Deadly Harvest: The Intimate Relationship Between Our Heath and Our Food (49 page)

A second factor is the lifetime exposure of a woman’s breasts to estrogen. Today, girls are arriving at puberty much earlier than nature intended. Their breasts are exposed to estrogen for a longer period, so they are more likely to develop breast cancer later in life. A girl who starts menstruating at age 10 has three times the risk of breast cancer compared to starting at 15.
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On the other hand, menopause around 50 is quite normal. Nevertheless, the same mechanism is at work: menopause at 55 doubles the risk of cancer compared to menopause at 45 and triples it compared to menopause at 35.

Why is it that girls’ periods start earlier these days? Obesity, a high-fat diet, a high-glycemic diet, and a diet rich in dairy and soy products are all factors driving their bodies in this unhealthy direction. Soy products can also promote breast cancer directly.
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In another twist, women who have children, who have children early and/or have many children, and who breastfeed all have a reduced risk of breast cancer.
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There are many complex hormonal operations that science has yet to unravel and understand, but it all comes back to estrogen, progesterone, and other sex hormones. In our ancestral past, women were breastfeeding almost continuously for some 30 years while they were fertile. We might suppose that the body depends on this format to function properly. It is tough to emulate this pattern in today’s world. Nevertheless, it is one more strong argument for breastfeeding and doing it for as long as possible.

Finally, breast cancer is practically unknown outside the West. You don’t even have to clamber over the Himalayas or the Andes to find peoples who live free of breast cancer. Take a comfortable plane to Tokyo, Singapore, or Hong Kong and you will immediately be among peoples who live longer than Westerners do and whose women do not suffer from breast cancer. Their secret? Traditionally, they have very low-fat, low-glycemic diets. That might not last for much longer: the Japanese diet is becoming Westernized, and the rates of breast cancer are rising.

Lung Cancer

Lung cancer is entirely due to smoking, right? Wrong—many people who have never smoked get lung cancer, and many smokers never get it. The Japanese are one of the heaviest smoking populations in the world—and yet one of the longest lived. Japanese longevity is not due to smoking but in spite of it. But they get away with smoking because their diet, while not perfect, is a lot better than the one that is common in the West. In other words, the Japanese diet, turns out to be closer to the ideal diet for the human species than what is eaten elsewhere. Their focus on fish (which contains omega-3 oils) instead of meat is beneficial.
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In general, researchers find that the micronutrient connection is critical.
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People who have a high consumption of non-starchy plant food are much less likely to get lung cancer, whether or not they are smokers.

Colon Cancer

With approximately 135,000 new cases reported each year, colon cancer is the third most commonly diagnosed cancer in the United States, and it is one of the leading causes of cancer-related deaths. Studies have shown that a variety of diet and behavioral modifications reduce colon cancer risk in the general population.

It is hardly surprising that what you put into your mouth can have dramatic effects on what happens at the far end of the digestive tract. You don’t even have to eat like a primitive tribesman to avoid colon cancer. It is virtually unknown among many societies such as the Japanese and Chinese. Some of the causes are really surprising—who would have thought that high insulin levels might be a factor? But they are.
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So, too, are high-fat diets, the consumption of saturated fats and trans-fats. and diets that are dominant in omega-6 oils.
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Of course, the remarks about colon health (Strategy 5) have a direct bearing on colon cancer. Not only does poor colon health contribute to cancers developing in other parts of the body, it contributes directly to cancer developing in the colon itself.

Prostate Cancer

Asian men have much lower rates of prostate cancer than Western men.
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The same factors that are good for suppressing cancer in general, work well on the prostate too. The Asian diet, low in animal fat and dairy, high in omega-3 oils, and rich in non-starchy plant food is good.
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In contrast, a high intake of omega-6 oils encourages prostate cancer.
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Abnormal testosterone production is a major risk factor for prostate cancer. Some compounds, such as lignans, lock up testosterone and stop it from creating damage. Lignans are a kind of plant fiber. The highest concentrations of lignans are found in flaxseed, followed by squash, broccoli, carrots, and asparagus. Studies on flaxseed, which also contain high levels of omega-3 oils and fiber, show that they are indeed great cancer fighters.
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Sunshine is also protective. Dr. Esther John found that men who had received the most sunshine during a lifetime were 50% less likely to develop prostate cancer than those who received the least.
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Ejaculation is good, according to research by Dr. Graham Giles. The more often men ejaculate, between the ages of 20 and 50, the less likely they are to develop prostate cancer; the greatest protective effect is for a man in his twenties.
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Dr. Giles speculates that frequent ejaculation keeps carcinogens from accumulating in the prostate gland.

CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASE

Heart disease, atherosclerosis, thrombosis, strokes, and high blood pressure—this cluster of diseases has only become common in recent times, and chiefly in Western, industrial societies.
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They were unknown among primitive tribes, such as the Australian Aborigines, the Tarahumara hill tribe of Mexico, the Eskimos, and the San Bushman.
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Studies on tribes such as the Vilcabamba of the Andes and the Tarahumara of Mexico show that they have low blood pressure and an extremely low incidence of cardiovascular disease. Rarely does their blood pressure exceed 130/75, even among centenarians, and they have 13 times the rate of centenarians as America.
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As recently as the 1930s, heart disease was rare in America.
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Even today, Okinawans and Cretans do not suffer these diseases. As far as we can tell, they were unknown amongst our Pleistocene forebears.

