civilization, and very recent.

For thousands of years there has been no such habit in the traditions of other civilizations. Take the Ancient East, Hellas, India, China, even America before the appearance of Europeans there. People anointed their bodies with oils, various perfumes. Reread at least "One Thousand and One Nights"...

– What about the famous Roman baths? And the baths that have existed since ancient times and in the East?– The baths were not intended there at all for washing the body.

These were massage establishments: both direct physical massage, and with the help of a temperature drop. Remember what Suetonius wrote about the Emperor Augustus: "He supported his poor health with careful care. He rarely bathed. Instead, he usually rubbed himself with oil or sweated in front of an open fire." In Rome, as in the whole world, the body was only anointed with oils. When they wanted to remove the oil film from the skin, there were special spatulas made of fine ivory for this. They can still be seen in some museums today.

I want to draw your attention to another phenomenon. It is recorded in almost all religious teachings. There are prophets in the Bible, there were fools in Byzantium and Russia, dervishes and Brahmins in the East... All these people lived in deserts where there is no water, slept in the heat and in the winter cold under the open sky. And they lived, as a rule, a long life. They were distinguished not only by their incredible spiritual, but also by their physical strength. In appearance, they sometimes made a repulsive impression, but in some lives it is mentioned about the subtle aroma that emanated from them...

Since ancient times, ablution has also been an exclusively magical, ritual act. Among the Hindus, the Chinese, Japan, the Jews and the first Christians, it was a kind of symbolic action, signifying the idea of cleansing the soul from sin. The same as in Orthodoxy – immersion in the baptismal font or bathing in winter, on the feast of the Epiphany, in the "Jordan" – an ice hole in the shape of a cross. After the consecration, many dived into it – for the healing of the soul. But no one would have thought of lathering up at the same time...

The ancients washed with water, we need a sponge, a washcloth and chemicals for this. Along with a whole bunch of sad consequences that I've been talking about.

FROM ALL DISEASES IT IS MORE USEFUL TO US...– Are you suggesting that humanity stop washing with soap?

- Yes.

Now I am working with three groups of volunteers who, at our request, agreed not to wash at all. We tried to select mainly those who had serious health problems.

Now that we are talking to you, the test subjects have not washed for more than nine months. During all this time, not one – and there are more than 50 people – has fallen ill with a single cold, although two flu pandemics occurred during the period of our experiment.

Twelve people had serious problems in the cardiovascular region. These symptoms have completely stopped. Three of them had an ulcer. One of the participants of the experiment, diagnosed with cataracts, reads today without glasses – an incredible case! But the most surprising results are in the field of mental illness. However, about them – at the end of the experience, calculated until April 1 next year...

– Can your words be considered a promise to continue the conversation in the "Light"?– I'll be glad.

Living in the States, I read Ogonyok from cover to cover. It is an honor for me to be its author.

Yuri LOZOVSKY
Professor

And after a couple of issues (Light No. 18, May 2000), these blockheads stamped the continuation of the topic – the reader's letter.

WITHOUT SOAP...I think readers have accepted Professor Yu's article.

Lozovsky's "Body wash – not to live long!" as a joke. I'm afraid that the editors also prepared this material as an April Fool's prank. But everything written is true, and my life experience confirms this.

I myself have never washed my body with soap since the late 50s, and my head with shampoos. And I started using soap – and everything went wrong. And this is natural: nature does not know soap. If you want to ruin a cat or dog, wash them more often with soap. The animal will not even have to be twisted, as in that joke – it will die by itself.

How I realized the harm of soap. I lived as a child in Tbilisi in a house where there was no hot, cold water even on holidays. Therefore, we washed rarely, sparingly and felt great. But at the age of 15, I signed up for the barbell section and trained almost every day. And there was a gorgeous hot shower in the hall – an impossible dream of the residents of our house. That's where I started washing every day. With soap, a washcloth, and I also washed my hair. And what do you think?.. The bliss lasted for about a month, after which dandruff fell from the head, the body became covered with a rash, the temperature began to rise, and the barbell "did not go". I was an excellent student and loved to read the encyclopedia at night, where I first read about the protective functions of the skin for the body.

By the way, the great hygienist Muller (who is older, remembers his famous books in the series "My Gymnastics ...") warned about this. And then I almost stopped using soap. For 45 years I have been using it only for washing my hands after the street. And at the same time, I did not become dirty, and household items did not run away from me as from the Moidodyrov hero. And most importantly, I stopped being sick, and soon became the champion of the city of Tbilisi in the barbell among young men.

How to be clean without soap? In the morning I take a contrast shower, in the afternoon (if possible) – hot, and in the evening, before going to bed, cool. And all this without a single molecule of soap! But in winter I swim in any pond, even in Ostankino and Sarinsky ponds, where microbes seem to have died from dirt. And at least some rash would appear! I won't brag, but I challenge any CIS citizen of my age and weight (60 years, 80 kg) to compete in lifting weights. Squeezing less than 130 kg with your hands and 450 kg with your feet, please do not worry!

I am an Abkhazian by origin, I have been to mountain villages a lot, I know centenarian old people and have drunk with them many times! So, I can assure you that they bathed very rarely, and if they washed once a year in the spring, they only poured water and wiped themselves. I will say more, Yakuts and Evenks are also considered long-livers. Gerontologists still cannot explain this phenomenon, because these peoples live in extremely unfavorable conditions, and they eat harmful fatty meat food with a high content of cholesterol, in addition, there are practically no vegetables and fruits in their diet.

