Bill Sardi
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 Omega-3 consumption in the western diet has become so low that researchers can't find it in lab sample tissues. A study of men found higher concentrations of omega-3s in blood serum samples taken from healthy males, with lower concentrations taken from men with prostatitis. The lowest rates were found in men with prostate cancer. [Clinical Biochemistry 32: 405-09, 1999]
Fish oil has about 30% omega-3 oil while flaxseed oil has about 60% omega-3 oil. So flax is the only oil that can correct the imbalance in omega-3 & 6 oils in the western diet. |
Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr., M.D.
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 That level represents a significant departure from the 37 percent fat content of the typical western diet, but it is ideal for good health. It provides all the fat you need without giving you the extra doses that wreak such havoc with your heart health.
And this diet will not cause a protein deficiency. Typically, the western diet contains an excess of protein—especially animal protein. The nutrition plan I recommend provides a variety of healthy plant proteins, somewhere between 50 and 70 grams every day. That is entirely adequate for a healthy lifestyle. |
Jonny Bowden, Ph.D., C.N.S.
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 Eating Locally and Healthfully
The idea that the western diet has nothing to do with acne should have been given its walking papers years ago. Back in 1971, O. Schaeffer published a reporting that acne was completely absent in the Inuit (Eskimo) population when they were eating and living in their traditional manner, but as soon as they adopted the Western way of eating, acne showed up. Local physicians in Okinawa prior to World War 11 reported that "These people had no acne vulgaris."
According to one published report, only 2.7 percent of almost 10,000 rural Brazilian school kids have acne. |
Jonny Bowden, Ph.D., C.N.S.
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 Would you like to know what the average person consuming a western diet gets? It's between 20:1 and 25:1. (I've heard some estimates as high as 65:1, but even at the lower number it's completely unhealthy.)
Think I'm being a nervous Nelly about nothing? Consider this: High ratios of omega-6s to omega-3s are associated with increased prostate and breast cancer risk; increased risk of heart disease; and aggravated inflammatory and autoimmune diseases.
In addition, most of our restaurants, in response to the fear of "bad" saturated fat, now cook with "healthy" vegetable oils. And cook. And cook. |
J. Douglas Bremner
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 Studies have consistently shown that rates of heart disease are higher in Western cultures, that heart disease rates go up in countries that adopt western diet and lifestyles, and that modifications of diet reduce heart disease. Some of the differences may not be attributable to diet per se but rather to how food is raised and the industrialization of American agriculture (e.g., the effects of corn-fed vs. pasture-fed animals). |
Tori Hudson, N.D.
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 Observations in large Asian populations, whose diet includes soybeans as a basic food group, show a lower incidence of CVD than in populations who consume a traditional western diet.104
Much research has been done on soy and its relationship to blood pressure, cholesterol, and even some inflammatory biomarkers of cardiovascular disease. In general, the studies are varied, with some showing clear benefit and some not showing any. Perhaps the best evidence comes from a review of 38 scientific studies. |
| But a standard western diet (high in fats, salt, and sugar and low in complex carbohydrates) also lacks essential vitamins and minerals needed during pregnancy and breast-feeding, which can compromise your baby's health.3 The appropriate diet is well balanced and varied and includes fresh fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, beans, and fish, with a limit on refined sugars, processed foods, and saturated fats. Organically grown produce, meats, and poultry are preferable, or inorganic produce that has been carefully washed to remove agricultural chemicals. |
Mehmet C. Oz., M.D. and Michael F. Roizen, M.D.
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 Plus, studies do show lower breast cancer rates among Japanese women who eat traditional diets, which include soy, compared to those who eat a typical western diet. (Other elements of a traditional Japanese diet may also be factors, such as a high intake of fish, vegetables, and tea and a low intake of red meat and dairy products.) The benefits of soy phytoestrogen seem best achieved by societies that have used moderate amounts of these products for generations-rather than Americans forcing down entire tofu forests in a single bound.
Saturated fats cause constriction of arteries after a meal. |
Dr. Steven R. Gundry
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 And, to a large extent, it's our western diet and lifestyle that are making us sick and ultimately killing us-although paradoxically, as you'll soon learn, they suit our genes just fine.
Sadly, as a heart surgeon, I don't see many people like Michelle-at least initially. Many of my patients are severely ill and often prematurely aged. Most are also overweight. |
Jonny Bowden, Ph.D., C.N.S.
