Resource

1

2

“Dr. Joel Fuhrman is a rising star in the medical community. His program for

vibrant health and his approach to healing should be integral parts of every
physician’s standard prescription. A diet of fruits, vegetables, grains, and
legumes allows the body’s own rejuvenative powers to work, often with
surprising results. And fasting has shown a remarkable effect in conditions that
may have been thought to be virtually untreatable. Dr. Fuhrman’s powerful and
practical guidelines apply for conditions ranging from the common cold to
serious heart problems. This program provides an alternative to the cost and
all-too-common side effects of surgery and drugs.”

-ANDREW NICHOLSON, M.D.,

Director of Preventive Medicine

Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine

“By individually tailoring nutrition plans based on a case-by-case basis,
Fuhrman has treated hundreds of patients with rheumatoid arthritis

successfully.”
—Vegetarian Times

“As a family physician who has used nutrition and healthy lifestyle as the basis
of my practice for over ten years, I believe that the information in Dr.

Fuhrman’s book is essential for every practicing physician who genuinely wants
to get his sick patients well and keep his well patients from getting sick.

Although some physicians give lip service to the value of health promotion, the
profession as a whole has little idea of the tremendous degree to which lifestyle

affects health and disease. The result is that people are unnecessarily sick, and
expensive, high-tech treatments are not making them well. Dr. Fuhrman

presents a better solution in this book. This is where the future of medicine
should be heading.”

-RONALD CRIDLAND, M.D.

“Dr. Fuhrman’s approach is a refreshing change from the high-tech, symptom-
oriented, medical and surgical treatments that dominate medical care today.

This is neither alternative medicine nor conservative medicine, but rather

progressive medicine. By aiming his treatment at the underlying causes of
many chronic diseases rampant in our society, Dr. Fuhrman’s approach offers

individuals suffering from these diseases the only real chance for a meaningful
cure. I have been fortunate to observe many of these outcomes firsthand and

can testify to the power of this approach for certain diseases.”

-JAMES CRANER, M.D., M.P.H.

“Dr. Fuhrman’s book is revolutionary. It shows clearly and unmistakably the

way to recover health, and could change the prevailing way of treating disease.”

-THEODORE COUMENTAKIS, M.D.

“If you are lucky, you will read Dr. Fuhrman’s book before you have subjected

3

yourself to medications and medical procedures. This book is for those who

want to take charge over their health and well-being, for those who want to

4

embark on a journey towards a more satisfying life.”

-DAN JERET, M.D.

“As a family physician who deals with chronically ill people on a daily basis, I
know that every health seeker in America will want to read this book. It
provides a working knowledge of vital information that is currently known to
relatively few people. Share it with those you love.”

-JOHN PILLA, M.D.

“Finally, a modern-day, scientific book about fasting and nutritional

intervention to reverse disease. It will be nothing less than a complete

revolution in health care, watching millions throw away their medication and
get well when the information in this book is utilized by our society. Every
person in America must learn about this safe, non-invasive approach for getting

well. Nothing else can equal the ability of the therapeutic fast to unleash the

healing potential within every patient.”

-GEORGE FETT, M.D.

“Dr. Fuhrman’s book places the ancient healing practices of diet and fasting

into the hands of modem practitioners—and their patients. Thought-provoking
and sure to be controversial, this guide will be seen as one of the mileposts on

our journey towards sane, affordable health care, based upon simpler and more
natural methods. It will be valued by anyone seeking more vitality, a greater
understanding of their body, or aid in overcoming a personal health challenge.”

-MICHAEL KLAPER, M.D.

5

FASTING

—AND EATING—

FOR HEALTH

A Medical Doctor’s Program for Conquering Disease
JOEL FUHRMAN, M.D.

St. Martin’s Griffin M New York

Note to the reader
The information provided in this book is intended to describe the potential benefits of a

natural diet and therapeutic fasting. However, any decision involving the treatment of an
illness should be made only after consulting the physician of your choice. Do not start,
stop, or change medications without professional medical advice, and do not change your

diet if you are ill or on medication, except while under the care of a physician. Neither this
nor any other book should be used as a substitute for professional medical care or
treatment.
Fasting—and Eating—for Health is not meant to be a how-to guide to self-conducted
fasting. Readers should take important note that all fasts should be conducted under the

supervision of a qualified doctor trained in the use of therapeutic fasting.

The names of patients discussed in this book have been changed, along with certain
identifying characteristics.
FASTING—AND EATING—FOR HEALTH. Copyright © 1995 by Joel Fuhrman, M.D. All rights
reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or
reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of

brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St.
Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

I dedicate this book to Lisa, my wife of thirteen years. Her support and
encouragement have enabled me to pursue my personal visions and helped
make this book a reality. Without her devotion to our three beautiful daughters,
I would not have had the peace of mind to devote myself to the project of
writing this book, on top of the sixty hours a week I spend in my medical
practice.

6

Acknowledgments

This book would not have been possible without earlier work by pioneers of

nutritional healing, especially Herbert Shelton.
I greatly appreciated the help in editing this book from my sister, Elen Weiss.

My friend Max Huberman also spent many hours editing and offering sage
advice. I am sincerely in debt for his gracious help.

Doris Walfield also made valuable contributions to the manuscript.

I will always be grateful to my father, Seymour Fuhrman, who, more than
anyone else, influenced my thinking about health. His conviction and
enthusiasm for learning about health science spurred my interest.

I thank my three daughters, Talia, Jenna, and Cara, for their cooperation in
allowing me to write this book. They have graciously sat by my side or on my
lap while I worked at the computer.

7

Table of Contents
Foreword by Neal D. Barnard, M.D.

xiii

Introduction 1

1. Fasting for Physical Rejuvenation 7

2. Improper Nutrition: The Major Cause of Disease 24

3. Understanding Health and Disease 55

4. Headaches and Hypoglycemia: Two Misunderstood Conditions 76

5. The Road Back to a Healthy Heart the Natural Way 101

6. Recovery from Diabetes Through Optimal Nutrition 127

7. Autoimmune Disease: A Superior Approach 143

8. Overweight and Other Chronic Medical Conditions Respond to Fasting 173

9. A Chapter for Physicians and for Readers Who Want More Technical Information 194

10. What to Expect on Your First Fast 213

Chapter Notes 227

8

Foreword

A revolution is occurring in the world of modern medicine. We now have
powerful tools against conditions that previously had defied our strongest

medical treatments. Where drugs and surgery have failed, these emerging
techniques bring results that surprise the doctor and delight the patient.

Joel Fuhrman, M.D., is leading that revolution. He is one of the most
remarkable physicians in America, and it is no surprise that many doctors,
including me, often refer patients to him and call on his advice. Dr. Fuhrman is
not only an expert in modern medical diagnosis and treatment, but also has
developed a unique expertise in strengthening the body’s innate abilities to
restore health, often from very serious conditions, without the need for
medications. Dr. Fuhrman is putting these techniques within the reach of
everyone.

We all know that our bodies naturally rebound from a cold or “flu.” Our white

blood cells seek out and destroy the invading viruses, and all we have to do is
get out of their way and let them work. But our ability to restore good health
goes much further than that. Built into our cells are natural mechanisms that
can clean cholesterol, fat, and debris from our arteries; restore health to joints
that are attacked by arthritis; and bring us to a level of health that we may
never have anticipated. The key to unleashing these wonderful functions lies in
the nutrients the body has to work with.

As Dr. Fuhrman shows us, the right nutrients can turn on these abilities,

while the wrong nutrients—which are all too common in the standard western
diet—can leave these abilities buried forever. The most amazing results,

however, come when the body is given a complete rest from the work of

digestion and assimilation of food.

Therapeutic fasting goes back thousands of years, of course, and was long

regarded by doctors as being more appropriate for philosophers than

physicians. Researchers, however, have investigated what occurs when the
body takes a short break from nutrients. They have studied the biochemical

events that occur in the bloodstream, in the joints, in the fat tissues, and in the
brain, and have found astonishing results.

Rheumatic arthritis, for example, has long challenged physicians. Existing

drugs are too weak to change the course of the disease, and are usually used
to make the patient more comfortable as the joint destruction progresses. But

several teams of researchers have shown that within days of beginning a
supervised fast, the joints cool down, and as the foods that triggered the

arthritis are identified and then avoided, the disease often disappears, never to
return.

Scientific journals have now embraced this knowledge, and a growing

number of doctors are putting it to use in their daily practice. Individuals
should work with these doctors, rather than fast on their own, because while

9

fasting is safe, it is also powerful and should be monitored as health returns.

Dr. Fuhrman is foremost in this new generation of medical leaders. The
information he provides in this volume is clear and practical and of vital interest

to patients and doctors alike.

I am grateful to Dr. Fuhrman for assembling this remarkable work, and

recommend it to you wholeheartedly.

NEAL D. BARNARD, M.D.
President, Physicians Committee for

Responsible Medicine

10

Introduction

Therapeutic fasting accelerates the healing process and allows the body to

recover from serious disease in a dramatically short period of time. In my
practice I have seen fasting eliminate lupus and arthritis, remove chronic skin

conditions such as psoriasis and eczema, heal the digestive tract in patients
with ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease, and quickly eliminate cardiovascular

diseases such as high blood pressure and angina. In these cases the recoveries
were permanent: fasting enabled longtime disease sufferers to unchain

themselves from their multiple toxic drugs and even eliminate the need for
surgery, which was recommended to some of them as their only solution.

As a means for recovery from disease, fasting has hit the front pages of

major medical publications due to its recognized effectiveness in well-controlled
scientific studies. Although fasting has been around as a therapeutic approach

for thousands of years, only now is the medical profession studying the broad-
reaching reparative properties of the fast. Even with this progress, most of the

medical community and the general public are still unaware that the medically
supervised fast is the safest and most effective treatment for many dangerous

but common illnesses.

The health of our nation is not improving; in fact, we are getting sicker.
Changes are developing in health care, and the public is more aware that a

problem exists. Our economy is weighed down by an expensive and largely

ineffective medical system that relies on expensive tests, treatments, and last-
minute heroics to attempt to combat the harmful effects of a nation poisoning

itself with a rich, disease-causing diet.

The U.S. Public Health Services, in a progress report of its “Healthy People
2000” program to reduce the prevalence of chronic disease in the nation, found
no improvement in the overall dietary practices of Americans between 1976 to

1980 and 1992. This conclusion is based on data from the National Health and

Nutrition Examination Survey and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In fact,
we now have the most overweight population in the history of mankind.
Medical propaganda to the contrary, our adult population has never been
sicker, and cancer rates have continued to climb.

While high-tech methods such as new drugs and surgical techniques

(angioplasty and bypass surgery, for example) aim to reduce symptoms, they

do not address the underlying cause of the disease, and people are getting
sicker and sicker. The underlying cause I am referring to is not an absence of

adequate medical care. It is severe malnutrition. By malnutrition, I do not

mean the lack of food or nutrient deficiency; rather, what we have today is a
society of overfed people, poisoning themselves with high-fat, high-protein,

highly refined foods. This rich diet harms our bodies and lays the groundwork
for chronic degenerative disease. Fasting in conjunction with optimal nutrition

after and before the fast offers the ability to undo the damage done to the body
by the rich diets of modern societies.

11

In the last ten years there has been a revolution in medicine. The diet—
disease relationship is more well documented than ever before. More and more
physicians are embracing nutritional and preventive approaches. Doctors are
advising their patients about the quality of their diets and about the importance
of exercise and life-style modifications such as smoking cessation. The
physician community and the population are attempting to modify cardiac risk
factors by lowering their intake of fats and cholesterol. Even dietary
suggestions for reducing the risks of cancer are in vogue.

New information, collected from large investigations on various human

populations, has shown that the majority of the chronic and life-threatening
diseases are preventable. But because conventional medical therapy does not

address the cause of disease, it thereby limits itself greatly as a long-term
solution.

Because of conventional medicine’s limited success and high costs,

alternative treatments are becoming more widely used. Fasting, combined with
nutritional competence, removes the most significant causes of disease, and

due to its great success, is now being looked at by conventional physicians as
well as by patients. The health care of the future will have to be both more

effective and less costly than what we have available today. Fasting, as a.
therapeutic modality, is safe, effective, and a true health care bargain.

In most serious chronic diseases the body can heal itself and recover when a

properly conducted fast is undertaken. Certainly there are advanced pathologic
states, such as cancer, that will not respond to fasting, but the majority of

chronic diseases do respond in a predictable manner. Modern medicine offers
little hope of recovery from the variety of chronic debilitating diseases affecting

the population. Fasting offers that hope.

Many current approaches offered by the medical profession to deal with a
medical problem or health crisis involve significant risk or side effects. Fasting
is noninvasive and can be both more effective and safer than the more
standard approach. The details of this with regard to multiple disease states
will be explained in this book. Additionally, the traditional medical practice of
treating the symptoms of a disease with medicine or surgery does not remove
the causes. Inevitably these causes, left unchecked, allow the disease process
to advance. By contrast, therapeutic fasting, supported by a healthy life-style,
removes the causes of disease and accelerates the healing process. This can
allow the disease sufferer to reclaim a normal life, free of a lifetime of
medicines and further suffering.

As you read this book you will experience the thrill of learning all about the
miraculous healing powers of the human organism.

The self-healing power of the body is often overlooked because it is rarely

given a chance to act in a world that expects the quick fix. The power of the
body is as evident as green grass, rainy days, and sunshine. It is by no means
a mystical power: it arises from the same exceptional intelligence that

12

produced you out of two microscopic cells and that heals your wounds when

you are injured. It is the same set of natural human characteristics that allows
you to eliminate waste or to “lose weight” when you change your diet. It is the

same innate ability that allows an exhausted individual to go to bed (without
eating) and wake up vibrant and full of energy for another 16 hours. Fasting

enables the body to repair and rejuvenate its own tissues, by directly providing
the conditions for recovery and removing the impediments that curtail your

recuperative powers. The fast establishes a unique opportunity, vital for the
restoration of health.

I will present many case histories in this book in order to give you factual

knowledge about how fasting can help get you healthy . . . fast. After reading
these pages you will be clear on how to act efficiently in putting your life on the
fast track of healthy living.

I present this case history now as an illustration of why I am so enthusiastic

about fasting and why I feel it is so vitally important to share this information
with everyone.

Years ago, a 20-year-old world-class athlete and Olympic ice skating hopeful

suffered a severe injury to his leg. Forced to walk on crutches, he could not
bear weight on his leg without excruciating pain. His heel was so swollen and
sensitive that the mere weight of a bed sheet caused intense discomfort.
Because he was ranked among the top two in the country in his event, the U.
S. Olympic Committee encouraged him to seek treatment by one of the
country’s leading orthopedic surgeons.

After months of prodding, probing, and medical tests by the prominent

doctor, and still unable to walk after a year in pain, the young man was quite
discouraged. His doctors offered him no solution to the swelling and acute
sensitivity in his injured foot. Then one day without warning, while in the
hospital, a nurse instructed him to take a medication because the doctor
intended to perform surgery the following morning. Outraged, the young man
refused to take the drug and demanded that his physician discuss the proposed
surgical plans with him.

Later that day, the doctor stormed into the room and brusquely informed the

athlete that experimental surgery was required to promote the healing of his

foot. The doctor explained that after exposing the injured tissues, he would use
his scalpel to traumatize the area in a checkerboard pattern in an attempt to

stimulate the area to heal. When the young man refused to participate in such
an experiment, the physician angrily told him that if he did not have the

surgery he would never walk again. Nevertheless, the young man rejected the

surgery and left the hospital.

The young athlete was aware that a few years earlier his arthritic father had
restored his health by fasting. He remembered the articles and books he had
read on fasting at that time and realized that the technique probably offered his
best chance to recover.

13

Determined to give fasting its best chance, he traveled to Dr. Shelton’s

Health School in San Antonio and fasted a total of 46 days. At the end of the
fast he was able to walk again. In a little over a year he placed third in the
World Professional Figure Skating Championships.

At Dr. Shelton’s Health School, the young man saw asthmatics cured so they

no longer needed medication. He- met colitis patients with bleeding bowels who
recovered without drugs or surgery. He observed people with chest pain who

had been told they needed bypass surgery. They were riding bicycles and
jogging for the first time in years. The young man saw for himself how the

body could heal itself if the causes of disease were removed.

This man was so impressed with what he witnessed and experienced that he
sought out other practitioners who used fasting and natural diets to heal

patients. What he learned from them excited him so much that he later decided

to attend medical school and become a physician. At medical school, however,
the patients were treated with conventional modem methods. Given large

amounts of medication to control their symptoms, they rarely got well. No
cardiac patients stopped taking drugs because their angina disappeared. No

hypertensive patients stopped taking medication because their condition
improved. No arthritic patients recovered and threw away their pills.

As a medical student, the young man saw patients suffer and die needlessly,

while under the care of modern medicine. Through it all, he remained
convinced that people could get well if only they knew how to use fasting and
natural diet to restore their health.

This young man was I.

14

Chapter 1

Fasting for Physical Rejuvenation

Many thousands of people have restored their health through therapeutic

fasting. Some, ill and distraught from years of discomfort and discouragement,
try fasting as a last resort. Fortunately, the majority of people who undergo a

supervised fast not only improve or recover (often from what are considered
incurable diseases) but also experience physical, psychological, and mental

rejuvenation. Fasting to heal one self can mean the difference between living
life pain-ridden and dependent on drugs, going from one doctor to another for

relief, and living a normal pain-free existence into old age.

Therapeutic fasting is not a mystical or magical cure. It works because the
body has within it the capacity to heal when the obstacles to healing are

removed. Health is the normal state. Most chronic disease is the inevitable
consequence of living a life-style that places disease-causing stressors on the

human organism. Fasting gives the body an interlude without those stressors
so that it can speedily repair or accomplish healing that could not otherwise

occur in the feeding state.

Fasting stops the continual work of the digestive tract, whose activity can
drain the body of energy and divert the healing processes. Each time we take

in food, the body must secrete digestive enzymes to break down the food,
move these simpler components into the cells lining the digestive tract, and

further move these nutrients into the bloodstream for distribution throughout
the body. All of these functions require a substantial amount of vitality and

energy — energy that might otherwise be used to fuel the healing process.

Each time we take in food we take in not only nutrients but also additives
and other toxins. The digestive tract, the liver, the kidney, and other organs

must work to remove these non-nutritive substances from the body. These

wastes include by-products of digestion, bacterial by-products from the
decomposition of inadequately digested foodstuffs, and excess nutrients the

body cannot use. All these as well as the waste products of normal cellular
metabolism must be actively eliminated for us to maintain excellent health.

Food, therefore, while providing essential nutrients for life, also introduces

toxins. Fasting, particularly when we are ill and the body is already
overburdened with self-produced wastes, can provide a welcome relief by

halting the introduction of further toxins and waste products. Without this extra
burden, the body is finally able to heal itself.

Individuals who suffer from chronic disease often have weakened or

abnormal digestive function. Indeed, this is often the reason they are ill to
begin with. In these cases, fasting allows the digestive tract to take a much
needed break to restore itself to normalcy.

15

When a person’s appetite and hunger disappear, especially during an acute

illness, the loss of appetite indicates that the body has a much lowered capacity
for digestion. Forcing this person to eat can result in the absorption of partially
or improperly digested food, which will impede a quick and complete recovery.

What Is Fasting?

Fasting, in the strictest sense, is defined as the voluntary abstinence from all
food and drink, except water, as long as the nutritional reserves of the body
are adequate to sustain normal function. This is a state of relative physiologic
rest. Some of the medical studies on fasting (which we will refer to) have
included the use of vitamins, coffee, tea, and drugs during the fast. Except for
extremely rare instances where some medication may be indicated, it should be
recognized that a total fast, with water only, is both the most effective and the
safest way to fast.

Vitamins are not generally required because within the body’s cells are

adequate reserves of protein, fat; minerals, and vitamins that can be called
upon during periods of famine, food scarcity, or fasting. Even in prolonged fasts
(those lasting from 20 to 40 days) no deficiency diseases develop, illustrating
that the body has the innate ability to utilize its stored reserves in a highly
exacting and balanced manner. Today, with modern laboratory tests available,
it is simple to check the blood for levels of every vitamin and mineral, as well
as for electrolytes and other essential factors. Interestingly, these levels of
vitamins and minerals are exceedingly stable during the fast and, if normal to
begin with, remain normal throughout the period of fasting.

In some cases a liquid diet, such as fruit or vegetable juices, has been

considered to be a fast. This may occasionally be appropriate for a person who

requires relative bowel rest, whose health condition would make a fast
inappropriate. One cannot, however, achieve the powerful benefits of complete

fasting if juices are part of the fast. ―Juice fasting‖ is not truly fasting;
biochemically the body does not enter the ―protein–sparing‖ fasting state. In

this state the body conserves its muscle reserves and fat is preferentially
broken down. This does not occur with juice fasting. Juice fasting also does not

have the powerful anti–inflammatory properties of the pure water fast that are
essential for recovery in autoimmune illnesses. Other benefits of total fasting

include decreasing platelet aggregation and promoting other biochemical
changes that help to prevent the formation of blood clots, which could cause a

heart attack. These beneficial changes, so essential in the cardiac patient, as

well as the significant lowering of blood pressure, also do not occur if even a
small amount of carbohydrate in the form of juice is taken.

Occasionally claims are made for special powders, vitamin preparations,

herbal mixes, or drinks that are intended to detoxify the liver more effectively
than fasting. Obviously, this is wishful thinking. The powerful detoxifying

effects of the fast cannot be obtained by following a restricted or supplemented
diet. Only when there is total abstinence from all calories do we observe waste

products being heavily excreted from the breath, the tongue, the urine, and the
skin. Plus, the fast does not merely detoxify, it also breaks down superfluous

16

tissue — fat, abnormal cells, atheromatous plaque, and rumors —and releases
diseased tissues and their cellular products into the circulation for elimination.

This kind of dramatic detoxification cannot occur with supplemented eating
plans. Toxic or unwanted materials circulate in our bloodstream and lymphatic

tissues and are deposited in and released from our fat stores and other tissues.
An important element of detoxification is mobilizing the toxins from their

storage sites. This occurs best and most efficiently during total fasting.

I have observed many sick patients who have tried these ―detoxification―
powders and not achieved results. I have seen how easily these same people
recover when they go on a complete fast. We can’t buy magic in a bottle. A
supplemented powdered drink food plan may sometimes be helpful for a person
with food sensitivity or a very poor diet, but I find that in these cases, where
total fasting is not necessary, changing the diet alone almost always achieves
equally good results, and adding supplemental nutrients is practically never
needed.

To think that we can buy an herb that will detoxify us is also an illusion.

Herbs do not detoxify. They merely are a source of nutrients or natural drugs.
For example, they do not detoxify the liver or kidney when they increase

urinary output. Diuretic is the name given to a drug that can increase our urine

flow. When a drug functions as a diuretic it does so because of its ability to
block or poison the ability of the cells that line the kidney’s collecting ducts to

reclaim fluid. When a natural herbal diuretic is taken, it works via the same
mechanism. Instead of accurately referring to it as a diuretic, its proponents

call it a kidney strengthener or detoxicant. Obviously, the profit motive
encourages claims made for many so-called ―healing‖ substances. It is

attractive to think we can buy good health in a bottle, but unfortunately it is
not that easy. There is nothing that can be taken that will ever accomplish the

biochemical changes that occur when we undergo a complete fast.

Nature Has Designed the Human System with the Capacity to

Fast

The human body has been designed to fast safely. Certain biochemical changes
take place when no food is taken that enable the body to fuel itself by burning

up its fat reserves and conserving its vital tissues. As this book illustrates, the
design of the human system is so masterful that it has built into it the blueprint

to change its fuel consumption to fast safely.

The innate intelligence of the body is remarkable, as represented by the
biochemical changes that occur in the fasting state. Glucose is a simple sugar
that supplies the necessary fuel our body needs. Normally, if we don’t eat for a
day or two, we start to utilize muscle tissue to make the glucose needed by the
body, since glucose can be manufactured .from amino acids stored in our
muscles. If we continue to fast, however, the body senses what is occurring
and attempts to conserve its lean muscle mass by a few different mechanisms.

Fats are broken down to fatty acids that can then be utilized by the muscles,
heart, and liver for energy. The brain, however, is the major utilizer of energy

17

when the body is at rest. The brain cannot be fueled from fatty acids; it
requires glucose to fuel its operations.

A special adaptation occurs in the fasting state whereby the brain can fuel

itself with ketones instead of glucose. By the third day of a total fast, the liver

starts generating a large quantity of ketones from the body’s fat stores. As the
level of ketones rises in the bloodstream, the brain and other organs begin to

use these ketones as their major fuel, thus greatly diminishing the utilization of
glucose by the body. This significantly limits muscle wasting. These keto acids

are utilized for fuel primarily by the brain, muscle tissue, and the heart.

