Myths and Truths about The China Study
I wrote this assignment to complete a requirement for a master's level class at Hawthorn University. It is a brief critical review of The China Study, a book written by Dr. T. Colin Campbell. If you are vegan or vegetarian, I encourage you to keep an open mind, but you probably won't like what you read!
I wrote this assignment to complete a requirement for a master's level class at Hawthorn University. It is a brief critical review of The China Study, a book written by Dr. T. Colin Campbell. If you are vegan or vegetarian, I encourage you to keep an open mind, but you probably won't like what you read!
Assignment for WISE 103 - Hawthorn University: Choose one China Study-related topic that
holds special interest for you. Write a focused essay of about 1,500 words on a
way or ways Dr. Campbell uses or misuses science to support his point of view about
your chosen subject. Be sure to credit Masterjohn, Minger or any other
reviewers who help you think this through.
General:
This book is very much like many of the nutrition guidance books presently
available on bookstore shelves (a scary concept in itself). It is set up to
sell a philosophy and if the book were read out loud, it would sound like an
infomercial. This book always disturbed me. My friends read it; one even gave
presentations at our local Whole Foods Market about the book. I bought it but
could never bring myself to open it. I am glad I didn’t because I don’t think I
would have questioned Dr. Campbell. To someone not familiar with statistics, he
poses a compelling story to eat only plant foods and uses scare tactics to
discourage any dissenting opinions.
Statistical
Review: I am not a statistician. I never took a statistics class and I
don’t understand statistics. The statistics in this book seem perfectly fine to
me. I can’t critique them. I don’t know if they are valid or not. I read Chris
Masterjohn’s and Denise Minger’s critiques of his data. Their responses
covering the statistics also sound valid.
Based solely on
the statistical evaluations, i.e., Dr. Campbell’s compelling presentation of
them, and Chris’ and Denise’s compelling reviews, I would lean towards Chris
and Denise, simply because my belief system is closer to theirs. So I had to
dig deeper to decide who tells the better story based solely on the statistical
evidence. I had to side with Chris and Denise because of the responses that
were presented from Dr. Campbell to Chris and Denise and their responses back
to him.
Dr. Campbell’s
response to Denise was long, boring and confusing. He used a lot of what looked
like eloquent phrases. He slammed her as a nobody that had no business
questioning him since he has had such a long, award winning career doing
research. He writes a lot but says little and never really addresses the
specific issues. He insists she is taking everything out of context and doesn’t
know what she is doing.
Dr. Campbell’s
response to Chris was easier to understand, however, he did not address any of
the meat of Chris’ comments. He attacks Chris as a nobody that is affiliated
with Weston A. Price, a Foundation that encourages eating lethal animal
products. He has some limited praise for Dr. Price but questions his data and
ability to do research on anything other than dentistry, which has no bearing
on real medical research.
Chris and Denise
both came back with responses to Dr. Campbell addressing his concerns item by
item. Dr. Campbell never responded back to them as far as I can tell. Since Dr.
Campbell provided very little defense of his conclusions, it is hard to
continue to believe anything except he has a strong belief and uses every means
to convince others to join him in his belief.
Questionable
tactics and other discrepancies: Dr. Campbell uses many tactics to get
people to believe in his story. For example,
·
Campbell’s theory is that animal products cause
all the problems and that the wealthier you are, the more animal-based foods
you eat. However, much work has been done showing processed foods and sodas, as
well as CAFOS animal foods, the highly processed animal foods and PUFAs are
causing much of the disease processes. Obesity, diabetes, heart disease and
cancer strike rich and poor alike in the U.S. If it was strictly a disease of
affluence, the affluent would all have the labels and the poor wouldn’t and
this isn’t the case. While more affluent people may eat more animal foods, poor
people consume more processed foods and probably fast foods as they do appear
to be less expensive. Grocery stores target the cheap processed foods to poor
people (as shown in Marion Nestle’s research) and this shows up in the health
statistics.
·
I believe the purpose of “Why Haven’t You Heard This Before”, is to provide convincing
evidence that if anyone disagrees with his work, they are being influenced by
big business, big government and self-interested groups intent on spreading a
message for financial gain. His voice is angry and righteous, pointing fingers
and blame at people and organizations. The tone of voice and the topics may be
new to some of his readers, but I believe they will appeal to most of his
readers. Vegans/vegetarians as a group seem quite righteous and Dr. Campbell’s
information in this section, right or wrong provides ammunition to defend the
vegan/vegetarian agenda.
