6. The same nutrition that prevents disease in its early stages (before diagnosis) can also halt or reverse disease in its later stages (after diagnosis).

In humans, we have seen research findings showing that a whole-food, plant-based diet reverses advanced heart disease, helps obese people lose weight, and helps diabetics get off their medication and return to a more normal, pre-diabetes life. Research has also shown that advanced melanoma, the deadly form of skin cancer, might be attenuated or reversed by lifestyle changes (p. 237).

In 1978 I got to meet the wife of a vegan raw foodist. I was at the Bircher-Benner clinic at the time and refused the cooked anticancer meals served there. Instead, I requested vegan raw food, and the chef was very happy to prepare these meals for me. I wanted to know why. After all, this meant overtime for him.

He actually invited me to his home and introduced me to his family. I found out that they had changed to a vegan raw food diet five years before because his wife had suffered from malignant melanoma with numerous metastases. She seemed to be in her mid-twenties. Cancer at this stage almost always ends in death within a few months.

But she had cured herself by making the radical and permanent change to an exclusively vegan raw food diet.

Later, I met a 35-year-old Austrian, who had also cured himself of cancer. At least, the doctors couldn’t find any signs of cancer in his blood. But after he had just barely recovered, he reverted back to his previous eating habits and died a little over a year later, just as I had expected. The same type of cancer had come back.

The woman mentioned above definitely remained healthy. And so did I, after healing myself from mantle cell lymphoma stage 3a, which at least back then was incurable. Today, bone marrow transplants offer a small chance of survival.

7. Nutrition that is truly beneficial for one chronic disease will support health across the board.

We learn again that a healthy diet prevents all types of diseases; it is not selective. This actually seems self-evident, but even the editor of a publishing house for the topic said that a separate diet plan for each disease would sell better and be more marketable.

8. Good nutrition creates health in all areas of our existence. All parts are interconnected.

The process of eating is perhaps the most intimate encounter we have with our world; it is a process in which what we eat becomes part of our body. ... people have more energy when they eat well. This synergy between nutrition and physical activity is extremely important and is evidence that these two parts of life are not isolated from each other. Good nutrition and regular exercise combine to offer more health per person than the sum of each part alone. We also know that physical activity has an effect on emotional and mental well-being (pp. 238–239).

2.12. How to Eat (p. 241)

Campbell opposes deprivation and complex weight loss plans that usually only lead to a yo-yo effect. He writes, My advice is to try to eliminate all animal-based products from your diet, but not obsess over it (p. 242).

However, this requires a radical change in your thinking. Cutting out only some animal-based products simply takes more work. He believes that a radical change for just one month, to try it out, is much better. Give it one month. You’ve been eating cheeseburgers your whole life; a month without them won’t kill you (p. 244).

Campbell emphasizes the fact that a large number of plant-based foods and herbs and spices available make it possible for you to have a varied and tasty diet—even without pasta and baked goods.

Tips to help you make the change

When you switch to eating a lot of raw foods, your digestive tract will have to adapt.

You should not expect support from your family, friends, and colleagues because many people perceive it as threatening when someone they know eats a vegetarian or even vegan diet.

One of Campbell’s associates gives numerous tips to help you make the change, such as buying cookbooks with interesting and easy-to-make menus and asking friends and families for good recipes. The associate’s sister, for example, gave him a delicious recipe for West African peanut stew.

Even restaurants rarely prepare rich and tasty vegetable dishes. When I do eat cooked food, it has been my experience that the dishes prepared at restaurants are often too salty—unless the chef is given special instructions.

Part IV: Why Haven't You Heard This Before?

People who are new to this subject often wonder why they generally have heard the opposite: that milk and meat are practically the best types of food. The author explains why and begins with this statement: As you will come to see, much is governed by the Golden Rule: he who has the gold makes the rules. There are powerful, influential, and enormously wealthy industries that stand to lose a vast amount of money if Americans start shifting to a plant-based diet (p. 249).