This production of ketones, called ketosis, develops within 48 hours in
females and 72 hours in males, and muscle wasting at this time decreases to

very low levels. This is known as protein sparing.

Thus, the human organism responds to the fasting state by attempting to

maximally conserve its muscle and lean body tissue. With severely restrictive
diets, like juice fasts, the body does lose weight, but the brain and other

organs do not subsist mainly on ketones. Therefore, proportionately to weight
lost, juice fasts and severely restrictive diets cause us to lose more lean body

tissue and less fatty tissue than do total fasts.

What Is Starvation?

Contrary to what many people believe, fasting is not starvation. Starvation
begins when abstinence is continued beyond the time when the body’s stored
reserves are used up or have dropped to a dangerously low level. During the
fasting stage the body supports itself from the stored reserves within its
tissues. When food is eaten at normal intervals, the body stores sufficient
amounts of nutritive matter to last for a rather lengthy time during later
periods of abstinence. Even thin people carry a reserve of nutrients in their
tissues to tide them safely over a period of fasting.

The body will not starve or in general even be hungry while fasting because it

is ―eating.‖ It is consuming the substances the individual consumed last week,

last month, and last year that have been converted into body tissue. In fact,
the symptoms of hunger generally disappear by the second day of the fast.

This illustrates that the body has entered a fasting, and (lean) tissue-sparing
metabolism. Of course, there is a limit to the body’s reserves. When they have

been used up, specific symptoms occur that indicate the fast should not be
continued. The time required for a fast to reach completion varies from

individual to individual. The trained physician can easily denote symptoms that
indicate the ending of the fasting period and the beginning of starvation. In the

vast majority of fasts, the physician will end the fast many weeks before the

nutrient reserves of the body have been exhausted. The average individual (not
overweight) would have to fast approximately 40 days or more to exhaust

nutrient reserves.

Such a prolonged fast is almost never recommended and, therefore, we are
not remotely considering the biologic processes of starvation during the fast of

18

average length. If the fast was continued beyond the point when the body’s
nutrient reserves were exhausted, starvation would begin. If not eating was

continued past this point, damage to the body and even death could result.
Most patients are fasted one to four weeks depending on their nutritive

reserves and the purpose of the fast.

Fasting Is Nature’s Restorer

In the animal kingdom, fasting is quite common. Some animals fast during
hibernation or estivation (sleeping throughout the summer in tropical climates).

Some animals fast during the mating season and in many cases immediately
after birth and during the nursing period. Animals instinctively fast when sick or

hurt. The ill or wounded animal finds a warm secluded spot where it can lie
quiet and undisturbed to rest and fast for a period of time until health is

restored. The ill animal sips only water until well again. Nature, with her
superior wisdom, has provided the animal world with an instinct to do that

which will facilitate optimal physical well-being.

Most people do just the opposite of the animals when they are sick. They
maintain their hectic work schedule, continue to eat a rich diet, and take

anything they can find to gain comfort. Any drug advertised to hide their signs
and symptoms is ingested. Drugs, well recognized as toxic and harmful if

ingested when we are well, are suddenly seen as healthful and healing when

the body is suffering with an acute illness.

Many people are unaware that symptoms such as a runny nose or fever are
the treatment the body has prescribed to remedy the condition. Increased

mucus production is the body’s means of washing away infected cells and
removing virus particles from the body. Fever aids in the body’s immune

defenses, activating the white blood cells and inducing interferon secretion
from the brain. Interferon is a powerful substance that stirs the fighting arm of

the immune system into action. Typical cold symptoms that people attempt to
suppress with drugs are nothing more than attempts of the body to restore

homeostasis and remove the disease itself. By drugging away their symptoms,
people keep themselves sick longer and can even turn a minor disease into a

major one.

Rather, we should do as the animals do. We should listen to our bodies when
appetite is diminished or absent. If we are not feeling well, we should sip water

and rest. It is amazing how quickly patients recover from viral syndromes when
this advice is taken. Recovery in this case leaves the body in a clean and

healthy state, rather than contaminated with toxic medications; we have thus
laid the groundwork for future good health.

In both acute illnesses and chronic disease there is no greater delusion than

that an individual needs ―strength‖ to fast. What is true is that such people

have bodies that are too weak to digest the food they take in. The people who
are most helped by a fast are those who are in most need. Too often the weak

patient is told he or she must eat to regain health or strength. In many cases,
while feeding, the person remains ill and fatigued.

19

Frequently, even extremely thin individuals who have been losing weight

while feeding themselves rich foods show a tremendous improvement in their
digestive capacity and begin to gain weight and strength after a moderate-
length fast. Fasting enables them finally to reach a normal weight. This
illustrates their weakened powers of digestion or assimilation or the presence of
serious chronic disease such as digestive impairment or autoimmune illness,
which improves or resolves as a result of the fast.

The job of fasting is to supply the body with the ideal environment to

accomplish its work of healing. During the period of a fast the blood pressure
will drop, the level of retained metabolic wastes will fall, and the blood vessels
will begin to soften and rid themselves of hard sclerotic plaque. In a short
period of time the heart and brain, as well as other organs and muscles, will

receive a more adequate blood supply and oxygenation. The tissues throughout
the body’s systems will begin to purify themselves and the rejuvenation
process of the fast will have begun.

The goal of the body at all times is to keep the individual healthy. When the

disease-causing stresses are removed, the natural healing and self-repairing
powers of the body begin to work unhindered. Within a short period of time,

allergic and mucus-filled individuals clear their nasal passages, asthmatics
breathe easier, arthritis sufferers report their pain is resolving, and cardiac

patients begin to have increased circulation to their hearts. Healing has begun.

Healing and rejuvenation occur because fasting is an opportunity for the
human body to take a rest from all of the stressful elements of life, such as
physical labor and emotional stress. It is also an opportunity for the internal
organs and digestive system to take a physiological vacation.

In our society, most people eat heavy foods during much of their waking

hours. This not only overworks the digestive tract, but also forces the body to
continue its work of digesting and absorbing foodstuffs and eliminating food-

derived wastes well into the night. This prevents the body from totally directing
its energies toward repair and self-cleansing of its tissues.

To regain normalcy or health, individuals suffering from chronic illnesses

must rid their systems of the burdens of toxic material and excesses, such as
fatty or swollen tissues or atherosclerotic plaque. It may be possible, over time,

to eliminate the excesses while on a restricted diet that calls for taking in foods

that support the body. Fasting, however, offers a much more efficient means of
accomplishing healing that is dependent on the elimination of retained waste.

This is because fasting gives the body an opportunity to focus completely on
the elimination of the waste deposits and the purification of its tissues that are

necessary to reach a recovered state of health.

When no calories are consumed, the body is living off its nutritional stores,
primarily its fat reserves. The innate wisdom of the body is such that, while

fasting, it will consume for its sustenance superfluous tissues, carefully
conserving vital tissues and organs. The body’s wondrous ability to autolyze (or

self-digest) and destroy needless tissue such as fat, tumors, blood vessel

20

plaque, and other nonessential and diseased tissues, while conserving essential
tissues, gives the fast the ability to restore physiologic youth to the system. By

removing or lessening the burden of diseased tissue, including the fatty tissue
narrowing the blood vessels, fasting increases the blood flow and subsequent

oxygenation and nutrient delivery to vital organs throughout the body.

Conceptually, fasting provides a comparative rest for the digestive tract,
while, throughout the entire body, from the blood vessels and nerves in the

feet to the noxious retained substances irritating the central nervous system,
the body conducts an internal ―spring cleaning.‖ Fasting enables the entire

system to focus on the elimination of superfluous tissue and the retained waste
that it was unable to break down and remove in the feeding state.

When an individual has a. serious chronic disease, we need to combine a

fast with necessary dietary changes before and after the fast to achieve a
recovery. By combining the fast with a healthy diet and life-style, the individual
can maintain the benefits from the fast and remain healthy.

Fasting Is Not New

Fasting has been used as a healing modality throughout recorded history.
Socrates, Plato, Pythagoras, and Hippocrates, for example, all recommended
fasting for various physical conditions.

Our species has survived on the earth for the last 400,000 years partially

because of the incomprehensible design of nature that enables us to survive
under various circumstances, including going without food for prolonged
periods of time. Built into our genetic code is the ability to instruct the body
exactly what to do to survive in a period of famine, food scarcity, or natural
disaster when food is unavailable for prolonged periods. Obviously, the body
functions normally for quite a long time when no food but only water is
ingested.

Extended religious fasts were frequently practiced by followers of far eastern

religions and in the early days of Christianity, especially during the Middle

Ages. Many of us have heard of individuals who have fasted for political
reasons. Mahatma Gandhi, for example, fasted 21 days to promote Hindu–

Moslem unity and mutual respect and tolerance between religions. Gandhi was
actually very familiar with the scientific and health-related literature regarding

fasting and even read the writings of and corresponded with Dr. Herbert
Shelton, who conducted more than thirty thousand fasts on his patients earlier

in this century.

Occasionally we hear of entombed miners, shipwrecked sailors, or stranded
aviators who are forced to go without food for weeks and weeks. People survive
for extended periods of time, until they are rescued, as long as they have
access to nonsalt water.

So fasting is not new. It has been practiced for religious, political, and health

reasons for thousands of years and has been recognized throughout recorded

21

history as having a curative effect on sickness and disease. Mark Twain wrote
in My Debut As a Literary Person (1889), ―A little starvation can really do more

for the average sick man than can the best of medicines and the best doctors. I
do not mean a restricted diet: I mean total abstinence from food . . .―

For more than ten thousand years fasting has been utilized to heal the sick.

Hippocrates regularly prescribed fasting for numerous conditions. The famous

Hippocratic Oath, familiar to every physician, admonishes us to ―First do no
harm,‖ recognizing that the most important foundation of healing the sick, even
today, is the remarkable recuperative power inherent in the human body. This
power of self-repair is beautifully witnessed during the fast.

Is Fasting Uncomfortable?

The reason many people are so afraid of fasting and find the mere thought of it

so unpleasant is that when they skip even one meal they feel awful. They
assume fasting would be very uncomfortable. These individuals, who exhibit

uncomfortable signs early in the fast, are in greatest need of a fast. Headaches
and other discomforts brought on by not eating are signs that the body has

begun to withdraw from and detoxify waste products retained in body tissues.
When we delay eating or fast, these tissue stores of toxic waste are mobilized

for removal. Thus fasting is ―cleansing‖ of the internal system. These
detoxification symptoms usually do not occur in those who are in excellent

health, with a lower level of retained wastes. When one is prepared properly
with a low-fat, lowered-protein, natural, plant-centered diet prior to the fast,

these symptoms, which actually are nothing more than withdrawal symptoms

from a more rich diet, usually do not occur.

Fasting is not as uncomfortable as many would think. Hunger typically goes
away completely by the second day and the symptoms of withdrawal from food
and toxins typically end quickly, usually by the second day of the fast.
Interestingly, it has been noted by physicians conducting fasts for decades that
true hunger is a mouth and throat sensation, felt in the same spot that one
feels thirst. Gnawing in the stomach, stomach cramping, headaches, and
generalized weakness from not eating or skipping a meal or two are
experienced only by those who have been eating the standard American diet
with all its shortcomings (those most in need of a fast). Those who have been
consuming a healthier, low-fat, low-protein, plant-based diet for months prior
to the fast typically experience no such typical hunger pains when they fast.

Symptoms such as abdominal cramping and headaches, traditionally thought

of as hunger symptoms, are not really symptoms of hunger. The medical books
are obviously wrong here. These symptoms are experienced only by those
eating a diet far too rich and stressful for their own internal controls. These
symptoms are signs of withdrawal that indicate healing is beginning when the
body has the opportunity to rest from the continual intake of food.

Detoxification and Improvement in Organ Function Occur
Simultaneously

22

Nothing is more fascinating than watching toxins being rapidly discharged from
the system while a person fasts. In fact, fasting has been employed to treat

chemical poisoning by people who have recognized the powerful effect it has on
accelerating the discharge of internal noxious wastes. One such enlightening

use of fasting was the subject of an article in the American Journal of Industrial
Medicine in 1984 entitled ―A Trial of Fasting Cure for PCB Poisoned Patients of

Taiwan.‖ The study involved patients who had ingested rice oil contaminated
with PCBs. After a seven-to ten-day fast, dramatic relief was noted and

improvement in symptoms was reported by all patients.

Fasting also has a powerful effect on improving liver function. This benefit is
not limited to the fasting period but continues after the fast. Medical studies

have tested the ability of the therapeutic fast to improve conditions such as
alcoholic liver injury, damage from fatty liver, and drug-induced liver injury.

Dramatic improvements were consistently reported.1

Fasting is a very valuable treatment for psychological disorders. There are
hundreds of journal articles in the medical literature documenting the value of

fasting in improving the function of the entire body, including the brain.2,3,4,5
Fasting has been repeatedly observed to alleviate neuroses, anxiety, and
depression.6 It appears from these studies that fasting improves our ability to

adapt to frustration and external stress. One Japanese clinic fasted 382 patients

with psychosomatic disease with a success rate of 87 percent.7

When the beneficial effects of the therapeutic fast were investigated with
various research parameters measuring organ function, it was found repeatedly
that substantial improvements are seen in the autonomic nervous system,
endocrine system, and adrenal function after the fast.8

Fasting Typically Achieves Results Where Other Methods Have
Failed

Many who earnestly want to improve their health are convinced that their diets
are lacking in some vital nutrient or other substance that they can buy to
recover their health. Though it may be true that some individuals, especially the

elderly, may be borderline deficient in certain nutrients, the reality is that most
of the chronic diseases people suffer from are not primarily the result of
nutrient deficiencies. Therefore, supplying additional nutrients does not result in
recovery. After a while, those with chronic medical conditions, including
cardiovascular disease, migraines, colitis, arthritis, psoriasis, asthma, and
sinusitis, realize that they still have not achieved a recovery and that they
cannot purchase optimal health at the health food store or pharmacy.

The diets that I prescribe for my patients are abundant in appropriate

nutrients, yet contain no excess of sugar, protein, fat, or cholesterol. Generally,
by following an optimal diet and lifestyle, which will be described in the next
chapter, chronically sick people get well. The rate of recovery from the diseases
that have been mentioned, as well as from many other autoimmune and diet-
related illnesses, is astonishing. While dietary modifications alone may be
enough for recovery from disease in some cases, to obtain a complete recovery

23

a physician-supervised fast often becomes the only solution to enable the

individual to achieve the desired healing in a reasonable time frame. A properly
conducted fast is a safe and expedient way to remove excesses from the body
— excesses that are preventing the body from achieving a full recovery.

Medications cannot do this.

Some persons who are suffering from serious chronic ailments can make
great strides in their health while continuing to eat. It is important that these
individuals strive to remove all the possible causes of ill health. This must
include reducing all the stressors on the body, and calls for careful
management of the diet (adapting it to their individual digestive and nutrient
needs), less food, less work, and more rest. This method can frequently take
too long and require infinite diligence and patience. A successful outcome is not
so certain as when a prolonged fast is undertaken.

Sometimes people are not careful enough with the changes in their diet or

are unwilling to make the changes that are sufficient to bring about a complete
recovery from their condition. Then, when their health is restored with a fast
and they see the health potential that is available to them through natural
methods, they develop a heightened ability to conform to a healthy way of life
to maintain their long-sought-after good health.

For those who are not in need of a fast, the very principles behind the fast

are the basis for dietary changes that will lead to recovery and the subsequent
control of health. Throughout this book the concepts of health recovery and

disease causation that apply to both the fasting and the eating state will be
explained. Readers will gain a clear comprehension of the causes of disease

and how to maintain and achieve optimal health, even if they never fast.

The medical profession’s primary method, over the last century, for
combating the effects of improper diet and life-style has been to offer

medication and surgery. This approach has not been effective. Almost every

medical treatment offered for the chronic disease sufferer today attempts only
to control symptoms. There are no ―cures.‖ The current medical treatments not

only have risks, but also represent a Band-Aid type of approach. They can offer
relief from symptoms, but they cannot cure because they do not address the

cause of the disease. Under ―modern‖ medicine, the incidence of most chronic
diseases has increased and the vast majority of people are still dying from what

are preventable, diet-and life-style-induced illnesses.

Obviously, traditional medical treatments can be lifesaving in an emergency
situation and on some other occasions can be appropriate and extremely

beneficial. We certainly have today the best emergency medical care ever
available. But, overall, modern medicine has continued to fail. People are still

suffering needlessly and dying prematurely. This is because treatments don’t
eliminate the primary cause: a rich diet that stresses the system and overloads

the body with excesses and toxins.

Imagine if every day I smashed my hand with a hammer. Could I expect a
pain medication or anti-inflammatory drug to heal the wound? Obviously, I

24

would not recover unless I stopped the daily pounding. Every day our nation’s

people are pounding themselves with a rich diet, ill-adapted to the needs of our
species. This inevitably results in the eventual breakdown of our internal
systems and the development of chronic disease.

Fasting, as opposed to the usual medical treatments, helps to remove the

cause of the disease. For example, with atherosclerosis (the buildup of plaque
in the arteries), fasting allows the body to work to actually remove the plaque

from within the blood vessels. In diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, fasting
clears out the waste deposits that are stimulating the immune system and

inflaming the joints. This allows the body to heal itself.

In addition to the consistently positive results of fasting on disease, fasting
enables the disease sufferer to drop weight rapidly to a safer level. Excess
weight in those suffering from diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol
levels, or angina can contribute to their premature death from a heart attack or
stroke. While diets of every description flood the media, nothing will remove
these risk factors more effectively, more quickly, or more predictably than
fasting.

A natural foods dietary approach, utilizing superior nutrition, combined with

therapeutic fasting, when appropriate, is the only way our society will be able
to free itself from the hordes of ill people still chronically suffering and taking
multiple drugs as the only option to lessen their symptoms.

The practice and methods described here offer a rational approach that is

not only effective but also consistent with the Hippocratic admonition to ―do no

harm.‖ The results described are consistent with natural laws and logic that
would assume that health will result from healthful living and from removal of

the causes of disease. Likewise, abuses done to our bodies, whether recognized
or not, can result in ill health. Rather than merely reduce the signs of disease,

such as lowering blood pressure with medication, this approach enables the
faster to remove the disease itself and significantly extend longevity.

Doctors leave medical school with the hope and intent of gaining self-

satisfaction through helping others in need. Doctors and patients both,
however, become resigned and frustrated due to the inherent weaknesses in

today’s approach that calls for powerful diagnostic tests, and then leaves the
patient with little option but to take potentially harmful drugs to attempt to

control the signs and symptoms of disease. Rather than hoping for the
discovery of some wonder drug, we are discovering the true wonder of the

healing properties inherent in the human body that can be unleashed by
removing impediments to normal function.

Once you are exposed to the powerful effects the methods described within

this book will afford you, there is no turning back. As a result of reading this
book, you will come to view your own body in a completely different way and
will inevitably take better care of yourself in the future. The clear
comprehension of the causes of disease and how to maintain and achieve
optimal wellness will crystallize in your mind, giving you a powerful tool to

25

regain control of your own health even if you never undergo a fast.

26

Chapter 2

Improper Nutrition:
The Major Cause of Disease

Man lives on one quarter of what he eats.

On the other three quarters lives his doctor.

-INSCRIPTION

ON AN EGYPTIAN PYRAMID,
3800 B.C.

Modern research has confirmed the folk adage that eating less, and especially
eating less fats and high-protein animal foods, prolongs life.

Our rich, modern diet has been implicated as a causative factor in cancer,

heart attack, stroke, hardening of the arteries, and diabetes, and the leading
causes of death in this country can be prevented or delayed by adopting

healthier nutritional habits. The same foods that cause premature deaths also
subject us to misery and chronic illness in life.

This is the main purpose of this book: to provide a more complete

understanding of the cause of various diseases and to explain how to remove
the obstacles to healing so you can recover your health.

If individuals choose to undergo a fast for internal cleansing and rejuvenation

of their system, or for therapy of a specific disease, they must combine the fast

with a healthy diet before and after fasting to maintain the benefits they reap
from the fast. In many instances the change in diet alone is sufficient to achieve

a complete recovery.

Many do not comprehend the relation between their food intake, their life-
style habits, and their chronic illnesses, such as arthritis, osteoporosis,
recurrent infections, allergies, acne, asthma, and sinusitis. Ironically, and sadly,
health authorities, most physicians, and dieticians recommend the very same
eating plans that cause these diseases to develop in the first place. Patients and
their physicians generally rationalize that the problems they are facing are
genetic, biochemical, structural, or otherwise beyond their control. Patients are
frequently told the food they consume has nothing to do with the disease from
which they suffer. This is simply untrue. Most chronic medical problems are not
only caused by improper diet and life-style, but also can be reversed by
adopting a more primitive and natural diet, one that our species was originally
designed for.

This information is not a ―new breakthrough‖ or medical discovery. Many

27

renowned physicians, after reviewing the evidence collected over the last few

decades, are taking a new approach to dietary recommendations. For example,
the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, headquartered in
Washington, D.C., has recently asked the Department of Agriculture to replace
the traditional four food groups (meat, dairy, grains, and fruits and vegetables)
with four new ones: fruits, vegetables, grains, and legumes. The reasoning
behind this change is sound — it emphasizes the foods that protect against
disease rather than those that cause disease.

Unfortunately, we live in a modern society where suffering from preventable

illnesses and chronic disease is the ―norm.‖ Half of us die from the totally
avoidable occurrence of heart disease, and the majority of the individuals who

do not die of hardening of the arteries die of cancer. Millions suffer from
osteoporosis, deterioration of the musculoskeletal system, and chronic back and

joint pain. The majority of people in this country are out of shape and

overweight, and live their lives waiting for some disease to strike.

From hay fever and allergies to hypertension and high cholesterol, all these

chronic conditions can be prevented through optimal nutrition. We do not need
to be a nation of medical dependents, visiting physicians and taking drugs in a
futile attempt to combat the effects of our disease-producing modern diet.

Instead of feeding ourselves in such a manner as to cause our deterioration, I

recommend eating primarily unrefined plant foods. This means eliminating or
de-emphasizing meat, chicken, fish, and dairy products; and avoiding processed
foods, fried foods, fats, and sweets. If these rich foods are to be consumed at
all, my patients are encouraged to limit their use to special occasions (once
weekly or less) or to use animal-based foods only as condiments, in very small
quantity, to flavor a soup or vegetable dish.

Even though these recommendations may be abhorrent to certain individuals

and to the animal agriculture community, it can not be denied that vegetarian
populations live longer and healthier lives than meat-eating populations. Not
only does the epidemiologic evidence from around the globe point to this, but
also the studies on healthy vegetarian populations show that there is a
significant survival advantage when animal foods are eliminated from the
diet.1,2

Meat and dairy products, which have traditionally been our primary source of

protein, have high fat and cholesterol content, minimal fiber, and are deficient
in the cancer-preventing antioxidant nutrients. This nutritional profile of animal

foods is the precise combination associated with an increased risk of coronary
artery (heart) disease, most cancers, diabetes, and obesity.

Plant foods have substantial amounts of fiber, little fat, and moderate

amounts of protein. Much modern research has linked not only fats to cancer
and degenerative illnesses but also the proteins in animal products.3 These

foods were thought in the past to be appropriate for our species, but now it is

clear that animal-based foods, because of their link to so many of our ills, are
poorly adapted to humans when used in significant quantities.

28

As a species we are closely related to the great apes, who are primarily plant
eaters. Clearly, the diet for which our species is best adapted is one consisting
predominantly of natural, unrefined, plant-based foods with little if any foods of
animal origin.

We’re Winning the Race to an Early Death with Our Knives and

Forks

Our population is nutritionally miseducated. Outdated nutritional concepts
encourage us to feed our children a diet that promotes premature growth and

rapid maturity. Nutritionists have suggested humans need to consume high-
protein animal foods such as eggs, meat, and fowl because these foods have

been noted to promote more rapid growth in rats and other rodents. This is a
tremendous error, as now we have learned that growth acceleration promotes

aging.

Over the years researchers noted that the rodents that matured and grew the
quickest died the earliest. This Nvas tested again and again with all animal

species: the faster an animal grows and matures, the younger it dies.4 This is
now an established fact in humans as well; for example, early puberty increases

our risk of certain cancers, especially breast and prostate cancer.5

It was also noted that if we restrict the calories an animal can eat, by
underfeeding it or periodically fasting it, we can significantly prolong its life. In
fact, periodically fasting animals can double their natural life span.6,7

Utilizing the traditional four food groups as a guide, modern society consumes

a diet with a severe excess of fat, cholesterol, and protein, and that is also
significantly deficient in fiber, vitamins, and minerals. Almost any menu that
uses these outdated guidelines would have us consume between 30 and 45
percent of calories from fat. This is more than double the amount consumed in
countries that do not have the high rates of heart attack and cancer that we see
in our country today. Our fiber intake hovers around 10 to 20 grams per day,
less than a fourth of what it should be.

