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achievable goal for everyone. To learn more, please visit our website at aging.ucsd.edu. [MUSIC] Good evening, everyone
and welcome to the UC San Diego Center for Healthy Aging Public
Lecture event. For those of you who I haven't had the chance to meet yet, my name is Danielle Glorioso, and I'm the Executive Director of the Stein Institute
for Research on Aging and the Center for Healthy Aging.
I'm just so delighted to see such a lovely turnout
tonight for our talk. We're really excited about it. For those of you
who are new to us, the Center for
Healthy Aging focuses on advancing lifelong health and well-being through
community outreach, training, and research. I know many of you have
been to our lectures before and know that these
lecture series have been going on for over 25 years now with the idea that we want to get exciting advances that are happening in the field of
aging out to the community.
These lectures have been
going on for 25 years now, free to the community and are sponsored entirely
through donations. I'd like to take a
moment to thank all of you for supporting these
lectures over the years because we wouldn't
still be here doing this exciting work and connecting with the
community without your help. I'd also like to note
that this lecture tonight is sponsored
by GreatCall. GreatCall is a San
Diego company and a leading provider
for easy to use technology for active aging. They've been wonderful supporters of the work we're
doing and we're very grateful that we can have this talk tonight
because of them. I'd like to go ahead and
introduce our speaker tonight.
We're so thrilled to have Dr. Katherine Richman or Meg Richman. She's a radiologist
here at UC San Diego, and she has been serving
as Medical Director of radiology at Thornton
hospital since 1999. She completed all of her
training here at UCSD, starting from medical school all the way through fellowship. She's a body imager
performing CTs, ultrasounds and
fluoroscopic studies, specializing in procedures
to assess a women for infertility and
gynecological issues. Today, she joins us to discuss the impact of nutrition
on our health. Please join me in
welcoming Dr. Meg Richman. [APPLAUSE] Thank you, Danielle, and thank you all for coming this evening. I really appreciate it. Let's talk about what we eat and how it impacts our
health. Are you excited? Yes.
Great. I'd like to
start with a quiz. Make sure you're all
awake and excited about this information. Dr. Campbell, I
heard you rumbling that you've already
read the China Study, but as you remember in the book, he's looking at rats
with liver cancer. He fed them 20 percent
protein or 5 percent protein, and what happened
to the rats then? What's going on in Norway
during World War II? What is being depicted
in this graph? We're going to talk about that. How to have a good time, eat blank to power
your sexual life. Even if it seems hard at times, we'll find out what that is. In terms of osteoporosis, we're looking at
various countries. Calcium intake here, let me
use the other pointer, sorry. Calcium intake on the bottom here and hip fracture right here. You'll see that these
countries here have very high calcium intake but also very high hip fracture rate. These two countries here, very little calcium intake but very low hip fracture rate. What are those countries? G-bombs, Dr.
Fuhrman
refers to G-bombs. What are they? Why
are they important? What is even more
disturbing and what virtually no one
recognizes is that blank is killing our brains to physically shriveling them. Two different brains here. Which one do you want? [LAUGHTER] Let's get started. We're going to be
talking about healthy, nutrient, wealthy and wise. We're going to
start with healthy, and we're going to begin
talking about cancer.
There are three stages to cancer. The first is initiation. I hate to say, but
every single one of us in this room is
making cancer cells. It's just what we do. The next stage is promotion. Initiation is like
you make seeds, and then the promotion face is where do you put those seeds? Do you throw them on a carpeted floor like here so they can't grow or do you put them on soil and give them miracle grow. Do you allow that cancer to grow? Then the third stage
is progression where the cancer just
grows like wildfire. Dr. Campbell here wrote
the book that China Study, Cornell Nutritional Biochemist. How did he get involved
with all this? It started in the 1960s. He was looking at malnutrition
in the Philippines.
He was involved with
something called the Mother Craft project. The whole point of the project
was to cure malnutrition, and how are they
going to do that? They were going to
increase protein. When he got to the
Philippines, he was shocked. Hepatitis B is endemic there, but the poor, he found
no liver cancer. Yet in the rich, even in kids as young
as four years of age, they were getting liver cancer. Four years of age
getting liver cancer. How is that possible? Well, he noted that the
rich were the only ones who could afford
the animal protein. Now, this didn't make
sense to him because then liver cancer was
previously thought to be a protein deficiency problem. In fact, that was the whole point of the Mother Craft project was to cure malnutrition by increasing
protein consumption. How could protein consumption
be related to cancer? He'd knew that aflatoxin, which is the most
powerful carcinogen, was very high in the Philippines and he
thought maybe that's why. He also had heard of this
obscure study in India. The rats with liver cancer, some are fed 20 percent
protein levels, others 5 percent protein levels.
What happened? They also gave them aflatoxin, that carcinogen. These rats got liver cancer, all the white dots you see, these rats did not
know liver cancer. One of Dr. Campbell's
colleagues said, "Oh, they must have mislabeled
the cages because then, [LAUGHTER] yeah, then as now, everyone believes protein,
protein, protein." Dr. Campbell start
thinking about what is the role of protein
in tumor genesis, meaning the growth of cancer. The rats study in
India cancer only developed in those with
high protein intake. The Mother Craft project, only those with diets higher
in protein got cancer. How could this be? He started doing some investigations
in his lab. He started studying
what happened as he brought protein levels
down to five percent.
You have to understand
that aflatoxin by itself is not dangerous. It becomes dangerous when acted on by this mixed
function oxidase, NFO, makes aflatoxin the
dangerous metabolite. What Dr. Campbell found
was as he lowered protein, he found lower levels of
NFO, and did this matter? Yes, lower protein levels meant fewer mutations of the DNA. What else did he find happened as he lowered the protein levels? Less aflatoxin entered the cells. The cells multiplied more slowly. The NFO, that enzyme, the ability decreased and
the amount decreased, and all of this collectively
lead to fewer DNA mutations. Then Dr. Campbell started
to do another study. He looked at actual cancer foci. Meaning he looked under
the microscope and he looked for little
cells of cancer, and he found that those fed the 20 percent protein
had many cancer foci. But the one fed 5 percent, very few cancer foci, and he thought, well,
that's interesting. Then he thought,
now which is more important, toxins or protein? He did another study. The 20 percent rats got
off easy, no aflatoxin.