·
I believe he is hypocritical – stating how evil
someone or some study is because it conflicts with his belief when he could be
accused of the same thing. Some of the points include:
o
Organizations with a mission or a hidden agenda
selectively pull the science they need to support their agenda (which can be
true!). To quote Campbell “Institutions
also are a part of the dark side of science. Committees like the Public
Nutrition Information Committee and the American Council on Science and Health
generate lopsided panels and committees and institutions that are far more
interested in promoting their point of view than debating scientific research
with an open mind. (Page 267).” His belief that animal foods are dangerous,
colors everything he is willing to consider. He condemns these organizations
and people and yet has an agenda and promotes it at all cost. I agree that
these organizations have names and apparent missions that strike charity and
trust in people and may have a very dark side of misinformation and misuse of
data – exactly like Dr. Campbell.
·
Campbell wants the reader to believe only him – “Only someone familiar with the inside of the
system can distinguish between sincere positions based in science and
insincere, self-serving positions. I was on the inside of the system for many
years, working at the very top levels, and saw enough to be able to say that
science is not always the honest search for truth that so many believe it to be. It far too often involves
money, power, ego and protection of personal interest above the common good.”
·
Campbell talks about scientific reductionism and
how harmful this can be but he focuses much of his information on protein –
isn’t this reductionism?
·
He isn’t a fan of supplements but he recommends
some for vegans.
·
He really slams Harvard and the Nurses’ Health
Study and yet his China Study methods could be considered similar to this
study. As a scientist he should be open to considering all sides, however he is
quite convinced that animal products are so bad that he can’t conceive looking
at a study like this.
These are just a
few comments that could be discussed in depth from the book. The book is
well-designed to create a fearful attitude and add fuel to the fire of vegan
righteousness and the argument that animal products are evil.
More
in-depth analysis of Part III – THE GOOD NUTRITION GUIDE
There are so many
topics in this book that bother me and that I could discuss as holding a
special interest for me, however the paper would become quite large! I am going
to address a few of the topics in Part III – The Good Nutrition Guide.
Introduction: Dr. Campbell introduces
this subject by slamming the Atkins and South Beach Diets since these are diets
high in animal products and low in carbohydrates – the opposite of his ideal
diet. He equates the Atkins Diet to the “standard
American diet, the toxic diet that has been shown to make us fat, give us heart
disease, destroy our kidneys, make us blind and lead us to Alzheimer’s, cancer
and a host of other medical problems.”
This section is set up to be highly inflammatory. I object to this for many
reasons, some of which are:
·
The Atkins Diet, if followed according to his
book, would not necessarily include many of the highly processed foods causing
problems in todays diet. It may not be ideal but could be way more beneficial
than eating a vegan diet!
·
According to Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary
Taubes, the Atkins Diet has not been shown to be harmful and may be beneficial
in losing weight and keeping the weight off. It studies it has proven more
beneficial than a low calorie or vegan diet!
·
A high carb diet, opposite of the Atkins Diet
could also be considered a standard American diet, full of chemicals and
inadequate nutrition that could be causing all the problems discussed by
Campbell. This diet has been studied and shown to cause problems. While he says
don’t eat processed foods, a high carb diet could be easily turned into a vegan
diet fitting Campbell’s description and cause many health problems.
·
He ignores any data supporting a diet containing
a large amount of animal foods such as Dr. Price’s research or the research done
on the Masai nomads of Kenya or the mostly meat diet of many native populations
such as the Aleuts. This research and the resulting vibrant health is worth
considering as blowing a hole in Campbell’s hypothesis (or rigid belief).
·
He ignores the meat-eating county in The China
Study (he gives a weak excuse why he excludes them).
·
I could go on and on!
Chapter 11 – Eating Right: Eight Principles
of Food and Health. Dr. Campbell starts this chapter out using all the
buzzwords people are looking for. It reminds me of a televangelist giving a
sermon. Of course it is going to suck people in that want to be healthy and do
the right thing. He tells them if they only change their ways by changing their
diet, they can have vibrant health – basically guarantees it. I don’t believe
anyone can provide this guarantee and it is a deceptive tactic.
