1 Kia ora. I'm Miriama Kamo, and this is Sunday. If you or your kids play or used to play league, union or football, then this story is a must watch. Tonight, dramatic new proof and a revelation from a sporting great that the head knocks so common in contact sports are causing brain damage. Here's Peter Fitzsimons. You know, when you're 25, and you're at the top of your game, and, um... You know, you're 10ft and bulletproof. COMMENTATOR: Beaming down on Central Park, the` Oh! Robert's` Robert's just pulled off a smacking tackle! Scene six, take three. Marker. What did you ask me? Ian's latest role... Sorry, what did you ask me? Something like that, isn't it? ...is one he fears he may also be living. I got knocked out a number of times through my professional career, you know. You got hit that hard. It's nothing personal. It's a head ring. It's a ding dong, ding dong, ding dong. You can hear the bells. And those bells are sounding an alarm around the sporting world. He was out before he hit the ground. Repeated concussion has been linked to a disease causing dementia. Not just the pros; the damage can begin early. You basically say nearly every game you've played, you've had that moment at some point in the game, where your head's dinged, and you've felt that` that shake. Basically every game you've ever played. # Well, I remember when I was young. # The world had just begun, and I was happy. I was about 4 or 5 when I first started playing league, and I played` I played ever since. It was` You know, I was no different to a regular kid on the block. Let's go back to 1986. Let's have a look at how this happened. He went up. He couldn't handle. Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. Yeah. You were totally gone. I'd driven to the` to the game, but we had to` my dad drove me home. We had to look for my car. I could not remember where I parked it. I'd lost the whole day. It's those experiences that I'm worried about, because there's different times in my` in my memory that I lost the whole day. I quite literally lost the whole day. Bad luck for Roberts. He was one of the key players. He'd been standing in tackles extremely well. Too often knocked out. And then, in 1995, he came out. The first high-profile Australian sportsman to reveal that he was gay. It wasn't such a big issue to me. Uh, but I still remember, you know, the controversy. After retiring in 1998, Ian was accepted into NIDA, Australia's leading acting school. Then he went to Hollywood and secured some tough guy roles. # Everybody goes to Hollywood. # Often cast as the muscle, Ian keeps in shape. His body couldn't be fitter, but his mind is letting him down. Ian finds it increasingly difficult to remember his lines. I've been acting now for 10 years. Uh, studying lines and that type of thing ` you know, one day you've got it down, and then a day later you're like, 'I've just lost all that information.' COMMENTATOR: Williams. Clever, actually. Williams hasn't moved. Your brain is jello floating inside of a` a bone bucket. Your skull. And every time it moves around quickly, your brain is stretching and pulling and can be bashing into those rigid sides of your brain, causing injury. You've played more than 10 years of football. Right now, over 95% have shown positive for the disease. WOMAN: Sorry, who is this? WOMAN: Sorry, who is this? This is Chris Lewinsky from Boston University School of Medicine. Chris Lewinsky and his team of scientists have been studying the brains of American footballers, discovering time and again a disease known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE. Essentially, it kinda causes your brain to rot. Like, memory problems, impulse control issues, depression. And that eventually you may get dementia if you live long enough. BELL TOLLS The only way the disease can be detected is by dissecting the brain. And so far, only the brains of dead American footballers have been tested. That's about to change. Thank you all for being here today to celebrate the amazing life of Barry Hugh Robert Taylor. Barry Tizza Taylor was a good rugby player and coach. A very hard player. He never took a step backwards. Inid and Barry met at the local surf club. They married in 1961 and had two children, Steven and Jenny. In his later years, though, Tizza's mind began to deteriorate. Before he was 60, he had dementia. I started to think about it all those times. At the bottom of the rucks and being kicked perhaps in the head and what have you. BELL TOLLS In April last year, Barry Taylor died. Tizza was 77, but he had one last play left in him. His family agreed to send his brain to the US to become the first Australian sportsman to be tested for CTE. 16,000km away, Tizza Taylor's family is about to get the results. Good morning, Mr Taylor, Mrs Taylor. Jenny, how are you? Fine, thank you. Fine, thank you. Good, thanks. Fine, thank you. Good, thanks. Good morning. His brain only weighed about 1000g, which was quite small for an adult man. Uh, when we dissected, uh, the brain, uh, it was very abnormal. He had so much cell loss. Some of the worst we'd ever seen. But` But these changes are