The 5 percent rats got
whopping doses of aflatoxin, and what happened?
Nothing changed. Lots of cancer foci here, very few despite
all the aflatoxin. Many more foci here. Then he made the study
even more complicated. For three weeks, the rats had
a 5 percent protein diet, then he switched them to 20 percent protein.
What happened? The cancer foci grew. Then after three
weeks at 20 percent, he flipped them back to 5 percent diet,
and what happened? The cancer foci went away. When he flipped them again, the cancer foci came back. When he flipped them
back to 5 percent, the cancer foci went away.
What he said was
foci growth could be reversed up or down by switching the amount
of protein for all stages of cancer development. I hope you now notice, so that means we have good
memory for bad nutrition. The body can remember
early carcinogen insults and cancer can be reawakened
by bad nutrition later. He also noticed that the Dose
Response Curve disappears. What do we mean by
Dose Response curve? Those fed the high-protein diet had a Dose Response Curve. As he increased aflatoxin, he got more cancer. More aflatoxin, more cancer. That's what you expect for
a Dose Response Curve. But for the rats in
the low-protein diet, he could give him as much
aflatoxin as he wanted and they didn't bump
the cancer foci number. Remember his question was, which one's more important,
toxins or proteins? What does this show us? This shows us that low protein could override the
effects of carcinogens, so protein more important
than carcinogens. You'll say that's
tiny cancer foci. What about actual
tumor development? Dr.
Campbell did that. He was looking for gross tumors, stuff that you
could actually see. The 20 percent rats,
they all died. The five percent
fed rats were fine. In fact, he mentioned
that they were alive and active with
sleek hair coats. I don't know what that
means, but it sounded good. Then he repeated the study again. The five percent protein
rats got lots of aflatoxin, didn't make any difference. These rats died. These rats were fine
despite the aflatoxin. So still alive. He said, "Like flipping a light
switch off and on, we could control cancer promotion merely by changing the
levels of protein, regardless of initial
exposure to a carcinogen." What about other cancers? Not Dr.
Campbell, a different group at the
University of Chicago, they looked at breast
cancer in rats. They use two different
carcinogens, these here. They did a similar
study looking at 20 percent protein versus five percent protein
and what did they find? Just like Dr. Campbell, they found that these rats died, and these rats were fine. They noticed that as they
increase the amount of protein, they were using casein, that promoted breast
cancer development. Back to Dr. Campbell. He started looking
at other cancers, including pancreatic cancer. He repeated it again. The five percent got
lots of aflatoxin, the 20 percent did
not. Same results. These ones died,
these ones didn't. Why am I personally very interested in this one
about pancreatic cancer? Because of my dad.
Here's my mom and dad. My dad fought in World War II, he did not smoke and
he did not drink, but he ate the terrible
American diets.
He had multiple strokes and
multiple heart attacks, but he finally died
of pancreatic cancer. Because he had pancreatic cancer, I'm at increased risk, and so anything I can do to reduce my risk makes me happy. Before you say, well,
I'm just going to lower protein in my diet. Let's ask what protein was being used in
all these studies? The answer is milk protein. It was casein, milk protein. Then Dr. Campbell said, "Well, is the problem protein, or is the problem where
you get the protein from?" He repeated the studies. This one looking at breast
cancer, he used wheat. Guess what? Those rats were fine.
It wasn't the level of protein, it was the type of protein. He tested a whole bunch
of plant-based proteins. In this one looking
at liver cancer, he used soy. Guess what? Those rats were fine. It's not the protein,
it's the type of protein. Now, he had strong evidence. Two different organs,
liver and breast, four different carcinogens,
two different species, he was looking at mice and rats; casein, milk protein
promotes cancer growth. It affects the way the
carcinogens interact with DNA, and affects the way
the cancer cells grow. In terms of tumor
genesis, growth of tumor, he tested a whole variety of
things and what did he find? Nutrients from
animal-based foods, increased tumor development,
while nutrients from plant-based foods decreased
tumor development.
Very striking. Guess what? I used to eat this all the time. Not anymore. Casein one is the most
relevant cancer promoter ever discovered. Now, you may be saying,
"That's in rats, why do I care? Who
cares about rats?" Well, why is this relevant? Rats and humans have
the same protein need, protein operates the
same way in both. The level of protein that causes cancer is the same
for both and in both, the promotion stage is far more important than
the initiation stage. Meaning that it's
not just you make a cancer cell, what
do you do with it? Do you allow that
cancer cell to grow? What he said is "These,
and many other studies, showed nutrition to be far
more important in controlling cancer promotion than the dose of the initiating carcinogen." What about in human populations? Do we see the same results? What was The China Study? That's the name of his book, it's a monumental survey
looking at death rates of 12 different cancers in
2400 Chinese counties, 880 million Chinese, 96
percent of the population, that's a huge study.
Eighty-seven percent of them were the same ethnic group,
the Han people, so we couldn't say it was genetic variability that
led to the results. The New York Times called this the "Grand Prix of
epidemiologic studies." Which cancer should they find were most responsive to diet? The three most responsive, breast, prostate and colon, but also lymphoma, liver, lung, brain, and esophageal.
What did they find? As the amount of animal
foods increased, so did the rate of cancer. Even for small amounts
of animal food, you have to understand
the Chinese on average, eat a whole lot less meat
than we do in the States. Most cancers occurred in direct proportion to the quantity of animal foods consumed, meaning you eat more
animal products, you get more cancer.
More animal products,
more cancer. Now, you may be saying
denial, don't believe it. Guess what? Denial is a
uniquely human trait. Dr. Varkey here at UCSD
has found this out. He was very interested in
evolution and he was trying to decide why did we humans beat out all the other
super smart species? Why did we humans beat out
all the other hominids? You might think that
your neighbor or your boss is a Neanderthal, but actually there
are no Neanderthals. We beat out everything else. In his book, he's
talking about how that ability to deny
some aspects of reality, what allowed us to evolve. Then in the middle of this
book I find this paragraph. He's a molecular
biologist here at UCSD. "In my own lab, I
study the mechanism by which the eating of
red meat, beef, pork, and lamb results in the well-known increase
of heart attacks, cancer, and early death." This is a slide Dr.
Varkey gave me. Red meat and milk products have glycolylneuraminic acid
that when we ingest it, it goes into our endothelium
and our epithelium, and causes cancer
and heart disease.