Principle # 1 – Nutrition represents the
combined activities of countless food substance. The whole is greater than the
sum of the parts.
He explains, and I
believe rightly so, that our food is complex and it is treated in the body much
different when eaten as whole as possible, along with other foods during a meal
than if we took supplements of each of the individual nutrients. He says “Our bodies have evolved with this
infinitely complex network of reactions in order to derive maximal benefit from
whole food, as they appear in nature. The misguided may trumpet the virtues of
one specific nutrient or chemical, but this thinking is too simplistic. Our
bodies have learned how to benefit from the chemicals in food as they are
packaged together, discarding some and using others as they see fit. I cannot
stress this enough, as it is the foundation of understanding what good
nutrition means.” I agree with this, however, he uses this theory when it
serves his purpose and discards it when it doesn’t.
He then shows a
chart of the known nutrients in spinach. He doesn’t list the quantities of any
of the nutrients, therefore making the chart look way more impressive than if
you were to list the amount of these nutrients in the spinach. This is
misleading. In addition, he doesn’t discuss the anti-nutrients in the spinach
and how they would affect the absorption of minerals, or the fact that the
spinach also has cellulose that can’t be digested by humans (he believes in
large amounts of fiber so even if he did discuss the cellulose it would be in a
positive light). He only uses spinach as a model, none of the other vegetables.
I doubt that there are very many people that eat spinach daily, or even weekly!
Principle #2 – Vitamin supplements are not
a panacea for good health.
He states “Isolating nutrients and trying to get
benefits equal to those of whole foods reveals an ignorance of how nutrition
operates in the body.” So far, I can’t argue with this, however, Dr.
Campbell doesn’t adhere to this in his actual diet recommendations.
Principle #3 – There are virtually no
nutrients in animal-based foods that are not better provided by plants.
He presents the
argument that plant-based foods are all similar to each other in their nutritional
elements and animal-based foods are all similar to each other in their nutritional
elements but animal-based foods and plant-based foods are very different
nutritionally from each other. He then presents a table of a few well-selected
nutritional elements and lists the nutrient composition of plant vs.
animal-based foods based on 500 calories of energy.
This is highly
misleading because:
·
Rather than list individual foods, the plant
based food information is derived from equal parts of tomatoes, spinach, lima
beans, peas and potatoes. The meat-based foods are equal parts of beef, pork,
chicken and whole milk. Then he only looks at a handful of nutrients –
nutrients that aren’t in large quantities in meat-based foods. This allows him
to stack the deck so that the plant-based foods look amazing while the animal-based
foods look incredibly weak. For example, beta-carotene in these plant-based
foods is listed as 29,919 mcg while it is only 17 in the animal-based foods. He
cites the US Nutrient Database for Standard Reference to obtain the nutritional elements in this table but I could
not recreate the numbers.
·
500 calories of plant-based foods is a huge
amount of food where the animal based foods would be much smaller in quantity.
Most people don’t sit down to eat 500 calories of just vegetables – especially
on a low-fat diet – which is what he recommends. Eating 500 calories of
vegetables with very little added fat would be boring and unfulfilling.
·
He has selected specific nutritional items and
omitted others. For example, he doesn’t list Vitamin A, only beta-carotene. We
know that there is a poor conversion of beta-carotene to vitamin A in the body.
All that beta-carotene may be useless while the vitamin A in the meat may be
quite necessary.
·
He lists 33 grams of protein in the 500 calories
of plant food and only 34 in the animal based foods – I can’t recreate this
from the database. This doesn’t seem right. In addition, much of his research
has centered around protein as being something we don’t need much of and it may
cause cancer. He doesn’t talk about all the essential amino acids and how they
are only present in animal-based foods. He does indicate the protein in animal
food is unhealthy while the protein in plant foods is healthy – something I
don’t think he can substantiate without manipulating data.
·
He doesn’t use organ meats. He doesn’t list
vitamin K2. He doesn’t list vitamin B12. He doesn’t list vitamin D. He doesn’t
list carnosine or CoQ10 or any of the other nutrients primarily found in animal
foods (and ones we don’t even know about yet) and fats that are turning out to
be quite necessary to vibrant health. He doesn’t address the need for fat for
the fat-soluble vitamins to work effectively and to be able to absorb all the
minerals, etc.
