Healing Foods

Reference 1 provides useful information on the important phytonutrients that are in healing foods including vitamins, carotenoids, flavonoids, minerals, etc. Flavonoids are only found in plants, but the others are found in both animal foods and plant foods. Unfortunately cooking can destroy certain vitamins including vitamin C and flavonoids. For this reason fruits may be the best source. Fruits are rarely cooked except in pies.

However, the potassium in fruits, which helps fight hypertension, is not destroyed by cooking. Bananas and oranges are very good sources of potassium. On top of that they are low in sodium and low in fat. This makes them perfect for fighting hypertension. They are also high in fiber, which fights cholesterol and fights colon cancer. Fiber is thought to prevent colon cancer. Apples have pectin, which is soluble fiber. Soluble fiber is best for fighting cholesterol.

The Vegetarian Diet

"It is the position of the American Dietetic Association and Dietitians of Canada that appropriately planned vegetarian diets are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases."

(2)

The full text of this article is available free on the Internet (2).

"In one study, 42% of nonvegetarians had hypertension (defined as 140/90 mm Hg) compared with only 13% of vegetarians." (2)

Ref. 3 provides more information on hypertension. These reasons for these results could include the fact that fruits are high in potassium, low in sodium, high in fiber, and low in fat. However, fruit juices don't have much fiber. Therefore the fruits themselves are better than the juices. Refs. 5-7 give more studies on hypertension. Refs. 8-12 consistently show benefit from a vegetarian diet.

Cancer

"Vegetarians have an overall lower cancer rate compared with the general population, but it is not clear to what extent this is due to diet. When nondietary cancer risk factors are controlled for, differences in overall cancer rates between vegetarians and nonvegetarians are greatly reduced, although marked differences remain in rates of certain cancers. An analysis from the Adventist Health Study that controlled for age, sex, and smoking found no differences between vegetarians and nonvegetarians for lung, breast, uterine, or stomach cancer but did find that nonvegetarians had a 54% increased risk for prostate cancer and an 88% increased risk for colorectal cancer."

(2)

Ref. 13 provides more information.

"Vegetarians do not consume heme iron, which has been shown to lead to the formation of highly cytotoxic factors in the colon increasing colon cancer risk." (2)

Heme is found in blood. Ref. 14 documents the association between red meat and colon cancer.

There is a theory that soy products protect against cancer (15).

Osteoporosis

There is a theory that animal protein increases the risk of osteoporosis (16). Refs. 17 & 18 report that dietary protein, which is higher in the omnivorous diet, cause urinary loss of calcium.

Conclusions

The vegan diet contains no cholesterol. Therefore it is good to fight atherosclerosis.

Unfortunately there have been a lot of very serious problems with drugs (19-21). Even interferon, a drug used for cancer and to fight viruses, has a bad side effect. This side effect is depression. It seems that interferon causes an increase in tryptophan metabolism. This increase appears to cause the depression. Ref. 22 provides information on depression.

More information on the benefits of the vegan diet is presented in Ref. 23. The vegan diet has no cholesterol, but the lacto-ovo vegetarian diet contains dairy products and eggs. Both dairy products and eggs are rich in cholesterol and saturated fats. Neither contain any fiber, which is very beneficial. On top of that dairy products are a problem for anyone with lactose intolerance. They are allergic to dairy products.

References

1. http://orthomolecular.org/resources/omns/index.shtml.

2. www.adajournal.org/article/PIIS0002822303002943/fulltext

3. Messina MJ, Messina VL. The Dietitian`s Guide to Vegetarian Diets: Issues and Applications. Gaithersburg, MD: Aspen Publishers; 1996;.

4. Hypertension Detection and Follow-up Program Cooperative Group . Five-year findings of the hypertension detection and follow-up program. I. Reduction in mortality of person with high blood pressure, including mild hypertension. J Am Med Assoc. 1979;242:2562-2571.

5. Ophir O, Peer G, Gilad J, Blum M, Aviram A. Low blood pressure in vegetarians: The possible roles of potassium. Am J Clin Nutr. 1983;37:755-762.

6. Melby CL, Hyner GC, Zoog B. Blood pressure in vegetarians and non-vegetarians: A cross-sectional analysis. Nutr Res. 1985;5:1077-1082.

7. Sciarrone SE, Strahan MT, Beilin LJ, Burke V, Rogers P, Rouse IL. Biochemical and neurohormonal responses to the introduction of a lacto-ovovegetarian diet. J Hypertens. 1993;11:849-860.

8. Rouse IL, Beilin LJ, Mahoney DP, Margetts BM, Armstrong BK, Record SJ, et al. Nutrient intake, blood pressure, serum and urinary prostaglandins and serum thromboxane B2 in a controlled trial with a lacto-ovo-vegetarian diet. J Hypertens. 1986;4:241-250.

9. Rouse IL, Armstrong BK, Beilin LJ. The relationship of blood pressure to diet and lifestyle in two religious populations. J Hypertens. 1983;1:65-71.

10. Prescott SL, Jenner DA, Beilin LJ, Margetts BM, Vandongen R. A randomized controlled trial of the effect on blood pressure of dietary non-meat protein versus meat protein in normotensive omnivores. Clin Sci. 1988;74:665-672.

11. Sacks FM, Rouse IL, Stampfer MJ, Bishop LM, Lenherr CF, Walther RJ. Effect of dietary fats and carbohydrate on blood pressure of mildly hypertensive patients. Hypertension. 1987;10:452-460.

12. Rouse IL, Beilin LJ, Armstrong BK, Vandongen R. Blood pressure lowering effect of a vegetarian diet: Controlled trial in normotensive subjects. Lancet. 1983;1:5-10.

13. Fraser GE. Associations between diet and cancer, ischemic heart disease, and all-cause mortality in non-Hispanic white California Seventh-day Adventists. Am J Clin Nutr. 1999;70:532S-538S.

14. Sesink AL, Termont DS, Kleibeuker JH, van der Meer R. Red meat and colon cancer: The cytotoxic and hyperproliferative effects of dietary heme. Cancer Res. 1999;59:5704-5709.

15. Messina MJ, Loprinzi CL. Soy for breast cancer survivors: A critical review of the literature. J Nutr. 2001;131:3095S-3108S.

16. Sellmeyer DE, Stone KL, Sebastian A, Cummings SR. A high ratio of dietary animal to vegetable protein increases the rate of bone loss and the risk of fracture in postmenopausal women. Am J Clin Nutr. 2001;73:118-122.

17. Kerstetter JE, Allen LH. Dietary protein increases urinary calcium. J Nutr. 1990;120:134-136.

18. Linkswiler HM, Zemel MB, Hegsted M, Schuette S. Protein induced hypercalciuria. Fed Proc. 1981;40:2429-2433.

19. www.associatedcontent.com/article/2480350/suicide_and_related_matters.html

20. www.associatedcontent.com/article/2473238/psychiatric_drug_side_effects.html

21. www.associatedcontent.com/article/2462506/psychiatric_drugs_gods_or_frauds.html

22. www.associatedcontent.com/article/2456500/depressed_mice.html

23. www.associatedcontent.com/article/2452994/how_the_government_could_save_massive.html