Now before you jump to say, "Oh, great. I just won't eat
these, wait just a minute." But going on within his
book, I found this, "Seventy percent of the
group in his lab had been moderate to heavy red meat eaters prior to joining the group. All understood both the epidemiologic
and molecular information and fully agreed with
the nature of the risk. Despite this, only a third had significantly reduced
their meat intake, and only one person
had quit altogether." This is a photo he
gave me his lab.
Look, they're all eating meat. This guy has got a meat mustache. [LAUGHTER] In fact, the meat consumption
has actually gone up in his lab 90 percent, even though they know
it's bad for them. This is what he says, "Denial of mortality is also part of a much broader concept about other human ability to deny many other aspects of reality, especially, when such realities
are not to our liking. For example, we smoke cigarettes, eat unhealthy foods, don't watch our weight,
and don't exercise, despite our full awareness that these habits are a prescription
for an early death." Who else was in denial? That's me with my husband. That's 2007 before
we were plant-based. I look awful. You can say it. It's okay. I look terrible before
going plant-based. [LAUGHTER] I'm fat, I'm pudgy, my skin looks yellow,
it's terrible. My husband's fat,
it's just terrible. [LAUGHTER] Yeah. It's okay. You can say it. [LAUGHTER] We started dating in 2007 and many people laugh at this, I'm
not quite sure why.
But anyway, when
we started dating, he says, "You shouldn't
be dating me. I'll be dead in a year." He was told that if he didn't
get a liver transplant, he would be dead in a year because of his liver condition. He was having monthly or
weekly shaking chills and fevers to 104. It took quite a while
before he ever went to see a doctor and you might be going, "Well, that's stupid.
Why didn't he go to
a doctor earlier?" Finally, a tick
bite got him to go. Why didn't he go earlier? Because he grew up on
a ranch in Wyoming and cowboys don't go
to see the doctor. Come on. He waited a long time, but he finally went because he thought he had Lyme's disease. Turns out his liver
function tests were 12 times higher than normal. They tested him up the
yin-yang, no Lyme's disease, no viral hepatitis, normal
iron, normal copper. For any docs in the audience, he has Alpha 1 Antitrypsin
trips and which attacks the lungs and the liver.
A genetic liver disorder, that's what was
attacking his liver. Because he grew up on a ranch, he ate meat three times a day. Grand Slam at Denny's, all the meat you can
eat, he loved meat. He thought this whole being plant-based was a
bunch of hogwash. I said, "Okay, let's
do a study on you. We're going to do 12 days
of a plant-based diet. I'm going to test
your cholesterol day one and I'm going
to test it day 12." His cholesterol one from
199 to 163 in 12 days. More impressive, his
liver function tests were three times normal, became normal for the first time since he knew he was sick.
He's now plant-based and
gone are the chills, gone are the fevers. You know those commercials
where the food smacks the person, I don't even have to yell at him. Because if he cheats, his own body says no, I don't want that
bad food anymore. He's plant-based too. This was the most powerful
information to help him see the impact
on his own body. Now, you might be saying is
red meat the only problem? That's great, I'll just
get rid of red meat. Wait just a second. In
this study, 32,000 adults, if they avoided red
but ate white meat, more than 300 percent increase
incidents of colon cancer. Now, notice eating beans, peas, and lentils at least twice
a week halved that risk.
So 50 percent lower risk than
never eating those foods, so eat your beans. But even better, don't eat this. Can a vegan diet
really help humans? Yes. Dr. Dean Ornish did a study with UCSF looking at men, 93 men with early
prostate cancer. The study group did a vegan diet, moderate exercise,
yoga, and relaxation. After one year, the study group had lower PSA only
by four percent, but those in the control
group rose by six percent. None of the men needed
additional therapy, whereas six of men in
the control group did. Interestingly, when they
drew their blood and put it on prostate
cancer cells in the lab, it inhibited the prostate
cancer cells.
Remarkable. This is what he said, "This is the first randomized
trial showing progression of
prostate cancer can be stopped or perhaps even reversed by changing diet
and lifestyle alone." Are there any other studies showing that a vegan
diet can help? Yes, one population studied
probably the longest. The Seventh Day Adventists
a bunch in Lama Linda, just about two hours from here. In this 12-year study, you have to understand that
many Adventists are vegan, but there's also vegetarians
and meat eaters. They're encouraged
to the plant-based, that they don't have
to be plant-based. Within the study,
they were looking at vegans to modest meat eaters. Vegan females on
average were living nine years longer than
average Californians.
Whereas men nine and
half years longer than average Californians
and those who ate nuts and seeds
lived the longest, slightly more than near vegans. Again, have we seen
that a plant-based diet nutritionally in populations has been shown to be beneficial? Yes. Okay. Let's switch from
cancer to heart disease. I showed you this is
part of the quiz. What was going on in
Norway during this time? This is looking at heart
attacks. What happened? The Germans came in and took all of the livestock so
they didn't have their milk, their butter, their
cheese, or their meat.
Look what happened. They Plummeted the
amount of heart attacks. What happened when
the war finished? They got their livestock back. What else did they get
back? The heart attacks. To me, this is some of the
strongest evidence that what we eat absolutely
affects our health. Who wants an artery like this? You don't want all
this black in here, and look how it's
narrowing the vessel. Dr. Esselstyn is an endocrine surgeon
at Cleveland Clinic. He wrote this book, Prevent
and Reverse Heart Disease. Plant-based but also no oils for people with very
severe heart disease. This is the program
and the doctor with whom Bill Clinton worked
to get his health back. I'll show you the cardiac NGO, one of the anesthesiologists and Dr. Esselstyn
stones Hospital. He was 49, exercise all the
time, had a heart attack, was told you can
see the narrowing here and he was told he needed stance or a heart open
heart surgery.
He refused. He knew about Dr.
Esselstyn and his plans, so he went on the plan and you can see within two years he completely reversed the plaque and has a normal
appearing artery. This has been shown time
and time again with Dr. Esselstyn patient's, Dr.