·
He talks about the fats and protein in nuts and
seeds as being better than the fats in animal foods. The fats in nuts and seeds
are primarily PUFAs and are not necessarily better. In addition, there are lots
of anti-nutrients in nuts.
·
He defines essential nutrients (chemicals) as:
o
“The
chemical is necessary for healthy human functioning
o
The
chemical must be something our bodies cannot make on their own, and therefore
must be obtained from an outside source”
·
“There are four nutrients which animal-based
foods have that plant-based foods, for the most part, do not: cholesterol and
vitamins A, D and B12. Three of these are nonessential nutrients. As discussed
above, cholesterol is made by our bodies naturally. Vitamin A can be readily
made by our bodies from beta-carotene, and vitamin D can be readily made by our
bodies simply by exposing our skin to about fifteen minutes of sunshine every
couple days. Both of these vitamins are toxic if they are consumed in high
amounts. This is one more indication that it is better to rely on vitamin
precursors, beta-carotene and sunshine, so that our bodies can readily control
the timing and quantities of vitamins A and D that are needed.” There are so many things wrong with this
statement. Cholesterol is beneficial in so many ways and as far as more recent
research indicates, dietary cholesterol has little to do with cholesterol
levels in the blood. Vitamin A can’t be readily made by beta-carotene. The
conversion is sloppy and inefficient and many people can’t convert it anyway.
Most people don’t spend 15 minutes in the sun every couple of days with a lot
of skin exposed so they can’t produce vitamin D. This isn’t even possible in
many areas of the world that fall above or below a certain distance from the
Equator. The conversion from sun exposure to vitamin D doesn’t happen that
readily and requires cholesterol. It is rumored by the press and encouraged by
studies showing there is a serious vitamin D shortage in the US so we clearly
aren’t getting it and it isn’t in plant based foods. He just stated the body
can handle nutrients in food and now he says the body can’t handle it if eaten
in huge quantities. You can’t have it both ways. He just got done talking about
the synchronicity of food and how important it is and now claims we can get too
much vitamin A and D from foods. The studies that show toxicity are based on
supplements and he isn’t a fan of supplements.
·
“Vitamin
B12 is more problematic. Vitamin B12 is made by microorganisms found in the
soil and by microorganisms in the intestines of animals, including our own. The
amount made in our intestines is not adequately absorbed, so it is recommended
that we consume B12 in food. Research has convincingly shown that plants grown
in healthy soil that has a good concentration of vitamin B12 will readily
absorb this nutrient.” This was news to me so I did some research. I read
some of the paper that this information came from and googled as much
information about this as I could. I found that the research was completed on
spinach, barley and soybeans. The soil used was amended with cow manure. The
plants grown in the amended soil did indeed have a lot more vitamin B12
measured. However, it could not be determined if the B12 was an analogue or
not. There were no studies done that I could find to see if humans could
utilize this B12 in the plants. In addition, a human would have to consume the
food raw or sprouted. One website www.beyondveg.com
ran some numbers to indicate a person would have to consume roughly 5 to 10
pounds of soybean sprouts per day, or roughly 1 to 3 pounds of unhulled barley
per day or roughly 3 to 7 pounds of raw spinach per day to obtain the daily
requirements of 2 mcg of B12. In addition to this, it appears that amending the
soil with a fertilizer high in active B12 would be very expensive. I can’t
substantiate any of this, but I believe if this were all possible and we could
obtain useable B12 from plants, it would be an active practice right now since
it would be economically beneficial to the vegan agenda, the medical agenda and
the engineered food manufacturers.
·
Dr. Campbell recommends taking a B12 supplement
and potentially a vitamin D supplement. He slams supplements in his book in
several locations and then recommends taking 2 of them. I don’t think either
vitamin supplement work well for many people. Most of the commercially
available supplements are so highly processed they aren’t readily
bio-available.
I am not going to cover the rest of his
“Principles” as some of what he says makes sense with other things I have
studied, some if it is presented quite simplistically and some of it doesn’t
agree with other theories from respected scientists, however the overall intent
is to convince people that diet matters.
I would like to
comment on his list of recommended foods. My comments are as follows (I could
provide extensive discussion so I’m only hitting the highlights!):
·
“Flowers”
– more and more information is coming out about incorporating a lot of brassica
vegetables into the diet including cauliflower and broccoli.