Campbell doesn’t believe that the industry pays scientists to “cook the data” or conduct other illegal activities. However, he writes, The entire system—government, science, medicine, industry, and media—promotes profits over health, technology over food, and confusion over clarity (p. 250).

2.13. Science - The Dark Side (p. 251)

The author first explains how great the need is for people with advanced cancer and how by the end of the 1970s, Americans were spending a billion dollars a year for various “miracle cures.”

How myths are kept alive

He then describes how myths are kept alive such as in the case of the supposed “miracle cure” called amygdalin, which was touted to be a newly discovered vitamin (B₁₇). There was, of course, no scientific basis for this—only commercial reasons.

The link above to amygdalin includes additional information. Sensational books have been published on amygdalin for decades, such as "Vitamin B₁₇ Die Revolution in der Krebsmedizin" (Vitamin B₁₇, the revolution in cancer therapy), which have proven to be unfounded.

In this context, Campbell also mentions pangamic acid, which was initially called vitamin B₁₅. However, the body can produce both of these substances in sufficient quantities.

Both are marketed strictly for commercial reasons or, at best, faith. They are good examples of the subject at hand. This issue is covered in the book on page 252.

Dr. Colin Campbell outlines the positions he has held in various organizations, societies, and committees. In the following pages, he describes what he experienced there and how things work in this world of their own.

How things work in this world

For example, he worked with the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology and Medicine, FASEB, which now has 26 member organizations and at that time included more than 20'000 scientists. He also worked for two of its member organizations, in societies on nutrition and pharmacology. Campbell was especially active in the late 1970s at the American Institute of Nutrition, now called the American Society of Nutritional Sciences (ASN).

His principal work was to chair, under contract to the Food and Drug Administration, a committee of scientists investigating the potential hazards of using nutrient supplements (p. 253).

There was a dispute at the time regarding what “eating right” really meant. The industry wanted to expose the McGovern Report from 1977 as a fraud. For this report, Senator George McGovern, a Vietnam War opponent, had led a committee to establish a healthy eating plan.

Within the scientific community, it was widely known that the NAS [National Academy of Sciences] Food and Nutrition Board was strongly influenced by the meat, dairy, and egg industries (p. 255).

Campbell was the only one of the 18 committee members who had no connections to the commercial food and pharmaceutical industries and their coalitions.

Some of his colleagues enjoyed handsome benefits, including first-class travel expenses and nice consulting fees, paid by animal foods companies (p. 256).

He compares this situation with the problem of cigarettes and health.

When scientific evidence first emerged to show that cigarettes were dangerous, there were hordes of health professionals who vigorously defended smoking (p. 256).

The United States has a large number of organizations that provide information about nutrition, and some of them have huge budgets. Could this be the reason that the US has the worst diet when compared to other countries?

Only someone familiar with the inside of the system can distinguish between sincere positions based on science and insincere, self-serving positions. ... It far too often involves money, power, ego, and protection of personal interests above the common good. Very few, if any, illegal acts need to occur. (p. 267–268).

You will only be able to really understand this statement by reading the 18 pages of this chapter. I’m surprised at how objectively “cool” he writes about it as if it were just an ordinary news story. An American drama unfolds.

2.14. Scientific Reductionism (p. 269)

We learn how a recommendation must be greatly simplified so as to be understood by a large number of people. Campbell goes over how the 1982 National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report on Diet, Nutrition, and Cancer, of which he was a co-author, was the first expert panel report that deliberated on the association of diet with cancer. It included chapters on individual nutrients.

Although they recommended getting these nutrients such as vitamins, from natural foods and no pills or supplements, the report found its way to the corporate world and was used as a money-making opportunity. The next thing you know vitamin pills are being advertised as products that prevent cancer. As an example, Campbell describes a product called Healthy Greens, which is a multivitamin supplement of vitamins A, C, and E, beta-carotene, selenium, and a miniscule half-gram of dehydrated vegetables (p. 269).

The 1982 National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report

This led to a year-long legal process initiated by the Federal Trade Commission (FTP) against General Nutrition Corporation (GNC). The FTP used Campbell as an expert on the case. Despite the fact that this was a pretty clear case, GNC managed to get it settled by agreeing to pay what was a ridiculously low fine as compared to the revenues the product generated.