The modern way of eating sets the stage for our bodies to function at low

efficiency, stressing our internal organ systems, leading to chronic disease.
Though all chronic diseases may have genetic factors contributing to their
expression, without the stresses of modern living and modern dietary practices,
these inherited differences, the weak links in our genetic codes, need never
express themselves in chronic disease.

Chronic diseases, more prevalent in modern times, are on the rise not merely

because people are eating an animal-based diet, but also because the grain

products we consume are highly refined and processed to make them nearly
devoid of fiber. In addition, modern societies consume a large amount of added

sweeteners, simple sugars, and refined vegetable fats or oils. These foods rob
us of our nutritional reserves and add further toxic stress to the body.

29

Rather than eat unprocessed foods as nature intended, most of us consume
large quantities of processed foods that are high in fat, salt, sugar, and

chemical additives and that are deficient in fiber and essential nutrients. Instead
of providing a diet predominating in fresh fruits and vegetables, which supply

the proper nutrients for normal development, most parents allow their children
to consume large quantities of ―empty-calorie― foods. These deficient foods

include bottled fruit juice and other sweet drinks that are high in sugar and
deficient in essential nutrients. Incredible as it may seem, the top three sources

of calories in most American diets today are milk, cola, and margarine, with the
combination of fat and refined sugar occupying 65 percent of caloric intake.8

It amazes me that the human body can even survive this onslaught of abuse

that begins at such a young age. Is it any wonder that almost from birth many
children are frequently sick with one infection after another? Then they get
older, develop hay fever, allergies, or asthma, and are increasingly prey to
autoimmune illnesses and cancer. Is it surprising that we have a nation of the
walking sick? Unfortunately, few comprehend the correlation between diet and a
multitude of common diseases such as acne, hyperactivity, anxiety, headaches,
and PMS.

Obesity in children is also rising at an alarming rate. The May 1987 issue of

the American Journal of Diseases of Children reported a 54 percent increase in
obesity in 6- to 11-year-olds since 1960.

The 1992 Bogalusa Heart Study discovered atherosclerotic lesions, the early

signs of clogging of the arteries, in most children, teenagers, and young adults.9
Autopsies were conducted on over 60 percent of all children who died, mostly

by accidental deaths. They confirmed that this disease process begins very

early in life, setting the stage for a premature death later on.

It astounds me that parents in our society allow their children to consume the

foods they do — sugary cereals, fast food, pizza, white bread, and other empty-
calorie foods, never wondering why their children are chronically ill, allergic,

asthmatic, or have recurrent ear infections. High-calorie malnutrition takes its

toll, flooding doctors’ offices with sick patients of every description.

Pasta Is Not Health Food

The standard American diet is centered around animal foods and processed
wheat products, neither of which are ideal foods. Even worse, the typical

modern eater consumes a tremendous amount of extracted vegetable oil. Many
Americans add high-fat dressings or sauces to almost everything they consume

that is not a high-fat food to start with. Yet those familiar with the scientific
research on fats, including extracted plant fats such as olive oil and soy oil,

know that fats increase our risk of cancer.10 Vegetable fats are processed foods
that interfere with the normal function of our immune system11,12 and that

contribute to obesity and chronic disease.

When individuals change from an animal-food-based diet to a vegetarian diet,
but then eat mostly processed foods such as low-fat pizza, tofu dogs and other

30

health food store concoctions, refined cereals and grains, pasta, and bread as

the primary source of their calories, the diet is still inadequate.

Grains, when consumed in their refined state, are comparatively poor sources

of vitamins, especially antioxidants. They are also nearly devoid of essential
fatty acids. The opposite can be said of green vegetables. Green vegetables and

especially the leafy greens are rich in vitamins, minerals, and essential fatty
acids, as well as thousands of other important nutrients that research scientists

are beginning to identify as being essential for optimal health. These plant-
based substances, called phytochemicals, support our immune system and

protect us from cancer.

Just a few years ago, scientists didn’t know phytochemicals existed. Today
they represent the new frontier in cancer-prevention research. The reality is

that there exist thousands of compounds that will never see the inside of a

vitamin bottle. Until recently nobody even knew they existed, and more are
being discovered each year. Every slice of an orange, every bit of broccoli,

every forkful of romaine lettuce, contains thousands of these essential nutrients
produced when sunlight hits plants. Only through eating large amounts of many

different natural, unprocessed fruits and vegetables will we obtain these
necessary elements for optimal health.

The normal functioning of the intestinal tract depends on the presence of

adequate fiber. The typical diet is unhealthfully deficient in fiber. So another
benefit of a diet high in natural plant food and complex carbohydrate is that it’s
invariably accompanied by more fiber. A diet high in fiber holds fluid within the
digestive tract and moves feces through the system at a faster speed. This is
important to protect against colon cancer, diverticulosis, appendicitis, and
hemorrhoids, as well as constipation and intestinal spasm.

The contemporary diet that most Americans view as ―healthy‖ is a far cry

from that. Those believing they are on a ―low-fat‖ diet are usually consuming

between 30 and 40 percent of calories from fat, roughly three times as much fat

as we should be eating. When the fiber and antioxidant nutrients consumed by
most people are totaled, the result is frightfully low.

In a nationwide survey, only 9 percent of those polled had eaten three or

more servings of vegetables and two or more servings of fruit on the previous
day. People are not following the recommendations by the government to

consume more fruits and vegetables. More important, even if they followed the
U.S. Department of Agriculture’s recommendations to the letter, their diet

would still be inadequate. Though an improvement over the past, the
recommendations of the new Food Guide Pyramid still do not sufficiently

emphasize fresh fruits and raw and cooked vegetables.

The suggested guidelines still encourage a diet too high in fat and protein,
and too low in plant-borne nutrients and fiber for optimal health. Only a plant-

centered diet can provide optimal amounts of vitamins, minerals, and fiber
while keeping fat intake under 20 percent of calories. For example, the diet I

recommend supplies about 1,500 mg of vitamin C daily from food. With the

31

abundance of fresh fruits and vegetables and the adequate amount of food-

borne vitamin C come the other bioflavonoids and important unidentified
compounds that are present only in whole plant food.

The Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) for vitamin C is 60 mg a day.

This is a ridiculously low and arbitrary number, as are the RDA’s of many other
plant-derived nutrients. These inadequate recommendations are healthy only
for the industrial food giants, so their products don’t look as deficient as they
are. Contrary to popular belief, we can get very large quantities of nutrients
such as vitamin C, beta carotene, and vitamin E in our diets without the use of
pills simply by eating a natural, plant-based diet.

Humans Were Not Designed to Eat Processed or High-Protein Foods

Our population has accepted the fact that more than half of us will die of heart
attacks and more than a third will develop cancer at some point in our lives. So

too is it accepted that we live and suffer with medical problems, take
medications recommended by our physicians, and then die or become a

physical or mental cripple in later years.

This common pattern is a tragedy of modern life, but one that can be
avoided. Disease, dementia, and disability associated with aging are unnatural.
We have control over our health as we extend our life span by making different
food choices. Dennis Burkitt, M.D., one of the world’s most renowned physician
researchers on human nutrition and a pioneer who established the value of
fiber, has explained that western man has made more change in his diet over
the last six or eight generations than has been made throughout the whole of
the rest of his sojourn on earth.

Genetically, anatomically, and physiologically our bodies are the same as

those of humans who lived in the Stone Age. What we put into our bodies is
quite different. Refined supermarket food is being fed to our Stone Age bodies.

Much of the food found in supermarkets derives its calories from extracted

sweeteners, sugars, fats, and refined flour. Besides the empty-calorie
drawbacks and fat-producing effects of these foods, they are deficient in the
vitamins, minerals, and other important nutrients needed by the body to burn
them for energy. Therefore, the body must continually draw on its reserves of
stored nutrients, thus draining its nutritional reservoir.

Not only sweets, but also all processed foods that no longer carry with them

the essential nutrients endowed by nature are deficit inducing. For example, the

ingestion of processed foods has been shown to induce chromium deficiencies,
even though the chromium levels may have been normal before the

introduction of these refined products.13 Diets with a high ratio of refined
carbohydrate to total carbohydrate induce various nutritional deficiencies. This

form of high-calorie malnutrition causes the brain and nervous system to
become irritable and the immune system to malfunction.14,15 This weakens our

immune system and has an assortment of negative effects on our development,
including heightened intraocular pressure and poor eyesight.16

32

The China-Oxford-Cornell Study is one of the largest nutritional research

projects ever conducted. This massive project, called the ―Grand Prix of
Epidemiology,‖ documented the observation that in underdeveloped areas

where populations consume predominantly unrefined plant foods, the
degenerative diseases of modern society as well as the leading cancers are

virtually nonexistent. This study confirms hundreds of other studies that have
documented that most diseases of modern society originate from dietary folly.

Unfortunately, the rural societies examined in the China-Oxford-Cornell Study

are more and more adopting the ―American way‖ of eating and are statistically
beginning to show increasing incidence of disease.

The China Project dramatically demonstrates that if we plot the amount of

animal foods eaten against the death rates from the leading causes of death
(heart disease and cancers), all animal food consumption, even fish and

chicken, raises the rates of cancer and heart disease.17 Interestingly, even small
quantities of animal foods in the diet were able to trigger higher cholesterol

levels, heart disease, and cancer. The evidence from the China Project and
other confirming studies shows that the animal protein itself, not just the fat in

the animal foods, causes cholesterol to rise and cancer to increase. Dr. T. Colin
Campbell, head of the China Project, predicts that in the next 10 to 15 years

research will solidly establish that animal protein is one of the most toxic
nutrients for humans.

Dr. Campbell has explained, ―There is strong evidence in the scientific

literature that when a reduction in fat is compared to a reduction in protein
intake, the protein effect on blood cholesterol is more significant than the effect

of saturated fat. Animal protein is a hypercholesterolemic agent . . . Many
Americans are switching from beef to skinless chicken and other animal-based

foods simply to reduce their intake of fat. However the existing evidence

suggests that this makes little or no sense.‖18

It is clear that one should consume protein in quantities sufficient to meet the

needs of the body, but with no extra. Excess protein affects the body in a

variety of negative ways, shortening potential life span. Animal protein
consumption has been linked with increased cancer rates and tumor formation

as well as the acceleration of at.herosclerosis.19 Excess proteins also increase
our requirements for other nutrients by reducing the uptake of folate,

pantothenic acid, and pyridoxine, and by washing away essential minerals
through the kidney as the kidney attempts to eliminate the extra nitrogenous

waste.20 Because our physiological nature is such that we are primates,
equipped with the virtually identical digestive apparatus (comparatively small

liver and kidney) as the great apes, our structure is not well equipped to handle
high quantities of concentrated fats and proteins. Monkeys also do poorly on

high-protein diets and improve physically and emotionally when a high-
carbohydrate diet is resumed.21 Relatively high levels of uric acid, ammonia,

and other toxins such as phenols, skatole, and indole are formed by proteolytic
bacteria, which line our digestive tract when we consume a high-protein

diet.22,23 These toxic by-products elaborated by bacteria in our gut can

significantly add to the toxic load the body must deal with on a daily basis and

33

can contribute to multiple disease processes.

The idea that the major diseases in prosperous countries are related to
dietary excesses is becoming a majority view among those studying the

question. Dr. Mark Hegsted, Professor of Nutrition at the Harvard School of
Public Health, stated before a Senate Committee, ―The risks associated with

eating this diet (rich in meat, other sources of fat, sugar, and refined
carbohydrates) are demonstrably large. The question to be asked is not why

should we change our diet, but why not? Ischemic heart disease, cancer,
diabetes, and hypertension are the diseases that kill us. They are epidemic in

our population. We cannot afford to temporize. We have an obligation to inform

the public of the correct food choices. To do less is to avoid our responsibility.‖24

We continue to pretend that the cause of disease is a mystery or is genetic —

beyond our control. Fortunately, this is not so. On the other hand, many,

including physicians and informed laymen, are eager for excuses not to face the
annoying facts so they can continue to eat in ways that are convenient and

agreeable but hazardous to their health.

We Can Stop the Cancer Epidemic Only If We Change Our Diets

If we look at breast cancer as a model to illustrate why cancer incidence has
skyrocketed in this century, we can observe that in spite of modern medicine

there has been a slow, steady climb in the death rate from breast cancer.
Efforts to detect cancer earlier with mammograms and breast exams have not

impeded the climb in statistics showing that an increasing number of women
are still dying from this cancer. The failure to prevent cancer has exacted an

increasing toll: as of 1993 the disease attacks one in eight women in America.

The evidence linking diet to breast cancer has been known for years. As is the
case with most other diseases, however, the public is the last to know. In
Japan, for example, breast cancer was rare, but Japanese women who migrated
to this country soon had the same rate of cancer as American women—at least
400 percent higher than in Japan. We discovered that the decreased rate of

cancer was due not to genetics but primarily to the amount of fat in the diet.

In Japan, until about 50 years ago, less than 10 percent of calories came

from fat,25 compared to 40 percent in the American diet, even in the 1940s.
Today, however, the Japanese eat more and more meat, fat, and fast foods.

Predictably, the rate of breast cancer as well as other cancers in Japan is rapidly
increasing.26 Similar findings have been made within the United States. For

instance, studies comparing vegetarian to nonvegetarian groups show much

less cancer among vegetarians, especially those avoiding dairy products.27

American Children Produce Too Much Estrogen and Androgen

Increased quantities of dietary fat cause an array of negative effects on immune
function. The link between higher fat intake and the increasing occurrence of
common cancers has been well established for years.28,29 The link between fat
and breast cancer is also explained because it is well known that breast tumors

34

are fueled by estrogens.30 When women eat a low-fat diet, their estrogen level
drops quickly.31 Fats not only increase the amount of circulating estrogens in

the body, but also increase the biologic activity of the estrogen. A heightened
estrogen level through life eventually takes its toll — as a cause of menstrual

difficulties and increased bleeding, and as an important cause of breast cancer.

This effect of estrogen on the development of breast cancer is also indicated
by the fact that women who mature early, as measured by when menstruation

begins, face increased risk of developing breast cancer.32 Sexual maturation is
dependent on circulating estrogen levels. Ominously, the onset of menstruation

has been occurring at a younger and younger age in western societies during
this century.33 The average age in the United States is now about 12 years.

According to the World Health Organization, the average age at which puberty
began in 1840 was about 17.34

The early development of breast tissue and the early stimulation of this tissue

with high levels of estrogen is unprecedented in the history of the human race.
This unnatural stimulation of breast tissue occurs before and during the teenage

years, setting the groundwork for breast cancer later on. Feeding our children a
plant-centered diet predominating in wholesome natural plant foods such as

fruits, vegetables, and whole grains is probably the most important thing we
can do to prevent them from getting breast cancer as adults. We are finally

realizing that the diet we are raised on early in life has profound, far-reaching

effects on our later health.

As modern young Japanese have adopted our ways of eating high amounts of
fatty foods and more animal products, their age of onset of menses has
gradually fallen over the last 50 years from 16 to 12.5 years.35 The onset of
early maturity is an ominous sign both in males and females. As with estrogen
in women, heightened levels of androgens in men at a young age set the stage
for the development of prostate cancer later on.

Excess Fats Promote Cancer, While Plant Nutrients Protect Us

Comparing various populations around the world, the death rates of most
cancers, especially the most common — breast, colon, and prostate—are

directly proportional to the dietary fat intake.36 Dietary fat not only retards the
general effectiveness of the immune system, but also encourages the

absorption of carcinogens. For example, when the carcinogens in cigarette
smoke are absorbed through the lung tissue, the carrier vehicle for their

absorption is the fat in the blood. On a low-fat diet the body is less able to
absorb and transport carcinogens. Smokers on a high-fat diet have a higher

incidence of lung cancer than smokers on a lower fat diet. When we look at the
diets of those who contract lung cancer and never smoke, we find a lack of

fresh and raw fruits and vegetables.37

It is important to note that a diet composed primarily of fresh fruits and fresh
vegetables is high in vitamins A, C, and E and high in beta carotene and

selenium. These are sometimes referred to as the antioxidant nutrients. They

are called antioxidants because they have the ability when combined with

35

apoproteins produced by the body to function as scavengers of toxins. They aid

in controlling excessive production of free radicals, which are extremely reactive
and destructive molecules.

New antioxidant nutrients are discovered every year, but they are not

available in food supplements or vitamins. All of these protective nutrients that
enable us to remain free of disease are found in the highest quantity in green
and yellow plants and fresh fruits. These newly discovered phytochemicals with
anticancer activity are being found in increasing numbers in fruits and
vegetables. This is one of the hottest areas in nutritional research today.

When we do not eat a diet that obtains most of its calories from fruits and

vegetables, we inevitably earn low levels of these antioxidants and protective

phytochemicals in our bloodstream. Low blood levels of beta carotene and
vitamin C have been linked in multiple studies with increases in cancer

mortality, including breast cancer, lung cancer, stomach cancer, and colon
cancer.38 A recent study reported in the medical journal Nutrition in Cancer

revealed that patients who had a low beta carotene level in their blood in
conjunction with a high triglyceride level had a more than tenfold increase in

the risk of breast cancer.

High beta carotene and vitamin C levels in the blood are markers for high
fruit and vegetable intake, therefore targeting those with a high level of the

thousands of other important protective nutrients that travel along with beta
carotene. We will never be able to buy them all in a health food store or

pharmacy; they can be obtained only by eating large amounts of a variety of
fruits and vegetables. Whenever we look at populations who consume high

levels of fruits and vegetables, we find reduced levels of cancer and disease in
genera1.39

Our present-day diet is responsible for most of the ill health and premature

death observed today. In light of the preponderance of scientific evidence
available, it would be foolish to consume a diet containing more than 20 percent

fat, even though the National Cancer Institute still recommends a diet with no

more than 30 percent of calories from fat. Studies indicate that diets drawing
30 percent of calories from fats have negligible effect on cancer incidence.40 To

prevent cancer, fat intake must be reduced to the low levels found in countries
with extremely low cancer rates, such as China, where less than 15 percent of
calories are derived from fat.

In the massive China Health Study, fat intake in various provinces ranged

from 6 to 24 percent of calories. Breast as well as other cancers were
proportionally more prevalent as the fat intake increased. Less fat is consumed
in the areas of China where cancer incidence is lowest, and this level of fat is
much, much lower than what American authorities are recommending. (Our
government and our health authorities, like the American Cancer Society and
the American Heart Association, recommend a diet proven to cause high levels
of cancer and heart disease.)

High-Protein Diets Cause Osteoporosis

36

The human body is physiologically ill-equipped to handle a diet high in refined

foods, animal products, fats, and proteins, without ill effects. Just as heart
disease and cancers arc strongly related to a high consumption of animal foods,

the same can be said of autoimmune illnesses and osteoporosis. Multiple
studies have linked osteoporosis not to low calcium intakes, but to diets high in

protein, salt, refined sugar, caffeine, and phosphorous contained in soft drinks,
all of which cause an excessive loss of calcium in the urine.41,42,43,44 In fact,

populations that consume the highest levels of calcium usually have the highest
rates of osteoporosis-related hip fractures.45 Therefore, osteoporosis should be

seen as just another one of the diseases that is linked to our rich, highly

refined, high-protein, high-fat, modern diet.

The United States Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) for protein is 44

grams for a young woman. This includes a twofold safety factor, which doubles

the minimum requirements as determined by nitrogen balance studies. We do
not need to eat any animal foods to meet these protein requirements. Strict

vegetarians who eat no animal products get more than enough protein, and
they do not need, selectively or scientifically, to mix and match foods to do so.

It is a mistaken notion that we need to cat protein-concentrated foods in

order to obtain the eight essential amino acids. A thorough review of the
literature on human protein requirements and population studies shows that
children and adults grow healthy and strong on vegetable- and complex-
carbohydrate-based diets.46,47 Vegetables that do not contain significant
amounts of all eight essential amino acids tend to complement each other even
if the amino acids are consumed in separate meals in the same day or as much
as 16 hours apart.48

The average American woman consumes more than 100 grams of protein per

day, which is more than twice the level of our already high RDA. The extra

protein that we do not need merely adds stress to the system by increasing the
acid tide in our bloodstream after a high-protein meal and forcing the body to

deal with excess nitrogenous waste. The stress from excess protein results in
premature aging of the kidney and loss of excessive calcium when urinating.

This inevitably weakens the bones as we age.

A negative calcium balance means more calcium is excreted in the urine
than is absorbed via digestion. A positive balance means more calcium is

absorbed than is excreted. Studies have shown that when subjects consume

more than 75 grams of protein per day, even with a daily calcium intake as high
as 1,400 mg, negative calcium balance can result.49 The continual depletion of

our calcium reserves over time from excessive calcium excretion in the urine is
the primary cause of osteoporosis. It is the inevitable consequence of

consuming the American diet, which is much too high in protein.

Plant foods contain plenty of essential proteins, and you do not have to be a
food scientist or dietician to get enough. Any mixture of wholesome plant-based

foods consumed in a 24-hour period will supply the body with sufficient
amounts. For example, whole wheat bread is 16 percent protein; peanuts, 18

percent; beans, 28 percent; broccoli, 17 percent; and even fresh fruit such as

37

an orange is 5 percent protein. Stop being brainwashed by the false notion that
only animal foods contain adequate protein.

Sufficient amounts of protein are obtained when caloric requirements are met

from wholesome natural vegetable foods. Plant products contain an abundance
of protein, without being excessive. How else could the gorilla get to be 800
pounds of muscle, eating solely fruit and leaves? The main point is that we
should be concerned about too much rather than too little protein. It is ironic
that the chief argument used to promote the use of animal products—the idea
that they are rich in protein—is a great reason to avoid them.

Increased urinary calcium loss from the conventional high-protein diet also

leads to an increased risk of kidney stones and nephrocalcinosis (calcification of
kidney tubules). Numerous studies have shown that the formation of kidney
stones is directly proportional to the amount of animal protein in the diet.50 The
calcium supplements and increased milk consumption recommended to today’s
women will further accelerate kidney stone formation and nephrocalcinosis,
since more calcium will be filtered through the kidney.

Plant foods are a preferable source of protein also because they do not

contain antibiotics, cholesterol, and man-made chemicals that concentrate in
animal tissues. Unfortunately, animal foods such as milk, fish, and meat are
contaminated with man-made poisons and can contain high levels of pesticides
such as PCBs and DDTs. As animals eat the treated feeds and contaminated
grains and grasses, they retain the added toxins in their tissues. Animal
products contain much higher levels of pesticides than do plant foods.

Animals are fed antibiotics, other drugs, and growth agents. For example,

some of the most common drugs used on the farm include sulfamethazine,

which can cause cancer in laboratory animals and is believed to cause thyroid
tumors in humans. As a result of the process of biologic concentration (animals

retaining and accumulating poisonous chemicals for a lifetime in their tissues),
these chemicals are transmitted to humans when animal products are eaten.

PCBs and DDTs have also been linked to cancer. Women who have breast

cancer have a higher concentration of these chemicals in their breast tissues
than women who do not have cancer.51,52 Fish and dairy products are the

largest contributors of these toxic products in our diet. Though the highest
levels of PCBs are found in fish, they also occur in chicken and red meat. The

insecticides DDT and DDE are found mostly in dairy products.

Researchers at the National Cancer Research Center in Tokyo have confirmed
other reports that at least ten cancer-causing compounds are known to be
released when meat is grilled or fried. Many of the same compounds can be
found in cigarette smoke. When these compounds enter breast tissue they can
spur cancerous mutations.53 These compounds, mostly heterocyclic amines,
cause cancer by damaging human DNA. The same effect is seen with fish and
fowl.

A Natural Plant-Based Diet Is a More Sensible Approach

38

For ideal nutrition, I recommend a low-fat, lowered-protein, low-sodium diet;
one that is high in raw, unrefined carbohydrates. Meals can consist entirely of

fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, and raw nuts and seeds used
judiciously. This will cut the protein content to less than 75 grams per day. A

large salad of green lettuce should be consumed daily.

This ideal diet consists of at least 40 percent of calories from vegetables,
including raw vegetables, steamed green vegetables, and cooked starches such

as squash and potato. Fruit comprises another 25 percent of the diet, and
grains, beans, nuts, and seeds another 25 percent. This diet would derive not

more than 15 percent of calories from fat, 10 to 15 percent of calories from
protein, and 70 to 75 percent of calories from complex carbohydrate. The fat

would come from the natural foods themselves, not from extracted oils.

Refined food products, all sweeteners, added-salt and salted products, as well
as soft drinks, coffee, and caffeine drinks would be excluded from an optimal

diet. Dairy products would be eliminated or consumed infrequently.
If we look at a sample plant-food menu of approximately 2,000 calories (the

caloric intake appropriate for an average adult female), we see that it contains

a desirable level of protein, including generous amounts of all the essential

amino acids. Even without any nuts or beans, the menu contains much more
protein than the RDA.