Furnishes patient's. When you are plant-based
and very low fat, you can absolutely reverse
plaque along vessels. This is a quote from the doctor heading the Framingham
Heart Study. We tend to scoff at vegetarians, but they're doing much
better than we are. Vegans have cholesterol
levels so low, they almost never
get heart attacks. We've never seen anyone in
the Framingham study have a heart attack with
a level below a 150. We're going to talk
briefly about Gary. Gary had three heart
attacks by the time he was 52, worked
out all the time. In fact, he had a heart
attack and dropped dead while on the
treadmill at the gym.
Luckily, the fire station
was literally next door. They came over and
resuscitated him. He had tremendously
high cholesterol. He was given the statins. He had tremendous muscle pains so he couldn't take them anymore. He was then put on niacin. He had an anaphylactic reaction. That's a life-threatening
allergic reaction, so he couldn't take the niacin, and his cardiologist said there's nothing else
I can do for you. One of these days you're
just going to drop dead. Gary was very depressed
and despondent. His wife works with us. She's one of the stenographers. I gave her a copy of
Forks Over Knives. They watched it
together and Gary said, "Hey, wait, there's
something I can do about my life and about my health." He gave up all meat
and all dairies, but a little bit of salmon, he has a little bit of
salmon now and then. He gave up all carbohydrates, meaning the bad carbs, the pasta, the breads, the donuts, that kind of thing. He feels and looks great. His cholesterol was normal and his lipoprotein
profile is normal. Instead of the bad B kind, he's now converted his
lipoprotein to A.
It's great. I like to joke that there's now only one carnivore
in this picture. That's over here.
Dr. Kim Williams is now the president of the American College
of Cardiology. He became plant-based in 2003. Why? Because he had a
patient who had elevated cholesterol and he told her, "You got to go on
statins," and she refused. She said, "Absolutely not." She became plant-based and he saw in front of his eyes
and she cured herself. Then he tested himself and said, "Oh my goodness, I have
elevated cholesterol. He said, "Well, I
know what to do now." He did what his patient did
and he became plant base. It's great and he's been
feeling great ever since. Now, we're going to
switch gears again and talk about erectile dysfunction.
What is the number one cause of erectile dysfunction
in the United States? If you listen to too much TV, you're going to go
with low testosterone. What are some other things? Psychological issues,
obesity, prostate issues, improper nutrition,
low testosterone, diabetes, trauma,
and heart disease. What is the number one cost? Don't listen to the TV ads. It's improper nutrition. This is a busy slide,
but bear with me.
Okay. The erectile dysfunction really is the canary
in the coal mine. In this study, what they
did is they looked at men having a variety of problems, Angina which means chest pain, MI, which means heart attack, chest pain or heart attack
stroke, heart failure. TIA is a mini stroke, arrhythmia, first
cardiovascular event or death of any cause. They asked how many
of these men had erectile dysfunction before
they had their event. Here are the numbers,
the percentages, whopping percentages. In fact, nine different
studies with 3800 men, 78-88 percent, the
vast majority had erectile dysfunction
before the event or their sudden death.
If you know anyone with
erectile dysfunction, their body is saying
please help me. My arteries are having difficulty please
fix my endothelium, because if they're having
erectile dysfunction they're incredibly high risk of
having some kind of an event. We want to stop it when they had the erectile dysfunction
and not let them go on. In fact, there's even a free book on Amazon Diet And Impotence, how your food choices
are either causing or preventing erectile
dysfunction and infertility. If you want to have a good
time, what do you need? Well, you have to have
an intact endothelium. That's the lining of the artery, smooth muscle nerves and you
got to have nitric oxide, that's dynamite that
gets everything going. What do you want to eat
to get the nitric oxide? This is a photo from
what the planet eats. Anyone think this is
an American table? No, look at all these
lovely veggies and fruits.
Yeah, so this is great
for nitric oxide. But look at the
photo they took of the typical American Table. I defy you go ahead, find a veggie and
a fruit in there. There's a grape and a tomato, but other than that,
it's pizza, meat, meat, meat, meat,
processed foods, dairy. Is this going to give
you the cascade you want to cure erectile
dysfunction? This is the cause of it.
In fact, this doctor,
this cardiologist, he prescribes a vegan
diet to improve sex life. He says outside the need
for emergency surgery, I've never seen anything
come close to the breadth and depth of benefits that a
plant-based diet provides, says cardiologists
Dr. Robert Ostfeld, Yale- & Harvard-trained who runs the Cardiac Wellness Program at Montefiore Medical Center. What foods are packed
with a nitrates and the antioxidants that make them rush to convert to nitric oxide, arugula, rhubarb,
kale, swiss chard, spinach, bok choy, and beats
are at the top of the list.
Finish your diet off with grapes, pomegranates, apples
and green tea, and you have a dynamite
erotic potion that will supercharge your endothelium both in your groin and in your heart. Over 400 years ago,
Thomas Sydenham said, "A man is as old
as his arteries," so you don't want old arteries. "Eat plants to
protect your brain, eat plants to protect your heart, but also eat plants to power your sexual life even if
it seems hard at times. What may seem hard
will keep you hard." [LAUGHTER] Now that's
a great quote. You got to love that.
That's a great quote. We're going to switch gears again and talk about osteoporosis.
Is osteoporosis a big problem? Yes, 50 percent of women and 25 percent of men over
50 will have a fracture. Worldwide, almost nine
million fractures annually with a fracture
occurring every three seconds. I showed you this as
part of the quiz. These countries here have
very high calcium intake, but also very high
hip fracture rate. What countries are
we talking about? The United States, New Zealand, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. You think, how is
that possible that we have whopping dairy intake here? But what are the other countries
that you see down here? Hong Kong and Singapore, they're lactose intolerant
are very little dairy intake. Despite what you hear in
the news and the ads, hip fracture rates
are actually highest in the countries with the
highest dairy intake. We're brainwashed to drink
your milk for strong bones. That's the furthest
thing from the truth.
When you see all
these ads, Got Milk? You don't want to read the ad. What she really is
trying to say is yes, almond milk or oatmeal milk
or hemp milk, not cow's milk. You may be saying, why
doesn't milk have calcium? Yes, it does, but what happens? The standard American
diet causes much of the consumed calcium to
be lost in the urine. Excess salt, caffeine, sugar, and animal products
leach calcium out of the bones and promote
urinary calcium loss. You ingest it and
then you lose it, and you lose even more. In contrast, vegetables,
beans, fruits, nuts, and seeds are rich
sources of calcium and other important
minerals and do not promote the urinary
excretion of calcium. Which foods are high in calcium? Romaine, lettuce, bok choy, sesame seeds, broccoli,
kale, garbanzo beans.