The 1982 National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report was published only as a watered-down version. For example, the original data on the fat content of food was altered and recommended reducing our fat intake from 40 % to 30 % of calories, although this goal of 30 % was an arbitrary cutoff point. This is because:

the director of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Nutrition Laboratory told us that if we went below 30 %, consumers would be required to reduce animal food intake and that would be the death of the report (p. 271).

He then discusses a study started in 1976, which had enrolled 120'000 nurses to investigate the relationship between various diseases and oral contraceptives, postmenopausal hormones, cigarettes, and other factors, such as hair dyes.⁵ Beginning in 1980, Professor Willett added a dietary questionnaire to the study and four years later, in 1984, expanded the dietary questionnaire to include more food items. This expanded dietary questionnaire was mailed to nurses again in 1986 and 1990 (p. 272).

The Nurses’ Health Study

The data was collected by the organization for two decades with a budget of 4–5 million dollars annually. This prospective cohort study gained a lot of attention. Frank E. Speizer and Walter C. Willett are regarded as the founders of the Nurses’ Health Study. Willett also wrote the book "Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy".

The author criticizes this study harshly and gives some very good reasons for his criticism. For example, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) national school lunch program counts French fried potatoes as a vegetable (p. 273).

The nurses’ diet turned out to contain even more meat than that of the average American diet. The nurses consumed twice the recommended daily amount of 9 to 10 % protein. And of the total protein consumed, 78–86 % came from animal-based foods. Their diet included very few whole plant-based foods. He includes a graph developed by Professor Carroll (p. 275) to show the significance of this in terms of cancer.

The group was definitely not homogeneous. Those with a high intake of fat were up to 50–55 % fat relative to total calories. Those who reduced the fat content simply consumed less fatty meat, such as chicken and fish, and chose low-fat crackers and low-fat chips, cookies, and other types of junk food.

We therefore find only small differences in overall health, but a big difference in terms of the proportion of fat consumption.

The study had serious flaws and as a result, false conclusions were drawn. Such studies that attempt to isolate just one substance don’t reveal the whole truth, but The China Study does indeed cover the full spectrum.

Campbell shows a number of false conclusions from studies he had criticized. Just one example: we found no evidence that lower intake of total fat or specific major types of fat was associated with decreased risk of breast cancer (p. 279). Of course, a study like this would come to such a conclusion—and it cost more than $100 million to boot.

The author then exposes the conflicts he has encountered by publishing his correspondence with Dr. Hu and Professor Willett. In a personal conversation, Willett said to him, You may be right, Colin, but people don’t want to go there (p. 287).

2.15. The “Science” of Industry (p. 289)

In this chapter, the author shows just how much power the industry has by listing several sales figures that I am not going to repeat here, as I have already taken up this subject in the book review on Salt Sugar Fat.

The author then lists a number of industry groups that work to increase general demand for their products. ... the most powerful among them have yearly budgets in the hundreds of millions of dollars (p. 290).

Marketing campaigns

When Campbell was just starting "The China Study", he learned about a group of professors who had formed a committee under the direction of Professors E. M. Foster and Michael Pariza. Their committee was financed by the meat and dairy industries and had been given the task of monitoring people and institutions who might do ‘harm’ to their industry (p. 290) With a marketing budget of, for example, $165 million in 2003, Dairy Management Inc. was and is able to increase the demand for dairy products. Their target group: young children and their mothers. Campbell then describes some of their marketing campaigns.

The public and press like short headlines like drinking milk reduces cancer risk (p. 297). These attract attention even if they are just empty talk.

To give an example, Campbell describes how Professors Bauman and Pariza used tricky experimental methods to get results showing that the CLA (conjugated linoleic acid) in milk reduces tumors in rats that are given carcinogens. Had they not used these tricky methods, their research results would most likely have been completely different.

