The China Study (2 page)

Contents
1
Introduction
Port I: The Chino Study
11
1.   Problems We Face, Solutions We Need
27
2.   A House of Proteins
43
3.   Turning Off Cancer
69
4.   Lessons from China
Port II: Diseases of Affluence
5. Broken Hearts                                                111
6. Obesity                                                      135
7. Diabetes                                                     145
8. Common Cancers: Breast, Prostate, Large Bowel
(Colon and Rectal)                                           157
9. Autoimmune Diseases                                          183
10. Wide-Ranging Effects: Bone, Kidney, Eye and Brain Diseases   203
Port III: The Good Nutrition Guide
225
11. Eating Right: Eight Principles of Food and Health
241
12. How to Eat
xiii

CONTENTS
xiv
Port IV: Why Haven't You Heard This Before?
13.   Science-The Dark Side                                         251
14.   Scientific Reductionism                                       269
15.   The "Science" of Industry                                     289
Government: Is It for the People?
16.                                                                 305
17.   Big Medicine: Whose Health Are They Protecting?               321
18.   Repeating Histories                                           343
Appendix A. Q&A: Protein Effect in Experimental Rat Studies   351
Appendix B. Experimental Design of the China Study            353
Appendix C. The "Vitamin" D Connection                        361
References                                                    369

Preface
T. COLIN CAMPBELL, at his core, is still a farm boy from northern Virginia.
When we spend time together we inevitably share our stories from the
farm. Whether it is spreading cow manure, driving tractors or herding
cattle, both of us share a rich history in farming.
But from these backgrounds, both he and I went on to other careers.
It is for his other career accomplishments that I came to admire Colin.
He was involved in the discovery of a chemical later called dioxin, and
he went on to direct one of the most important diet and health studies
ever conducted, the China Study. In between, he authored hundreds
of scientific papers, sat on numerous government expert panels and
helped shape national and international diet and health organizations,
like the American Institute for Cancer Research/World Cancer Research
Fund. As a scientist, he has played an instrumental role in how our
country views diet and health .
And yet, as I have gotten to know Colin on a personal level, I have
come to respect him for reasons other than just his list of professional ac-
complishments. I have come to respect him for his courage and integrity.
Colin seriously questions the status quo, and even though the scien-
tific evidence is on his side, going against the grain is never easy. I know
this well because I have been a co-defendant with Oprah Winfrey when
a group of cattlemen decided to sue her after she stated her intention
not to eat beef. I have been in Washington, D.C., lobbying for better
agricultural practices and fighting to change the way we raise and grow
food in this country. I have taken on some of the most influential, well-
f u n d e d groups in the country and I know that it's not easy.
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THE CHINA STUDY
xvi
Because of our parallel paths, I feel connected to Colin's story. We
started on the farm , learning independence, honesty and integrity in
small communities, and went on to become established in mainstream
careers. Although we both had success (I still remember the first seven-
figure check I wrote for my massive cattle operation in Montana), we
came to realize that the system we lived in could use some improve-
m e n t s . Challenging the system that provided us with such rewards has
demanded an iron will and steadfast integrity. Colin has both, and this
book is a brilliant capstone to a long and dignified career. We would do
well to learn from Colin, who has reached the top of his profession and
then had the courage to reach even higher by demanding change.
Whether you have interest in your personal health or in the wretched
state of health in the United States, this book will richly reward you.
Read it carefully, absorb its information and apply it to your life.
-Howard Lyman, author of Mad Cowboy