The list goes on and on. Your body will absorb some 50 percent of the
calcium and veggies, but only a third of
the calcium and milk. Then because of the
cascade of events, you actually lose the
calcium from your bones. If you want to
treat osteoporosis, you want to eat
plant-based foods. How about diabetes? Dr. Barnard has studied
this extensively. He's found time and again that
a low-fat plant-based diet leads to significant
weight loss and dramatic improvement
in blood sugar, plasma lipids, and
blood pressure. He says, all of this occurs in the absence of any
limits on carbohydrates, calories, or portion sizes.
Let me say that again. This is not weight watchers
where people have to weigh their staff and they
eat tiny little meals.
All of this benefit occurs in the absence of any
limit on carbohydrates, calories, or portion sizes. If the food is good for you, you can eat as much as you want and still get
these benefits. He says, in our studies
and many others, people with diabetes,
weight problems, lipid disorders, and
other conditions discover the power of
throwing out meat, cheese, and other animal products, as they replace them with
healthy beans, grains, vegetables and fruits,
weight melts away, blood sugars fall and the
need for medications drop. For most people, hypertension, diabetes, high cholesterol
goes away within days.
What about auto-immune disorders? There's a whole host of
auto-immune disorders. This includes multiple
sclerosis, Crohn's disease, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, what are they all have in common? They're all auto-immune
disorders. Guess what? They all respond beautifully
to a plant-based diet. This is a woman I met. This is before I met her, she has sarcoid, which is one of the
autoimmune disorders. She had so much pain, had eight out of 10 pain daily, never left her house, was on all pain medications. Then she became plant-based. Look at her on a
plant-based diet. She's glowing, she's thinner, she's active, she's living
life to her fullest. She became plant-based, got
off all of her medications including her inhalers,
and is pain-free.
What about her eyes? [LAUGHTER] Macular degeneration. Is this a serious problem? Yes, it's the leading cause of blindness for folks over 65. The damage is caused by
excess free radicals. If you think about a fireplace, the little sparks coming
out of the fireplace, that's like a free radical. If it lets it go out, it could start a
fire, so we don't want those little
sparks going out. The damage to the macular
is from the free radicals. What they found in this study was 88 percent less
macular degeneration people eating greens
five times a week. When the folks said, "I don't
want to eat the greens, I'm going to do the
supplements instead." Vitamin C, vitamin
E or vitamin A, they found it was of no use.
You've got to eat the veggies. If you want carotenoids. Higher carotenoids, lower
rate of macular degeneration. You want to eat green
leafy veggies, carrots, and citrus. What about cataracts? I thought you just get
older, you get cataracts. No. Instead of the blurry vision, what they found is, is
this a big problem? Yes, 20 million Americans
over 40 have cataracts. Damage caused by what? Excess free radicals.
This is a common thing. Free radicals are bad
throughout our body. They cause inflammation
and they cause disease. What they found is that lutein is the main component in
our lens of the eye. It's also the antioxidant in spinach and the dark
leafy green veggies. What happens when you eat a lot of dark green leafy veggies? What they found is the
folks in this study, this Wisconsin study, the
highest lutein consumption, half the rate of cataracts, and those with the highest
spinach consumption, 40 percent fewer cataracts.
Yay, so eat our spinach. What about dementia? We're going to talk
about this more in the last segment of the talk. But just briefly, Alzheimer's, 1 in 5 over 70 will have
cognitive impairment. Half of folks with
cognitive impairment will develop dementia
in five years. About 20 percent of
Alzheimer's cases are attributed to elevated
homocysteine. Homocysteine is a
byproduct of methionine. Where do you get the methionine? From animal products. The brain uses B12, B6, and folate to get rid
of the homocysteine. But 96 percent of Americans don't eat enough greens and beans
to have enough folate. Which side of the
brain do you want? If you're eating this, you're heading towards this. If you want to keep this, you want to eat these, the beans and the greens. In fact, one study put folks on a plant-based diet for just
one week, just one week.
In one week alone, they saw homocysteine drop by 20 percent. Boom, one week, 20 percent drop. That's remarkable. Just think if you were plant-based
all the time. Let's switch to the
second part of our talk, which is talking about nutrients. Let's be nutrient wealthy. There's the good and the bad. If you want to be plant-based, you have to have B12. You must take a B12 supplement, absolutely key to take
a B12 supplement.
Also important to check
your vitamin D levels. You want calcium but you want it naturally through your food. Folate, not folic acid. Resveratrol and there's a lot of information also coming
out on probiotics. In terms of the bad, you do not want folic acid. Yes, you want folate,
but not folic acid. If you're on a
multivitamin check, most multivitamins have folic
acid rather than folate. You can find ones
with folate instead. You do not want vitamin
A, Beta carotene, vitamin E, selenium,
iron, copper, or salt. What they found is
supplements are not just neutral, and many times,
when you take supplements, these kinds of supplements, they actually can increase
your risk of death. What are the good nutrients? Free radicals again,
we've talked a little bit about free radicals
with Dr. Fuhrman has found is that
animal-based foods lack antioxidant shields and tend to activate free radical
production and cell damage. While plant-based foods with their abundant antioxidants
tend to prevent such damage. What should we be eating? He calls them G-bombs, and we need to eat
them every day. Greens, berries, onions,
mushrooms, beans, and seeds.
Within seeds, he includes nuts. G-bombs. When he looked at
206 epidemiologic studies, the consumption of raw greens was the most consistent and
powerful association with reduction of cancers of all
types including stomach, pancreas, colon, and breast. You really want to become friends with the
cruciferous vegetables. Kale, broccoli,
cabbage, cauliflower, watercress, bok choy. These guys rock. Why? When you increase your regular veggie
consumption 20 percent, you decrease your
cancer risk 20 percent. But when you increase
your cruciferous vegetable intake 20 percent, you decrease your
cancer risk 40 percent. It's twice the bang for the buck. What about mushrooms? These guys think of them as the Arnold Schwarzenegger
terminator for cancer cells. These guys rock. Why? They enhance natural killer T cell function,
getting rid of cancer. They prevent DNA damage. They slow tumor growth. They cause programmed
cancer cell death. They prevent angiogenesis,
meaning cancer needs to have a blood supply so it chokes off the blood supply
to the cancer. This has been shown for breast, prostate, colon,
and other cancers. It helps dendritic cells, think of them as
spindly things that catch cancer cells and microbes. It helps prevent the
decline in the number of dendritic cells that
we see with aging.
