An extract from Wikipedia:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_China_Study
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The China Study:
Startling Implications for Diet, Weight Loss and Long-Term Health
Author T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D. and Thomas M. Campbell II, M.D.
Country United States Subject
Nutritional science Publisher
BenBella Books
Publication date January 2005 [1]
Pages 417 (first edition)
ISBN 1-932100-38-5 Followed by
Whole: Rethinking the Science of Nutrition (2013)
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The China Study is a book by T. Colin Campbell, Jacob Gould Schurman Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Biochemistry at Cornell University, and his son Thomas M. Campbell II, a physician. It was first published in the United States in January 2005 and had sold over one million copies as of October 2013, making it one of America's best-selling books about nutrition.
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The China Study examines the relationship between the consumption of animal products(including dairy) and chronic illnesses such as coronary heart disease, diabetes, breast cancer, prostate cancerand bowel cancer. [3]The authors conclude that people who eat a whole-food, plant-based/ vegan diet—avoiding all animal products, including beef, pork, poultry, fish, eggs, cheese and milk, and reducing their intake of processed foods and refined carbohydrates—will escape, reduce or reverse the development of numerous diseases. They write that "eating foods that contain any cholesterol above 0 mg is unhealthy."
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The book recommends sunshine exposure or dietary supplements to maintain adequate levels of vitamin D, and supplements of vitamin B12 in case of complete avoidance of animal products. [5]It criticizes low-carb diets, such as the Atkins diet, which include restrictions on the percentage of calories derived from carbohydrates, which would, by quantity, reduce the benefits of complex carbohydrates. [6]The authors are critical of reductionist approaches to the study of nutrition, whereby certain nutrients are blamed for disease, as opposed to studying patterns of nutrition and the interactions between nutrients.
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The book is loosely based on the China-Cornell- Oxford Project, a 20-year study – described byThe New York Times as "the Grand Prix of epidemiology" – conducted by the Chinese Academy of Preventive Medicine, Cornell University and the University of Oxford. T. Colin Campbell was one of the study's directors. It looked at mortality rates from cancer and other chronic diseases from 1973–75 in 65 counties in China; the data was correlated with 1983–84 dietary surveys and blood work from 100 people in each county. The research was conducted in those counties because they had genetically similar populations that tended, over generations, to live and eat in the same way in the same place. The study concluded that counties with a high consumption of animal-based foods in 1983–84 were more likely to have had higher death rates from "Western" diseases as of 1973–75, while the opposite was true for counties that ate more plant foods.
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Arguments and evidence
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Alleged misinformation about nutrition
The authors write that "most, but not all, of the confusion about nutrition is created in legal, fully disclosed ways and is disseminated by unsuspecting, well-intentioned people, whether they are researchers, politicians or journalists."
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However, the authors also write that certain industries would suffer if Americans were to shift towards a plant based diet, or were to remove all animal products from their diet, and that those industries (like all industries) "do everything in their power to protect their profits and their shareholders."
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They argue that earlier studies of nutrition (particularly the well-known Nurses' Health Study, which began in 1976) were flawed because they focused on the effects of varying amounts of individual nutrients among people who were consuming a uniformly carnivorous (animal-based) diet. [11]They write that "hardly any study has done more damage to the nutritional landscape than the Nurses' Health Study," and that it should "serve as a warning for the rest of science for what not to do." [12]
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Eight principles of food and health
The authors describe their eight principles of food and health:
1.Nutrition represents the combined activities of countless food substances. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
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2.Vitamin supplements are not a panacea for good health.
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3.There are virtually no nutrients in animal-based foods that are not better provided by plants.
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4.Genes do not determine disease on their own. Genes function only by being activated, or expressed, and nutrition plays a critical role in determining which genes, good and bad, are expressed.
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5.Nutrition can substantially control the adverse effects of noxious chemicals.
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6.The same nutrition that prevents disease in its early stages can also halt or reverse it in its later stages.
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7.Nutrition that is truly beneficial for one chronic disease will support health across the board.
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8.Good nutrition creates health in all areas of our existence. All parts are interconnected.
