Re: Diet and Disease...Animals, Plants, Humans...
Steve Hall (sgh1@cornell.edu)
Thu, 19 Dec 1996 17:09:21 -0500
Hi Dan and list:
Regarding diet and health, it is true that lots of "little" studies
have been done, but very few "big" ones have - i.e. studies that look at
lots of people, lots of diseases, different eating and living habits, and
link all these factors together over a long period of time to really make
some sense of all the confusion. To be honest, it is challenging to try to
draw correct answers from the limited data available most places. There are
certainly many (usually very poor) places in the world where millions
(hundreds of millions, by some estimates!) of people are suffering from
malnutrition diseases - sometimes lack of protein or a particular nutrient,
more often simply lack of calories (i.e. starvation!). This is one end of
the problem. It is, however, abundantly clear that there are serious
diseases related to TOO MUCH of some things (like fat, often associated with
heavy animal product consumption) in many of the richer areas and countries.
[I will let someone else get into the social aspects of food distribution,
population, etc...]
One really impressive study I am aware of was directed by Prof.
Colin Campbell at Cornell University, and studied many thousand people over
many years, and showed some useful info. In short, our "low fat" diet at
30%, can and does contribute to many diseases, including diverse cancers and
heart/lung/internal organ diseases. Campbell found a negative correlation
of fat with disease down to 6% (basically almost vegan!) fat in the diet,
with several of our "developed country" (or "rich country?") diseases. This
suggests that, from a health point of view, we might do well to radically
alter our diets, cutting back perhaps 90% on meat intake, and increasing
intake of vegetables, pulses (beans) and grains, while maintaining
sufficient vitamin,protein and other nutrient intake. [we might also note
that reducing meat consumption could also reduce some of the ecological,
social and animal rights problems recently discussed on the list;
personally, I still eat some meat and milk, but far less than I once did]
You can find out more at his web site:
http://www.ch.planet.gen.nz/~mcspot/media/reports/campbell_china2.html
Enjoy! And thanks for some good discussions!
Steve
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Steven G. Hall, P.E.
Natural Resource Engineer
Biological Systems Control Engineer
Sustainable Agriculturalist
Local and Global Ecological Engineer
Experiential, Environmental and Outdoor Educator
College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, ABEN
Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853
telephone:(607)256-5408 fax: (607)255-4080
e-mail: sgh1@cornell.edu
web site: http://caep.aben.cornell.edu/sghhome.htm
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