This next one I
particularly like, it helped stop the
growth of fat cells. Yay. That one gets a smiley face. [LAUGHTER] What about onions and garlic? It reduces the risk of all common cancers
including colon, ovarian, prostate, esophageal,
and stomach cancer. The stuff that makes you
cry is the stuff you want. It inhibits angiogenesis, again, it doesn't allow the cancer
to get a blood supply. It detoxifies carcinogens and can even be an anti-inflammatory
for arthritis. Pomegranates. I've
just got to eat more of these because
these guys rock. They are anti
everything, antioxidant, anticarcinogen,
anti-inflammatory. They help prevent
cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular disease,
erectile dysfunction. Who needs a little blue pill? Just eat a pomegranate. [BACKGROUND] It's great. It helps prevent
bacterial infections, antibiotic resistance,
and UV skin damage. It lowers blood pressure, prevents cancer
especially breast, prostate, colon, and leukemia. It prevents platelet clumping, so blood clots and
atherosclerosis. Reduces kidney infections. One study showed heart patients with severe blockages
in their arteries, they took one ounce a day for one year of the pomegranates, they had 20 percent
less blood pressure and 30 percent less
plaque after one year.
Berries, you want to eat a lot. They act just like the
cruciferous vegetables. They help transform the
damaged DNA back to near normal and reduce
cancer at many sites. What kind of berries? Any
kind of barriers you want. Black, blue raspberry, acai, goji, elderberries,
strawberries. They're great. Very
high in antioxidants. Nuts and seeds. I hear
some people saying, "I can't eat nuts and seeds. It's too high in fat." The fat problem is a problem only if the fat
is coming from animals, not if it's coming from nuts. Study after study has
shown for all populations, genders and ages, as nut
consumption increases, death from all causes decreases. What they found is that the
overall lifespan increases. Eat your nuts. This is not
achieved with the oils.
You need to eat the actual nuts. The last part of our talk is
talking about being wise. Exercise is better than Zoloft
at treating depression. This was in the New
York Times in 2000. But what about treating dementia? This is part of the
quiz. What is even more disturbing and what
virtually no one recognizes, is that inactivity is
killing our brains too. Physically shriveling them. This is my mom. My mom got a degree in
English and Library Sciences. She actually had ADD or ADHD before we knew
what that was. She was a librarian
and English teacher. She ran a pharmacy. She worked as a circulating
nurse for a while. Well, she married my dad and
they moved to Palm Springs.
You see, brings wealth of cultures to life in Palm Springs. My dad was an attorney and so
mom was bored and she said, "I think I'd like to
go to law school." My dad said, "Don't bother, you could never pass
the bar." [LAUGHTER] [BACKGROUND] Well, you don't give a challenge
like that to my mom. [BACKGROUND] Here she is graduating from law
school and there I am. Is that with my dad? No, that's the dean of the
law school. [LAUGHTER]. She was a practicing
attorney for many years, she did crossword
puzzles every day, she could quote sonnets and
do poetries incredibly smart.
Here she is with my
daughter 11 months, look at the bright
look in her face and then look at her
seven years later. I hope you can see the
glaze look on her face, the light has gone from her
eyes and she has all timers. Now she did have Alzheimer's, she since passed but she
was born in South America, her parents were
missionaries, so she played hymns at church from
five years old on. It was very interesting, she could play full hymns with full chords but she couldn't
remember our names, her name, couldn't
brush her teeth, couldn't brush your hair or do the activities of daily living. This is the last picture of her, she died after battling
Alzheimer's for 13 years. For me, personally, this is the number one reason why I am plant-based and why I try to exercise everyday because I
will do absolutely anything to avoid this and have that
impact on my daughter.
Luckily, found out
about this book spark, The Revolutionary New Science
of Exercise in the Brain. Physical activity sparks
biological changes that encourage brain cells
to bind to one another. I do not know about you, I want my brain cells to
bind to one another, I want them to hold
hands and hang on. [LAUGHTER] Moving on, muscles produces proteins
that travel through the bloodstream and into
the brain where they play pivotal roles in the mechanisms of our highest thought processes. Brain scans of exercising
rodents: "Not only did the running rodents show
an increase in BDNF, that's growth factor over controls but the
farther each mouse ran, the higher the levels were." The act of mice had twice as many new stem
cells in the hippocampus. Now you may be saying, "What
the heck is the hippocampus? That sounds like hippopotamus." Well, let's talk about that. Here's a healthy brain, here's an all timers brain and this part here is what is
associated with memory. This is where the
hippocampus is and look at that same area in the
person with Alzheimer's.
Alzheimer's causes decrease
in brain volume, but particularly, in the
area for memory. We really want brain
cells everywhere, but particularly, in
the areas from memory. Does exercise help? Absolutely. It strengthens the connections
between brain cells, it creates more synapses
to expand connections, it encourages new
stem cells to divide and become functional
neurons in the hippocampus, that's the area for memory. It elevates the supply of neurotrophic factors for neuroplasticity and neurogenesis, meaning you get new brain
cells and you put miracle grow on them so you'd make
him grow and stick and stay.
Has this been shown
in human populations? Absolutely. In this
study of 1,500 people in Finland falling people
for 21 years aged 65-79, those who exercise at
least twice a week had 50 percent less likely
to develop dementia. This was even more pronounced for the folks that
have the gene that predisposes them to
Alzheimer's, the APOE4. When people come to recognize
how their lifestyle can improve their
lifespan, living better, not simply longer, they will
at the very least be more inclined to stay active and
I added and eat good foods. What kind of exercise
you want to do? The best is if you can do aerobic exercise and
have skill acquisition. Basically, dancing where you have to do more
complex movements. Dancing, yoga,
rock-climbing, martial arts, this kind of dancing,
all of that is great. Here's one of our
former residents, he's studying for his boards while he's golfing multi-tasking. [LAUGHTER] Basically,
any exercise can help, even walking five
minutes a day can help so get out
there and exercise. The American Heart Association
calls these the Simple 7, we are supposed to
meet all seven.