What is at the root of these illnesses? Heart disease is any disorder that affects the heart’s ability to function normally. The most common cause of heart disease is narrowing or blockage of the coronary arteries, which supply blood to the heart itself. This happens slowly over time. Arteries start to block when they are inflamed. This process, known as atherosclerosis (“hardening of the arteries”) can happen anywhere in the body, including the brain. Special white blood cells called macrophages respond to this inflammation by rushing in to help “clean up” the damage. However, in doing so they also damage the artery walls, which in turn become ideal sites for fatty plaque to accumulate. Repetition of this cycle narrows arteries and raises the potential for clots, heart attack, and stroke.

Sometimes, under abnormal conditions, blood coagulates and forms a clot in a blood vessel. This is not supposed to happen, but when it does it is called a thrombosis. The consequences are serious: the clot blocks the blood supply to the affected part and can cause it to die. When a thrombosis occurs in the brain, it is called a stroke; in the lung, it is a pulmonary embolism; in an artery supplying the heart, it is a heart attack;.

High blood pressure can occur for several reasons. When arteries become blocked, the heart has to pump harder. For example, kidneys, to filter blood properly, need to have a decent pressure across the filters. Loss of pressure can occur if the arteries in the kidney are partly blocked by atherosclerosis; it then sends signals to the heart to pump harder. In another example, the body can secrete hormones that cause blood vessels to constrict, which causes the heart to pump harder to maintain flow. Similar hormones may cause the blood to be thicker than normal and again the heart has to pump harder. The result is that the heart has to step up the pressure to force the blood to flow where it is needed—hence, high blood pressure.

What causes blood to thicken and clot abnormally, for blood vessels to constrict, and for arteries to become inflamed? There are several factors, almost all of them dietary. Overconsumption of omega-6 oils such as sunflower oil, peanut oil, and corn oil produce “bad” prostaglandins that increase blood clotting, blood pressure, and inflammation, clogging arteries with plaque. These hormones also encourage the liver to overproduce cholesterol and stimulate the pancreas to overproduce insulin. Right here we have one reason why heart disease only became common since the 1930s: these vegetable oils only became abundant after World War II. In contrast, the omega-3 oils produce “good” prostaglandins that do the opposite: decrease blood pressure, decrease coagulation, decrease inflammation, and reduce plaque.
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Aspirin and Heart Disease

Various studies have demonstrated that aspirin quenches many of the “bad” prostaglandins. This remarkable result led doctors to recommend that cardiac patients should take an aspirin a day as a preventative measure. And it works: heart attacks can be reduced by up to 40% in vulnerable patients. So, doctors started recommending that even perfectly healthy people should regularly take aspirin “just in case.”

However, there is no such thing as a free lunch. Aspirin works by knocking out all prostaglandins, both good and bad. Blood may then clot poorly (giving rise to internal bleeding) and stomach acidity is disrupted (leading to ulcers). Over the longer term, the immune system is depressed and sensitivity to allergies is increased. In fact, aspirin, while fulfilling a great role for emergency relief, does not deal with the fundamental problems. The good news is, we have the ideal drug right in front of us: our food. Get that right and the fundamental problems disappear.

A second powerful effect is provided by the hormone insulin, which is produced in abnormal quantities by a high-glycemic diet. Insulin acts in ways that provoke the overproduction of similar blood clotting and blood pressure factors.
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Insulin itself inflames the artery walls directly. In other words, foods that are glycemic and/or insulinemic—and combinations of such foods—are part of the problem. This means that the principle culprits are starches like grains and potatoes, sugars, and insulinemic foods like yogurt and potato.

Some saturated fats also inflame arteries. The chief perpetrators are myristic acid and palmitic acid, which are the kinds of fats found in dairy products, tropical oils (like palm oil), and red meats (beef, pork and lamb). That is why all nutritional professionals say we should avoid them. But there are worse: the artificial saturated fats called hydrogenated and trans-fats are even more harmful to the arteries. The American Institute of Medicine states that the only safe level of trans-fat is zero.
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Trans-fats and hydrogenated fats are found in vegetable shortening, margarine, potato chips, crackers, doughnuts, cookies, fried foods, cakes, pies, and pizzas.

A high-salt diet is not helpful. Salt, just by being in the bloodstream in abnormal amounts, damages arteries.
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For a high percentage of the population, salt also raises blood pressure. It is significant that strokes are the biggest killer in Japan. Japanese smoking and high salt intake (from soy sauce) have something to do with it. In contrast, high blood pressure yields well to a high plant-food diet.
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Proteins, Amino Acids, and Homocysteine

Proteins are composed of a cocktail of compounds called amino acids. The composition of the cocktail varies with the foodstuff. Eight of these amino acids are essential: the body must obtain them from food. One of these essential amino acids is called methionine. When methionine is digested, it produces a toxic waste product called homocysteine. Proteins of animal origin tend to contain much more methionine than proteins of plant origin. Compared to plant proteins, animal proteins, therefore, produce a higher toxic load of homocysteine.

The story on artery damage is not yet finished: where proteins come from is also significant. Animal protein is potentially atherogenic (artery damaging) and milk proteins, notably the casein in cheese, particularly so.
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How can this be? After all, we are naturally adapted to consuming animal proteins, albeit in modest proportions. The answer lies with a waste product from animal protein digestion called homocysteine. Homocysteine, if it is not swept up quickly by the body, does a lot of damage to arteries. The naturally adapted “sweepers” are micronutrients readily found in non-starchy plant food. Fruits, salads, and vegetables are the natural—and essential—companions to the consumption of animal matter.
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