Eat to Live: The Amazing Nutrient-Rich Program for Fast and Sustained Weight Loss (10 page)

Humans are genetically adapted to expect a high intake of natural and unprocessed plant-derived substances. Cancer is a disease of maladaptation. It results primarily from a body’s lacking critical substances found in different types of vegetation, many of which are still undiscovered, that are metabolically necessary for normal protective function. Natural foods unadulterated by man are highly complex—so complex that the exact structure and the majority of compounds they contain are not precisely known. A tomato, for example, contains more than ten thousand different phytochemicals.

It may never be possible to extract the precise symphony of nutrients found in vegetation and place it in a pill. Isolated nutrients extracted from food may never offer the same level of
disease-protective effects of whole natural foods, as nature “designed” them. Fruits and vegetables contain a variety of nutrients, which work in subtle synergies, and many of these nutrients cannot be isolated or extracted. Phytochemicals from a variety of plant foods work together to become much more potent at detoxifying carcinogens and protecting against cancer than when taken individually as isolated compounds.

After years of examining the accumulating evidence, eight top health organizations joined forces and agreed to encourage Americans to eat more unrefined plant food and less food from animal sources, as revealed in the dietary guidelines published in the
Journal of the American Heart Association
. These authorities are the Nutrition Committee of the American Heart Association, the American Cancer Society, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Council on Cardiovascular Disease in the Young, the Council on Epidemiology and Prevention, the American Dietetic Association, the Division of Nutrition Research of the National Institutes of Health, and the American Society for Clinical Nutrition.

Their unified guidelines are a giant step in the right direction. Their aim is to offer protection against the major chronic diseases in America, including heart disease and cancer. “The emphasis is on eating a variety of foods, mostly fruits and vegetables, with very little simple sugar or high-fat foods, especially animal foods,” said Abby Bloch, Ph.D., R.D., chair of the American Cancer Society at the time. Based on a culmination of years of research, these health experts’ conclusion was that too much animal-source food is one of the leading causes of heart disease, cancer, strokes, diabetes, obesity, etc.—all the major chronic diseases that cost 1.4 million Americans their lives each year (more than two-thirds of all deaths in the United States).

We are on the verge of a revolution. Substances newly discovered in broccoli and cabbage sprouts sweep toxins out of cells. Substances found in nuts and beans prevent damage to our cells’ DNA. Other compounds in beets, peppers, and tomatoes fight cancerous changes in cells. Oranges and apples protect our blood vessels from damage that could lead to heart disease. Nature’s chemoprotective army is alert and ready to remove our enemies and shield us from harm.

Hardly a day goes by when some new study doesn’t proclaim the health-giving properties of fruits, vegetables, and beans. Unprocessed plant foods contain thousands of compounds, most of which have not yet been discovered, that are essential for maintaining health and maximizing genetic potential. Welcome to the phytochemical revolution.

Phytochemicals, or plant-derived chemicals, occur naturally in plants (
phyto
means “plant”). These nutrients, which scientists are just starting to discover and name, have tremendously beneficial effects on human physiology. The effects of our not consuming sufficient amounts of them are even more astounding—premature death from cancer and atherosclerosis.

Eating a wide variety of raw and conservatively cooked plant foods (such as steamed vegetables) is the only way we can ensure that we get a sufficient amount of these essential health-supporting elements. Taking vitamin and mineral supplements or adding some vitamins to processed foods will not prevent the diseases associated with eating a diet containing a low percentage of calories from whole natural foods.

Scientists cannot formulate into pills nutrients that have not yet been discovered! If the pills did contain sufficient amounts of all the phytonutrients and other essential substances, we would have to swallow a soup bowl full of pills and powders. To date, researchers have discovered more than ten thousand phytochemicals.
No supplement can contain a sufficient amount. Thankfully, you can get all these nutrients
today
by eating a wide variety of plant-based foods.

Please bear in mind that I am not against nutritional supplements. In fact, I recommend various supplements to many of my patients with various health problems, and a high-quality multivitamin/multimineral to almost everyone.

I do
not
recommend that most people consume supplements containing vitamin A, isolated beta-carotene, or folic acid, as there are risks associated with excess consumption of these nutrients. The point to be emphasized is that supplements alone cannot offer optimal protection against disease and that you cannot make an unhealthy diet into a healthy one by consuming supplements.

When your nutrient intake is out of balance, health problems may result. For example, beta-carotene has been touted as a powerful antioxidant and anti-cancer vitamin. However, in recent years we have discovered that beta-carotene is only one of about five hundred carotenoids. Scientists are finding that taking beta-carotene supplements is not without risk, and supplements are certainly a poor substitute for the real thing—the assortment of various carotenoid compounds found in plants.

The reason researchers believed beta-carotene had such a powerful anti-cancer effect was that populations with high levels of beta-carotene in their bloodstream had exceedingly low rates of cancer. More recently we found out that these people were protected against cancer because of
hundreds
of carotenoids and phytochemicals in the fruits and vegetables they were consuming. It wasn’t that beta-carotene was responsible for the low incidence of cancer; it merely served as a flag for those populations with a high fruit and vegetable intake. Unfortunately, many scientists confused the flag for the ship.