Foreword
IF YOU ARE LIKE MOST AMERICANS TODAY, you are surrounded by fast food
chain restaurants. You are barraged by ads for junk foods . You see other
ads, for weight-loss programs, that say you can eat whatever you want,
not exercise and still lose weight. It's easier to find a Snickers bar, a Big
Mac or a Coke than it is to find an apple. And your kids eat at a school
cafeteria whose idea of a vegetable is the ketchup on the burgers.
You go to your doctor for health tips. In the waiting room, you find
a glossy 243-page magazine titled Family Doctor: Your Essential Guide to
Health and Well-being. Published by the American Academy of Family
Physicians and sent free to the offices of allSO,OOO family doctors in the
United States in 2004, it's full of glossy full-page color ads for McDon-
ald's, Dr Pepper, chocolate pudding and Oreo cookies.
You pick up an issue of National Geographic Kids, a magazine pub-
lished by the National Geographic Society "for ages six and up," expect-
i n g to find wholesome reading for youngsters. The pages, however, are
filled with ads for Twinkies, M&Ms, Frosted Flakes, Froot Loops, Host-
ess Cup Cakes and XtremeJell-O Pudding Sticks.
This is what scientists and food activists at Yale University call a toxic
food environment. It is the environment in which most of us live today.
The inescapable fact is that certain people are making an awful lot of
money today selling foods that are unhealthy. They want you to keep
eating the foods they sell, even though doing so makes you fat, depletes
your vitality and shortens and degrades your life. They want you docile,
compliant and ignorant. They do not want you informed, active and
passionately alive, and they are quite willing to spend billions of dollars
annually to accomplish their goals.
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THE (HINA STUDY
xviii
You can acquiesce to all this, you can succumb to the junk food sellers,
or you can find a healthier and more life-affirming relationship with your
body and the food you eat. If you want to live with radiant health, lean and
clear and alive in your body; you'll need an ally in today's environment.
Fortunately, you have in your hand just such an ally. T. Colin
Campbell, Ph.D., is widely recognized as a brilliant scholar, a dedi-
cated researcher and a great humanitarian. Having had the pleasure and
privilege to be his friend, I can attest to all of that, and I can also add
something else. He is also a man of humility and human depth, a man
whose love for others gUides his every step.
Dr. Campbell's new book-The China Study-is a great ray of light in
the darkness of our times, illuminating the landscape and the realities of
diet and health so clearly, so fully, that you need never again fall prey to
those who profit from keeping you misinformed, confused and obedi-
ently eating the foods they sell.
One of the many things I appreciate about this book is that Dr. Campbell
doesn't just give you his conclusions. He doesn't preach from on high, tell-
ing what you should and shouldn't eat, as if you were a child. Instead, like
a good and trusted friend who happens to have learned, discovered and
done more in his life than most of us could ever imagine, he gently; clearly
and skillfully gives you the information and data you need to fully under-
stand what's involved in diet and health today. He empowers you to make
informed choices. Sure, he makes recommendations and suggestions, and
terrific ones at that. But he always shows you how he has arrived at his con-
clusions . The data and the truth are what are important. His only agenda is
to help you live as informed and healthy a life as possible.
I've read The China Study twice already, and each time I've learned
an immense amount. This is a brave and wise book. The China Study is
extraordinarily helpful, superbly written and profoundly important. Dr.
Campbell's work is revolutionary in its implications and spectacular in
its clarity.
If you want to eat bacon and eggs for breakfast and then take cho-
lesterol-lowering medication, that's your right. But if you want to truly
take charge of your health, read The China Study, and do it soon! If you
heed the counsel of this outstanding guide, your body will thank you
every day for the rest of your life.
-John Robbins, author of Diet for a New America, Reclaiming Our
Health and The Food Revolution

Introduction
THE PUBLIC'S H NGER for nutrition information never ceases to amaze me,
U
even after devoting my entire working life to conducting experimental
research into nutrition and health. Diet books are perennial best-sellers.
Almost every popular magazine features nutrition advice, newspapers
regularly run articles and TV and radio programs constantly discuss
diet and health.
Given the barrage of information, are you confident that you know
what you should be doing to improve your health?
Should you buy food that is labeled organic to avoid pesticide ex-
posure? Are environmental chemicals a primary cause of cancer? Or
is your health "predetermined" by the genes you inherited when you
were born? Do carbohydrates really make you fat? Should you be more
concerned about the total amount of fat you eat, or just saturated fats
and trans-fats? What vitamins , if any, should you be taking? Do you buy
foods that are fortified with extra fiber? Should you eat fish, and, if so,
how often? Will eating soy foods prevent heart disease?
My guess is that you're not really sure of the answers to these ques-
tions. If this is the case, then you aren't alone. Even though information
and opinions are plentiful, very few people truly know what they should
be doing to improve their health.
This isn't because the research hasn't been done. It has. We know an
enormous amount about the links between nutrition and health. But
the real science has been buried beneath a clutter of irrelevant or even
harmful information-junk science, fad diets and food industry propa-
ganda.

