Last August, an Egyptian man in his 50s with Type 1 diabetes went to work as usual, used his glucose meter, and discovered that his blood sugar level was alarmingly high. He took a vial of insulin from his bag, injected himself with his usual dose, and, when his glucose levels began to return to their normal range, he went back to work, where a colleague advised him to see a doctor.
This doctor was called Diaa al-Awadi; he said he was treating patients with diabetes without insulin. Back home, the man told his wife, who encouraged him to go. A week later, he went to al-Awadi, who reportedly told him to stop taking insulin because diabetes was “a complete illusion”. He was instructed instead to follow a dietary regimen called the ‘Tayyibat Diet’. The man did as he was advised, and began eating foods and products high in sugar. Five days later, he fell into a diabetic coma and died the following day. Months later, Diaa al-Awadi was also dead, but the diet was not.
News of the diet had already begun to spread by word of mouth throughout Egypt and beyond, propelled by emotive rhetoric and conspiracy theories. Some supporters even claimed that the doctor had been “assassinated” by pharmaceutical companies fearful of the commercial consequences of the diet. So, what is the ‘Tayyibat Diet’, and how do we differentiate fact from fiction? Does it have any scientific basis? What do doctors think about it? And why did the Egyptian government and the Medical Syndicate intervene to confront it?
Central deception
The ‘Tayyibat Diet’ relies on the attractively simple claim that the body can repair itself if we eat ‘the right food’ and avoid ‘harmful’ food. It seems obvious that our health can be affected by what we eat, and lifestyle plays an important role in preventing disease and controlling some risk factors. But this is a partial truth. It becomes a sweeping claim when its claimants start saying that a different diet can replace the need for heart medication, blood thinners, diabetes treatment, or approved cancer protocols. At this point, talk of nutrition veers into medical misinformation.
No serious doctor or respected researcher denies the importance of a healthy diet, but no serious scientific studies show that patients with stents in their coronary arteries can stop taking blood thinners because the body ‘will repair itself’ based on food intake. Nor is there any medical logic to the idea that people with diabetes should stop treatment because an untested diet promises recovery. Those with hypertension can reduce salt, but not at the expense of stopping blood pressure medication. Likewise, those with high cholesterol can reduce harmful fats without compromising their cholesterol meds.
This is the central deception of the ‘Tayyibat Diet’. It takes a narrow truth—that food matters—then, upon that, builds a myth that food alone can replace medicine. Many similar medical superstitions operate in this way, beginning with a part-truth before stretching its limits well beyond the bounds of medicine.
To understand the ‘Tayyibat Diet’, it helps to understand the audience. People are drawn to it because they fear illness, the cost of treatment, and the exhaustion of repeated medication, not necessarily because they reject science. It targets people in moments of weakness and vulnerability, promising easy deliverance from medicine and doctors’ bills through food lists, personal testimonies, and circulating clips.
Medicine does rest on stories or videos; it relies on studies, trials, and evidence that can be tested and scrutinised. Anything that urges patients to abandon their medications without scientific evidence is not an alternative treatment; it is a direct threat to their health.