Recently, large-scale studies have shown that taking beta-carotene (or vitamin A) in supplemental form may not be such a great idea.
¹¹

In Finnish trials, taking beta-carotene supplements failed to prevent lung cancer and actually increased its incidence.
¹²
This study was halted when the researchers discovered that the death rate from lung cancer was 28 percent higher among participants who had taken the high amounts of beta-carotene and vitamin A. Furthermore, the death rate from heart disease was 17 percent higher for those who had taken the supplements than for those just given a placebo.
¹³

Another study showed a similar correlation between beta-carotene supplementation and increased occurrence of prostate cancer. At this point, as a result of these European studies, as well as similar studies conducted here in the United States, articles in the
Journal of the National Cancer Institute,
the
Lancet,
and the
New England Journal of Medicine
all advise us to avoid taking beta-carotene supplements.
¹⁴
A meta-analysis of the studies on this subject in 2007 recognized a 16 percent increased mortality in people who took vitamin A supplements and a 7 percent increased mortality in people who took beta-carotene supplements.
¹⁵

We can learn a lesson from this research. A high intake of isolated beta-carotene may impair the absorption of other carotenoids. Taking beta-carotene or vitamin A may hinder carotenoid anti-cancer activity from zeaxanthin, alpha-carotene, lycopene, lutein, and many other crucial plant-derived carotenoids. When my patients ask what multivitamin they should use, I tell them I’d prefer they take a high-quality multi that does not contain vitamin A or plain beta-carotene. (See recommended products at my website,
DrFuhrman.com
.)

A high intake of just one nutrient when nature has combined it with many others may make things worse, not better. We humans, especially physicians, are notorious for interfering with nature, thinking we know better. Sometimes we do—all too often we don’t. Only later, when it may be too late, do we realize that in fact we have made things worse.

While it still may take decades longer to understand how whole foods promote health, we must accept the fact that the foods found in nature are ideally suited to the biological needs of the species. “The most compelling evidence of the last decade has indicated the importance of protective factors, largely unidentified, in fruits and vegetables,” said Walter C. Willett, M.D., Ph.D., chairman of the Department of Nutrition at Harvard’s School of Public Health and a speaker at the American Association for Cancer Research.
¹⁶

In other words, a diet in which fruits, vegetables, and other natural plant foods supply the vast majority of calories affords us powerful protection against disease. Phytochemicals in their natural state are potent cancer inhibitors. For example, a study published in the
Journal of the National Cancer Institute
reported that men who ate three or more servings of cruciferous vegetables a week had a 41 percent reduced risk of prostate cancer compared with men who ate less than one serving a week.
¹⁷
Cruciferous vegetables, such as broccoli and cabbage, are high in isothiocyanates, which activate enzymes present in all cells that detoxify carcinogens. Eating a variety of other vegetation lowered risk even further. Green vegetables, onions, and leeks also contain organosulfur phytonutrients that inhibit abnormal cellular changes that eventually lead to cancer. A wide variety of wholesome plant-based foods is the only real anti-cancer strategy.

The list above is only a small sample of beneficial compounds, and more are being discovered daily. Cancer-prevention studies attempting to dissect the precise ingredients or combination of ingredients in fruits and vegetables are ongoing; but these studies, like the many others before them, are likely to be a huge waste of resources. There are simply too many protective factors that work synergistically to expect significant benefit from taking a few isolated substances. These beneficial compounds have overlapping and complementary mechanisms of action. They inhibit cellular aging, induce detoxification enzymes, bind carcinogens in the digestive tract, and fuel cellular repair mechanisms.
¹⁸

The process of carcinogenesis entails an accumulation of mutations or damage to our DNA (the cellular blueprint) over the course of twenty to forty years. You must start protecting yourself today, not after you find out you have cancer. Cancer is much more preventable than treatable. Instead, many try to dig a well after their house is on fire.

The process of cellular disintegration is extremely prolonged, and we know that many pre-neoplastic lesions (abnormal, but not yet cancer) disappear spontaneously.
¹⁹
Studies on both humans and animals have shown that plant-derived nutrients are able to prevent the occurrence of, and even reverse, DNA damage that may later result in cancer.
²⁰
Fortunately, we have the potential to suppress the progression of cancer in its early stages by how we choose to eat. The ability to remove and fix these partially damaged cells is proportional to their exposure to phytochemicals.

When we consume a sufficient variety and quantity of phytochemical substances to maximally arm our immune defenses against cancer, we afford ourselves the ability to repair DNA damage, detoxify cancer-causing agents, and resist disease in general. These same substances also activate other immune-enhancing mechanisms that improve our defenses against viruses and bacteria, making our body disease-resistant in general.

FIVE WAYS PHYTOCHEMICALS PREVENT CANCER