Breakfast
Oatmeal (3 cups cooked)

Oranges (2 medium)

Apple (1 medium)

Lunch

Vegetable salad,
made from
lettuce, sprouts,
cucumber,
carrots, jicama, and

lemon

(8 ounces)

Kale (3 cups, steamed)

Potato (1 whole, baked)

Snack
Banana (1 raw)

Dinner Vegetable
salad, made from

lettuce, celery, red
pepper, carrots,

tomato, and lemon

(16 ounces)

Sunflower seeds (1 ounce)

Broccoli
(16 ounces,

steamed)

39

Brown rice
(2 1/2 cups

cooked)

Snack
Grapes (2 cups)

This sample diet provides 2,095 kilocalories, of which 13 percent come from

protein, 74 percent from carbohydrates, and 13 percent from fat. It can be seen
from the following analysis that there is plenty of protein in this diet, along with

the other essential nutrients. The percent of sodium, rather than being too low,
is actually appropriate. The ridiculously high RDA for sodium is reflective of the

American norm and is much too high for optimal health.

Nutrient Values and Percent RDA

for Selected
Nutrients of Preceding Menu

PERCENT
OF RDA

Protein
73.12

grams

149

Tryptophan 851.9 mg 340

Threonine 2,493 mg 554

Isoleucine 3,011 mg 465

Leucine 4,565 mg 480

Lysine 3,185 mg 398

Methionine 1,166 mg 274

Cystine 1,048 mg 246

Phenylalanine 3,124 mg 657

Tyrosine 2,051 mg 437

Valine 3,647 mg 561

Histidine 1,633 mg 296

Calcium 989 mg 123

Magnesium 829.4 mg 296

Phosphorus 1,898 mg 237

Selenium 0.289 mg 525

Vitamin A 8,981 IU 1,122

Thiamine (B
1
) 3.429 mg 311

Riboflavin (B
2
) 1.960 mg 150

Niacin (B
3
) 22.08 mg 147

Pyridoxine (B
6
) 4.479 mg 279

40

Cobalamin (B
12

) 0 µg 0

41

Folate 844.5 µg 469

Pantothenic acid 8.692 mg 158

Vitamin C 791.2 mg 1,318

Vitamin E 46.28 mg
(No

RDA)

A-Tocopherol 66.67 mg 833

Vitamin K 1,376 µg 2,117

Linoleic fat
14.64

grams

299

Iron 25.8 mg 171

Manganese 15.35 mg 438

Potassium 6,728 mg 336

Zinc 12.57 mg 104

Sodium 488 mg 20

On a strict vegetarian diet such as this, the only nutrient that might need to be
supplemented is vitamin B

12
. One B

12
tablet weekly is sufficient, as the body

stores vitamin B
12

effectively and our needs are very small. Most strict

vegetarians do not need to take vitamin B
12

supplements as their blood level of

this nutrient is adequate, probably because of production from bacteria residing
within the intestines. I advise people avoiding animal foods to either take a
supplement or get a blood test yearly. In a more primitive environment humans
on a plant food diet received the small amount of B

12
needed from bacteria on

the foods they ate. Improved hygiene, careful washing, and modern processing
destroy this bacteria so, today, it is wise to play it safe by assuring adequate
intake.

A compromise diet plan for those desiring to move closer to good nutrition

from their present eating habits, but unable to give up animal products, would
contain animal foods in very limited quantity. These concentrated foods are
such a significant health risk that if they must be consumed, they should be
limited to not more than 3.5 to 4 ounces every other day. Even then the
animal-based food should be utilized in small quantities, perhaps as a
condiment to flavor a vegetable dish or soup. This 3.5 ounces should include all
types of animal-based foods.

Another suggestion for those who do not want to restrict themselves to

vegetarian foods and who are otherwise in good health would be to eat animal
foods such as fish and chicken a few times a month, as in foods for special
occasions. Thus one wouldn’t have to worry about quantity.

If dramatic improvement in your health is what you have in mind, then

dramatic changes must be made in your diet. These changes must be

permanent. A miraculous recovery from disease, as I see with so many of my
patients who adopt these changes, requires dramatic changes in eating habits.

42

Healthy Diet Food Pyramid

Rational Recommendations for a Healthy Society

Official Food Guide Pyramid
Issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture

43

A Healthy Society with Limited Medical Costs Is Possible

Diseases that plague our modern society are reversible if sufficient dietary and
environmental stresses are removed from the picture. A good physician can
help people recover their health by helping them discover and eradicate all
possible impediments to healing.

Reversing disease through nutritional medicine and preventing cancer through

diet are the most powerful weapons we have to fight and win the war on cancer

and other degenerative illnesses that have taken over our country. Ninety
percent of cancers can be stopped before they even start. If just half of the

billions of dollars spent on cancer research were spent on educating the public

on how to avoid disease, we would witness a powerful reduction in the incidence
of most chronic diseases. Millions of lives would be saved from cancer.

If we look at heart disease alone, more than $150 billion a year is spent on

expensive medical procedures that attempt to remedy the effects of our rich
diets. Yet we ignore the reality that heart disease can be totally prevented by a

low-fat (less than 15 percent of total calories), plant-based diet. The American
Heart Association and the American Cancer Society still recommend a diet with

30 percent of calories from fat.

People are unaware that even 30 percent of calories from fat is an extremely
high level when we look at diets consumed throughout human history. Scientific
studies show that when this level of fat intake is consumed, there is no
improvement in heart disease. On the other hand, it has been shown that at
much lower levels of fat intake arterial blockages are easily reversible. When
patients who have coronary artery disease are placed on diets containing less
than 10 percent of calories from fat, improvement in their condition occurs in a
predictable fashion.54

The ineffective dietary recommendations from most authorities are

comparable to telling a smoker with lung disease that he will be taking care of

his disease if he cuts back from three packs a day to merely two.
(Unfortunately, these American institutions are misleading the public by

recommending diets with a level of fat that has been documented in the
scientific literature to actually promote heart disease and cause cancer.)

Instead, our government spends over $20 billion on price supports that

benefit the dairy, beef, and veal industry.55 These dollars are given to farmers

to artificially reduce the cost of crops used to feed cows and are also used to
advertise and keep the prices down on dairy foods, fowl, and meat. Fruits and

vegetables grown primarily for human consumption are specifically excluded
from USDA price supports. Out of one pocket we pay billions of our tax dollars

to support the production of expensive disease-causing foods. Out of the other
pocket we pay medical bills that are too high because our population consumes

too much of these rich, disease-causing foods.

44

Because of animal agriculture’s powerful lobbyists, these price supports are

not even considered wasteful by our present and past administrations. Worse
than wasteful, by keeping fatty foods artificially cheaper, we actually are paying
to make our society sicker and keep our health insurance costs high.

Most Americans, though aware of the change in nutritional thinking, have not

made substantial changes in their food choices or life-styles. Why? Because
most of us are physiologically addicted to food and assume it is difficult to
change our diet. We are also confused, uncertain, and have an incomplete
picture of how to maintain our health, so we resign ourselves to the way things
are. We are unaware of what standards of health are possible for us.

If you have a chronic illness or medical problem, most likely you have been

told there are no special diets that will help. This book will put an end to that
outmoded, incorrect, and dangerous position, which denies you the chance to
regain your health and regain control of your life. Unfortunately, if you try to
improve your diet and make changes following the guidelines you have been
given from the typical dietician or physician, you will not get better. These
recommendations are almost always too liberal to achieve substantial risk
reduction or disease reversal. As you will see as we discuss most of the major
health problems in detail in later chapters, aggressive nutritional management
of specific medical conditions can mean the difference between wellness and a
life of chronic illness, multiple medications, and premature aging and death.

Vitamin Pills Will Not Give Us a Healthy Population

It is true that the American public is deficient in certain essential vitamins and

minerals, as well as trace elements. Many people are concerned enough about
their health to take vitamins, but unfortunately, this will not have a substantial

impact on the wellness of our population. Today almost every medical problem
patients are faced with is the result of years of dietary excesses they have

consumed, not merely deficiencies.

The message people hear is that it is okay to continue with their present diet,
as long as they supplement with vitamin pills or other nutritional supplements.

This is a powerful lie, but it is attractive because it is what people in general
want to believe. However, you cannot achieve optimal wellness as long as

present-day dietary habits continue.

Powerful industrial forces driven by economics, not science, are trying to
convince us that it doesn’t matter what we eat. Any amount of processed,

chemicalized, so-called ―food‖ will allegedly meet our needs as long as we take
vitamins, antacids, digestive aids, headache and allergy remedies, and other

drugs.

The animal food industry has promoted the use of its products by false
nutritional dogma for decades. We have heard this effective misinformation not
only from advertisements, but also in the classroom, where it is taught that
animal proteins, milk, and dairy foods are essential to good health.

45

This has occurred as the result of billions of dollars spent by these industries

to influence the information we receive. Prevailed upon by powerful lobbyists
wielding tremendous economic power, our government has made dietary

recommendations that have been at odds with nutritional science for decades.
Even with the USDA’s latest food pyramid, which de-emphasizes dairy, meat,

poultry, and other high-fat foods, the power of the food industry was evident:
publication of this pyramid was held up for five years while these food

producers negotiated for and won a weaker stance against their products.

These industries financially support and therefore bias the majority of
nutritional research carried out by major universities and scientific institutions

in this country. For instance, over the last 50 years the largest financial
contributors to nutritional research done at Harvard have been the dairy, meat,

and sugar industries. Even the American Society for Clinical Nutrition, which
pub-

Harvard Department of Nutrition

Funding Sources, 1942-198656

American Meat

Institute
Armour & Co.
Beatrice Food Co.

Borden Co.

International Sugar

Research Foundation
Kellogg Co.
Kraft Corp.

McDonald’s Corp.

California & Hawaiian National Biscuit Co.

Sugar Co.

Campbell Soup Co.

Carnation Co.
Coca Cola Co.

Dairy Council of
California
Florida Sugar Cane

League, Inc.

Frito-Lay, Inc.
General Foods
General Mills
Gerber Baby Food
Co.
Hartford Foundation

(A & P Foods)

H. J. Heinz
Hershey Foods Hunt-

Wesson Foods

National Confectioners

Association

National Dairy Council
National Dairy Products
National Livestock and
Meat Board
Oscar Mayer and Co.

Oscar Mayer Foundation
Pet Milk Co.
Pillsbury Co.

Special Dairy Industry

Board
Sugar Association, Inc.

Sugar Research
Foundation

Swift & Co.

Swift and Co. Foundation
Tuna Research

Foundation

lishes the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, discloses on the inside front

page of the journal that it is supported by such companies as Coca Cola,
Borden, Inc., Nabisco, NutraSweet, and various drug companies.

The result is that establishment nutritional advice does little more than

reinforce the dietary errors people prefer to make. Much of the nutritional

46

information that is given to the public is misleading. Even food labeling is
deceptive. Food producers are permitted to use portion size or weight to

calculate fat information, which presents a lie to the unsuspecting consumer.
For example, is whole milk 4 percent fat? It does contain 4 grams of fat per 100

grams of milk, but since each 100 grams of milk contains 70 calories, and since
fat carries 9 calories per gram, whole milk actually gets 50 percent of its

calories (4 x 9/70) from fat. Even ―low-fat‖ dairy products still are high-fat
foods. The dairy industry always presents nutritional ―education‖ in

nutrient/weight terms to hide the fat content of its products.

The meat and fast food industry has even picked up on the dairy industry’s
mathematical subterfuge. McDonald’s ―91 percent fat-free hamburger‖ contains

45 percent of calories from fat.

In spite of the continual onslaught of misinformation, a powerful opposition,

and the desire of the majority to want to believe they can consume anything
without paying the price, honest nutritional information will eventually reach

more and more of the public. This is because we have become such a sickly
society that more people are looking for answers.

The facts are that if animal foods are included in the diet in significant

quantities, it is impossible to devise a diet consistent with the overwhelming
bulk of evidence about food and health in the scientific literature. Society and

individuals will pay the price in suffering due to chronic disease and increased
rates of premature death.

The diseases most prevalent in our society will never be prevented just by

taking vitamin or food supplements. The causes are multifactorial and most
significantly the result of eating the wrong type of food. The diseases of affluent

societies arc virtually unknown in societies of lesser economic strength, which
live on natural-food, plant-based diets. When the effects of plant foods are

compared to the detrimental effects of animal products, it becomes clear why

these ―backward‖ societies have superior health. It is not merely the effects of
fiber, vitamins, and minerals in the plant foods that are protective; it is plant

foods as a whole.

Preventive Nutrition Is the Same as Nutrition to Reverse
Disease

The chicken, fish, and low-fat dairy eating that most people think is healthy for

the heart may be a little better than the typical greasy diet, but it is a far cry
from a good diet. It will never offer significant protection against or reverse

heart disease or cancer. We now have a population of miseducated consumers

who think they are on a low-fat diet and wonder why they continue to have high
blood pressure and heart disease, not to mention all the other diseases

resulting from this outmoded diet. Doctors tell them their illnesses must be
genetic or idiopathic (no known cause), which covers up ignorance or inability

to improve outcome. The patients are forced to take more medication.

These often ignored points must be emphasized. Even the lower-fat animal

47

products are linked to heart disease, cancer, and auto immune diseases. Also,

extracted oils, even the least harmful of them, such as canola or olive oil, still
promote obesity and diabetes and even increase the risk of cancer. Keep in

mind that when food is not in its natural state (you never saw a jar of oil
growing on a tree), it more than likely is a risky food to consume on a regular

basis.

If we follow a dietary program that is rich in natural plant foods and
eliminates or reduces the intake of refined and overly processed foods and
high-protein, high-fat foods, the body remarkably begins to slowly heal itself.
The power of your food choices has astonishing effects since food is the most
variable and the most substantial external agent that we are in contact with
each day.

Fasting, like food selection, is a form of nutritional modification. It has broad

biochemical effects on the body. While fasting, the healing process is
accelerated. This enables the cells and tissues to clean out the excesses that
already exist. Keep in mind, however, that if the message you glean from this
book is to fast periodically to give your body a chance to rest and perform
internal housecleaning, and yet continue to stress your system between the
fasts, you will lose most of the possible benefits.

Rational Recommendations for a Healthy Society

To summarize, general dietary guidelines are suggested here:

1. Eat at least five pieces of fresh fruit a day and a large green salad daily. In

addition, a large serving of dark green or yellow vegetable such as
broccoli, string beans, or kale (which may be steamed or microwaved if
desired) should be eaten daily.

2. Adopt a vegetarian diet, if possible. If you continue to eat animal foods,

limit the quantity to less than 3.5 ounces every other day. This includes

fish, fowl, meat, and low-fat dairy foods. Unprocessed complex
carbohydrates such as baked potatoes, sweet potatoes, rice, and squash

should be a daily staple in your diet.

3. Severely limit or eliminate sweets, except for fresh fruit. Fried, salted,
pickled, and barbecued foods should also be eliminated from your diet.

4. Drink purified or distilled water, not tap water, which contains chlorine.

If you are seriously interested in your health and longevity, the answers are
here for you in this book. But it is pertinent to ask how many people would

voluntarily restrict their diet in order to prolong life or lessen the risk of

disease? Many believe that people would prefer to satisfy their food desires,
rather than live a long life.

When I give presentations on nutrition to hospital staffs or physician groups,

a typical statement I receive from someone in the crowd is, ―I could never get

48

my patients to do that.‖ This person also is probably thinking, ―I don’t want to
eat like that either.‖

My response to these doctors is, regardless of the percentage of individuals

who would be willing to eat a healthy diet; the least a responsible physician

should do is present the option to those who seek advice and treatment about a
significant medical problem. To do less is to sell the patient short. With an

accurate presentation, the number of people willing to make significant changes

might prove surprising.
In my practice I routinely see patients who are desperately seeking a way to

recover their health. It is rare that they aren’t willing to make the necessary

changes when they are given the opportunity to get well and avoid a lifetime of
taking drugs to control symptoms.

49

Chapter 3

Understanding Health and Disease

The ideas presented in this book are centuries old, yet are increasingly

supported by new research on human nutrition. It should not be forgotten that
today’s discoveries and ideas were founded on a long history of scientific effort

by physicians who considered nutrition the most critical part of their practice.

As early as 400 B.C. the Greek physician Hippocrates used nutrition as his

chief therapy. His favorite healing foods were barley mush, apples, and dates.

He paid strict attention to the dietary needs of his patients and stated,
―Whoever gives these things [food] no consideration, and is ignorant of them,

how can he understand the diseases of man?‖

Today the health of our society is poor, specifically because today’s
physicians know little of human nutrition and the power of optimal nutrition in
restoring health. In fact, some of the most respected physicians in history who
are remembered because of their success in the treatment of the ill have been
all but ignored by the conventional medical community, which bases its practice
on giving drugs to the sick.

Isaac Jennings, M.D. (1788-1874),1 spent 20 years adhering to the regular

drugging and bleeding practices of the time, but gradually lost confidence in
those procedures and methods. He noticed that he was not helping his patients
and found that they did better with fewer drugs. He decided to change his
methods. Instead of furnishing his patients with drugs, he gave them
placebos, pills and liquids he concocted out of bits of food and water. At the
same time, he gave them advice on diet and rest. He often instructed his
patients to use the ―medicine‖ for the first week with water and no food. He
told them the medicine would not be effective if they did not follow his
instructions. He usually continued the plan for a few more days after their next
visit. Diseases vanished, and his fame spread. People thought his ―medicines‖
were magical and he became known as the greatest healer of his day.

Early in this century, John Tilden, M.D. (1851–1940), built on the work of

other pioneering physicians such as Jennings and devoted his life to teaching
the public how to maintain health. He stated,

Nature returns to normal when enervating habits are given up. There
are no ―cures‖ in the sense generally understood. If one has a

tobacco heart, what is the remedy? Stop the tobacco of course . . .
What will cure? Drugs? No! Removing the cause. Every so called

disease is built within the mind and body by enervating habits. A fast,
rest in bed and the giving up of enervating habits, mental and

physical, will allow nature to eliminate the accumulated toxin; then, if

50

enervating habits are given up, and rational living habits adopted,

health will come back to stay . . . The medical world has been looking
for a remedy to cure disease, notwithstanding the obvious fact that

nature needs no remedy—she only needs an opportunity to exercise
her own prerogative of selfhealing.2

Herbert Shelton, D.C., N.D. (1895-1985), built on the works of these early
medical doctors and wrote prolifically from the 1920s on, in his own self-
published magazines and through his publication of 12 books on the subject of
health and healing. Dr. Shelton’s Health School in San Antonio, Texas,
improved and restored the health of more than thirty thousand people through
fasting and natural food diets. Both my father, who twice fasted 21 days, and I
(who fasted 46 days), were among those thirty thousand patients who fasted
at Dr. Shelton’s Health School.

To this day, the mainstream of modern medicine and the alternative health-

care movement, both fueled by a remedy mentality that dominates our society
combined with the financial incentive to make profits selling cures and drugs,

has generally ignored this minimalist school of healing. Until recently, little
scientific research has been done in this field.

In the last ten years, however, there has been a significant upswing in

research on the causes of various diseases. The knowledge gained from these

studies, when applied to chronic ailments, will have a major impact on future
medical care. It has also lent credence to those ―medical heretics‖ of the past

who championed natural food diets and fasting as a means of preventing and
treating disease.

The body can heal itself when the proper environment for healing is

established and all obstacles to healing, or stressors, are removed. When
people live in harmony with their physiological needs, health is the inevitable

result. By supplying the organism with its basic requirements—natural
unadulterated food, clean water, and appropriate physical, mental, and

emotional activities—while simultaneously eliminating all harmful factors and
influences, the self-constructing, self-regulating, self-repairing qualities of the

body are given full rein. The same innate wisdom that constructed our bodies
from two cells at conception is always there to restore the body to health if we

let it.

Understanding why we have a health care crisis in this country involves more
than looking at political and economic concerns. The primary reason we spend

a large proportion of our income on health care is that our population is
chronically ill and growing sicker. The ―Band-Aid‖ approach offered by the

conventional physician can do. little to stop this epidemic of sick people from

needing medical care. Unfortunately, legislation will never be able to curtail the
runaway medical costs because ―disease care,‖ as it should be called, does not

lead to a healthier society with fewer medical needs.

Our bodies were designed to function from birth to an uneventful natural
death. But our chance of living in our modern society and then dying from the

51

natural aging process is close to zero. Disease is so much a part of the
American way of life that it is considered normal. People do not develop chronic

degenerative illnesses through bad luck. Disease develops through years and
years of nutritional and other stresses on the human system. When these

causes are sufficiently removed, people can get well, throw away their
medications, and avoid unnecessary, expensive, and invasive medical care. It

is not aging that makes us sick; it is the stresses we place on ourselves that
continue their insidious work over the years and eventually cause damage to

the body.

Just because you are ignorant of the harmful stresses that you are placing on
your system doesn’t make them less injurious. If you drink 6 cups of coffee a

day, snort cocaine, and eat fast foods and sweets, it is ludicrous to expect
health to evolve from the addition of more drugs in an attempt to lessen the

symptoms that arise from the daily abuses that are placed on the body. If the
poisoning stops, however, the body has the ability to heal itself and restore

normalcy. Clearly, consuming coffee, cocaine, and junk food are examples of
practices recognized as obvious stresses to many people, but hundreds of other

stressful life-style and dietary practices that are also injurious are generally not

recognized as so.

Degenerative or chronic disease is earned. Our bodies follow strict biological
laws of causation. If we feed ourselves the wrong fuel, or are exposed to toxic

substances, if we do not get sufficient rest and sleep, are chronically unhappy
or under chronic emotional stress, our bodies will inevitably express some

malfunction called disease.

These avoidable chronic illnesses encompass almost every condition that a
doctor sees every day. They include acne and other skin diseases, allergies,

asthma, arthritis, diabetes, headaches, heartburn, fatigue, indigestion,
psoriasis, high blood pressure, recurrent viral infections, and more.

Unfortunately, all patients get when they seek help is more poisons in the form
of drugs to consume. These drugs only add to the toxic insults the body must

bear, thus further contributing to ill health. Neither the medical community nor
the public has understood the simple concept that the body will not function

normally if injurious substances are consumed.

It is rare that even years of self-abuse and destruction of the body due to the
disease process will cause irreversible damage. When the cause of disease is
removed, the rejuvenating effects of the human system are astounding.

Toxicosis Is a Common Cause of Disease

In order to understand the nature of the disease process one must first define
toxicosis. Toxicosis means nothing more than the retention of elements within

our system that are foreign to normal cellular function. It could also refer to the

retention of an increased quantity of a substance that would be normal in small
amounts but irritating or toxic in higher quantities.

Each cell is like a little factory. It takes in raw materials, processes them into

52

some usable product, and produces waste. This cellular or self-produced waste

is called endogenous waste. Endogenous wastes are the metabolic wastes
produced within our own body, the by-products of cellular metabolism.

Many are familiar with the concept of free radicals, a major endogenous

waste whose amount and location in the cell must be tightly controlled to avoid

cellular damage. Even the free radical has a positive function within the cell. It
is used there as part of the garbage disposal system helping to chew up and

destroy other waste products. Only when the amount of free radicals becomes
excessive or they escape their normal confines within specific cellular

organelles do they become a harmful element.

Exogenous wastes are those toxins taken in from outside the body—usually
from our food supply. They include chemicals, pesticides, and other obvious

pollutants. These wastes also include excesses of elements that may be

nutritive in normal amounts but produce toxic by-products when consumed in
larger amounts. Toxins may also be elaborated from bacteria residing within

the digestive tract.

Of course, the body has mechanisms to process and eliminate toxins and
protect itself from their damage. This occurs mostly through the breakdown of
toxins in the liver and elimination via the kidney. However, the body’s ability to
process and remove toxic material has many limitations. Given the typical
modern diet and environment, our detoxification mechanisms are under stress.
They are often chronically unable to keep up with the excessive demand for
removal of toxins and other wastes.

Toxins also may be eliminated through the skin and mucous membranes. For

example, a skin rash may occur as the body’s attempt to rid itself of some
offensive substance, or one’s nose may produce excessive mucus as the body

attempts to channel irritating substances or dead cells through mucosal
eliminative channels.

If you were a fireman who entered a burning building and inhaled the acrid

smoke, your nose would run, your eyes would tear, and you would begin to
cough. Why? Because your body would be making an effort to protect itself
from the damage of the toxic smoke.

Your system has means to protect itself from irritants. Is this a sign of illness

or of health? Coughing is a sign of health; the body produces a cough as an

effort to keep the lungs clear. A healthy body offers a vigorous response when
we try to poison it. The body may cough, sneeze, develop a fever or a rash,

and even produce mucus or diarrhea in its attempt to rid the system of
unwanted retained waste.