diagnostic or of chronic traumatic encephalopathy and an extremely severe or advanced case. Wow. Wow. Oh, we're stunned. You know, um, I've gotta say, for my sister and I, and her two children, this is like` A relief. ...I hate to sound selfish, but this is an amazing relief, I mean, we've been` I dunno about you, but I've been worried for a long time that, of course, this is genetic, and we're gonna cop this too, and having watched this, you know... horre` horrendous thing. You know, and to think, thank God, it's not genetic, you know, I mean... Ian Roberts has travelled to Melbourne to learn whether his years of football have inflicted any permanent damage to the brain. Already, 40 AFL players have been tested, and the news is not good. So you've just completing your testing. Out of 40 former Aussie Rules players, how many showed signs of brain damage? Um, 35. Um, 35. That sounds shocking. > Yeah. Look, uh, it was. Absolutely. Just make yourself comfortable. We'll, uh, set you up. So what we need to do is just put a few electrodes on your hands. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna measure the activity of your brain. First, Ian's brain is stimulated. And his response times are measured. And relax. Then there's a memory test. In all of them, just give it your best shot. Ian must remember the shapes and the order they appear. No idea. I'm just lost now. All right. I was close, yeah. All right, when you're ready to go, I'll start timing. Two, one, go. Do it as fast as you can. Finally, a timed motor skills test. In all, two hours of brain-draining exercise. OK. Thanks, Ian. I'll, uh` Give me about 30 minutes to, uh, analyse the data, and, uh, I'll see you soon. and, uh, I'll see you soon. All right. I'll wait outside, yeah? and, uh, I'll see you soon. All right. I'll wait outside, yeah? No worries. Thanks. Be kind. Hi, Ian. So what we have here is on the left is your data from today. You are outside of the range of our healthy comparisons, so it seems to be that multiple concussions are affecting a certain pathway of the brain that can lead to a number of different things. So what we're seeing here is abnormal. Right. Right. Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, I can't say I didn't expect it having seen the, uh` the shell. So, uh, yes. I was waiting across the road. The news was as hard as to take as one of his hits. So how do you sum up what he said? Um, I've got brain damage. SHOUTING, CHATTER Since we began filming, Ian Roberts has quit his acting career in Hollywood and moved back home. If you are` If you get dazed throughout the game, don't be afraid to speak up, guys, after a game. Tell someone. Tell an official what, uh` the feeling you're feeling and what's happened. Ian's future is uncertain. He doesn't want history to repeat itself for the next generation. This is about peoples' health. This is, you know, we just can't ignore the statistics or the research. Any parent now who sends their kid to school, and their` and their kids are playing contact sports at school, they need to be educated. They need to know about these results. After the break ` raw food. It's the diet du jour, but how does it work, and is it safe? So in a perfect world, we'd only eat fruit and vegetables? Absolutely. That would be a perfect world, yes. I have no cancer in my body. I have a really high level of health. Can the raw food diet cure cancer? A big decision. A big decision. It's just a couch. Oh, no, the place you put around it. May I? Sure. Sure. This is only the first plan you should consider. The other is a plan that helps you look after it and makes it work for you. So it's not just your home; it's also the key to your future. An ANZ expert can help you into your new home and show you how to protect it for the future. Trust me, this is the one. (LAUGHS) How does a veggie wrap with miso mustard gravy, a side of kale and a citrus green smoothie sound to you? Quite possibly ` horrific. But for many, it's the dream meal. The raw food diet has gone from marginal to mainstream, with promises of increased health and vitality. But there's something more ` it's a diet some claim isn't just a lifestyle but a life saver. Our grandmothers have been telling us for years and years ` eat more fruits and vegetables. Well, we're the grandparents now. We're telling you. It's true. Kiwi couple Alan and Janette Murray-Wakelin are on a mission. For nearly a year, these gritty grandparents have run a marathon every single day all around Australia, powered pretty much purely... ALL: Cheers. ...by pureed fruit. It's really delicious. I mean, I can't imagine running a marathon on it, but... it's pretty darn good. It's exactly what we're doing. It's exactly what we're doing. We've done it every day for 340 days. You'd think at 68 and 63 years old, they'd be kicking back. Instead, they're chasing the most marathons ever run back to back. We've got 18 to go. (CHUCKLES) You look emotional. > You look emotional. > Yeah. (CHUCKLES) Why? Just being away from the kids and seeing the grandchildren, and it's been a year. Yes, they're so devoted to their epic challenge, they