For the first time, the northern peoples saw soap under Soviet rule, at first they took it for a treat and ate with pleasure, especially strawberry. (Mark Twain observed the same pattern among the Eskimos of Alaska.) While they were eating soap, they were healthy, but as soon as they began to wash, they became sick. And the fact is that they used to wash once a year when they took off their winter skins!

... And what do we do with hair?! Some women wash their hair with shampoo every day, but any shampoos are liquid soap based on the so–called caustic potassium, which is hardly more caustic than anything in nature. My great-grandmother Anna Alexandrovna Gigauri, even in old age, had hair almost to the floor, except for egg yolks, she never washed them with anything. By nationality, she was a Georgian national minority – a Mohevka. And her neighbors in the mountains – Khevsurki, they washed their hair with horse and cow urine. When I was young, I saw them more than once, seeing how a cow lifted her tail, hurried to put her head under a stream of urine. But the Khevsurka woman could be recognized from afar - her hair is fiery red, sometimes even the face is not visible from under the hair. One word – a pile!

The authors of the well–known book "The Phenomenon of Longevity" – American and Soviet scientists who studied the problem of longevity, studied literally everything in centenarians - genes, the ratio of the length of arms to legs, the propensity to smoke with drunkenness, and temperament, even the shape of teeth were checked. But they did not understand why Abkhazians, Balkars, Azerbaijanis, Karabakh Armenians, Yakuts, Evenks, Colombians, Ecuadorians and Pakistanis live for a long time, but Europeans – more civilized and cultured – do not.

Alexander ZUDIYA,
ethnic centenarian

Either not only in Russia, but also in Abkhazia, representatives of the intellectual majority are not sown, they do not reap – they will be born themselves, or the ogonkovites continued to fool around by inventing this letter, or one of the readers was so fucked up, and the editors did not understand the humor... It is difficult to find out over the years, and is it necessary?

And for a snack – here's a quote from Vadim Shefner's story "A million by the sweat of your brow."

... There was a thick smell of unwashed linen in the chapel, but through this smell there was a pleasant, subtle aroma of tobacco – it came from empty boxes on which boards were placed to replace benches. Ahead loomed a small bandstand made of humps. A stout, middle-aged man with a noticeably unwashed face was standing there. He was wearing some kind of ragged gray hoodie, but because of the hoodie, good trousers and not too worn brown shoes were visible. It was Gosha Angel. Previously, he worked as an appraiser in a pawnshop, and when the pawnshops closed, Gosha suddenly had a stroke of grace: he declared himself an angel and organized this very sect. Today, on the day of Thanksgiving, all the sectarians were gathered. Nemytiki and nemytitsy sat on makeshift benches and listened to Gosha Angel. There were a lot more non-Whites, but Kostya didn't notice any young and pretty ones among them. They were elderly disheveled women, Goshin's admirers, ready to go into the fire for him, but, of course, not into the water. After all, Gosha is a fierce enemy of water.

To the side of the stage, a brightly painted sheet of plywood leaned against the wall. An artist was busy around him. He was finishing work. It depicts a naked blue man lying on a bath shelf and happily whipping himself with a broom. He steams for his own pleasure and does not see who is standing behind. And behind him is Death – an orange skeleton with a black dagger in his right hand. With the other hand, Death holds a banner with a clear inscription:

"COME TO YOUR SENSES, YOU WRETCH! WHEN YOU WASH, YOU KILL YOURSELF!"

Everything was drawn very well, but there was something dog-like in the face of the washing uncle, and the skull of Death was slightly horse-like. Therefore, Kostya immediately guessed that the artist they needed was here. But now it is inconvenient to approach him: Gosha Angel is holding a sermon.

– Oh, friends and girlfriends in non-existence! Gosha was saying in a pleasant singsong voice. – I will continue the word about longevity, which is given through non-existence. Why, I ask, did Jesus Christ, personally known to me, walk along the Genisaret Lake, on the water surface? Why, I ask you, did he invent this miracle? Yes, because he did not want to dive into the water! He was against washing, he wanted a long life! And why did wanderers and hermits live so long? Yes, because, retiring to hermitages and deserts, they received a happy opportunity not to wash! When washing, a person washes off the substances and fluids he needs, relaxes the body and soul. God never washes, and therefore he is eternal!

Gosha suddenly jumped up and sang:

The devil invented soap, invented, invented,
Humanity has failed! Oh, let me down! Oh, let me down!
We can live without soap! We will live! We will live!
We will survive Satan!
Fact or not fact?

The unwashed and unwashed, stamping their feet and swaying on the benches, sang to him in response:

A clear fact! Fact! Fact! Fact!
God's fact! Fact! Fact! Fact!
A clear fact! Fact! Fact! Fact!
God's fact! Fact! Fact! Fact!

They pronounced the first words clearly, and then they got something like croaking. Gosha started a new verse, where it was said that water is poison. The Nemytics picked up the chorus with renewed vigor. Some jumped up from their seats and began to jump and dance. In some places, the boards fell from the boxes. The barn became noisy and fun…

End of quotes. Be healthy!

A Healthy Skeptic,
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru24.07.2009