It is easy for most people to see how the body can attempt to wash away or

push out a toxin such as smoke, but difficult for most to grasp the concept of
elimination when there is an invisible irritant coming from within. Waste usually

causes no symptoms, just painless cellular damage, unless the body has the
means to try to rid itself of the waste. Symptoms occur as the body tries to rid

53

itself of these internalized substances, and excess mucus or inflammatory pain
results.

Trying to suppress these symptoms with medication is not a good thing if it

enables the body to tolerate more waste products or toxins within it without

reacting to them.

In itself, the absence of symptoms is not the same as good health. Like the

smoker who continues to inhale noxious smoke on a continuous basis but feels
fine, most Americans are poisoning themselves daily in one form or another,

yet they feel healthy. Frequently these people feel bad only after they attempt
to quit smoking and the body gains the ability to attempt to rid itself of the

toxins. Only after quitting smoking does the body begin to repair damage and
attempt to remove abnormal cells that have been damaged from years of

abuse. So often I hear the complaint, ―I felt fine before, but now that I quit
smoking, I am coughing and bringing up mucus like I never did before.― These

symptoms may indicate that the body is moving in the direction of better

health.

The absence of symptoms is not indicative of adequate health. Detoxification

or rightly directed remedial activities of the body may be uncomfortable or

painful, but they always represent a form of withdrawal from an offensive
retained element. These same bodily actions may be called into play when the

body reacts against an unwanted invader, such as a virus or bacteria and the
elaborated toxic products from these microbes.

Occasionally, individuals manifest unusual eliminative pathways that express

themselves in troubling symptoms. These may declare themselves in
inflammation in almost any body part, but most frequently are observed in the

skin and mucous membranes of the nose, throat, sinuses, lungs, vagina, and
rectum. For example, vaginitis or prostatitis may be associated with the

overgrowth of certain infectious microbes, but in many cases no pathogenic
species can be found to account for such symptoms. Physicians are generally

not helpful at this point because they have found nothing to treat and kill with
drugs so they are unable to offer a solution.

Under these puzzling conditions, it is not unusual for me to see a patient

after he or she has visited numerous other physicians to no avail. When the
patient undertakes the solutions outlined in this book, and allows the body to
finish its rightly directed activity (of detoxification), he or she is soon free from
further discomfort. So many symptoms—from unusual skin rashes and joint

pains to more infrequent but extremely troublesome proctitis and vulvadynia—
are unexplainable by the conventionally trained physician but easily remediable
though fasting and natural diet, which allow the body to detoxify.

Exogenous Wastes Typically Come from Food and Drugs

In the first pharmacology lecture that I heard in medical school, the physician

impressed on us that all drugs are toxic and we should never forget this. We
were taught that medications work because of their pharmacologic properties—

54

properties that enable the substance to interfere with, block, or stimulate an

activity of the body. Drugs typically modify the way the body expresses the
signs and symptoms of disease, but in chronic disease states, they do not undo
the damage or remove the disease.

Of course, medications can be lifesaving in emergencies and in the case of

severe infections, such as pneumonia or meningitis. However, the modern drug
approaches to chronic degenerative illnesses fail to offer a safe, effective
solution for most chronic medical problems.

So medications, alcohol, over-the-counter remedies, and even most herbal

remedies (because their primary mode of action is via pharmacologic or toxic
effects) can add to the toxic load the body must deal with.

The average person suffers from the effects of toxicosis, or the retention of

excessive quantities of waste within the body. This modern type of malnutrition

is the result of consuming too much of certain food elements (fat, protein,
simple sugars) and too little of others (vitamins, minerals, fiber). When we eat

freely of relatively rich foods instead of predominantly natural plant material,
we disturb the function of every one of our millions of cells. This results in a

buildup of unwanted substances inside and around every cell, contributing to
disease.

Improper diet exposes us to many offending substances and is the largest

cause of disease. The chief cause of disease in this country is not vitamin or
nutrient deficiency. Though specific nutrient deficiencies and imbalances may

contribute to the disease process, as does everything from the air we breathe
to exposure to chemicals in the home or workplace, their contribution is not so

great as the destruction of the body from food-borne toxins and excess

nutrients, such as excess fats, proteins, and refined sweeteners.

All Disease Represents an Abnormality in Cellular Function

With the exception of illness caused by direct injury, virulent poisoning, or

defects present prior to birth, internal physiology and cellular biochemistry

determine an individual’s level of health and capabilities. Damage at the
cellular level causes groups of cells to function abnormally, eventually leading

to chronic disease.

Within the scientific community, the theories of cellular aging, based on
advances in cellular biology, explain not only the factors that accelerate the

aging of our cells, but also the destructive processes that lead to disease.
These mechanisms of cellular damage often express themselves in chronic

degenerative illnesses, especially autoimmune diseases, and work to accelerate
our death.

In medical research today the cellular congestion theory is the leading

theory of biologic aging. A few other respectable theories also have advocates
in the scientific community. They are presented here because it is likely that no

single idea adequately explains all the mechanisms involved in the loss of

55

cellular function that leads to disease or premature aging. When we can

comprehend the science supporting many of these most respected theories, we
can gain a clearer understanding of cellular function. It then becomes easy to

understand how fasting can lead to cellular rejuvenation and why scientific
experimentation on animals reveals that fasting prolongs the life span.

The Cellular-Congestion Theory of Aging

Many scientists believe this theory explains why aging occurs. Waste material
gathers inside the cell, and eventually accumulates to the point of internal cell
damage. The amassing of unwanted and often toxic substances explains the
gradual decline in cellular function and therefore body function in general.

The waste products of cellular breakdown and cellular metabolism include

excesses and unrestrained free radicals, as well as hundreds of other toxic
metabolites. The more stress or the more use demanded from the cell, the
more metabolic wastes will be produced.

The Free-Radical Theory of Aging

Free radicals are reactive elements. They contain an unpaired electron, making
them chemically reactive. They can break apart other chemical bonds they

come in contact with. Free radicals have both negative and positive functions
within the cell. Though they are an important toxin, they also function as part

of the detoxification machinery of the cell. Cells contain free radicals in order to
utilize their reactive and destructive properties to chew up and destroy other

wastes. It is only when the production of free radicals becomes excessive and
their activity continues outside the confines of the specific areas of the cell that

are designed to process waste that free radicals cause cellular damage.

We know now that there are hundreds of other cellular toxins besides free
radicals; therefore, it is more precise to include the free-radical theory of aging

as part of the cellular-congestion theory. Since the free-radical theory of aging
was proposed in 1956 by Harmon,3 many attempts have been made to use

antioxidants, vitamins, and free-radical-scavenging drugs to see if they extend

the life span in lab animals. These interventions have not been effective at
extending life spans, though periodic fasting of animals has consistently shown

the ability to do so. This failure does not provide strong evidence against the
free-radical theory for three reasons: 1) The administered antioxidant may not

be distributed to the cellular site of production of the free radical; 2) each
antioxidant is specific for a particular free radical species and thus is unlikely to

have a global effect; and 3) significant damage to cellular structures, especially
the mitochondria, occurs from other nonradical toxins such as

malondialdehyde, ceroid, lipofuscin, and other related substances.

On the other hand, fasting (and food restriction in general) has a powerful
effect on modulating free-radical production, repairing free-radical damage,

and facilitating removal or detoxification of the products of free-radical
damage. Fasting aids in the removal of other toxins, and has been shown to

maintain the integrity of the cellular structure even at advanced ages.4 Food

56

restriction also decreases the rate of free-radical generation by reducing the
rate of electron transport and oxygen utilization.

The Cross-Linkage Theory of Aging

Tissues in our body, especially collagen, develope cross-links at the cellular

level as the tissue ages. These cross-linkages cause tissue to become less
elastic and interfere with normal function. Internally produced waste products

that are the leading cause of these cross linkages are intermediate metabolites.
Intermediate metabolites are waste products that increase in quantity as a

result of excess nutrient intake, especially excessive protein intake.

When a product the body needs, such as a hormone, is manufactured by the
cellular machinery, it is put together by enzymes in numerous steps. The more

proteins and other excess raw materials are fed into our system, the more
these enzymes will be activated to produce products. Since the body regulates

its production of end-products very carefully, it must have a means of
controlling this production so that too much product will not be produced. For

example, can you imagine if too much insulin was produced?

The body accomplishes this regulation by slowing the activity of the enzymes
in the pathway as more fuel (typically protein) is available. As these rate-

controlling enzymes slow down, less final product is produced and more
partially constructed products, also known as intermediate metabolites,

increase in quantity. This explains one clearly defined mechanism via which
excess proteins and a few other nutrient precursors are converted into harmful

substances within the cells.

Studies have shown that the process of cross-linkage can be retarded in rats

by restricting food intake. Overeating and nutrient excesses cause the
accumulation of intermediate metabolites, many of which are potent cross-

linking agents.5 When animals are fasted, the aging of collagen is prevented.
Fasting inhibits production of cellular intermediates and enables the body either

to eliminate such retained wastes or to utilize them as fuel. It was observed
that fasting in animals prevented the aging-related stiffening of the blood

vessels as well.6

This theory of aging is not very different from the cellular-congestion theory.
This theory describes further endogenous toxins besides free radicals and

shows the powerful effect they can have by cross-linking connective tissue. By
combining the above leading theories we can have a more accurate picture of

biologic damage on the cellular level.

Genetic-Code-Error Theory of Aging

The genetic code theory is based on the overuse of the cell’s genetic

machinery, or DNA. The nucleus of the cell contains the architectural blueprint
(DNA) for all activity the cell is called on to perform. If the DNA suffers

sufficient damage, the cell will not be able to function normally, and could even
become cancerous. The more the cell is called on to function, the more the DNA

57

is utilized. Unessential usage of the genetic machinery of the cell encourages
more errors to occur in the genetic code and leads to cellular breakdown.

Each cell has a DNA repair team of enzymes that is continually working to

repair damage to the cell’s vital DNA; however, a cell’s ability to repair itself is
limited. Free radicals and cellular congestion are known to contribute to DNA
damage. This is known as the genetic-code-error theory.

Other theories of aging focus on the function of endocrine glands, growth

rate, and rate of immunologic breakdown. Whichever theory we look at can be
applied to our model and shows that a nutritionally adequate diet containing no

excess nutrients (especially proteins and fats) and no overeating will prolong
structure and function at the cellular level.

What these theories all have in common is that we age prematurely when

we place our body under stress and drive cellular machinery to overwork in the
attempt to process unessential waste. These theories, because they are based

on modern scientific knowledge of cells combined with experimental studies on
both animals and humans, indicate that food intake is the most crucial factor

that determines aging.

It is remarkable to consider the number of scientific studies illustrating the
effect of food restriction on life span. Hundreds of studies have found that in
many species dietary restrictions can increase longevity by approximately 50
percent. These studies also show that any fat at all on an animal’s body has the
effect of shortening life span.7,8,9,10 Fasting animals not only extends their life
but also, by blunting most physiologic mechanisms of aging, dismantles
immune system imbalances that contribute to disease.

It is also evident that fasting powerfully opposes all the processes that lead

to aging at the cellular level. This prolongs life even in healthy individuals. The

restorative effects of fasting have been observed in many species of animals
(including primates), and have been clinically observed in humans by doctors

such as myself who regularly conduct therapeutic fasts.

The Longer the Belt, the Shorter the Life

Many experiments in animals and observational studies in humans show that
both severe malnutrition and over nutrition significantly lower resistance to

disease. Longevity studies on humans excluding smokers, drinkers, and the
chronically ill illustrate that the leanest live the longest.11 Though thinness is

not the only criteria for health, it is undeniable that a person in good health, on
a nutritious diet, who is below the average weight, has by far the best chance

for a long life. The National Institute of Health also reports the same
conclusion: when smokers and those with a disease that causes thinness are

excluded, the greatest longevity is found in those whose weight is below

average.12

When the diet is without deficiencies, minimum caloric intake greatly
increases resistance to infectious diseases. There are a host of mechanisms

58

that strengthen our immune system and make the ―soil‖ unwelcome for

microbes when the body is not overfed. After studying various population
groups, including underfed wartime prisoners, researchers have concluded that
resistance to disease is highest on what would generally be considered an
inadequate diet.13 It has been noted that when epidemics struck wartime prison
camps, the underfed prisoners had a much lower morbidity than their overfed
captors.

When we contract a viral infection and lose our appetites, nature is telling us

to fast. It is a means the body has of powerfully exciting white blood cell
activity and releasing more immune system modulators, such as interferon,
thus enabling the body to more quickly and effectively recover.

The best way to guard against nutritional excesses, while still maintaining

optimal assimilation of all essential nutrients, is to consume an abundance of
natural plant products that are rich in vitamins and minerals. At the same time
one must avoid empty-calorie, processed foods, fats, refined carbohydrates,
and animal products, which are high in fat and protein and deficient in the
nutrients that are most protective to our system.

In the last thousand years, poor societies with constant low caloric intake

have had a monotonous, sometimes nutrient-deficient diet, while prosperous,
well-nourished societies have blatantly over consumed calories, fat, and
protein. Fortunately, today’s modern transportation and refrigeration methods
allow us to have an assortment of fresh fruits and vegetables year round,
affording us an opportunity to practice a nutrient-rich diet low in fat and empty
calories. This has been difficult to achieve in the past. We should take

advantage of this opportunity.

Fasting Enhances Immune Responsiveness

Deficiency of nutrients can occur from the consumption of an insufficient diet
over a prolonged period of time. Much of our population is indeed deficient in
essential plant-derived nutrients because of their overconsumption of fat,
protein, and. refined carbohydrate. Chronic exposure of experimental animals
to diets severely deficient in calories or essential nutrients results in
compromised cellular immunity. By contrast, short-term fasting followed by
controlled caloric restriction without malnutrition greatly increases longevity
and enhances immune responsiveness.

As early as 1911, researchers demonstrated that restricting the diets of

animals greatly improved their disease resistance and markedly increased
longevity14,15 as long as the restricted diet was not deficient in vitamins or
minerals. Subsequent research has shown that underfeeding reduces the
development of both spontaneous and induced tumors in rodents. Specifically,
underfeeding enhances cell-mediated immune function and prevents the
decrease in immune function associated with aging.

In non-obese humans the immunological response to caloric restriction and

weight loss has been studied under conditions of malnutrition, anorexia

59

nervosa, and voluntary fasting. The effect on immune function is marked.
Severe chronic malnutrition results in suppression of immune function and

increased infections. Anorexia nervosa patients, if consuming very few calories,
develop significant reductions in cellular immunity.16,17 However, no impairment

of immunity is seen until the patients become severely emaciated.18,19

In Dr. Anton Keys’s classic study of the biology of human starvation, healthy
volunteers who fasted repeatedly had a decreased incidence of infection.20 More

recently researchers evaluated the immune competence of patients before and
after a 14-day fast and noted enhancement in serum immunoglobulin levels,

skin testing response, and the bacteriocidal capacity of monocytes and natural
killer T cell activity. These researchers draw a parallel between their findings

and the enhanced immune responses seen in experimental animals following
fasting.21

Fasting is very different from chronic malnutrition. Deficiency disease does

not occur as a result of the fast. Rather than suppressing immunity, which is
what happens in cases of long-term malnutrition and anorexia, fasting actually
does the opposite; it normalizes and enhances immune function.

Our Bodies Follow the Law of Cause and Effect

The body has certain needs. It operates according to strict law and order, not
at random. If the laws that govern the body are broken, the body will naturally
begin to malfunction and break down. This is really another way of describing
what we call disease.

The opposite is health. If you provide the causes of outstanding health, you

get outstanding health. If you provide the causes of disease, you get disease.

Every level of health, which extends on a spectrum from optimal health and
vitality to the disease states of chronic illness, is directly related to and

governed by the law of cause and effect.

The general population is bombarded by health information generated by the

health profession, drug companies, and food manufacturers, whose intention is
to maintain the status quo. Unfortunately, the average consumer can become

more confused than ever. The holistic practitioners, the alternative and
complementary physician groups, and the suppliers of vitamins and other

natural remedies and treatments add to the giant net of confusion. Everyone
claims to have the magic cure. But the sobering facts are undeniable: cure

doesn’t really exist, so long as the cause is permitted to continue unchecked.

In reality, cure occurs only when the body has rid itself of disease-causing
factors and has had a chance to recuperate from their ill effects. What we

commonly refer to as being cured is usually the diminishing of symptoms
through pharmacology or the removal of diseased tissue through surgery. This

is always a short-term solution, does not leave the body in better shape, and
sets the body up for a reoccurrence of the same set of symptoms or, in the

case of surgery, affliction at a future date elsewhere in the body. The cause,
not identified and removed, does not allow the body the chance to heal itself.

60

Healing by means that do not require changing personal habits and taking

more responsibility, though always appealing, will commonly fail. Daily, I
witness the failure of this approach, representative of the failure of modem
medicine.

True recovery that does not increase one’s later risk of serious illness can

result only from positive steps that remove stress from the body. This requires
significant personal responsibility and dedication to achieving wellness.
Sometimes people really must undertake a fast to recover. Through fasting,
individuals are allowed to catch up on elimination of retained waste, thus
raising themselves to new levels of superior health. Though most people would
rather take pills, potions, and drinks, they often do not make an adequate
recovery without the powerful detoxification effect of a total fast.

We all have our inherited weaknesses; genetics always plays a role in the

body’s form and function. Often this genetic influence determines how disease

will express itself as cumulative stresses expose the weakest links in the body’s
structure. However, these inherited flaws rarely would be given the chance to

express themselves if not for disease-causing influences. Improper life-style
and primarily improper dietary habits are responsible for the majority of

chronic diseases, as well as being the major causes of death in our country.
When individuals make aggressive positive changes in their diet, the results

can be easily illustrated.

As a physician, it is immensely rewarding to watch people recover from
serious disease, as well as routine maladies ranging from obesity to the
common cold, through fasting. This is especially true for me since I have
witnessed the failure of so many current medical treatments for serious chronic
diseases. Medical treatments can be very effective in the short term, but
because they do not address the cause of the disease, the person’s condition
gradually deteriorates.

The laws of nature will never change: it always has been and always will be

more effective to remove cause and allow the body’s self-reparative powers to
have their way than to try to add treatments while cause continues unchecked.

Sleep and Fasting Are the Natural Restorers

Therapeutic fasting can be compared to the recuperative therapy we rely on
every night when we sleep in order to charge the body for the next day. Excess

stresses, whether from excess consumption of substances or from stressful
physical and mental activities, impose negative biological effects on the body.

Recuperation through sleep is responsible for rebuilding and preparing the body
to handle the increasing demands. Rest and sleep enable the body to recover

from the effects of these waking stresses, because the body can concentrate its
repair efforts most effectively at this time when fewer demands are placed

upon it.

Recuperation takes time, sometimes more time and effort than people

recognize. The goal of fasting is to allow time to provide extended physiological

61

rest for the purposes of catching up with recuperative needs generated from
the vicious cycle of overactivity, overstimulation, and dietary indiscretions.

If This Diet Is So Healthy, Why Do I Feel So Sick?

If a person truly wants to improve health and rid himself or herself of chronic
complaints, it is necessary to recuperate and detoxify. To heal and detoxify, a
natural-food, plant-based diet must be followed because natural plant foods not
only supply the body with essential nutritive elements needed for optimal
function, but also are easy on our organs of digestion and elimination. This diet
often does not make a person feel better immediately. Sometimes people
initially feel worse when they make positive changes to improve their health.

Before the dietary changes, the digestive tract becomes adjusted to a drier,

low-fiber, high-salt diet. After making large changes in one’s eating habits, it

can take time for the peristaltic waves to adjust themselves to the heavier,

higher-fiber, higher-water content stool, which requires less internal pressure
to move along. This may temporarily cause some increased gas and diarrhea,

which will improve with time.

Withdrawal symptoms from a prior unhealthy diet arc common. Fatigue,
headaches, diarrhea, coated tongue, or even a skin rash may occur or intensify

at first. These symptoms reflect detoxification and rarely last longer than two
weeks.

Occasionally individuals misinterpret detoxification symptoms and think the

diet is not working for them, or is lacking in some essential element.

Sometimes because they are so misinformed by other physicians, they believe
these symptoms to be hypoglycemia or a yeast overgrowth on their tongue.

Invariably, though, when they persevere, they soon report that their troubling
symptoms have resolved, they feel more energetic, have no more indigestion,

and feel and look better than ever before.

We Can Extend Our Productive Lives

People aren’t aware that our excessive consumption of dietary fat is a modern
phenomenon. Before the Civil War in this country there is hardly any mention

of heart attacks in medical books because they were so rare. But now heart
attacks are our leading cause of death for both men and women.

Years ago, the rich foods that people consume today were simply unavailable

and unaffordable. In the Middle Ages, for example, the kings and queens got
fat, and developed gout, diabetes, arthritis, and heart disease, while peasants
living in the fields never knew of these afflictions.

The incidence of many chronic diseases and cancers has been increasing

steadily in this century. Many years ago a high infant mortality rate, including

birth-related deaths, and a higher childhood mortality rate affected statistics
concerning life spans. Because infant and early childhood mortality rates were

added into the formula, it showed that average Americans lived shorter lives

62

than they do today.

Thanks primarily to better sanitation, modern plumbing with flushing toilets,
and refrigeration, life-threatening infectious diseases became less prevalent

earlier in this century. This was not due to the advent of antibiotics or
vaccinations; this tremendous decline in infections occurred many years before

these medicines were introduced.

Many mortality studies have been done on the Seventh-Day Adventists, a
conservative Christian group that provides dietary and life style advice to its
members. They are prohibited from using tobacco, alcohol, and pork, and are
discouraged from consuming meats, fish, eggs, and caffeine-containing
beverages. Because the latter items are only discouraged and not prohibited,
there is a wide range of consumption of these items. For example, some
Adventists never eat meat or eggs, whereas others consume them daily.
Furthermore, about one-half join the church as adults and, before converting,
these Adventists may have been exposed to a diet high in animal products for
most of their lives. If we look at multiple scientific investigations done on this
group, we find the following:

1. As a whole, male Adventists live an average of 8.9 years longer than the

rest of (nonsmoking) America, and Adventist women 7.5 years longer (this

includes both vegetarian and nonvegetarian Adventists).

Vegetarian Adventists live the longest in proportion to the time they had
been oh a vegetarian diet.22 If we extrapolate the results to include those
on a vegetarian diet for more than half their lives, more than 13 years are
added to the life span, compared to the average nonsmoking American.

2. Egg and meat consumption is strongly associated with all causes of

mortality. Dairy product and milk consumption is associated with prostate
cancer. The earlier in life that Adventists became vegetarians, the lower

their risk of coronary heart disease.23 These findings are consistent with
the findings of numerous epidemiologic investigations, including those

done on dairy products and their relation to prostate cancer.24

3. All-cause mortality shows a significant negative association with green
salad consumption, meaning the more leafy green vegetables consumed in

the diet, the longer the life span.25 This confirms the importance of raw,
natural plant foods, the loss of important factors with cooking, and the

protective effect of all of the health-giving nutrients they contain.

The conclusion one must make is that animal food consumption is more of a
risk factor for an early death than even cigarette smoking. Of course, I am

strongly against smoking, but a smoking, lifetime vegetarian probably has a

better chance to reach 75 years of age than a nonsmoking, lifetime meat eater.

The opportunity is ours: we cannot rely on modern medicine to give us health

and long life. Good health is our own responsibility, and only through accurate
information can we protect ourselves and our families.

63

Chapter 4

Headaches and Hypoglycemia:
Two Misunderstood Conditions

If you regularly suffer from headaches that make you feel as if your head were
clamped in a vise, you are not alone. Headaches, including the migraine type,
are so widespread that many people consider them a normal occurrence of
human existence.

Headaches are our country’s number one pain problem and are one of the

most common reasons why patients visit physicians. The National Headache

Foundation says 45 million Americans suffer from chronic recurring headaches.
A recent study has shown that migraine affects 17.6 percent of women and 5.7

percent of men in the United States.1

Headaches are a signal that something is wrong. Typically they result from
retained toxins in the body. When these metabolic waste products are

eliminated, people can regain their long-sought-after freedom from pain.

Most people suffer through their headache attacks using home remedies or

over-the-counter medications (on which we spend more than $4 billion each

year). When they finally consult a physician, further medication is thrust their
way. It is exceedingly rare that the patient will be taught that life-style and diet

choices have brought on this problem and that only the removal of these
inciting causes can resolve the distress.

Typically, patients are encouraged to become drug dependent, forever

popping pills or injecting themselves with drugs in an attempt to control their
suffering. This Band-Aid approach will never restore such patients to normalcy.

It does not attempt to remove the cause.

Many pain syndromes of undetermined cause have similar biological

mechanisms that lead us to feel discomfort. If you are suffering from any type
of related pain, by understanding the concepts explained in this chapter you

should be able to banish these symptoms from your life forever. The chronic
headache patient and the migraine sufferer will be able to throw away their

medications and join the ranks of those who rarely—if ever—experience such
agony.