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| The problem in the western diet is that we get far too little omega-3 (of any variety) and far too much omega-6. The problem is compounded by the fact that most of the omega-6 we get is crappy. Omega-6s are like foods at the typical Vegas buffet—the wrong kind of food, and there's so darn much of it! |
Dr. Steven R. Gundry
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| Chapter 2
WE ARE WHAT WE EAT
You now understand why the typical western diet is the best thing that's ever happened to your genes, even if it eventually damages your own health. Despite the dramatic changes that have occurred in our diet in the last century, the way we eat today is a mere blink of the eye in human evolution. If you've ever seen photographs of your great grandparents, I'm willing to bet that almost all of them were slim. |
Herbert Ross, DC with Keri Brenner, L.Ac.
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 The typical western diet, with its high levels of dietary fat and low levels of fiber may have a direct influence on testosterone production, according to clinical studies.16 Other foods that have been found detrimental to hormone balance include saturated fats (commonly found in fast foods, processed foods, and red meats), hydrogenated oils, preservatives, and products containing refined sugar.
The minerals zinc, copper, and selenium are necessary for normal hormone production in men. In one study, a group of patients was given 1.4 mg of zinc daily while a second group received 10. |
Dr. Steven R. Gundry
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| If you swap your western diet for one composed exclusively of raw vegetables and juices for even a short period of time, you're likely to experience what natural health practitioners call detox symptoms: headaches, skin rashes, fevers, chills, and lethargy, to name a few. But the real reason you experience these symptoms is not the result of purging your body of built-up toxins. Rather, the symptoms result from a sudden massive exposure to plant toxins, which your liver enzymes can't process fast enough. The detox diet is actually a toxin diet. How do I know this? |
Marshall Editions
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 Medical care must be sought immediately in these cases, and intravenous fluid replacement will be given as well as a diagnosis and treatment of the cause of the dehydration. A western diet is generally high enough in salt for electrolytes to be obtained by eating and sipping water slowly. This fluid intake should be slow, but constant until symptoms of dehydration, such as dark urine, are resolved. In the early stages of dehydration, sports drinks such as Catorade™ can be used.
Oral rehydration solution: These are available over the counter and should be mixed with water as directed. |
Steven V. Joyal
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 These factors, along with the popularity of fast-food restaurants and processed foods that contain vegetable oils, combined to drastically alter the balance between omega-6 and omega-3 in the western diet.
Generally, no more than 10 percent of your calories should come from saturated and trans fat (and your goal should be to minimize the amount of trans fat in your diet as much as possible), and since people with diabetes are at high risk for or
BENEFITS OF DIETARY FATS
Essential fatty acids
?help promote healthy nerve function
? |
Michael Pollan
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 Put simply, we can escape the western diet and its consequences.
This is the burden of the third and last section of In Defense of Food: to propose a couple dozen personal rules of eating that are conducive not only to better health but also to greater pleasure in eating, two goals that turn out to be mutually reinforcing.
These recommendations are a little different from the dietary guidelines you're probably accustomed to. They are not, for example, narrowly prescriptive. I'm not interested in telling you what to have for dinner. |
| It sounds like an elitist club for foodies (which, alas, it sometimes can be), but at its most thoughtful, Slow Food offers a coherent protest against, and alternative to, the western diet and way of eating, indeed to the whole ever-more-desperate Western way of life. Slow Food aims to elevate quality over quantity and believes that doing so depends on cultivating our sense of taste as well as rebuilding the relationships between producers and consumers that the industrialization of our food has destroyed. |
| I'm speaking, of course, of the elephant in the room whenever we discuss diet and health: "the western diet." This is the subject of the second part of the book, in which I follow the story of the most radical change to the way humans eat since the discovery of agriculture. |
Dr. Steven R. Gundry
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| An examination of their eating habits revealed the typical western diet, helped along by huge amounts of "healthy" rice, since Pansy is Asian. Out it went! In went my dietary program and a host of supplements.
In three months, Mark was down 25 pounds, his insulin levels had fallen, and his blood sugar—once 111—was now 95. His HDL had skyrocketed and his blood pressure had returned to normal. Two years later, and another 10 pounds slimmer, Mark demolishes his tennis opponents, which has made me unpopular with them. |
Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr., M.D.
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| A minimal amount of free radicals—those chemical substances' that are so harmful to the body and so prevalent in the typical western diet.
• Many antioxidants, natural compounds that neutralize free radicals and supply generous amounts of natural fiber. (Fiber has two great benefits: it is essential to health, and also helps fill you up.)