·
There is nothing said about raw or cooked. In
just glancing at his diet, many of his recommendations would do well to be
well-cooked and loaded with butter!
·
“Stems and
leaves” – Many of these vegetables are high in anti-nutrients and
cellulose. They need to be properly prepared.
·
“Legumes”
– These all need to be properly prepared by soaking and cooking for a long
time. These can be difficult to digest. Soybeans are included and these are
quite toxic and harmful. Peanuts are included and can cause major problems, are
highly sprayed and high on the list of common allergies.
·
“Nuts”
– These can be difficult to digest and contain anti-nutrients. They primarily contain
PUFAs and if eaten in excess can cause damage. They are also difficult to
digest and are a common cause of allergies.
·
Whole grains (in breads, pastas, etc.) –
grains need to be properly prepared and are rarely properly prepared! Wheat is
causing major issues to growing numbers of people. Breads and pastas are highly
processed and I believe are causing harm – I know I can’t eat most of these
unless properly prepared. Also, on a vegan diet, grains are usually the filler
for the diet and eaten in highly processed states and large quantities.
·
He recommends minimizing corn oil, peanut oil,
and olive oil and doesn’t mention any fats in the recommended foods. Lard is
included in the foods to avoid. Butter isn’t listed but all dairy is listed in
foods to avoid. He encourages eating whatever you want from the approved
category, limiting refined carbs the mentioned vegetable oils and limiting
salmon, tuna and cod. He doesn’t list shell fish.
·
My interpretation of this is to eat as many
vegetables, grains and fruit as I want to, eating very little added oils (dry
salad vs. salad dressing, steamed or raw veggies without added fats, etc.).
This eliminates all of the densely nutritious foods and the foods that are
soothing and soul-satisfying. The diet eliminates most of the fat-soluble
activators. It would affect the body’s ability to absorb and utilize nutrients.
It could cause thyroid damage. And the list goes on! Basically he recommends
eating the diet that Lierre Keith ate while practicing the vegan agenda. This
is flat out wrong!
Conclusion. The biggest problems I have
with his recommendations and this book are:
·
Prior to the invention of supplements, our
ancestors could not have eaten a diet based almost exclusively on plant-based
foods and thrived. They weren’t able to supplement B12 or vitamin D.
·
Banning any foods from a healthy diet that
contain ESSENTIAL nutrients claiming they are bad for human consumption and
cause all the dread diseases of our modern times is downright silly and makes
no scientific sense. How can an entire food category be bad if they are the
only foods containing essential nutrients? It doesn’t make sense no matter if
you believe in intelligent design or evolution. If you believe in intelligent
design – what intelligent “god” would put an essential nutrient in a potential
food and then declare it evil to eat requiring the use of supplements? It
doesn’t make sense in the evolutionary theory either. Evolution is basically a
story of the human race getting better and smarter at what we do. Banning an
entire food source that is the only source of an essential nutrient would mean
disease suffering and death until at least some of the population developed the
ability to live without that nutrient and this could take tens of thousands of
years!
·
If animal foods cause cancer, heart disease,
diabetes, obesity, auto-immune diseases, Alzheimer’s, etc., and our ancestors
ate animal foods (and we have lots of evidence that they did), why are these
diseases only showing up in the last 100 or so years and only now becoming
epidemic in numbers? Why are so many of these diseases unheard of in history?
Why did Dr. Price not find these diseases in populations eating lots of animal
products? There is no evidence to suggest that these types of diseases showed
up or were a major problem in the hunter-gatherer societies or most societies
up until modern times.
·
Finally – Dr. Campbell should know better. He
prides himself on first and foremost being a scientific researcher that is
supposed to question everything and be open to formulating new hypotheses. In
practice he does none of this and openly criticizes other respected
researchers. He has the potential to affect millions of people. I have to
believe that he believes so strongly in his conviction that a vegan/vegetarian
diet is the absolute answer to all of our problems that he can’t see any data
that doesn’t support his belief (as it isn’t a hypothesis to him) and
manipulates data to be able to baptize everyone else into his one-sided
“religion” of the vegan agenda.
(Kroger’s brand to promote organic and so-called healthy junk food products)
(Blessed by Dr. Oz)
(If you get on their website you get a live person trying to communicate with you! Great marketing ploy!)