Retained Toxins Are the Major Cause of Headaches

The standard theory that tension headaches are caused by widening of the

blood vessels and migraines are caused by constriction of the blood vessels has
been disproven in recent investigations.2 The evidence now illustrates the

64

similarities between migraine and other types of headaches rather than the

differences. The major cause of both tension headaches and migraines is the
retention of toxins or tissue irritants within the central nervous system. These
chemical irritants may cause an oversensitivity of nerve tissues to other stimuli.

It has also been shown that tissue waste, such as nitric oxide and other

irritating chemicals, can be released from both the nerves and blood vessels in
the central nervous system.3 These recent findings illustrate the biochemical

players associated with detoxification in the central nervous system.
Withdrawal from toxins either taken orally or self-produced within the body is a

form of detoxification. This merely means the body is actively engaged in an
effort to lower the levels of waste retained in our cells. Sometimes this release

of waste from cells can be painful; nevertheless, it has a positive benefit to the
body. Our cells and the tissues they comprise must continually strive to

maintain their purity to prevent early cellular degeneration and premature cell

death.

One clue to understanding severe headaches is the fact that migraine
sufferers are more sensitive to drugs including hallucinogenic agents than

people who do not suffer from migraines.4 This suggests a difference between
sufferers and nonsufferers in the blood—brain barrier, or the sensitivity of the

brain’s surrounding membranes to toxins.

The biochemical mediators causing the pain in so-called tension headache are
actually closely related to the causative factors in migraine. Rather than saying
that tension headaches and migraines are caused by differing mechanisms, it
would be more accurate to see them on a pain and symptom continuum
differing only in severity of symptoms and sensitivity of the individual to toxic
stimuli and pain-modulation neurotransmitters. The additional symptoms in the
migraine such as nausea, visual auras, and dizziness occur simply because the
headache is more severe.

For more than 30 years, tension headaches were simplistically believed to be

caused by muscle contraction. Now we believe that muscle tension is the
response to the pain and not the cause of the headache. Similarly, in migraine,

dilation and constriction of the blood vessels follow the onset of pain and do not
cause it.

The tension type or muscle-contraction headache is generally less severe

than a migraine. It is experienced when the individual is under stress, in

contrast to the migraine, which is usually experienced after stressful periods
have ended and the body attempts to repair and detoxify. We need not concern
ourselves with the minute biochemical differences between migraine-type and
so-called tension or muscle-contraction headaches because the biochemical
mechanism causing the pain is similar for each, and the treatment described in
this chapter is equally effective for both.

The pain of a migraine almost always occurs in the front of the head and is

centered on an eye. It is typically accompanied by visual and gastrointestinal
disturbances. Essentially, migraines are severe pulsating, or throbbing,

65

headaches, associated with nausea or photophobia.

Many factors may trigger or aggravate an attack of migraine. A common

aggravating factor is physical activity. Other common precipitating factors

include menstruation, alcohol consumption (especially red wine), too little or
too much sleep, a missed meal, or a change in the weather. Certain foods can

also trigger migraine in many patients (dietary recommendations will be
discussed later).

“Cures” Are Not the Answer

The general medical viewpoint is that migraines cannot be cured, but merely

suppressed with drugs. Physicians generally don’t hesitate to prescribe
medication for a person to take for the rest of his or her life. The common

medical practice of giving drugs (which are all toxic) to treat the ill effects of
retained toxins, without attempting to determine and remove causative factors,

is a misguided approach illustrative of the overall inadequacy of today’s health
care system. Fortunately, I can take my patients off these drugs when they

learn how to adopt healthful diets and life-style practices that are much more
effective at preventing such attacks.

During the first pharmacology lecture I attended in medical school, the

instructor admonished us never to forget that all drugs are toxic. Indeed, many
of their effects on the body are obtained because these substances are toxins

that interfere with or poison the body’s natural activity. Besides contributing to

the body’s toxic overload and leading to overall deterioration in health, it is well
recognized that the medications used to treat migraines are a crucially

important factor in perpetuating future attacks. Drugs that are used for
headaches—such as acetaminophen (Tylenol), barbiturates, codeine, and

ergotamine—all cause headaches to recur on a rebound basis as these toxins
begin to wash out of the nervous system. Then, in order to temporarily lessen

the pain, headache sufferers take more of these tissue poisons, only to excite
another attack in the near future, thus maintaining the patient on a drugging

merry-go-round.

The use of medication, even in quantities as low as ten aspirin tablets per
week, can be the cause of a chronic daily headache syndrome.5 The best thing

a physician caring for headache patients can do is withdraw their medication.
One medical study found that stopping all treatments and pain medication

actually decreased headache frequency and intensity in the subjects by more
than 50 percent.6

Besides the typical toxic drugs that physicians routinely prescribe, toxins

such as alcohol, lead, arsenic, morphine, carbon monoxide, pesticides, and
noxious fumes can cause severe headaches.

Likewise, other unhealthy practices—drinking coffee and soft drinks, eating

sweets and other nutritionless foods—contribute to the problem. Even drinking
milk can add to our discomfort, as it frequently contains multiple antibiotics

given to the cow.

66

Most individuals in our modern society are dealing with the ingestion of drugs
and other chemical toxins almost daily and are continually, and sometimes

painfully, attempting to detoxify. Taking further poisons into the system to
prevent the painful elimination of wastes merely perpetuates the problem and

allows headaches to recur more frequently.

Just as we can ―cure‖ the coffee drinker’s headache by giving him or her more
coffee to stop the withdrawal or elimination of the retained toxins associated
with caffeine consumption, so, too, can we ―cure‖ the heroin addict’s withdrawal
symptoms by giving him or her more heroin or by substituting methadone. We
can ―cure‖ the headache or migraine sufferer’s problems by giving him
narcotics, or by prescribing Esgic, Ergostat, Bellergal, Cafergot, Excedrin,
Fiorinal, Vanquish, or Wigaine, which contain either caffeine, ergotamine, or
barbiturates.

These approaches, although widely employed and accepted, do not remove

the cause and, in fact, perpetuate the problem they attempt to solve.
Prescribing such medications merely temporarily curtails symptoms of
withdrawal, not much different from the pusher on the street corner, selling his
wares to the addicts who must suffer pain should they not continue to take their
narcotics. Headache patients should never be given opiates, barbiturates, or
caffeine (which are found in many headache remedies) as these substances will

always make the problem worse in the long run.

Many other medications also cause headaches, both the garden variety

tension headache as well as migraines. These drugs include those used for
angina and high blood pressure, as well as estrogen-containing birth control

pills and estrogen hormone replacement therapy, often prescribed after
menopause.

When migraine and tension headache patients are placed on low-protein,

natural plant-based diets, with no refined sweets of any type, they almost all
recover within a month, never needing medication or further treatments to
control their condition.

What to Do and What Not to Do If You Are a Headache Sufferer

Most people mistake feeling good for health. But anything that quickly makes

you feel good is likely to be harmful to your health. Often, in order to recover
your health you may have to temporarily feel bad so your body can cleanse

itself of an offensive substance. Cocaine may make a person temporarily feel
better, but you would not argue that cocaine use is a healthful practice.

Anything that rapidly takes away symptoms of ill health or makes you feel
stimulated is likely to be a health risk. Superior health must be earned through

healthful living. The road to optimal health through removal of cause may take
a little longer, but the result you earn will be everlasting.

Drugs to relieve pain are rarely necessary if headache sufferers are allowed to

fast and detoxify at the first sign of headache symptoms. Patients trying to

67

detoxify and eliminate dependency on medication often find it useful to retire to

a dark room and use ice compresses or a tight ice wrap around the head to

reduce pain. An alternative can be to stand in a hot shower with hot water
beating on the painful area. In addition, biofeedback techniques such as

progressive relaxation and self-hypnosis can often be helpful to these patients.

Commonly, though, such techniques are not needed because the headache
sufferers have quickly eliminated their headaches through the nutritional

approach described here. By the time biofeedback methods are learned, they
are no longer necessary. If the person still suffers from headaches during the

first week after the diet is changed, I find cold and pressure to be most
effective and practical.

Many individuals with migraine can obtain effective relief by simply applying

an elastic band around the head, securing it with Velcro, and inserting rubber
discs for added local pressure over the areas of maximum pain. An

investigational study utilizing a 2-inch elastic band approximately 25 inches
long with Velcro at each end illustrated impressive results with this non-drug

approach for relief. Firm rubber discs the thickness of a finger and a little over
an inch in diameter were employed. Patients were instructed to place these

discs under the elastic headband over the area of maximum pain. Almost every
patient in the study reported benefit. Twenty-three patients used the band for

a total of 69 headaches. Forty of the headaches were relieved by more than 80
percent and 15 headaches improved by more then 50 percent.7

One should be warned that when one is not continuing to ingest harmful food

substances, the body will often use this opportunity to detoxify, and that may
initiate another headache. This is the time when the patient must try to use

physical modalities—such as cold compresses, seeking rest in a dark room,

banding with Velcro, and biofeedback—and at all costs avoid the use of further
medication. Employing such mechanical approaches and avoiding medication

will enable the headache sufferer to avoid taking toxic drugs, which will
interfere with the body’s ability to manifest a complete recovery through

nutritional intervention.

Headache can be exacerbated by not eating. The reason is that not eating
triggers withdrawal symptoms as the body begins to detoxify and get rid of
retained toxins. Remember: For a short time you must feel bad so that for a
long time you can feel good.

Obviously, some headaches may result from brain tumors, meningitis,

tuberculosis, hypertension, head injuries, and diseases of the eyes, nose,
throat, teeth, and ears. Such conditions are rare, however. Allergic conditions
and chronic sinusitis are also uncommon causes of headache. Persistent severe
headaches that do not respond within a few days of fasting should always be
further evaluated by a physician. The onset of a severe headache like one
never experienced before, especially in an older person, should also be properly

evaluated by a physician.

Eating Right Can Eliminate Migraines

68

Headaches can worsen around menses, and have a tendency to run in families.
Sometimes headaches are caused by food allergies, and anyone with severe

migraines should avoid foods that have been noted to trigger headaches.
Salted foods are frequently noted as a trigger, as are chocolate, cheese, ice

cream, nuts, eggs, banana, herring, fatty foods, citrus fruits, NutraSweet
(aspartame), MSG (monosodium glutamate), nitrates (often present in

processed meats), and concentrated sweets. MSG and aspartame have similar
chemical structures, and frequently those who react to one also react to the

other. Alcohol is a frequent offender, not only because it can act directly to
trigger headaches but also because it contains chemical amines added as

flavorings that are potent migraine producers.

Since MSG can cause severe headaches and migraines,8,9 as well as other
symptoms, foods containing this ingredient should be totally avoided by

headache sufferers and possibly challenged (reintroduced as a test) at a later
date when the person is doing well and is headache-free. Delayed symptoms

may occur even 72 hours after MSG is ingested, so it is sometimes difficult to
trace the symptoms back to the offending substance. Some researchers

estimate that only 1 to 2 percent of the population is sensitive to MSG, while

others believe the figure is closer to 25 percent.10,11

Unfortunately, if you are trying to rely on food labels to disclose the presence

of a substance that you wish to avoid, you will frequently be deceived. Since

MSG and other food additives can sneak into so many processed and packaged
foods, it is best to avoid all such food items completely if you are a chronic

headache sufferer. Since such avoidance is extremely difficult for most people,
the table below may be helpful for those sensitive to MSG.

Food Additives That Always Contain MSG12

Monosodium glutamate

Hydrolyzed protein
Hydrolyzed vegetable protein
Sodium caseinate
Yeast extract

Hydrolyzed oat flour

Yeast nutrient
Autolyzed yeast

Textured vegetable protein

Calcium caseinate
Yeast food

Food Additives That Often Contain MSG

Malt extract
Bouillon

Barley malt
Broth
Stock

Flavoring

Malt flavoring Natural
flavoring Natural beef

flavoring
Natural chicken flavoring

Natural pork flavoring
Seasonings

A high-protein diet is one of the most common reasons people suffer from

chronic migraines. Protein breakdown and digestion causes the production of
multiple toxins, especially nitrogenous wastes, many of which easily cross the

blood–brain barrier. Humans are designed by nature to consume a low-protein
diet; they lack the equipment of a large liver to detoxify uric acid and other

69

proteinaceous wastes. We frequently suffer unknowingly from our modern
dietary practices because our bodies are not adapted to handle the foods we
eat.

A basic plan to rid one’s life of headaches is to start a low-protein, plant-

based diet specifically designed to avoid the foods listed below, as well as all
caffeine-containing products. The severe migraine sufferer should strictly
adhere to the food plan described here until a definite recovery is achieved.
Later, when the individual has fully recovered, the diet can be expanded to
include some of the prohibited fruits and vegetables to see whether or not they
cause a problem.

To start, headache sufferers should withhold all medication, including oral

contraceptive pills (utilizing another method to prevent pregnancy). They must

stop consuming all herbal preparations, food supplements, tea, soft drinks,
coffee, and all caffeinated beverages. Once these steps have been

accomplished, it is time to follow the rest of the program:

1. Avoid all salt and MSG, including soy sauce, oriental foods, canned soups,
sauerkraut, pickles, and sauces or processed foods that may contain salt
or other preservatives and artificial flavorings.

2. Avoid all sweets, including honey, maple syrup, dried fruit, or sweet fruit

juice.

3. Eat no animal foods, including beef, pork, fish, poultry, eggs, and dairy
food. If you add a small amount of animal food on occasion after a

recovery has been achieved, keep the portion size down to less than 4
ounces (the size of a deck of cards) and stick to chicken, turkey, or beef,

avoiding fish, ham, and all canned, cured, or processed meats, or meat
prepared with tenderizer.

4. At the beginning, avoid most fruits and all fruit juices. Bananas, citrus

fruit, pineapple, apples, applesauce, pears, apricots, avocados, cherries,
figs, fruit cocktails, papaya, passion fruit, peaches, plums, and raisins

should all be avoided. Melon and grapes are the only fruits allowed. These

may be eaten in a small amount before breakfast or as a snack. Once a
recovery is achieved, more fruits may gradually be included in the diet.

Bananas and citrus fruits should be saved for last.

5. Avoid nuts, seeds, and all legumes, including pole or broad beans, lima or
fave beans, lentils, snow peas, navy beans, pea pods, garbanzo beans,
onions, or olives. Once a recovery has been achieved, a small amount of
beans—less than 4 ounces daily—can usually be tolerated.

6. Avoid all dairy products, especially cheese sauce and salad dressings

containing milk derivatives such as whey.

7. Avoid all yeast-containing products, including brewer’s yeast.

70

Here is a sample diet for migraine patients in the first phase (Phase I) of their
recovery.

Breakfast
Small piece of melon

Oatmeal or other whole grain hot cereal or yeast-free whole grain bread

Lunch
Large green salad (no dressing except 1 teaspoon olive oil permitted)

Corn, sweet potato, white potato, brown rice, steamed carrots
Bunch of grapes

Dinner

Small salad

Steamed green vegetable such as broccoli, artichoke, kale, cabbage, or

asparagus
Starchy vegetable or grain such as butternut or acorn squash, potato, corn,

millet, quinoa, rice, or pasta. Tomato sauce made without salt is OK.

As stated earlier, sometimes headaches continue for a few days while the body

is still eliminating retained wastes, but usually this diet results in the quick
elimination of the patient’s problems.

Once a definite recovery has been achieved and the patient is free of

headaches for one month, some of the prohibited foods may be added back to

the diet. Add one food every few days, particularly avoiding any food that
clearly precipitates an attack.

Start with fresh fruits, reintroducing them into the diet a little at a time. Then

begin to include legumes, and then a small amount of nuts or seeds. If the

person swings back to his or her former eating habits and begins consuming a
significant quantity of animal-based, high-protein foods or highly salted

processed foods, the headaches invariably return.

Headache Sufferers Easily Recover

Taking care of patients with recurrent headaches or migraines is probably the
most rewarding patient interaction I experience on close to a daily basis

because these patients typically recover very quickly. A couple of examples will

suffice, as there is not much to say about headache case histories, except that
if the patients do what I tell them to do, their headaches quickly disappear. So

often, before the patients have been referred to me, they have seen a
neurologist or other physician, who besides treating them with the typical drugs

has ordered or recommended an MRI scan of the brain. I typically tell patients
to hold off on these expensive tests for a few days while they follow my

program and, invariably, they feel well in a short period of time.

Kate was a 42-year-old woman with a 20-year history of severe and frequent
migraine headaches. When she first came to see me she was taking Fiorinal

and Repan on a regular basis as prescribed for her condition. She was also

71

taking Deconsal for sinusitis and allergic rhinitis.

Kate started the migraine-reversal diet, and at the next visit three weeks

later reported that her headaches as well as her chronic sinus condition had
completely cleared. She no longer needed medications. She experienced only

one further episode, the day after the first visit, and has had no further
symptoms.

Kate later told me that for the first time in her life she was able to fast during

Yom Kippur (the Jewish holiday of atonement). Prior to this year she
experienced an excruciating headache and other hypoglycemic symptoms
whenever she attempted to fast.

Nancy, a 34-year-old woman, also had recurrent migraine headaches. They

were especially troublesome and severe around her menstrual periods. Her
headaches were accompanied by nausea and a desire to vomit. She was using
Xanax, and Repan as prescribed by her former physician. Nancy started a
Phase I diet and was tapered off the medications. Her headaches quickly
disappeared, and she has not had another problem with headaches since
instigating this program. An added benefit was that her periods were no longer

painful.

These patients did not need to stay on the Phase I diet for long. Other foods

were quickly introduced, and they remained symptom-free.

Occasionally when people’s symptoms are very severe and they wish to

accelerate their recovery, they can begin with a two- to three-day fast,
followed by the recommended diet. If the headaches do not resolve completely

from their lives after following the plan described here, a longer, medically
supervised fast for a more adequate detoxification must be considered.

Occasionally a patient with a severe condition may require a more prolonged

fast to clear out the retained wastes that are causing the problem. For
example, when Gordon came to see me he had already consulted with dozens
of renowned physicians for his severe headaches and facial pain. He was taking
16 Percocet tablets (a powerful narcotic) and 2 Klonopin tablets (a tranquilizer)

daily. His headache, accompanied by piercing pain, never left him for a minute.
If he did not take high doses of narcotics, the pain was unbearable and he had
no normal existence. Because of his severe problem, he was forced to leave his
job. He and his family were in financial distress. Besides unsuccessfully trying
every headache medication in the book, he had undergone facial and sinus
surgery, temporal artery bypass, and injections with nerve-blocking
medications, all without improvement to his excruciating condition.

After starting a simple plant-based diet, I slowly weaned Gordon off his

medications over a month-long period. His facial pain was very severe without
the narcotics and I placed him on a fast as soon as possible. Within a few days

of fasting all his pain resolved. So that he could more completely detoxify, I

extended his fast for an additional two weeks. He is now back working and for
the first time in 20 years is pain-free.

72

Our bodies try hard to keep us healthy. When disease-causing .stresses are
removed, the natural healing and self-repairing powers of the body begin to

work unhindered. This self-repair and self-cleansing occurs most efficiently in
sleep and when the body is no longer working hard or digesting food. During

these times, the system can more effectively devote its efforts to
housecleaning and the elimination of retained wastes.

Conventional Thinking Often Results in an Oversimplified
Diagnosis of Hypoglycemia

Hypoglycemia means low blood Sugar (the terms “blood glucose” and “blood

sugar” are equivalent). Frequently, I encounter patients who are convinced,
based either on their own interpretation of their symptoms or on the diagnosis

of a physician, that they have a disorder caused by swings in blood sugar
levels.

Their complaints usually include one or more of the following: weakness,

fatigue, headaches, abdominal pain, mental confusion, clouded vision, rapid
heart beat, anxiety, sweating, shaking, and incoordination. These symptoms

typically appear three to four hours after eating, especially when eating has
been delayed or a meal has been skipped. Since these symptoms occur at the

time when one’s glucose level is at its lowest, the patient or physician
attributes the problem to low blood sugar—thus the diagnosis of hypoglycemia.

There are two basic types of hypoclycemia: fasting hypoglycemia and

reactive or functional hypoglycemia.

Fasting hypoglycemia is generally due to serious and potentially life-

threatening disorders such as insulin-secreting tumors or advanced liver
dysfunction. Other causes of fasting hypoglycemia include drugs used for
diabetes, alcohol, advanced renal failure, and hormonal deficits. All these
conditions are relatively rare. In them, blood sugar levels can plummet
dangerously, resulting in profound weakness and even coma and death.
Obviously, individuals with this condition require urgent medical care.

Reactive or functional hypoglycemia is the second type of hypoglycemia

and the common type that is the focus of this chapter. This type of
hypoglycemia results in problematic symptoms, though the blood sugar levels

do not drop to dangerously low levels. The prevalence of this condition is
unknown, largely because there is no widely accepted criteria for its diagnosis.

Some physicians have taken the position that reactive hypoglycemia is very

common and is the cause of innumerable ills. When encountering patients with
symptoms suggestive of reactive hypoglycemia, many of these physicians

advise them to eat frequent meals of high-protein foods. This is usually
effective at reducing or controlling the symptoms.

Are these common symptoms, experienced by many, caused by low blood

sugar? Is a high-protein diet the best way to control this troublesome
condition? My answer to both these questions is an emphatic no.

73

There is much misinformation that surrounds the issue of hypoglycemia. As
with many other health ailments, health professionals tend to lump patients
with many different medical problems they can’t solve into a convenient
diagnosis. I will attempt to help clarify this confusing issue.

Glucose Metabolism—A Finely Tuned Balancing Act

Our brain and body tissues require glucose for survival. Without adequate

glucose circulating throughout our bloodstream and other tissues we would die.
Thus the prevention of hypoglycemia is critical to our survival.

The two major hormones that control our circulating glucose level are

glucagon and insulin. Basically, insulin drives the blood sugar down and

glucagon raises it. Insulin drives the glucose out of the bloodstream and into

the cells. Other hormones secreted to maintain our blood glucose level when
we are not eating include epinephrine, cortisol, and growth hormone. The

prevention of hypoglycemia between meals requires an intact liver and the
appropriate regulatory hormones to control it.

The Glucose Tolerance Test

Reactive hypoglycemia cannot be accurately diagnosed merely by a glucose

tolerance test. First, understand what occurs during a glucose tolerance test:
Before any readings take place, patients must fast for 12 hours. They then

ingest 100 grams of sugar. Every hour afterwards, for five hours, blood is
drawn and the glucose level is monitored.

In the first hour after glucose ingestion, the patient’s glucose level is high.

The body takes a bit of time to react to the very large quantity of glucose it has
ingested, but is then stimulated to secrete an unnaturally large amount of

insulin to rapidly lower the exceedingly high level of glucose that has entered
the bloodstream. As insulin is secreted, the glucose level drops. Plasma glucose

concentrations often reach nadirs of less than 50 mg (and sometimes less than
40) in normal people who experience no symptoms. However, when a person’s

glucose level drops to 60 mg or less (the lower range of normal) and they start
to experience symptoms, a doctor labels that person hypoglycemic. This is
overly simplistic.

The glucose tolerance test is notoriously unreliable. It is an artificial and

stressful stimulation and it can be expected that many normal people will get
sick from this experience. When a large dose of concentrated sugar (glucose) is

consumed after an overnight fast, we can expect it to produce a sudden surge

in insulin secretion in response to the unnatural stress on the pancreas. This
situation (consuming a large amount of refined sugar) might make many of us

feel ill, but this is not indicative of disease. Consuming such a quantity of
refined carbohydrate is always stressful to our system and should definitely be

avoided.

Other reactions and the release of additional counter-regulatory hormones

74

also occur to compensate for the insulin surge. Therefore, it is not only the
lowered blood sugar that makes a person feel ill. Besides that, the majority of

patients diagnosed by physicians as having hypoglycemia never had blood
glucose levels below 60 mg on their glucose tolerance tests when they

experienced symptoms.

In general, consuming concentrated sugars is stressful to the system.
Besides generating wide swings in blood sugar, the consumption of sweets can

deplete the body of nutritional reserves needed for optimal immune and
endocrine function. Refined sugar products and other concentrated sweets can

cause excessive fluctuations of insulin and other hormones that can cause
symptoms in healthy people. This does not mean they have hypoglycemia.

A more reliable way for individuals to discern if their symptoms correspond

with low levels of glucose in their blood is to go to the doctor’s office or
laboratory at the exact moment when they begin experiencing their symptoms,
and get their blood tested. People usually find that their blood sugar levels are
not unusually low at the time. In fact, it is very rare for them to find that their
blood sugar is low when they are symptomatic.