If you have heart disease—or if you never want to develop it— it is critical to grasp these absolute rules:
The rules
1. Do not eat meat.
2. Do not eat chicken, even white meat.
3. Do not eat fish.
4. Do not eat any dairy products. |
Bill Sardi
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| Therefore, researchers are describing resveratrol as a "promising anti-cancer agent for both hormone-dependent (estrogen positive) and hormone-independent (estrogen negative) breast cancers," and it may counter the undesirable effects of the western diet which is rich in these cancer-promoting oils. [Journal Cancer Research Clinical Oncology 127: 258-64, 2001]
Resveratrol and other antioxidants like quercetin found in red wine work at very low concentrations to inhibit breast cancer. |
| So flax is the only oil that can correct the imbalance in omega-3 & 6 oils in the western diet. Furthermore, flax contains lignans, weak plant estrogen-like molecules (about 1/1000th the potency of estrogen), which further inhibits prostate cancer.
However, men hear the "bad fats, good fats" story and think that the more olive oil and fish oil they consume, the healthier they will be. Oils should be used in moderation, cooking oils especially. Monosaturated-oils (omega-9s) such as olive oil, have also been found to reduce prostate cancer risk. |
| When these same researchers gave a typical western diet (low in vitamin D, low in calcium, low in folic acid and high in fat) to rodents, this diet led to the formation of precancerous cells and eventually colon tumors without any exposure to a carcinogen! [Carcinogenesis 22: 1871-75, 2001]
The new discovery that vitamin D production in the colon is regulated by calcium and folic acid is of great interest. Optimal nutrition, achieved via a multivitamin, would decrease the enzymatic degradation of vitamin D in the colon and enhance the ability of cells to produce vitamin D. |
Thomson Healthcare, Inc.
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 The safe upper range of iron intake is difficult to specify due to the complexity of the western diet and iron physiology (Lynch et al 1996).
The best dietary sources of iron are green vegetables, legumes, and meat. Much of the iron ingested in the American diet in the form of enriched breads and cereals is not well absorbed. The average dietary intake of iron in the United States ranges from 10 to 20 mg daily. Some individuals, including adolescents and pregnant and lactating women, may be at risk for iron deficiency. |
Jonny Bowden, Ph.D., C.N.S.
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| The take-away message is that the processed foods that are rampant in the western diet create a hormonal situation that is likely to seriously aggravate acne or even, in some cases, actually cause it.
Pomegranate Juice for the Heart ... and More
THE POMEGRANATE HAS always been associated with love and erotica. Just look at it—it's beautiful, purple, luscious, and sensual. In Turkey, brides throw the fruit to the ground and believe that the number of seeds that pop out predicts how many children they're going to have. The ancients connected the fruit with procreation and abundance. |
Donna Jackson Nakazawa
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 Even for people who are not ill, eating a western diet high in carbohydrates, fats, and sugary foods causes the balance of microflora in the gut to change dramatically, creating an overgrowth of bad bacteria and yeast, says Mullin. This directly damages the intestinal wall. To understand how this happens, consider the carefully interconnected parts of the intestine. The human bowel is lined with millions of projections called villi that facilitate the efficient absorption of nutrients. |
Dr. Sharon Moalem
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 And when that thrifty metabolism is combined with a typical western diet, the likelihood of that baby growing up to be a fat child dramatically increases.)
The lead scientist on the study, Marcus Pembrey, a British geneticist, believes this proves the existence of paternal effects in addition to maternal effects. He called this "proof of principle. The sperm have captured information about the ancestral environment, and this is modifying the development and health of subsequent generations."
This lends a whole new meaning to sons paying for the sins of their fathers. |
Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr., M.D.
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| Although they have been advising us for well over a decade that dairy products, oil, and animal fat are bad for us, and although it becomes clearer with every passing year that vascular disease, cancer, and other illnesses are the direct result of the toxic western diet, these organizations just cannot bring themselves to radically change nutritional recommendations. |
Michael Pollan
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| These changes have given us the western diet that we take for granted: lots of processed foods and meat, lots of added fat and sugar, lots of everything—except vegetables, fruits, and whole grains.
That such a diet makes people sick and fat we have known for a long time. |
Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr., M.D.
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| The first step is to educate the public, teaching the truth about what we know about nutrition and the ravages of the traditional western diet.
In my fantasies, for instance, I imagine a widespread use of the brachial artery tourniquet test (BART), which Dr. Robert Vogel used to such devastating effect to prove the vascular damage a single meal can cause. If public schools were forced to serve only meals that are BART-positive (i.e. |
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