Boom & bust - Ramadan

This week's Ask a Science Blogger:

A reader asks: Is severely regulating your diet for a month each year, as Muslims do during Ramadan, good for you?...

I will not offer a very scientific response because I suspect others have more to say from that angle, rather, I will offer my own perspective as someone who was raised in a Muslim family and has endured and observed the boom & bust cycle of Ramadan.

First, it matters where you live and when it happens. Since it goes by the lunar calender Ramadan could pop up in the middle of the summer or the middle of the winter. As someone who has lived the vast majority of their lives in the northern 1/3 of the United States (more precisely, the majority of my life has been spend around or to the north of the 45th parallel) I have observed a wide range of regimens. During Ramadan you don't eat or drink "from dawn 'till dusk." This isn't an onerous requirement in the depths of winter at higher latitudes, but, it is quite taxing during high summer. So, the question needs to be qualified by this regional caveat: how long does the fasting occur? In winter an 9 hour fast isn't problematic, but in summer a 15 hour fast can be straining. Additionally it is during the summer that one needs to be fortified with water.

But let's assume the "worst case scenario," fasting during mid-summer in Seattle. I know people who have done this, and it is exhausting (I've done it myself before). And yet remember that food is consumed when the lights go out, and boy is it consumed, a rapacious gorge session is often what ensues. I don't believe this is good for the body, and the cycle begins anew the next day. Economists have observed a drop in productivity during Ramadan as workers become listless and enervated in many Muslim nations, and this happens with many Americans as well. Whether people lose or gain weight depends from person to person, though my own anecdotal sample generally seems to lose a little weight.

I believe humans should be hungry part of the day, and that the main factors behind obesity are oversupply of food and lack of activity. But, the extreme of Ramadan during the summer in much of the northern hemisphere is not healthy, particularly abstaining from water as well as food. That being said, we are not talking of fasts of days here, and I am not aware of data which suggests that observant Muslims have lower life expectancies than non-observant Muslims. I suspect that the main ill effects are drains on short-term productivity and energy, but most people are able to recover before the next cycle of fasting begins. This might be balanced by the upside of social solidarity and communal good feeling.