But what about individuals who feel terribly ill at the same time their blood

sugar is low? Does this mean that their symptoms are caused by low blood
sugar? Not necessarily. They may be caused by other biological processes that
cause discomfort and occur in the system at the same time the blood sugar
drops. Gluconeogenesis is the process by which we maintain our glucose
levels between meals by breaking down stored reserves of rioncarbohydrate
tissues (primarily protein). During gluconeogenesis (which occurs when blood
glucose levels are low), urea and other nitrogenous wastes are dumped into the
bloodstream as the body’s tissues are broken down: These products can make
a person feel ill. Therefore, it is not merely low glucose levels that can cause
the ill feeling; there are a number of other factors involved.

Most of the symptoms individuals complain of when they think they have

hypoglycemia would not occur if low blood sugar alone was responsible.

Though weakness, hunger, and sweating are typical symptoms of low blood

sugar, visual disturbance, mental confusion, headaches, and anxiety are not.
These latter symptoms result from decreased activity of the central nervous

system and do not occur simply because of low blood sugar. Headaches and
anxiety, for example, do not occur in “fasting hypoglycemia,” such as when a

diabetic is overmedicated by mistake, unless the person also has an autonomic
neuropathy (nerve damage) that blunts the release of epinephrine.

Usually individuals who manifest these complaints when their blood sugar is

low are not accurately described or diagnosed as hypoglycemic, and the
standard treatment that follows is not satisfactory. We must first comprehend

the true nature of these symptoms before we can understand the most
effective way to help the individual who suffers with this problem.

Recurrent Headaches—A Close Relative of Hypoglycemia

75

Troubling symptoms such as headaches, mental confusion, and anxiety that

accompany a low blood sugar reading have biochemical similarities with the
more common tension or migraine headaches. It is incorrect to believe that low

glucose is the cause, though it may seem that way. Certainly it is easy to see
why people think this, because the headache occurs at the time when the

glucose dips when eating is delayed or a meal is skipped.

Assume you were drinking 12 cups of coffee every day. How would you feel if
you suddenly stopped drinking it? Terrible, right? You would have severe

headaches because when the caffeine is withdrawn the body attempts to
detoxify or remove the buildup of this noxious substance. This is called

withdrawal, or detoxification. Suppose you were addicted to high doses of
heroin. Would you feel better if you tried to quit? Of course not. You would

experience weakness, trembling, abdominal pain, and severe headaches.

Detoxification from most noxious substances results in symptoms much like
those noted by individuals who claim they have hypoglycemia.

If a heavy coffee drinker skips a meal, a severe headache will probably occur.

Heavy coffee drinkers who delay breakfast for a few hours will also experience
mental fatigue, headaches, and confusion. Those who are not addicted to

coffee will generally not suffer when breakfast is delayed. Are the headaches
experienced by caffeine addicts caused by low blood sugar? They occurred only

when the blood sugar was at its lowest point, but clearly these are
manifestations of withdrawal or detoxification that occur because we skip or

delay eating and the body eliminates retained noxious material most effectively
at this time. The body takes the opportunity to accomplish self-cleaning, or

detoxification, when it is not busy digesting and assimilating food and
nutrients.

Likewise, the symptoms of so-called hypoglycemia are most often related to

withdrawal or detoxification. Resolution of this condition is best accomplished
by methods that allow the body to lower its toxic load. To call these symptoms

hypoglycemia shows a gross oversimplification of what is occurring and
illustrates an insufficient understanding of body chemistry.

There are hundreds of other toxins our body may be exposed to on a daily

basis. When we skip a meal, delay eating, or fast, the body almost immediately

begins to detoxify and clean itself of waste. Withdrawal from any one or many
of these non-nutritive substances retained in our tissues can generate a sickly

feeling of weakness, confusion, or headaches.

When patients undergo therapeutic fasts, blood sugar levels below 50 mg per
deciliter are not uncommon. As the fasters’ blood sugars dip to low levels, they

may experience weakness and lethargy. Though these patients occasionally
experience headaches, the headaches always resolve with continuation of the

fast. This is the body’s way of telling us the elimination of the toxins causing
the symptoms has been completed. Even if the blood sugar levels continue to

fall, the headaches do not recur. This illustrates that these symptoms were not
the result of low blood sugar, but were caused by other processes that were

occurring simultaneously with the lowering of blood glucose.

76

Those who fast after following low-protein, plant-based diets have less

discomfort and are less likely to have a headache during the early stages of a

fast. This is because withdrawal from proteinaceous or nitrogenous wastes is
the chief culprit that precipitates headaches and sickly feelings.

High-protein diets and medications can control symptoms of so-called

hypoglycemia in the same way continued coffee drinking controls symptoms of

caffeine withdrawal. Individuals with these conditions can completely recover
without resorting to dangerous high-protein diets or medication to control

symptoms. Treatments and high-protein diets give only temporary relief as
they do not address the cause.

Problems with Protein

In the United States and many other industrialized countries, a diet high in

protein is thought to be health promoting. Unfortunately, most people
indoctrinated with this notion in their youth still cling to this outdated and

potentially dangerous misconception. In reality, high-protein diets are linked
with the development of serious diseases including cancer, heart disease,

osteoporosis, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, renal insufficiency, and kidney
stones.

As human animals we are not biologically adapted to a high-protein diet.

Metabolically there is little difference between humans and the great apes, who
are predominantly vegetarians. Like the ape, we are not adapted to function

optimally on diets that are high in protein and fat. Therefore, we suffer the

consequences of heart attacks, cancer, autoimmune illness, and so on when we
consume a diet ill-adapted to our basic constitution.

The misunderstanding of human protein requirements began 70 years ago

when two scientists published the results of a study that showed that rats fed
vegetable protein grew more slowly than rats fed animal protein. Today, we

have to interpret this information much differently. First of all, we now know
that humans and rats have different protein requirements and that people can

get all the protein they need from plant sources. More important, we now have
found that rats that grow and mature the quickest die earliest. Not only is rapid

growth a poor indicator of the value of a food, but foods that promote rapid
growth in animals and humans are the precise foods that promote premature

aging of our body and even cancer.

With all species the longer an animal takes to reach maturity, the longer it
lives. We know, for example, that women who mature earlier as measured by

their age of puberty have the highest risk of breast cancer. So another reason
to avoid high-protein foods is that they promote premature growth and

maturity.

The average American consumes about 150 grams of protein a day—about
five times the amount actually needed. This excess protein, not to mention the

fat that accompanies it, is extremely damaging. So what does this have to do

77

with headaches and hypoglycemia? Plenty. Consuming excess protein produces

certain toxins, by-products of animal food digestion, which enter our
bloodstream. These toxins have the ability to cause central nervous system

symptoms, such as mental confusion and headaches. The effects of these
toxins become most noticeable when the digestive tract is not busy digesting

and glucose levels are low. It is under these conditions that nitrogenous wastes
are effectively mobilized.

Since the American diet contains more protein than we need, the liver

attempts to break down the excess and excrete it in the form of urea via the
kidneys. The level of urea is measurable in the blood with a blood test called

BUN, or blood urea nitrogen. Urea is one irritating substance that results from
consuming excess protein. However, there are many other toxic by-products of

protein metabolism besides urea that are not so easily measurable in the

bloodstream: Researchers are finding that many of these other by-products of
protein digestion have a powerful toxic effect on the brain, and can cause

mental fatigue and confusion as their levels rise in the body.

The liver is the major organ of detoxification and it is especially when the
detoxification pathways in the liver are compromised that we see an increased

likelihood that individuals will suffer from the toxic effects of their high-protein
diets. A good way to illustrate the effect excess protein has on cerebral (brain)

function is to look at patients with diseased livers. Patients with advanced
stages of liver failure who cannot adequately metabolize excess dietary

proteins develop a change in mental function, drowsiness, confusion, and
disorientation. They may eventually become markedly confused before lapsing

into a coma. Dietary proteins, especially the ones containing sulfated amino
acids and aromatic amino acids—from the proteins contained in animal

products—must be significantly curtailed in patients with liver disease. This is

the established treatment for this condition. Without restricting animal
proteins, their disease and mental condition will significantly worsen.

A crucial point to keep in mind here is that there are about 14 other toxins

besides urea that are breakdown products of protein metabolism. Even though
urea is the only one we can inexpensively measure in the bloodstream at this

time, the other protein-related toxins are more responsible than urea for the
mentally confused state we see in cirrhotic individuals.

Uric acid and other potentially harmful nitrogenous wastes such as ammonia

increase in our body when we consume excessive protein. Vegetable proteins
generate less ammonia and other harmful wastes and are less acid-forming as
well.

The typical American diet, which is high in protein, especially animal proteins,

results in a high level of retained nitrogenous wastes and metabolic toxins that
have to be either eliminated or stored for future removal. When we give the
body the opportunity, it will attempt to eliminate such toxins. Sometimes
corresponding painful symptoms of mental fatigue, jitters, and headaches will
occur during this detoxification period.

78

Hypoglycemic persons can recover and no longer need to be addicted to
high-protein diets to control their symptoms. Individuals with a lower level of

retained wastes (especially proteinaceous wastes) in their systems will not
suffer from the symptoms generally regarded as hypoglycemic when their

blood sugar dips. They will recover because their bodies no longer need to

discharge nitrogenous wastes and other retained toxins in between meals.

A Different (and Natural) Solution for Hypoglycemia

So what should you do if you believe you have hypoglycemia?

1. Stop consuming foods that contain refined carbohydrates and simple

sugars. These foods will be absorbed into the body rapidly and force an

excessive insulin response. On the other hand, high-fiber foods slow the
absorption of nutrients and glucose and therefore do not cause an

excessive insulin response.

Especially avoid Sweets other than fresh fruit. Fruit not only contains trace
elements needed for the adequate metabolism of its contents, but also has
its sugars bound in fiber, which causes the sugars to be absorbed into the
bloodstream more slowly.

2. Stop consuming high-protein animal foods. Instead, replace them with

vegetables, fresh fruits, legumes, and unrefined grain products.

3. Avoid all soft drinks, coffee, tea, artificially flavored or colored foods, and
food additives. Avoid alcohol and caffeinated beverages as they
exaggerate hypoglycemia and result in withdrawal symptoms exacerbated
during the low blood sugar nadir.

4. Consume some food every two or three hours during the first few weeks

to minimize symptoms while your body is suffering from “withdrawal” from
your previously rich diet.

5. If necessary, eat a small amount of high-protein plant foods such as beans

or nuts and seeds with each meal for the first month or so when you

eliminate animal proteins from your diet to minimize the initial withdrawal
symptoms from an animal-protein-based diet.

After conforming to the above guidelines, people find they can return to a
wholesome plant-based diet with no further symptoms of so-called
hypoglycemia. With time, more than 95 percent of patients with these
complaints never have another symptom. If, after a reasonable amount of
time, one still gets uncomfortable symptoms before the next meal, he or she
should consider a fast to permanently resolve the condition. Fasting quickly and
predictably resolves symptoms of hypoglycemia because it so effectively allows
the body to lower the level of retained toxins, which can cause tissue irritation.

Occasionally individuals will have unusually severe symptoms of
hypoglycemia. Sometimes they will feel so bad that they arc unable to function

79

or live a normal life. The approach described here has enabled my patients to
recover when all other methods had failed them.

Samantha, a woman in her early thirties, had such severe hypoglycemic

symptoms that she was forced to quit her job. She had seen multiple

physicians and had undergone numerous tests. Her fasting glucose level ranged
from the forties to 70. She eventually became so weak that she was admitted

to the hospital for further evaluation. During her hospitalization, her doctors

could find nothing seriously wrong with her except for unexplained
hypoglycemic symptoms. Though still so weak she could barely walk,

Samantha was discharged from the hospital with instructions to remain on a.
high-protein diet.

When Samantha first came to see me she was eating eggs, beef, turkey,

ham, and cheese every two hours all day and most of the night. She
accompanied each meal with a glass of milk. She could not walk for even two

blocks. She was physically disabled, forced to quit her nursing job, and too
debilitated to seek any other line of work.

At the start, I maintained Samantha’s eating schedule of every two hours but

substituted plant protein for animal protein. Gradually, over the next eight
weeks, we eliminated all animal protein. Instead, Samantha ate tofu, beans,
lentils, chick peas, lima beans, and pumpkin and sunflower seeds, and
increased her intake of green vegetables. Over the next few months we made
gradual dietary adjustments so that her symptoms would not worsen. Her
illness was so severe that I thought she would need to undergo a prolonged
fast to completely recover. I was wrong. She made steady progress. The
severe incapacitating symptoms slowly resolved, and she soon reported that
she had a good energy level. She was able to walk 30 blocks without a problem

and has had no further symptoms: She is now back to work, living a normal
life.

You, too, can forever rid yourself from troublesome symptoms, merely by

adopting the best nutritional program, one that is more appropriately designed
for your natural genetic tendencies: a plant-centered, natural-food diet.

80

Chapter 5

The Road Back to a Healthy Heart
—the Natural Way

Cardiovascular Disease and High Blood Pressure Can Be Safely

Reversed Without Medications, Angioplasty, or Bypass Surgery

Cardiovascular disease is our nation’s number one killer! The gradual clogging,

hardening, and damage done to the interior walls of our blood vessels are the
primary cause of heart attacks and strokes. This process of atherosclerosis, or

hardening of the arteries, also results in poor circulation to the extremities, the
brain, and other organs. Ailments such as senile dementia, leg pain

(intermittent claudication), and even erectile impotence have their origin in
atherosclerosis.

Yet, by means of appropriate dietary approaches, heart disease, blood vessel

blockages, and high blood pressure can all be prevented and reversed after

they occur. As with other debilitating problems, these diseases are commonly
the result of a high-fat, high-protein, highly refined diet that is ill-adapted to

the needs of our species. The accumulation of fatty plaque on the inner walls of
our blood vessels begins early in childhood and progresses gradually through

life due to modern-day dietary practices.

High blood pressure is the result of blood vessels that are relatively inelastic
due to deposits of plaque. Fatty plaque causes blood vessels to become stiff

and weak. Such stiffened vessels lose their elasticity and are more likely to tear
or rupture from high blood pressure, thereby causing a stroke or heart attack.

Taking medication to lower blood pressure does nothing to reverse or remove
the atherosclerotic blood vessel disease.

Half of the population over 65 years of age has high blood pressure. It is the

leading reason for prescription medication in the country today.1 In numerous
countries, however, where the diet is not rich in fats and protein, and is high in
fiber and fresh produce, high blood pressure is virtually nonexistent.2,3
Atherosclerotic disease of the blood vessels and heart occurs only in parts of

the world where high-fat and high-protein diets are consumed, but heart
attacks are virtually unknown in societies that follow natural plant-based
diets.4,5

As this chapter will show, fasting, followed by an appropriate diet, gives

people a choice that can enable them to discard their hypertension medication
and live in good health.

Current Treatments for Cardiovascular Disease Are Ineffective

and Dangerous

81

Current treatments for clogged arteries include medication to lower blood

pressure and cholesterol levels, bypass surgery, balloon angioplasty, and
arthrectomy. Although surgical procedures can relieve the symptoms of chest

pain (angina), they result in little or no improvement in how long a patient
survives. In addition, these treatments are dangerous. Some patients die

during surgery or soon afterwards.

In numerous cases, various drugs are prescribed to lower cholesterol levels
and relieve chest pain. These drugs come with their own inherent dangers.

Cholesterol-lowering drugs may slightly reduce the risk of future cardiac
events, but, because of other undesirable metabolic effects, they increase the

cause of death from other causes. Side effects and costs are considerable as
well.

Cholesterol-lowering drugs are well known for their liver toxicity and can also

cause life-threatening reactions such as muscle breakdown and acute renal
failure.6

Drugs for angina relieve the pain, but they do not reduce the chance of a

heart attack or sudden death. All together, medications are minimally effective

or ineffective in prolonging life because they do not halt the underlying disease
process (atherosclerosis). Furthermore, as the patients are left with the false

impression they are now OK, their disease-causing life-style is indirectly
encouraged, since they rely on medication for symptomatic relief or lowering of

blood pressure. This lessens the essential importance of meaningful dietary
change. It is interesting to note that the well-known Helsinki heart trial showed

no significant difference in the total death rate between the group treated with
a cholesterol-lowering drug and the group given a placebo.7

Today, the use of cardiac diagnostic and treatment procedures is growing at

an alarming rate. More than 300,000 bypass surgeries costing more than
$40,000 each are performed each year. Huge profits are involved, but bypass
surgery rarely prolongs life. If the patient manages to get through surgery and
its aftermath in the hospital, alive and without complications, the subsequent
death rate is about 2 to 4 percent per year thereafter. Of patients who have
comparable levels of heart disease, 2 to 4 percent die each year without
surgery. The general death rate is the same in both instances, with or without
surgical intervention.8

While high-tech methods aim to reduce symptoms, they do not address the

underlying cause of the disease. People inevitably get sicker and die
unnecessary cardiovascular deaths.

Compare this to therapeutic fasting and natural diet, which not only quickly

relieve symptoms, but also strip the body of its cardiovascular risks. This
natural approach results in the prolongation of life and the avoidance of cardiac

death.

If every patient with cardiovascular disease were placed on a fast, followed
by a truly low-fat (less than 10 percent of calories consumed), natural plant-

82

based diet, millions of lives could be saved. Added benefits would include the

savings of billions of dollars in practically worthless medications, unnecessary
testing, invasive procedures, and surgeries.

Bypass surgery is under increasing criticism by the medical community, and

most doctors are aware that bypass surgery fails to save lives. Bypass is not

only unproven but also has been disproves. Even the Journal of the American
Medical Association reported that more than 125,000 of these procedures are

done for inappropriate reasons each year.9 The Office of Technology
Assessment of the U.S. Congress has also criticized the unproven character of

bypass surgery.10

Women are more at risk from these procedures than men. It is not generally
known that the in-hospital death rate for bypass surgery is 4.45 percent for

women and 3.33 percent for men.11 Bypass surgery is also associated with a 13

percent rate of postoperative complications, including heart attacks, strokes,
bleeding, kidney failure, and infections.

In almost every heart bypass patient, some brain injury occurs from the time

spent on the heart-lung machine.12 It is believed that 15 to 44 percent of those
who survive such surgery suffer permanent brain damage, detectable as minor

degrees of intellectual impairment, memory loss, sleep disturbance, and
personality change.13,14,15

There are some critics who say that bypass surgery has been shown to have a

slight survival advantage over medical treatment for those patients with a
severe blockage of their left main coronary artery or severe triple vessel

disease. Not denying this, we must consider that this situation affects only a
small percentage of patients undergoing bypass. More important, this slight

survival advantage is observed only if we compare such treated patients to
other patients on medication who live on the disease-accelerating American

diet. I believe the combination of fasting and a natural, zero-cholesterol diet
would offer even patients with advanced cardiac disease a significant survival

benefit.

Surgery should and can be avoided. Even if there is some short-term
reduction in symptoms, atherosclerosis then accelerates in arteries after they
have been subjected to bypass or angioplasty: the plaques grow faster after

surgery.16 The arteries treated by both angioplasty, arthrectomy, and bypass
often reclog within a short period of time. Approximately one third of arteries
dilated by angioplasty clog up again within four to six months.17

Angioplasty has never been tested in a prospective trial against medications

only, so doctors are in disagreement about its value despite its widespread use.
Since the native blood vessel has now been interfered with, the new blockage
that so often soon reappears is now more difficult to treat with nutritional
methods. This restenosis (return of the treated blockage) is not the same as the
original atherosclerosis. Restenosis is a new disease created by doctors (called
iatrogenic disease), and it is not controlled by the Same processes that contro
the disease process in untampered with coronary arteries. Lipid-lowering

83

measures, smoking cessation, dietary change, weight loss, and decreasing
blood pressure do not prevent restenosis or have a significant effect on its

reversal.

Balloon dilatation is a risky crap shoot, 30-40 percent of patients will need to

go back again for more invasive interventions. Another problem is that balloon
angioplasty is a self-referred procedure in general and incredibly compelling to

perform from the cardiologist’s perspective. We need to keep in mind that
angioplasty has some significant adverse outcomes, including myocardial

infarction (heart attack), cerebrovascular accident (stroke), and death.

Doctors should really think twice about doing interventions that could

potentially kill the patient or lead to significant disability. When we compare the
potential benefits and risks of these traditional though invasive procedures to

the nutrition interventions described in this book, these procedures look foolish.
This situation is especially tragic because aggressive nutritional approaches are

typically not even discussed with patients:

Though high-tech methods, new drugs, and advances in surgical techniques
aim to reduce symptoms, the underlying cause of disease—a disease-causing
diet—goes completely ignored or is addressed with inadequate and improper
advice. The patients inevitably get sicker and sicker.

Natural Methods Are Both Safer and More Effective

The encouraging news is that we now know heart disease is both preventable

and reversible. Every cardiac patient should be made aware of this.
Unfortunately, the general public, as well as many physicians, is not aware of

the fact that coronary blockages, high blood pressure, and angina can be
reversed without drugs or surgery.

For years, there has been a small number of avant-garde physicians who

have been using very low fat diets to reverse cardiovascular disease. These
nutritional approaches are much safer than conventional treatments; they are
more effective, and, most important, they prolong life. Now, when a healthy
diet is combined with controlled therapeutic fasting, we can offer even cardiac
patients with advanced disease a noninvasive, safe, effective approach that can

literally rejuvenate their entire cardiovascular system in a short period of time.

Before I explain this approach, let’s look at some of the recent studies of diet

and cardiovascular health. Both interventional studies and large epidemiologic
(population-based) studies conclusively document that certain diets promote

cardiovascular disease, and that other diet-styles can both prevent and reverse
it.

The Lifestyle Heart Trial

One of the most important recent studies on the effect of diet on heart disease

is the Lifestyle Heart Trial, conceived by Dr. Dean Ornish.18 It demonstrated
that blockages in blood vessels were effectively reversed when patients

84

combined a plant-based zero-cholesterol diet with exercise and stress

management, and that the most severely blocked arteries showed the most
improvement.

This interventional study, conducted on patients with documented coronary

artery disease, split patients into two separate groups, the control group and

the intervention group.

The control group was placed on the American Heart Association’s (step 2)

recommended diet, similar to the diet recommended by the American Diabetic
Association for diabetics. This diet suggests cutting out butter and choosing

chicken or fish instead of red meat, although a limited amount of red meat is

still allowed. This change of eating habits reduces fat intake from the American
norm of 40 percent of calories from fat to 30 percent. It keeps cholesterol

intake to less than 200 mg daily. This control group was also advised to
exercise and stop smoking. All patients had cardiac catheterization before

beginning the study, and one year later the cardiac catheterizations were
repeated to document the effect of the intervention.

Many were surprised to find that the majority of subjects in this control group

did not improve. They carefully followed standard medical advice (Step 2:
American Heart Association Diet) to stop smoking, to exercise, and to cut down
on fat by eating chicken (without the skin) and fish. Yet the follow-up cardiac
catheterizations on this group showed that a majority had a worsened cardiac
status after one year.

This result is not surprising since we know from numerous other medical

studies that the usual advice (recommendations of the American Heart
Association and most physicians) does not halt the progression of heart

disease; it merely slows down the rate at which a patient’s condition will
worsen.

Imagine if you came to me with a breathing problem stemming from a three-

pack-a-day smoking habit. If I said to you, “Don’t worry, I can help you—just
cut back from smoking three packs to two, and you will get better,” would you

expect good results? Studies have now conclusively documented that the

typical dietary advice doesn’t work: the level of fat and cholesterol permitted is
still much too high to allow improvement. People only think they are on low-fat

diets.

In comparison, the intervention group in the Lifestyle Heart Trial was placed
on a truly low fat diet, with less than 10 percent of calories derived from fat. To

achieve this ratio, they ate without restriction in quantity from plant foods such
as fresh fruits, vegetables, legumes, and grains. A limited amount of egg

whites and nonfat milk or yogurt was allowed. Dr. Ornish found reversal in
atherosclerotic plaque in 82 percent of coronary heart disease patients from

this intervention group after one year on the vegetarian diet, combined with
light exercise and stress management.

The important findings emerging from this study have served to change

85

conventional thinking about reversing heart disease. The findings include:

1. Age has nothing to do with atherosclerotic plaque reversal; even elderly

persons show impressive improvements.

2. Individuals do not have to lower their cholesterol levels to below 150 to get

reversal. Compliance with the program was what was related to the
reversal, not the degree or number to which the cholesterol level dropped.

3. Even arteries that have been totally blocked for years open up.

Dr. Ornish has astutely noted in a January 1994 interview in Visions

Magazine:

Conventional wisdom is that small, gradual changes are easy and big;
rapid changes are hard. If anything, we have found that, the reverse
may be true. When you make small, gradual changes, you get the
worst of both worlds. You get a sense of deprivation, because you’re
not getting to eat or to do everything that you enjoy, but you’re not
making changes big enough to be of much benefit. Your cholesterol,
your blood pressure or your weight don’t come down enough. Your
chest pain doesn’t get better. Worst of all, if you have heart disease,
according to not only our study, but those conducted by the American
Heart Association and National Cholesterol Education Program, in
every one of those studies where people made moderate changes, the
majority of those patients get worse.

