Lifestyle Issues

Sometimes when it comes to lifestyle issues, especially diet, the information coming out can often be conflicting. It is therefore often very hard for the sufferer of any disease to know just what is the right course of action for his or her needs.

I recently read a book and reviewed a study which really started me thinking about exactly what I had been taught and had learnt. Dr T Colin Campbell a highly respected and eminently qualified researcher was co -author of ‘The China Study’ a detailed look at diet related lifestyle issues he stated “The data from the China Project suggest that what we have come to consider as ‘normal’ illnesses of aging are really not normal. In fact, these findings indicate that the vast majority perhaps 80 to 90%of all cancers, cardiovascular diseases, and other forms of degenerative illness can be prevented, at least until very old age, simply by adopting a plant-based diet.”

In China, it was found people whose diets ranged from being very low in fat (6% of calories) and almost entirely made up of foods of plant origin, to diets that contained significant amounts of animal products and even much higher amounts of fat (24% of calories). Dietary protein also varies across China. When we compare people on diets that are virtually nil in animal protein with those for whom animal protein is upwards of 20 to 30% of the total protein intake, the cholesterol levels go on average, from around 90 mg per 100 ml to about 170 mg per 100 ml. Such an increase in cholesterol is associated with the emergence of the cancers and heart disease that increasingly plague the world's developed nations.

So what are the implications for us all? It seems Cancer, Heart Disease; autoimmune diseases are now fairly common in Australia and the US as well as Europe but still relatively unheard of in China, Japan and Korea, etc. Could the link be saturated fat? The data is currently thin but adopting a healthy lifestyle, eating more plant based foods, more fruit and veg, less red meat and less fast convenience foods so full of Trans and hydrogenated fats chemicals, additives and preservatives could well be an excellent start.

Phil Sheldon

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© Phil Sheldon
BSc - Nutrition
Grad Dip - Health Science, Environmental, Nutritional & Integrated Medicine
Masters - Human Nutrition

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