still haven't met a grandchild. She's only 6 months old, and she was born when we were about halfway around Australia. It's the only grandchild I haven't been at the birth for. But, um, yeah, I think it's important that we're doing what we're doing, you know, for our grandkids and for all kids, you know, for the future. So why are they doing this? What's behind this radical running mission? Well, they want to sell you a lifestyle. Janette and Alan are the pensioner pin-ups for the raw food diet. Why raw food? Because it's the most nutrient-laden food you can get. So it's raw plant-based food, and that's where we get all the nutrients, and if you don't cook it, you don't lose any of those nutrients. So in a perfect world, we'd only eat fruit and vegetables? Absolutely. That would be a perfect world, yes. Their perfect world is a purist movement. No food is to be cooked or even boiled. No animal products. No bread, rice, dairy, eggs or sugar. Nothing processed; just raw fruit, raw veggies and a few nuts. Why are you eating this way? We're showing and proving, by doing it, that it is actually perfectly normal to be able to run a marathon a day if you're in optimum health. Yup, at 4 every morning, Janette and Alan rise and run through searing heat, pouring rain and masses of Aussie midges. They routinely deal with bush fires, cyclones and heavy traffic. When those big trucks were going past us, the wind from them, the backdraft from them, would literally blow us off our feet. Did you ever think, 'This is mad. I wanna stop'? There were a couple of times, actually. Um, both times involved when Janette fell over pretty badly in the middle of a road. But we haven't had any injury from running. Just the falling over. (LAUGHS) It's the hitting the ground that causes the problem, not the actual falling. But with every step, Janette and Alan believe they're selling the answer to society's health woes. If you could discover a lifestyle that would give us happiness and health in abundance, wouldn't you choose it? That's what this is. That's what this is. That sounds very earnest, but is it fun? It's fun. Oh, of course it is. It's fun. Oh, of course it is. It's so much fun it's ridiculous. Convinced? Well, plenty are. This once marginal lifestyle is finding life in the mainstream. birthing popular eateries worldwide like Little Bird Unbakery in Auckland. This is what dozens line up for here every lunch time. Believers claim raw is the cure for many modern ailments. They say you'll lose weight, have oodles of energy and clarity, and you can prevent and reverse disease. Why do you think people choose this diet? > Makes you feel special, I think. Um, and it makes you feel good cos you're eating lots of fruit and vegetables. Well-known nutritionist, Nikki Hart. So what do you think is driving the interest in raw food? Maybe it's a backlash? Maybe it's, um` we talk about obesity a lot, and I think we frighten people about it, and we have a very good reason to be frightened. A lot of us are far too heavier than we need to be. But I think it's extreme. So if it's extreme, then what about the notion that this lifestyle can be a life saver? Not only can cancer be prevented by your lifestyle choices, it can be reversed as well, which I've done. That's right ` Janette Murray-Wakelin says the raw food lifestyle cured her cancer. More on that after the break. And we meet a man on a mission going raw to try and reverse disease. Feeling a bit nauseous. CHEERING And as Alan and Janette run towards the end goal and their new grandchild, we ask... can the raw food diet cure cancer? Now you can invest in Genesis Energy. They're right across this land. # They're in Di's house, Don's shed, # Jim and Mary's water bed, # his patch, their bach, # the under-12s hockey match, # tumble dryers, # deep-fryers, # anything with lots of wires. # anything with lots of wires. # They are everywhere, man. They are everywhere... Apply for your shares now. Go to genesisenergyshares.govt.nz, call 0800 90 30 90 or speak to a broker. # ...everywhere. # My doctor says I need to lose weight. My doctor says I need to lose weight. How concerned for you is she? She's` She's fairly concerned, yeah. I mean, um, I'm a big boy. Meet Shane Weallans, on the right, and his brother, Rohan. They're identical twins who no longer look quite so identical. How much did you lose? About 16kg in the initial 6` 50 days. Rohan lost his unwanted weight over 50 days of raw eating. Now he wants the same for his brother. < You want him to look better. < You want him to look better. Yeah. < You want him to look better. Yeah. Why is that? Maybe so I can, um, look at myself better maybe. Um, cos I always have this thing when I look at him, like I've got this idea of, like, parallel universe self-loathing. So, wait, you're saying that when you look at Shane, you feel self-loathing? Yup. Yeah. Yup. Yeah. < Wow. We might not understand the twin psychology, but the wish for a healthier body ` most of us get that. I've seen what results Rohan has, uh` has gone through. Um, and, you know, I want a bit of that too. You know, I've got a new daughter, and, um, you