Soon after the discovery of the carotenoid lycopene in 1995, the food industry reported that eating more tomatoes and tomato-based dishes including pasta sauces lowers a person’s risk for prostate cancer. This immediately opened up a new market for dietary supplements.

The citrus industry constantly praises the vitamin C content in citrus fruits, and they do so very successfully. Other natural foods that contain even more vitamin C just don’t have a lobby. That’s why you probably think that citrus fruits are the best source of vitamin C (p. 303).

Campbell gives a few examples of other foods containing a high amount of vitamin C. He states that papayas, for example, contain (at 80 mg/100 g) four times more vitamin C than oranges. However, this is not entirely true, as oranges and lemons contain about 50 mg/100 g of vitamin C, definitely significantly less but not four times less.

But for peppers (capsicum, chili peppers, and bell peppers) this does hold true as 0.1 to 0.4 percent of their weight is vitamin C. Other vegetables are also good sources of vitamin C, for example, brussels sprouts contain 112 mg, kale 105–120 mg, fennel 93 mg, cauliflower 69 mg, kohlrabi 65 mg, and spinach 40–150 mg. That is definitely more vitamin C than is contained in oranges. In the fruit category, acerola (also called Barbados cherry) is in the lead with 1'400–4'500 mg! (at least in acerola fruit juice.) Rose hips are more well-known for their high vitamin C content at 1'250 mg, in other words, 25 times more vitamin C than in citrus fruits, followed by the common sea-buckthorn with 450 mg and currants with 177 mg.

Back to The China Study: Yes, strawberries and garden strawberries with 64 mg and broccoli (raw 115 mg; cooked 90 mg) contain more vitamin C than oranges, but peas contain less than 50 mg at 41 mg.

Now do you know what I mean about the power lobbies have—or were you already aware of this?

2.16. Government: Is It for the People? (p.305)

The author explains how the government acts in practice. He shows the nonsense that occurs by providing various examples from a report issued in 2002 by the Food and Nutrition Board (FNB) (part of the Institute of Medicine, IOM):

To meet the body’s daily energy and nutritional needs while minimizing risk for chronic disease, adults should get 45 % to 65 % of their calories from carbohydrates, 20 % to 35 % from fat, and 10 % to 35 % from protein. ...

... added sugars should comprise no more than 25 % of total calories consumed. ... added sugars are those incorporated into foods and beverages during production (p. 306).

About this in the China Study

Drs. Campbell write the following about this in The China Study, This report says that we can consume a diet containing up to 35 % of calories as fat; this is up from the 30 % limit of previous reports. It also recommends that we can consume up to 35 % of calories as protein; this number is far higher than the suggestion of any other responsible authority (p. 306). This is an incredible travesty in the face of the scientific evidence that exists on the subject.

With what you know now from The China Study, the above presents a pretty grim picture of what’s going on. The reason for this is explained below. But bear in mind that the news release starts off by stating the report’s objective of ‘minimizing risk for chronic disease’ (p. 306).

According to these recommendations, a daily menu plan could look like this:

Breakfast: 1 cup Froot Loops, (very sugary breakfast cereal containing harmful food colors), 1 cup skim milk, 1 package M&M’s milk chocolate candies.
Lunch: grilled cheddar cheeseburger.
Dinner: 3 slices pepperoni pizza, 1 soda (16 oz.), 1 serving Archway sugar cookies.

Although this would only add up to 1,800 cal, it would be anything other than healthy.

To avoid any confusion, I would like to add a note here about “pepperoni pizza.”

Per Wikipedia: "Pepperoni, also known as pepperoni sausage, is an American variety of salami, usually made from cured pork and beef mashed together. However, The term pepperoni is a corruption of pepperoni, the plural of peperone, the Italian word for bell pepper. The first reference using pepperoni to refer to a sausage dates to 1919. In Italian, the word ‘peperoncino’ (diminutive of peperone) only refers to hot and spicy peppers, or sometimes too small, sweet kinds, while ‘peperoni’ refers only to sweet peppers, such as bell peppers."

This term sometimes causes confusion. The author is using it in the American sense of the word.