THE CHINA STUDY
2
I want to change that. I want to give you a new framework for under-
s t a n d i n g nutrition and health, a framework that eliminates confusion,
prevents and treats disease and allows you to live a more fulfilling life.
I have been "in the system" for almost fifty years, at the very highest
levels, designing and directing large research projects, deciding which
research gets funded and translating massive amounts of scientific re-
search into national expert panel reports.
After a long career in research and policy making, I now understand
why Americans are so confused. As a taxpayer who foots the bill for re-
search and health policy in America, you deserve to know that many of
the common notions you have been told about food, health and disease
are wrong:
• Synthetic chemicals in the environment and in your food, as prob-
lematic as they may be, are not the main cause of cancer.
• The genes that you inherit from your parents are not the most im-
p o r t a n t factors in determining whether you fall prey to any of the
ten leading causes of death.
• The hope that genetic research will eventually lead to drug cures
for diseases ignores more powerful solutions that can be employed
today.
• ObseSSively controlling your intake of anyone nutrient, such as
carbohydrates, fat, cholesterol or omega-3 fats, will not result in
long-term health.
• Vitamins and nutrient supplements do not give you long-term pro-
tection against disease.
• Drugs and surgery don't cure the diseases that kill most Ameri-
cans.
• Your doctor probably does not know what you need to do to be the
healthiest you can be.
I propose to do nothing less than redefine what we think of as good
nutrition. The provocative results of my four decades of biomedical
research, including the findings from a twenty-seven-year laboratory
program (funded by the most reputable funding agencies) prove that
eating right can save your life.
I will not ask you to believe conclusions based on my personal obser-
vations, as some popular authors do. There are over 750 references in this
book, and the vast majority of them are primary sources of information,
including hundreds of scientific publications from other researchers

3
INTRODUCTION
that point the way to less cancer, less heart disease, fewer strokes, less
obesity, less diabetes, less autoimmune disease, less osteoporosis, less
Alzheimer's, less kidney stones and less blindness.
Some of the findings, published in the most reputable scientific jour-
nals, show that:
• Dietary change can enable diabetic patients to go off their medica-
tion.
• Heart disease can be reversed with diet alone.
• Breast cancer is related to levels of female hormones in the blood,
which are determined by the food we eat.
• Consuming dairy foods can increase the risk of prostate cancer.
• Antioxidants, found in fruits and vegetables, are linked to better
mental performance in old age.
• Kidney stones can be prevented by a healthy diet.
• Type 1 diabetes, one of the most devastating diseases that can be-
fall a child, is convincingly linked to infant feeding practices.
These findings demonstrate that a good diet is the most powerful
weapon we have against disease and sickness. An understanding of this
scientific evidence is not only important for improving health; it also
has profound implications for our entire society. We must know why
misinformation dominates our society and why we are grossly mistaken
in how we investigate diet and disease, how we promote health and how
we treat illness.
By any number of measures, America's health is failing. We spend far
more, per capita, on health care than any other society in the world, and
yet two thirds of Americans are overweight, and over 15 million Ameri-
cans have diabetes, a number that has been rising rapidly. We fall prey to
heart disease as often as we did thirty years ago, and the War on Cancer,
launched in the 1970s, has been a miserable failure. Half of Americans
have a health problem that requires taking a prescription drug every
week, and over 100 million Americans have high cholesterol.
To make matters worse, we are leading our youth down a path of dis-
ease earlier and earlier in their lives. One third of the young people in
this country are overweight or at risk of becoming overweight. Increas-
ingly, they are falling prey to a form of diabetes that used to be seen only
in adults, and these young people now take more prescription drugs
than ever before.
These issues all come down to three things: breakfast, lunch and dinner.