No smoking, blood
sugar under 100, blood pressure less
than 120 over 80, being active 30 minutes
five times a week, cholesterol less
than 200, weight, BMI less than 25, eating better: so food low and
the bad fats, cholesterol, sodium and sugar and
food high in fiber, veggies/fruit and lean protein. What do you think?
How many Americans meet all seven? Any guesses? Fewer than 1 in 2,000
Americans meet all seven. [LAUGHTER] It's
terrible, isn't it? We got to get out
there, we got to eat better and we
got to exercise. We got some people
you may be saying, "Oh, I can't be plant-based,
I'm an athlete." Well, look at this couple, they ran a marathon every
single day for a year, in fact 366 because they wanted to be in the
Guinness Book of World Records. Yeah, and not only
were they plant-based, they were raw plant-based and they ran a
marathon every day. [BACKGROUND] ESPN
wrote this article, "Football players go
vegan never felt better". Lutui failed a physical.
He became vegan. He says he is in the
best shape of his life. Impressed with the result, his whole family is
now going vegan.
Pro Bowler Foster believes
he's creating a healthier, stronger body that
will make him a better player despite all the warnings and discouragement he hears. For him, the bottom
line is that he doesn't feel good
when the eats meat. He is philosophical
about the reason people are so resistant
to his new diet. We're emotionally attached
to food, bad food. Think about every big event in America, it's attached to food. Christmas, thanksgiving, birthdays, holidays,
it's with the food, that's why people feel
so strongly about it, they are emotionally
attached to it. This was on the cover of the sports page in the union tribune just
about two weeks ago. Vegging out at meal times helps Chargers' Allen
improve fitness. When asked, "What is the
main thing that's helped you improve your game and
improve your nutrition?" He said, "Salad." [LAUGHTER] You may be saying, "I'm too old, I can't
start this stuff." Here's Dr.
Horacio D'Agostino, he left UCSD to become chair
of radiology at Shreveport, he found out about the China
study in the book Sparks. In his 60s he's became
plant-based and started doing races,
triathlons, 5Ks, 10Ks. He comes in first and second
in his age group every race. His son, a gourmet chef, became plant-based as well and he comes in first in his age
group for every single race, triathlon, bike
race, running race, you name it, and he's now going to medical
school, which is great. So yes, you can absolutely
start at any age. This is the mom of
one of my friends, she started walking for
exercise at age 60, started running at 72, she is the current
USA record holder for the fastest half marathon
for 80 year old and above, so get out there and
exercise, absolutely. How do you want to start? Dr. Bernard, the
diabetes expert says for breakfast some choices include oatmeal with cinnamon
and raisins, half cantaloupe, whole
grain cereal with soy milk. Pick a bunch of different milks, there's oatmeal milk, ham milk, rice milk, almond milk, veggie sausage, tofu scramble. For lunch; lentil soup, split-pea soup or
white bean chili with crusty bread
and steamed veggies, pizza without cheese but with
extra sauce and veggies.
Dinner could be a green salad
and bowl of minestrone, followed by angel-hair pasta
with artichoke hearts, seared oyster mushrooms
and chunky tomatoes. I don't know about you but
sure sounds good to me. [BACKGROUND] I encourage you to do what I did to my husband. Don't believe me, don't believe anyone else, test yourself. Test yourself day 1 and
test yourself day 12, going on a strict
plant-based diet and test the labs that are
most important to you. For instance, you
might want to check your cholesterol and I know
that you are going to see a dramatic drop if you
have arthritis check some of the inflammatory markers. This is the book that we used and this is what I use
to convince my husband, this is 12 Days To
Dynamic Health.
What's great about
this is it gives you shopping list and
recipes for the 12 days. You know exactly what to
buy and what to make. Not happy the first week, don't despair, you
have detoxing to do. It's just like withdrawing
from caffeine and smoking, you might have temporary fatigue, weakness, headaches
that can occur. Gas? Yes, you're
going to have some, there's just no way around
it, [BACKGROUND] it passes. Your gut will get used to
your new way of eating, you're still going to have
gas, but it will get better. If you need more protein, try nuts and seeds. If you want more oil to feel full try flax seeds and walnuts. I can't cook to save my life, so my husband and
I eat out a lot.
Thai and Vietnamese are
lactose intolerant, so if you leave off the meat,
it's basically plant-based. We also love fast food, Mexican, so chipotle,
rice, beans, guac, and veggies, boom, we're out the door with
a fairly healthy meal. Then I get this a lot, "Well, come on Meg, everything
in moderation." Really, everything in moderation? Let's try somethings, let's
see if you agree on this. How about arsenic is
that okay in moderation? [LAUGHTER] How about
lead, cocaine, heroin, mold, really
everything in moderation? I encourage you to
think about meat and dairy in this list. We want to really reduce
our exposures to those. Kaiser is already
on board with this. They have a whole pamphlet, I have an example of one here, instructing patients to be plant-based because
they've already seen the benefits of it.
In the pamphlet, they
tell the patients about what is a whole food
plant-based diet. They tell them what the
health benefits are, they encourage them to
do a 30-day challenge. Going back to our
quiz, what did we see? That Dr. Campbell was looking
at rats with liver cancer, fed 20 percent protein
versus five percent protein, and what happened to them? These rats died,
these rats were fine. Before you say, "Well,
I'm just going to reduce the amount of
protein in my diet." Remember, he was
using milk protein. He did not find these effects
with plant-based proteins, so it was only the
animal-based proteins. Here, the heart attack rate in Norway during World
War II, for me, this is some of the strongest
evidence that what we eat absolutely impacts our
health because as soon as the war ended and they
got their livestock back, they got their heart
attacks back too.
Want to have a good time? Eat plants to power your sexual life even if
it seems hard at times. What may seem hard, will keep you hard. For osteoporosis, don't
be fooled by the ads, don't drink your cow's milk
to make your bones strong. These countries with the
highest dairy intake have the highest
hip fracture rate. We want to be like these folks
with not eating the dairy.