What would be right? The body needs a minimum of 5 to 6 % dietary protein, but responsible scientists recommend 9–10 % in order to maintain a safety margin in case of poor composition.

At the same time, an expert panel of the World Health Organization (WHO), and the panel’s spokesperson Professor Phillip James wanted to recommend an upper safe limit of 10 % for added sugar.

According to the Guardian newspaper of London, the U.S. sugar industry was threatening ‘to bring the World Health Organization to its knees’ unless it abandoned these guidelines on added sugar (p. 310). In spite of these efforts, the U.S. and WHO recommendations for added sugar are now quite different.

Campbell then gives several other examples of ways that individuals and committees are connected to the food industry and how this affects the public. He writes that the Food and Nutrition Board Report discussed above sets us back by years.

The author also describes a positive example in which Dr. Antonia Demas’ Food is Elementary educational program was incorporated into 300 school lunch and behavioral rehabilitation programs around the United States. Her program, which is entirely plant-based, is the total opposite of the government requirement that schools have to offer cow’s milk—and rely mostly on an inventory of animal-based products.

2.17. Big Medicine: Whose Health Are They Protecting? (p. 321)

The author asks the question: So why doesn’t the medical system take nutrition seriously? Four words: money, ego, power, and control. The author isn’t referring to individual doctors, but instead to the system with which they work, the system that should be responsible for promoting good health.

He tells us the story of the successful surgeon Dr. Esselstyn. After Esselstyn read the book "The McDougall Plan" by Dr. John A. McDougall, he realized that patients who ate a lot of meat, fat, and refined foods needed to be treated with a low-fat, plant-based diet.

The problem lies in the lack of nutrition training doctors have

With the official guidelines to back him up, one of Esselstyn’s colleagues said the following to a patient who wanted to take part in Esselstyn’s dietary program: Now you listen to me. There is no way to reverse this disease (p. 325).

Esselstyn believes that the problem lies in the lack of nutrition training doctors have in medical school and in the form of continuing education. Big companies wouldn’t develop an interest in a natural diet. This situation is dangerous. Nutrition training of doctors is not merely inadequate; it is practically nonexistent. ...

It gets even worse! When nutrition education is provided in relation to public health problems, guess who is supplying the ‘educational’ material? The Dannon Institute, Egg Nutrition Board, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, National Dairy Council, Nestlé Clinical Nutrition, Wyeth-Ayerst Laboratories, Bristol-Myers Squibb Company, Baxter Healthcare Corporation, and others have all joined forces to produce a Nutrition in Medicine program and the Medical Nutrition Curriculum Initiative (p. 327).

The Dannon Institute was founded and is “fed” by dairy giant Danone. Danone has 81 thousand employees and generates annual sales of more than 15 billion euros.

It is interesting to see how well the egg industry uses Wikipedia. Go here to see for yourself.

The same goes for the National Cattlemen's Beef Association (NCBA) (the meat industry) and Dairy Management Inc. (the dairy industry).

Wyeth is a pharmaceutical corporation with $22 billion in annual sales, which is now owned by Pfizer, a company with around $60 billion in annual sales—and $15 billion in profit.

In 2009, Bristol-Myers Squibb, in the same industry, had sales of $18.8 billion and achieved a net profit of $10.6 billion.

Baxter International makes its money off of people’s kidney problems.

It is therefore understandable that physicians recommend that osteoporosis patients drink more milk. The health damage that results from doctors’ ignorance of nutrition is astounding (p. 329).

Campbell describes some exceptions, for example, the experiences of Dr. John A. McDougall, who suffered a severe stroke at age 18 and as a result, developed a special appreciation of life. It is particularly interesting to read about his experiences as a junior doctor and the conflict he had with the establishment. His new understanding of nutrition and desire to share this with his patients nearly cost him his job and career. (p. 330, EE: From then on, his diet was mostly vegan, Wikipedia)

In the next section “Hooked on Drugs,” the author describes the ties between the medical profession and the drug industry. For example, big companies pay PR agencies to write scientific articles and then find researchers who agree to be listed as the authors of these ghostwritten articles (p. 333).

