An important question, surrounded with a lot of conflicting answers, and a lot of confusion. Why is that? Elucidation is at hand in the form of a talk given by the person many consider to be one of the most important nutrition research scientists of this (and perhaps any) age, T. Colin Campbell, the American biochemist who specializes in the effect of nutrition on long-term health, in a career spanning six decades of activity. If you're already familiar with Dr. Campbell's work this presentation is perhaps the best synopsis of his views I'm personally aware of, and I can't recommend it highly enough to you. Prepare to be surprised, and enjoy.
OK that was shameless clickbait:) I was having some trouble finding a title for this post that would convey my feeling of its importance without sounding cumbersome, so I gave up and went with the above. Thanks to the continuing efforts of Dr. Michael Greger and his team at Nutritionfacts.org, we see here in a single presentation a comprehensive compendium of research showing the outsized benefits of a Whole Foods Plant Based diet. It is significant in that it dispels uncertainty as it presents the facts. How can we be sure these are indeed facts? And if they are, why aren't we hearing more about them? Dr. Gregor handles both questions masterfully, so be sure to watch to the end. Prepare to be surprised along the way, and enjoy. OK perhaps not as groovy as sex, but...
I'm being just a wee bit subversive using the word slightly in the title of this blog; the word "radically" in its place would be more accurate. Are you curious? If so then you may find this presentation by Dr. John McDougall quite interesting. In it he shows why decreasing probability for developing detectable cancer in the first place is so desirable an idea and practice. File this under an ounce of prevention worth a pound of cure:
And then, after watching, if you presented this information to your medical doctor (if you could get their attention long enough in the first place...an unlikely scenario) the response you'd probably get would be along the lines of harrumphing and sputtering. One thing they would not be able to produce is science countering the science presented here.
Information like this can be very unsettling. We do not want to know the man behind the curtain is no wizard after all. The truth is the responsibility for your health cannot be handed over to others, and you are, in fact, almost solely responsible for it yourself.
Information is power. The purpose of misinformation is to persuade one to give control of one's destiny over to others, in this case, for profit, at the expense of your health.
For most this question is getting off into the weeds. Even the idea one could survive (much less thrive) eating nothing but fresh, whole raw foods is ridiculous. So bear with me for a few moments while I introduce a particular perspective you may not have been exposed to. I'm going to let a raw foods proponent of many years experience do the heavy lifting for me, a gentleman who also was featured in a previous blog "Fasting - How Does It Work?"
So there is research supporting this point of view. Think about it: leukocytosis and inflammation occur simultaneously. Inflammation should not be suppressed unless it goes to dangerous levels, it is part of the normal process of the body healing itself. Obviously inflammation should be prevented in the first place by achieving high levels of health. Allowing inflammation to run its course, essentially the same thing as allowing the body to heal itself, does not sell many drugs, herbs, and suppliments however! So it's not likely to be something we hear from traditional MDs, or even naturopaths and other alternative medical practitioners. In addition to the inflammation problem we know the net reduction of micronutrient content of cooked foods is substantial, and correlates to how cooked those foods are: fresh, ripe, raw, whole foods have as much micronutrient content as they ever will, and cooking reduces that net content by the degree to which it is cooked. Here's one other point that is even more obscure than the points about inflammation and micronutrient content; it has been suggested to me (by someone who probably knows) that the greatest source of greenhouse effect is the net global effect of cooking food. Recently we commonly hear that modern day practices of animal agriculture contributes more greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere than all transportation combined, pretty new information for most of us...for years the prevailing idea was transportation was the greatest contributor. If it is true the net global warming effect of cooking food is greater than any other a microcosmically few people must be aware of it at this point. It would be irresponsible to not mention that one cannot begin eating raw foods exclusively and hope for great results without first coming to some understanding how its done so that we get our needs for energy (sufficient calories) and nutrition met. It's not complicated, it's more that we have never been exposed to these ideas. It's also not difficult, depending to some extent upon where we live and how much access to quality raw foods we have there. Finally it's worth noting that the whole food plant based diet used to reverse chronic conditions by leading edge MDs (ie the MDs that achieve the greatest net result with patients) such as McDougall, Esselstyn, Barnard, Ornish, and Fuhrman is some mix of fresh/raw and cooked foods, and they believe that mix is practical and healthful. It can also be helpful to make diet and lifestyle changes in a context that is more familiar with what we are used to doing already. Meanwhile we can begin immediately to access the benefits of fresh, ripe, raw foods by eating more fruits and salads everyday. It's that easy.
We're hearing more and more about the efficacy of fasting recently because a lot of "paleo" proponents are discovering the many benefits, and paleo is very popular. But it may seem counterintuitive that abstention from eating can make us better. Here is a common sense explanation of how it works:
There are two full time fasting clinics in this part of the world I'm aware of, the one in this video is called Tanglewood and located in Costa Rica, and True North Health Center in Santa Rosa, CA: https://www.healthpromoting.com/water-fasting
Forks Over Knives is a documentary about the whole foods plant based diet that I feel is a must see. And of course I am not alone is that, it has helped many find a path back to robust health, me included. It's free with a netflix subscription, or can be streamed for 5 bucks: http://forksoverknives.vhx.tv/ I also suggest signing up for their mailing list, it is a good source of healthful information, scroll to the the bottom of their home page: https://www.forksoverknives.com/
