70 years without eating? ‘Starving yogi’ says it’s true<\/h1>\nPosted on Monday, May 10, 2010 7:00 PM PT<\/div>\nBy Brian Alexander<\/p>\nPrahlad Jani, an 82-year-old Indian yogi, is\u00a0making headlines <\/a>by claims that for the past 70 years he has had nothing — not one calorie — to eat and not one drop of liquid to drink. To test his claims, Indian military doctors put him under round-the-clock observation during a two-week hospital stay that ended last week, news reports say. During that time he didn\u2019t ingest any food or water \u2013 and remained perfectly healthy, the researchers said.<\/p>\nBut that\u2019s simply impossible, said Dr. Michael Van Rooyen an emergency physician at Harvard\u2019s Brigham and Women\u2019s Hospital, an associate professor at the medical school, and the director of the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative \u2013 which focuses on aid to displaced populations who lack food and water.<\/p>\n
Van Rooyen says that depending on climate conditions like temperature and humidity, a human could survive five or six days without water, maybe a day or two longer in extraordinary circumstances. We can go much longer without food \u2013 even up to three months if that person is taking liquids fortified with vitamins and electrolytes.<\/p>\n
Bobby Sands<\/a>, an Irish Republican convicted of firearms possession and imprisoned by the British, died in 1981 on the 66th day of his hunger strike.\u00a0Gandhi <\/a>was also known to go long stretches without food, including a 21-day hunger strike in 1932.<\/p>\n
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<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \nSterling Hospitals \/ AFP – Getty Images file<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \nPrahlad Jani was studied for two weeks.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\nJani, dubbed “the starving yogi” by some, did have limited contact with water while gargling and periodically bathing, reported the news wire service AFP. While researchers said they measured what he spit out, Van Rooyen said he’s clearly getting fluid somehow.<\/p>\n“You can hold a lot of water in those yogi beards. A sneaky yogi for certain,” he said. “He MUST take in water. The human body cannot survive without it.” The effects of food and water deprivation are profound, Van Rooyen explained. \u201cUltimately, instead of metabolizing sugar and glycogen [the body\u2019s energy sources] you start to metabolize fat and then cause muscle breakdown. Without food, your body chemistry changes. Profoundly malnourished people autodigest, they consume their own body\u2019s resources. You get liver failure, tachycardia, heart strain. You fall apart.\u201d<\/p>\n
The yogi, though, would already be dead from lack of hydration. If he really went without any liquids at all, his cardiovascular system would have collapsed. \u201cYou lose about a liter or two of water per day just by breathing,\u201d Van Rooyen said. You don\u2019t have to sweat, which the yogi claims he never does. That water loss results in thicker blood and a drop in blood pressure.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou go from being a grape to a raisin,\u201d Van Rooyen said and if you didn\u2019t have a heart attack first, you\u2019d die of kidney failure.<\/p><\/div>\n
Prahlad Jani, an 82-year-old Indian yogi, is\u00a0making headlines <\/a>by claims that for the past 70 years he has had nothing — not one calorie — to eat and not one drop of liquid to drink. To test his claims, Indian military doctors put him under round-the-clock observation during a two-week hospital stay that ended last week, news reports say. During that time he didn\u2019t ingest any food or water \u2013 and remained perfectly healthy, the researchers said.<\/p>\n But that\u2019s simply impossible, said Dr. Michael Van Rooyen an emergency physician at Harvard\u2019s Brigham and Women\u2019s Hospital, an associate professor at the medical school, and the director of the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative \u2013 which focuses on aid to displaced populations who lack food and water.<\/p>\n Van Rooyen says that depending on climate conditions like temperature and humidity, a human could survive five or six days without water, maybe a day or two longer in extraordinary circumstances. We can go much longer without food \u2013 even up to three months if that person is taking liquids fortified with vitamins and electrolytes.<\/p>\n Bobby Sands<\/a>, an Irish Republican convicted of firearms possession and imprisoned by the British, died in 1981 on the 66th day of his hunger strike.\u00a0Gandhi <\/a>was also known to go long stretches without food, including a 21-day hunger strike in 1932.<\/p>\n
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| Sterling Hospitals \/ AFP – Getty Images file<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| Prahlad Jani was studied for two weeks.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n Jani, dubbed “the starving yogi” by some, did have limited contact with water while gargling and periodically bathing, reported the news wire service AFP. While researchers said they measured what he spit out, Van Rooyen said he’s clearly getting fluid somehow.<\/p>\n “You can hold a lot of water in those yogi beards. A sneaky yogi for certain,” he said. “He MUST take in water. The human body cannot survive without it.” The effects of food and water deprivation are profound, Van Rooyen explained. \u201cUltimately, instead of metabolizing sugar and glycogen [the body\u2019s energy sources] you start to metabolize fat and then cause muscle breakdown. Without food, your body chemistry changes. Profoundly malnourished people autodigest, they consume their own body\u2019s resources. You get liver failure, tachycardia, heart strain. You fall apart.\u201d<\/p>\n The yogi, though, would already be dead from lack of hydration. If he really went without any liquids at all, his cardiovascular system would have collapsed. \u201cYou lose about a liter or two of water per day just by breathing,\u201d Van Rooyen said. You don\u2019t have to sweat, which the yogi claims he never does. That water loss results in thicker blood and a drop in blood pressure.<\/p>\n \u201cYou go from being a grape to a raisin,\u201d Van Rooyen said and if you didn\u2019t have a heart attack first, you\u2019d die of kidney failure.<\/p><\/div>\n |