Twenty percent of all new drugs have serious unknown side effects, and more than 100'000 Americans die every year from ‘correctly’ taking their ‘properly prescribed’ medication (p. 335).

On the following pages, the author describes the fates of the successful, if not exactly conventional medical doctors Dr. McDougall (see his website www.drmcdougall.com) and Dr. Esselstyn. Both Esselstyn and McDougall have now been denied reentry into the establishment, after headline-making success at healing people with a nutritional approach (p. 341).

But just before that, he describes the following: An interesting situation is now developing: just as with Dr. McDougall, many of the Clinic ‘bigwigs’ with heart disease have themselves gone to Esselstyn for treatment and lifestyle counseling. They know it works, and they seek out the program on their own (p. 341).

2.18. Repeating Histories (p. 343)

In 1985 during a sabbatical in England, Campbell had the opportunity to read much on the topic of diet and cancer at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, and at the Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) and the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (now called Cancer Research UK) in London.

He found several books written by George Macilwain (1797–1882), who was a prominent surgeon in the early 19th century. He became a vegetarian at the age of forty, after identifying ‘grease, fat and alcohol’ as being the chief causes of cancer. (EE: Please note how old he lived to be, which was remarkable for his time.)

He described the concept of the constitutional nature of the disease and that a disease is not the result of the failure of a single organ or cell. It is the result of multiple systems throughout the body breaking down (p. 343).

Plato and Socrates knew that 2'500 years ago. Macilwain describes a conversation between them and Glaucon. Glaucon’s arguments seem particularly interesting. Frederick L. Hoffman, who was instrumental in founding the American Cancer Society, also knew that diet was the way to prevent and treat disease (p. 345).

The authors again list out a number of facts and demonstrate how “unhealthy” most Americans are. To this end, they present 15 impressive statistics on the state of the population. Europe is currently heading in the same direction. ...

3. About the book

That the author lists out his numerous works and extraordinary awards may seem a bit arrogant to some readers. However, there are so many “experts” and charlatans in the field of nutrition that it is necessary for him to list out his qualifications. How else would readers be able to evaluate this new and impressive evidence?

In the book, the author doesn’t explain why he does this. But we are reading something from a highly respected top scientist and results from large-scale studies. These were conducted in collaboration with two US universities and numerous other professors. As the author or co-author, he has written 350 scientific papers. These have included large-scale human studies as well as animal studies. Collaboration with the Chinese for The China Study began in the early 1980s.

Summary on Amazon

You can find a summary of The China Study on Wikipedia by clicking here.

On amazon.de, the book is described as follows:

Be healthy and let animals live!

Even small amounts of animal products can have a negative impact on our health. In this book, you will find the scientifically based answers as to why this is. If we only all knew what already is considered a proven fact in science: that there is a direct relationship between diet and the development of chronic diseases!

Renowned nutritionist T. COLIN CAMPBELL led the China Study, the most comprehensive study of diet, lifestyle, and disease in the history of biomedical research. Two Western universities and the Chinese Academy of Preventive Medicine participated.

The study shows clear links between a diet high in animal protein and the development of chronic diseases. To substantiate the benefits of a vegan diet, the authors have evaluated hundreds of other nutritional studies. The results are included in this book and presented in a clear and understandable way. Our eating habits affect our general health and also the development of cancer, coronary heart disease, diabetes, obesity, and autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis and rheumatism.

The authors give practical advice on how we can combat chronic diseases and existing damage to our health simply by eating a vegan diet.

Title		The China Study
Subtitle		Startling Implications for Diet, Weight Loss, and Long-Term Health
Author(s)		T. Colin Campbell, US; Thomas M. Campbell, US
Publisher		BenBella Books
Publ. date		2005, (first edition)
Pages		417
ISBN		1-932100-38-5
Comments		Additional banner title: The Most Comprehensive Study of Nutrition Ever Conducted

5. Nutrition can substantially control the adverse effects of noxious chemicals.