G-BOMBS, you want to
eat them every day. Greens, berries, onions,
mushrooms, beans, and seeds, and with the
seeds we include nuts, so eat them every day. What is even more disturbing
and what virtually no one recognizes is that inactivity
is killing our brains too, physically shriveling them, so we got to get
out there and move. Then which brain do you want? If you're eating this stuff, you're heading towards here. If you want this brain
and want to keep this, again, you want your green leafy vegetables and your beans. Remember the study,
just one week on a plant-based diet decreased homocysteine levels
by 20 percent. In conclusion, [NOISE] in order for man to succeed in life, God provided him with two means, education and physical activity. Not separately, one for the soul and the
other for the body, but for the two together. What these two means, man can attain perfection,
and who said that? Plato. So we've known
this for quite a while. What are the eating
recommendations? Dr. Fuhrman says we need at least six servings
of fresh fruits a day, concentrating on berries
and pomegranates.
Eight servings of
veggies per day. Two servings at least from the cruciferous vegetables
and at least one raw. We want a half a cup of
beans and legumes a day, one ounce of raw nuts
and seeds a day, large salad every day, Omega 3s, and I added resveratrol
and probiotics. What do you not want to eat? He says barbecued, processed,
and commercial meats. I would say all
meats of all kinds, that includes turkey, chicken, and eggs, just so we're clear. Fried foods, dairy of
all kinds, soft drinks, sugar, and artificial sweeteners,
white flour products. So overall, if you got to have the bad food it should be less than 10 percent
of your diet. If you're a woman eating
1,500 calories a day, only a 150 calories should
come from bad food. I hate to tell you
a 150 calories of bad foods is a really tiny
surfing [LAUGHTER] bad food.
This is the article from
Scientific American, the true cost of risky behavior. They came up with this term, a microlife. What is a microlife? That you can get a half an hour, 30 minutes of your life, you can get it back
or you can lose it. When the green, these are
things that if you do them, you get extra time to your life. The first one exercise, you exercise 20 minutes, you get two microlives, yay, you got an hour
back in your life. Fruits and veggies,
you get a microlife, so just one serving of
fruits and veggies. Alcohol drink, you get a
microlife, you may be thinking, "Yeah, I can do that, awesome.
I'll keep doing that." Boom, subsequent alcohol drink, you lose 30 minutes of your life. [LAUGHTER] So be careful, one alcohol drink, okay, second one [NOISE] not so good. Red meat you lose a microlife. Smoking, absolutely,
you lose a microlife. Sitting more than two hours, lose a microlife,
being overweight. In fact, in the
article they said, just one quarter-pound burger, you lose a microlife. So is that burger
really worth it? Get the veggie burger instead. In closing, Dr. Campbell
says, "Why be plant-based? The possibility of death has been holding steady at a 100 percent for quite some time" [LAUGHTER]. "I have often met people who
use this fact to justify their ambivalence toward
health information but I take a different view." "I have never pursued health
hoping for immortality.
Good health is
about being able to fully enjoy the time we do have. It is about being as
functional as possible throughout our entire lives
and avoiding crippling, painful, and lengthy
battles with disease." I wish you all a long
[LAUGHTER] and healthful life. Thank you very much for your time and attention, you've
been wonderful. [APPLAUSE] Great, so we have about
half an hour for questions. In the blue shirt in the back. I didn't hear the
last part, what about fish and then the
last part you said? Yeah, the pros and cons of fish. Pros and cons of fish. The problem with
fish is that it's an animal product and I didn't have time to go
through the various cascades. But basically, all animal
products increase IGF, it's a growth factor. What they found is that by increasing your
fish consumption, you basically it's like
any other animal product and you increase
your risk of cancer. What I didn't realize again, we've been brainwashed
is you think, "Okay, fish I needed my omega
3, so I need fish." Do you know fish
don't make omega 3s? They don't make a single omega 3, they just concentrate it.
Skip the middleman and go
to the primary source, algae, and that kind of thing. There's all kinds of vegan
sources of omega 3s. You can even get them on Amazon. Buy all the stuff, it
doesn't taste bad, I squeeze it onto a spoon
every morning and eat it. Fish also, depending on
what kind of fish you get very high in pollutants, mercury, and other things, so you are really doing yourself a disservice eating the fish. I don't know if you
remember Michael Greger, in his talk show that in
the Mediterranean diet, there's been no health
benefit through eating fish, that hasn't been borne out. Whereas, the plants, the veggies, eating the beans and the grains has been
shown to be beneficial. In the hat. [LAUGHTER]
The question was, please tell me that chocolate
and coffee are okay. What are the other options? What are the other? Coffee has very high
in anti-oxidants. Then you just have to be careful what you put in your coffee.
Plain black. Plain black. I've been doing almond
milk in my coffee. Many studies showing that
a tiny anti-oxidants, so coffee is fine. The chocolate, you just
have to be careful what's in the chocolate
and in particular, milk chocolate, because
that's got the milk back. Luckily, even Vons and stuff has got vegan
chocolate if you will. More and more places they
have the dark chocolate. If you go to places
like Whole Foods, you'll have whole
shelves that you have to sort through in terms of which dark chocolate do you want. But more and more, if you have a sweet
tooth like I do, there are great vegan desserts, as you can see from
my rant back here, there are tons of really good vegan desserts.
So I'm here to tell you that. The good news is that, yes, you can still eat
your chocolate and you could still have your coffee, just be careful what else
you mix in with them.
He said even modest amounts of yogurt and cheese can
be undesirable, yes. Even stores like Vons, if you look in the corners
where they have the yogurt, there's coconut yogurt, almond milk yogurt,
and soy yogurt. There's a lot of not
cow's milk-based yogurt. Then you get the
probiotics feature of the yogurt without the problems
from the animal products. In terms of cheese, there is great fake
kale chip cheese, that kind of thing, things
that taste like Doritos. If you want a pizza cheese, I have yet to find a
good fake pizza cheese, it just does not exist. So I'm sorry about that. Cheese for me was the
hardest thing to give up and it didn't
make sense to me why until I found out
that cheese goes to our dopamine receptors just
like cocaine and drugs do.
So when you eat a bite of cheese, your little brain
cells are going, [NOISE] so that's why it was so hard to
give up the cheese. Once I knew that I go,
"Okay, that's why." Unfortunately, it's hard. Someone told me that Trader Joe's has a great fake mozzarella, I haven't tried it, so you
might want to try that. But in general, it's hard
to find a good fake cheese, but there are great
fake sour creams, fake yogurt, fake
milk, fake creamers. Just about all that other stuff. Mayonnaise, there's great fake replacements for all of that. [MUSIC].