know, I wanna be around for her. If I continue as I am, there's a big risk I won't. Looking at the data, he's probably got a 50% chance of getting diabetes in the next year. Pushing Shane to make change is his doctor, Siobhan Travellyan. It is very serious. If he wants an opportunity to live without diabetes, now's the time to do something. So, like his brother, Shane will eat only raw food for 50 days from Little Bird Unbakery. Why not just do a bit of exercise and cut down your food intake? Um, I guess I'm kind of an all-or-nothing kind of person. Um, I think having a clear goal to do this, um, will help really change my perspectives or give me some` some` some insight in respect to how to do things, um, differently. Do you have any concerns going in? Yeah, I'm concerned I'm gonna be really hungry. (LAUGHS) Meanwhile, Janette and Alan's marathon effort takes them to Melbourne,... < Hey. < Hey. < Look who's here! ...where they finally get to meet their 6-month-old granddaughter for the first time. I have a` a life ahead of me where I'm gonna be thriving, not surviving. Surviving for her family is what's behind this passion for raw food. 12 years ago, Janette was diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer. So what was your reaction to the diagnosis? Just didn't seem fair. Because, at that point, I thought I was pretty healthy. As a lot of people do, 'Well, I have a healthy diet', you know, you hear that all the time. 'I have a healthy lifestyle.' Already a vegetarian, Janette went raw vegan, then made the radical decision to reject chemotherapy and radiation ` a call that floored her husband. I said, 'Well, the doctors know what they're doing. Just do as you're told. 'Go and have chemotherapy. Go and have radiation.' Cos that's what everyone does. Everyone does that. You know, that was my first` my first reaction. It wasn't until I started looking into it that I realised there are some other choices. Janette and Alan claim that by following the raw food lifestyle, Janette cured her cancer. I have no cancer in my body. And, um, you know, I` I have a really high level of health. Can the raw food diet cure cancer? No. There is no long-term data that states that eating a raw food diet will cure cancer. And until I see peer-reviewed journal articles that state it, I'm gonna reserve my judgement. But do we need evidence when there are people saying, 'I've been cured by eating raw food'? Placebo is a powerful thing, and sometimes when you want to be well, and you've changed things so much, sometimes the power of placebo does have an affect. But while Janette claims raw cured her cancer, she didn't avoid conventional medicine altogether. Yes, I've had a lumpectomy. It was just removing the existing tumour. Couldn't the argument be made that it was the lumpectomy that saved your life, not raw food and exercise? Absolutely no chance. Removing the tumour did not solve the problem. You can have as much removed as you want, but if the cause is still there, it'll come back. I'm not convinced. I'm not convinced. Why not? > Because I` I think sometimes people latch on to things wanting an answer to something that they're been diagnosed with, and they end up doing extreme things and then they miss out on other nutrients that they need to help them be well. Or avoid conventional medicine altogether? Or avoid conventional medicine altogether? Which can sometimes happen. So, what about Shane? Out for prevention rather than cure and looking to reverse a serious diabetes risk. Will Shane gets the results he wants after eating 50 days of raw food? I've got your blood results from last week, and they look really really good. Great. So I think last time we talked, your level was 50, which was right on the cusp for diabetes. Now it's 41` Now it's 41` Oh, OK. ...which is right on the cusp of normal. That's a dramatic improvement. Shall we see what your weight's done? Shall we see what your weight's done? Sure. It's all looking good. OK. So that's 115 which is a drop of about 15kg. Yeah. Cool. Yeah. Cool. That's really good. But there's a bit of bad news too. So the other results are good except for the cholesterol level. Your LDL levels and your total cholesterol have stayed about the same, but your HDL, which is the good stuff, the protective cholesterol, has actually gone down. I am honestly surprised, and I can't explain it. They're mixed results, but on the whole, Shane's satisfied. Really happy that the diabetes, um, has receded. Um, so that's really positive and certainly gives me motivation to continue. So is raw the answer to our healthy woes? Can it cure disease? Whatever you think, it's hard to argue with its role in this ` the completion of 365 marathons in a year through rough Aussie terrain by a Kiwi couple in their 60s. Yeah, quite a feat. But Cancer Society told us, while we know fruit and vegetables offer some protection against cancer, unfortunately there is no scientific proof that any particular type of food or diet can cure cancer. That's our show for tonight. Do check us out on Facebook ` Sunday TVNZ, and thanks for joining us. Nga mihi nui, hei kona.