Tribute to Cleave—Forgotten Prophet

Abstract

The late Surgeon Captain T.L. Cleave (1906–1983) completed his life-long R N professional service by promotion to the post of Director of Medical Research to the Royal Navy. His voyaging as a medical officer gave him unique understanding of patterns of disease throughout the world. He concluded that many of the degenerative illnesses which during this century have become so common in advanced countries have a simple basic dietary cause—the consumption of ever increasing quantities of refined carbohydrates; human beings were not, in Cleave's opinion, adapted to the use of these artificially concentrated foods. He suggested the term “Saccharine Disease” to denote many diverse manifestations, including dental decay, obesity, diabetes and coronary thrombosis, of one master disease having one simple cause. The neglect of this concept by most authorities today repeats the attitudes of the ‘medical establishment’ towards one of Cleave's distinguished eighteenth century naval predecessors, James Lind, whose advocacy of citrus fruit juice for the prevention of scurvy was greeted with derision.