As Dr. Ornish states, his study is only one of several that document that the

standard recommendations (following a diet in which 30 percent of calories
come from fat) still allows the progression of heart disease.19 Yet research
studies, such as the Lifestyle Heart Trial and others, document that heart
disease is reversible with vegetarian diets.20,21,22 These studies were designed
after it was noted in numerous population-based studies that cardiovascular
deaths were virtually nonexistent in rural populations consuming vegetarian
diets. Additionally, it is noted by researchers that deaths from heart disease
increase gradually as populations gradually increase their consumption of
animal-based foods.23

The China-Oxford-Cornell Project

The most famous of the epidemiologic studies on diet and health is the China-
Oxford-Cornell Project (called the Grand Prix of epidemiology24). This study

clearly documented that the diseases that affect and kill most Americans are
unusual in rural China. Dr. T. Colin Campbell, the leader of the China Project,

stated:

The average protein intake from animal sources in the United States
is 70 percent. In China, only 7 percent comes from animal sources, so
there is a tremendous difference between the two countries. But in
spite of the low levels of protein intake from animal sources in China,

86

if they add just a little bit (animal protein) to the diet, the cholesterol
levels start going up, heart disease starts going up, and cancer

increases. This tends to suggest that it doesn’t take much animal
protein to start changing cholesterol levels and consequently have

the risk of heart disease and cancer.25

The more animal protein consumed, the higher the cardiovascular risk. In fact,
those Chinese who ate the most protein (even fish) had the highest rate of

heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.

The Dangerous Recommendations of the American Heart

Association

All animal foods are rich in fat and protein and deficient in fiber and antioxidant

nutrients that protect against heart disease and cancer. Many studies looking at

populations consuming 30 percent of calories from fat illustrate a substantial
amount of cardiovascular deaths, and all studies done on populations that

consume under 15 percent of calories from fat show that heart disease and
diabetes are virtually nonexistent.26,27,28

Standard medical advice for controlling heart disease and lowering

cholesterol levels is usually to switch from beef and pork to chicken, fish, and
skimmed-milk dairy products. Unfortunately, this advice does not work. Cardiac

disease invariably worsens.

A recent investigation analyzed the data from 16 different trials evaluating
the possible benefit of the American Heart Association Step 1 diet. It concluded
that this advice is essentially worthless, and that the “Step 1 diet produced no
significant gains in cholesterol reduction at any of several time points.”29

Once again it is important to note that a diet in which fat calories are lowered

to 30 percent is still too heavy in animal-based foods, which cause heart

disease. A diet that includes salad oils, chicken, fish, and dairy foods is a high-
fat diet for our species. Though the average American consumes even more fat

(40 percent of calories) than the American Heart Association guidelines,

dropping the fat ratio to 30 percent is simply not enough.

These standard recommendations still allow the progression of
atherosclerosis because the diet is still too high in cholesterol, too deficient in

antioxidants and fiber, and too abundant in animal-based protein. Since the
cholesterol levels in chicken and fish are equivalent to those in beef and port,
dieters’ cholesterol levels do not show a meaningful change. Studies in which
chicken or fish was substituted for beef in human subjects have shown no
significant difference in blood cholesterol level regardless of the choice of
animal flesh.30,31

Dr. John McDougall, the author of The McDougall Plan and other books, has

pointed out on numerous occasions that the cholesterol and fat content of the
American diet is so far in excess of the amount necessary to cause heart
disease that relatively small increases or reductions are unimportant. Once one

87

has exceeded the amount of dietary cholesterol needed to cause illness (as
little as 100 mg cholesterol per day), any more makes little appreciable

difference.32 For example, the egg industry can publish studies that show that
the addition of an egg to an otherwise high-cholesterol diet has little impact on

raising cholesterol levels further. However, when people on a no-cholesterol
diet are fed even one egg a day, their cholesterol level rises considerably.33

My intention here is to explain why the conventional recommendations and

treatments fail at truly removing the risk of cardiovascular disease, as a
preliminary to presenting an approach that is predictably effective even in the
most advanced cases.

Fasting: A Powerful Means to Reverse Cardiovascular Disease

In addition to aggressive dietary changes as described above, a physician-
supervised therapeutic fast can be utilized to bring a patient to a new level of
cardiac safety. Fasting, in conjunction with optimal nutrition before and after
the fast, offers the ability to undo the damage done to the body by the rich
diets of modern societies. Through therapeutic fasting a patient is able to
reverse a cardiac condition quickly, without the need for invasive medical
procedures. The results I have seen in patients using this approach have been
spectacular.

There are some cardiac conditions in which patients are at such risk that it is

imperative the blockages in the arteries be quickly diminished. People, who

have been told they need bypass surgery or angioplasty, as well as those with
angina at low workloads, are prime candidates for therapeutic fasting. Fasting

allows the body actually to remove the plaque from within the blood vessels
and to heal itself in the shortest amount of time.

There is always a choice. One can be put to sleep in the operating room,

have one’s sternum split and chest pried and stretched open, have a heart-lung
machine pump blood while the heart’s action is stopped, and risk death or a

decline in mental ability—all this for results that will not significantly increase
the life span. Or one can combine a fast with a healthy plant-based diet that

can facilitate a recovery and a new lease on life.

I find most patients who choose to get well via aggressive nutritional
approaches are angry that their other physicians did not give them this option

before they were told they must have bypass or angioplasty. Patients must be
given this choice of a very low-fat vegetarian diet and fasting because it is

safer, cheaper, less invasive, and more effective at extending the patient’s life.
Anything less is selling the patient short.

The deplorable state of cardiovascular health we have in our nation and the

current ineffective methods for treating heart disease should not continue. The
general public must learn how to challenge heart disease as the nation’s

number one killer. Those suffering from the ravages of heart disease must be

told that there is a safe, less invasive way to get relief and prolong their lives.
A plant-based diet in conjunction with a properly conducted fast most often

88

leads to a total recovery or a vast improvement in hypertension and angina.

This method of treating cardiac patients is not new. Studies in the medical

literature on fasting as a treatment for heart disease began in the 1960s. Over

the years, reports of improvements in cardiac status from fasting documented
consistent benefits ranging from reducing blood pressure to alleviating angina

and congestive heart failure.34,35,36

Dietary restriction has for a long time been considered an effective approach
to many chronic diseases. After World War II, studies of populations that
underwent semistarvaton during wartime rekindled physician interest.

It is interesting to note the diseases that were reported to be quite rare

during the period of semistarvation. Among these were coronary artery
disease, hypertension, congestive heart failure, gastric and duodenal ulcers,
appendicitis, nephritis, cholecystitis, hepatitis, diabetes, hyperthyroidism,
allergic states, upper respiratory infections, and rheumatic fever. Only with
improvement of the nutritional state did some of these return to their former
prominence as causes for hospitalization.37 Autopsy studies during the years
following World War II showed that clinical atherosclerotic disease became
extremely rare as well. This demonstrates the cleansing of the lipid component
in plaques. The reabsorption of atheromas has also been well studied and
documented with wasting diseases such as cancer,38,39 and also with dietary
restrictions and fasting in nonhuman primates.40

It is such a simple concept, yet so far away from the consciousness of today’s

modern physician, to simply allow the body to reabsorb the blood vessel
blockages with an aggressive nutritional approach. When we utilize this
knowledge and combine an extremely low fat diet with fasting, the potential to
clear the blockages within the blood vessels is maximized. Patients can expect
better results than when following the strict diet alone.

Chelation Therapy Compared

Chelation involves the intravenous infusion of EDTA
(ethylenediaminetetraaceticacid) and is promoted as a nonsurgical alternative

to angioplasty or bypass. Its value and positive effects are controversial. EDTA
is a powerful drug that is used to treat mineral poisoning because it pulls

minerals such as calcium and lead out of the body.

Chelation therapy for atherosclerotic disease is similar to other temporizing
measures. It might relieve pain and improve circulation temporarily through
vasodilation, but there is no solid evidence that it can remove the atheromas or
plaque lining the vessel walls; nor does it decrease one’s risk of sudden death.
I have seen many patients who have received hundreds of chelation treatments
without improvement and then watched their chest pain quickly resolve with
one fast.

A perfect example is George, a 69-year-old man with a history of diabetes,

hypertension, high cholesterol, and angina. He had already experienced one

89

heart attack. When I saw him for the first time he was using four different

medications: Tenormin, Lopid, Orinase, and a nitroglycerin patch. After 175
chelation treatments, and while following what he thought was a very low fat

diet suggested to him by his prior physicians, he continued to suffer chest pain
and chest pressure. These symptoms were felt even while he was resting.

I explained in detail my treatment plan and I immediately stopped the

medication he was taking to lower his blood sugar level. Following my advice,
he took care to adhere to a “less than-10-percent-of-calories-from-fat, zero-
cholesterol” diet. He returned to my office two weeks later.

At this time his blood sugar level was better controlled than it had been at his

first visit, when he was still on medication. My next step was to taper the other

medications, leaving only the nitroglycerin patch two weeks prior to the start of
his fast.

When he arrived for his fast, his weight was down to 175 pounds from 182

pounds. Because he was still experiencing chest pressure without the
nitroglycerin patch during the early part of the fast, I maintained the patch for

the first week of fasting. By week 2, he was experiencing no further angina and
I was able to discontinue the nitroglycerin patch without further problems.

George fasted a total of 19 days. For 4 additional days I gradually introduced

a diet of fresh fruit and vegetables before sending him home. His weight was
151 pounds.

A month later he called me excitedly while vacationing in Florida. He was now

walking more than two miles a day, off all medication, and angina-free. He was
no longer diabetic, either; his blood sugar levels were well within the normal
range.

I have now seen enough patients who have undergone chelation with no

benefit to conclude that this therapy is just like other drug treatments, only
minimally helpful, if at all, and more expensive. These same patients, when
introduced to aggressive dietary changes, had dramatic positive responses. The
fact that a cardiac patient must continue the chelation treatments indefinitely
and receive hundreds of treatments to maintain its supposed effect also

indicates it is not removing the disease.

The few well-designed double-blinded studies that have addressed the

efficacy of chelation for atherosclerotic disease have not found evidence that
chelation offers benefit over dietary intervention.41,42 Since both the EDTA-

treated and the placebo-treated groups fared the same, the authors concluded
that the beneficial effects were closely correlated with motivational

encouragement from the physicians, improved diet, and more exercise, rather
than from the therapy itself. Other carefully done, randomized, double-blind

trials also concluded that no therapeutic effect of chelation could be
demonstrated.43,44

Certainly, further studies will be done to evaluate chelation. Attractive as it

90

may be for those people looking for an effortless cure, chelation still does not
remove the cause of disease—high saturated fat and cholesterol-containing

foods. The primary treatment must be dietary, with a zero-cholesterol diet.
Then, as an adjunctive measure, fasting is the quickest and most effective

complement to diet to accelerate recovery.

Fasting Quickly Lowers Blood Pressure As It Extends Life

For a person with advanced cardiovascular disease, fasting can not only begin
to reverse the damage caused by years of improper eating, but also rapidly
decrease the risk of sudden death from a heart attack or stroke.

First of all, fasting rapidly and effectively lowers blood pressure without

medication. In most cases this effect is permanent if the person maintains the
correct eating pattern after the fast. A period of therapeutic fasting will lower
blood pressure even in severe hypertension. Many of my patients who have
had difficulty controlling hypertension utilizing combinations of three or four
different drugs have had their blood pressure decrease into the normal range
through fasting. Moreover, blood pressure generally remains low upon the
reintroduction of food if they continue to follow the recommended diet.

Greg came to me after suffering from repeated transient ischemic attacks.

These “mini-strokes” can be a warning sign that a serious and life-threatening
stroke is likely to occur. His blood pressure was difficult to control with diet

alone, so the dose of his blood pressure medication was increased and another
medication was added. Though taking the highest suggested dose of two blood-

pressure-lowering agents, he continued to have elevated blood pressure and
still suffered from headaches and visual disturbances. Fearful he would

experience a stroke, I advised him to undergo a fast as soon as possible. At the

start of his fast and while medicated, his blood pressure was 150/90, and he
weighed in at 236 pounds.

Greg fasted for 12 days. I tapered his medication until he was receiving no

medications by day 4. At that time his blood pressure dropped to 132/90. At
the end of the fast his blood pressure was 110/78 and his weight had dropped
to 216 pounds.

At the time of his follow-up visit to my office a few weeks later, his pressure

was 108/76. It has continued to remain in the low, normal range with no

medication, as he continues to adhere to a proper diet.

The medical literature confirms these findings. In a study of 683 obese

patients of whom 48 percent had high blood pressure, it was noted that rarely
did these patients continue to have high blood pressure after two to four days

of fasting.45 This phenomenon has been consistently noted with both obese
and nonobese patients.46,47

In Dr. Alan Goldhamer’s ongoing study of fasting and hypertension, so far 51

people with high blood pressure have been fasted an average of 11.2 days. The
average blood pressure when these individuals began fasting was 151.8/91.1;

91

by the end of the fast the average was 117.8/75.1. At a follow-up check 27

weeks after the fast the average blood pressure was 123/77.48

I have yet to see a case of hypertension resistant to the powerful blood-

pressure-lowering effects of the fast. Even more fascinating is the observation
that blood pressure does not rise back to its abnormally high level when eating

is resumed. In fact, fasting, if followed by a health-supporting diet, can be a
permanent cure for hypertension. Of course, if the same diet that caused the

development of the high blood pressure is resumed after the fast, the problem
will once again be created.

Since the blood-pressure-lowering effect of a prolonged fast continues after

the fast is ended, it is not the result of the fasting-induced fluid loss, nor
merely due to weight loss. Weight loss alone cannot account for the lowered

blood pressure, as the results seen from fasting are significantly greater than

what is generally observed from losing the same amount of weight through
dieting. The lowered peripheral resistance from plaque reduction and especially

the normalization of blood flow in the kidney achieved from fasting are
important factors leading to the normalization of blood pressure. Fasting also

results in a decrease in the size of enlarged hearts, slowing of the resting heart
rate, and decreased cardiac output, all of which contribute to the permanent

benefits achieved through fasting.49,50

Weight loss, vegetarian diets,51 and raw foods52 have all been shown to be
effective at reducing blood pressure. Indeed, solely with such nutritional
interventions, most of my patients are able to stop taking high-blood-pressure
medications. Only occasionally are individuals resistant to further weight loss
on an optimal diet. Sometimes the person’s blood pressure does not respond to
diet alone. When this is the case, I have found a therapeutic fast to be
universally effective at reducing the pressure and keeping it in the desired
range.

Most physicians do not offer their patients sufficiently aggressive dietary

advice to enable them to improve their condition enough to stop medications.
The patients who come to me have all been looking for. a way to get well and

off medications. The fast coupled with a nutritionally correct diet allows them to

accomplish their goals.

When I discuss the futility of medical interventions and the superior results
obtained with the methods discussed here with my medical colleagues or even
with my physician-teachers at the medical school I attended, their typical
comment is that very few people will want so restrictive a dietary approach no
matter how effective. Whether this is true or not is irrelevant. We must at least
offer patients the alternatives open to them and let them make the decision. It
is unethical to decide for them paternalistically and withhold evidence of the
effectiveness of this natural approach.

I believe many physicians would be surprised at the large percentage of

patients who would choose a natural approach to recover their health rather
than resort to continuous drugging and medical intervention. When individuals

92

are educated about the side effects and risks of drugs—how they treat only the

symptoms of high blood pressure without addressing the underlying cause—
they routinely become very interested in the natural approach.

Patients should thoroughly understand that medications do not have a

significant impact on reducing heart attacks, the leading cause of death in
people with high blood pressure. In fact, because of their negative effect on
lipids and glucose levels, drug treatments such as beta-blockers and diuretics
may even increase the risk of heart attacks. Even the data from the renowned
Framingham study indicate that the likelihood of death from coronary heart
disease is higher during treatment with thiazide diuretics than without them.53

The majority of patients with high blood pressure die of heart attacks, not

strokes. Medications, therefore, have been shown to have little or no effect in
reducing overall cardiovascular mortality in major clinical trials.54 Even when
researchers lumped together all nine of the major hypertensive trials to achieve
the statistical power of very large numbers, no significant trend was noticed in
the ability of hypertensive medication to reduce the mortality or morbidity of
coronary heart disease.55

Some of the side effects of high-blood-pressure medication are hard to

ignore. They include fatigue, headache, swelling, nausea, dizziness, and many
others. For example, I routinely see patients complaining of sexual dysfunction
who are anxious to get off their medication.

When patients are given all the facts, including the real benefits of removing

the disease rather than merely disguising its existence with drugs, they almost
invariably choose the natural way to a healthy heart.

Fasting Quickly Places the High-Risk Patient at Lower Risk

Besides effectively lowering blood pressure, fasting removes and softens the
cholesterol plaque that lines the blood vessels. Slowly and steadily the fast
allows more blood and oxygen to circulate and thereby rejuvenate all the tissue
and organs of the body.

Surgery, arthrectomy, and angioplasty, the invasive approaches to coronary

artery disease, will always remain ineffective at significantly extending life. This

is because these procedures address only the localized blockage. This small
area of diseased blood vessel, though it may be the source of chest pain, will

not necessarily be the area that causes death should a person suffer a fatal
heart attack. Concentrating on a localized area of coronary artery narrowing in

a body full of vessels with diffuse atherosclerotic plaque is like trying to save a
patient with advanced metastatic cancer by removing one surgically accessible

mass.

Understanding why a life-threatening event like a heart attack or stroke
occurs lets us see why high-tech surgical methods will never significantly

extend lives. Fatal or life-threatening heart attacks are typically initiated by a

rupture or fissure in the atherosclerotic plaque, which leads to clot formation. A

93

thrombus is a clot that forms within the blood vessels. The initial formation of

such a clot involves the sticking together of platelets. Injury to the vessel wall
releases substances, such as serotonin, that attract platelets and cause
constriction or narrowing of the vessel in an attempt to stop bleeding.

Normally, clots occur to prevent bleeding from a damaged blood vessel, but a

clot, or thrombus, that occurs as a result of a small fissure or ulceration in a
vessel wall diseased with atherosclerosis can occlude it, leading to a heart

attack or infarction (death of tissue in a specific area due to blockage of
circulation). In a person with atherosclerotic heart disease, we cannot predict

the spot where this fissure in the plaque and subsequent blockage will occur.

An embolus is a traveling thrombus that can occlude a small artery in the
heart or brain, causing a heart attack or stroke. The main causes of strokes

and heart attacks are thrombi and emboli.

While medical treatments aim at reducing symptoms and may address some

discrete areas of disease, they do little or nothing to remove the underlying

illness or stop its progression to an untimely death. On the other hand, fasting
treats the entire body. It addresses all the biochemical abnormalities that make

cardiovascular disease so dangerous. Combine this with a cholesterol-free diet
before and after the fast, and patients are able to rejuvenate their

cardiovascular system, safely adding years to their life.

Fasting thins the blood and prevents blood clots, or thrombi. Platelets do not
clot as easily during fasting, and the ability of the red blood cells to clump

together is diminished. Therefore, the fast quickly lowers an individual’s risk of
a heart attack.

The potential of a total fast (water only) to induce biochemical changes

within the body that prevent formation of a thrombus has been well

documented.56 In one such study a fast was undertaken by 22 normal
volunteers. The ability of their blood to clot and .form a thrombus under fasting

conditions was extensively analyzed. Fasting was discovered to lead to the
reduction of blood plasma and red cell coagulation, deterioration of platelet

aggregation, a rise of the oxidized hemoglobin content, and an increase in red
cell resistance to peroxide hemolysis. In short, fasting lowers the risk of

intravascular coagulation and thrombus formation.

Other studies have shown that after 36 hours of fasting there is a significant
increase in the fibrinolytic activity of the blood. Fibrinolysis is the breakdown of
clots. This activity continues for 24 hours after the fast is terminated.57,58

Increased fibrinolysis during fasting may account for the dramatic improvement
and feeling of well-being in patients suffering from thrombophlebitis (caused by
clots in the blood vessels in the legs) who are fasting to treat obesity.59

Early in the fasting state, a significant increase in sodium and fluid excretion

is predictable. This property of the fast to allow the body to excrete extra fluid
has been shown to be effective as a treatment for congestive heart failure.60
The sodium excretion and the quick loss of excessive fluid retained within the

94

body’s tissue and in the blood immediately place less stress on a diseased or

weakened heart.

Fasting so effectively reduces the workload of the heart that its efficacy has

even been reported in cases of intractable, severe congestive heart failure.
These medical investigations began when low-salt diets and medications such

as diuretics no longer sufficed to prevent the heart failure from causing fluid
overload, multi-organ failure, and death, and physicians were looking for

another solution.

One indication that a patient with severe chronic heart failure is entering a
terminal phase is when he or she retains water, even when given diuretics and
when salt intake is restricted. Several drastic measures have then been
applied, including tube drainage, dialysis, and water restriction. In the search
for a more successful and less harrowing program of management of these
patients, fasting was tried .and found to be successful in spite of failure of all
other medical interventions.

In a case reported by Arthur J. Merrill, M.D., a patient who was spiraling

downhill and expected to die was placed on a fast. This resulted in her
recovery, enabling her to be sent home without shortness of breath or edema.
Dr. Merrill states, “Had it been realized that the change would be so
spectacular, a more strenuous effort would have been made to obtain accurate
intake and output data with an indwelling catheter, as well as 24-hour
excretions of sodium, but the patient was thought to be moribund.”61

During the early portion of a water fast, excretion of sodium is about three

times that observed with a low-salt diet. This and other biochemical parameters
that favor the liquid state of the blood and lower cardiac workloads are
desirable aspects of water fasting not seen with juice fasts or calorie-restricted
diets. Remember, consuming only juices or any other source of calories will not
give the same benefits to the cardiac patient as a total fast. Even the smallest
amount of carbohydrate stops the sodium excretion.62,63

The fast will immediately lower or remove the risks that hang like a dagger

on a thread ready to drop on disease sufferers and cut short their lives. Diets
and treatments of every description flood the media, but nothing will remove
these risk factors as effectively, quickly, and predictably as fasting.

A case in point is that of Robert, a 59-year-old counselor. When he came to

see me he was in quite a dangerous condition, having suffered two heart
attacks. A third one was obviously imminent. Robert had undergone balloon
angioplasty and bypass surgery but was now suffering from recurrence of his
angina (chest pain). His last angiogram showed complete blockage of two out
of the three main coronary arteries and 80 percent blockage of the remaining
one. He was having chest pain even as he sat in my office and described his
medical history.

Robert explained that a recent stress test showed such severe cardiac

insufficiency that his cardiologist had immediately stopped the test. This

95

physician recommended repeating the bypass surgery. Robert, remembering

his prior bypass experience, which almost killed him and resulted in prolonged
postoperative mental confusion, decided to refuse such a risky procedure. He
instead contacted Dr. Dean Ornish’s office, which referred him to me.

After observing Robert for a short period of time, we began his fast. Shortly

thereafter, Robert’s blood pressure began to fall to a safe level and he felt
better than he had in years. The biochemical changes that occur during a fast,
decreasing the blood’s ability to clot, lowered his risk of sudden death. His
blood pressure fell to within the normal range and he enthusiastically continued
his fast for a total of 24 days. His chest pain did not recur. The results of his
next electrocardiogram (EKG) showed that the signs of ischemia (impaired
oxygen delivery to the heart) had resolved.

No long taking any medication, Robert began to exercise—riding a bike and

lifting weights—free of any pain. Today he is living a life free of any cardiac
symptoms.

Another patient, Neil, underwent two balloon angioplasty procedures for

recurrent angina. Within a few months after each angioplasty, his chest pain

recurred, as did his severe coronary blockage, as demonstrated by repeated

angiograms. He received the bad news from his physician: “You must undergo
bypass surgery now as too much scar tissue has formed in the main artery of

your heart and we cannot do another angioplasty.” Neil refused bypass surgery
and was referred to me. He underwent a 20-day fast. Soon, he was free of pain

and able to play tennis and golf, and enjoy his previously active life, symptom-
free. He no longer required any medication for high blood pressure or chest

pain. Repeated cardiac testing (PET scans) a few months later showed that his
blockage had reversed from approximately 95 percent to 60 percent. By

changing his diet and fasting, he quickly reversed a dangerous cardiac
condition.

For many years, Kevin had been suffering from erectile impotence and

excruciating pain in his legs whenever he walked. This type of pain is called
intermittent claudication. It is caused by blockages in the blood vessels that

supply blood to the legs. The leg and hip pain began when the patient was 46,
but at that time manifested itself only during significant exertions, such as long

hikes. The pain slowly progressed over the years and in the last two years had
become quite severe. Recently, even mild exertion such as walking 100 yards

on a flat surface would generate acute pain in both legs and hips and

numbness in the left foot.

Kevin consulted numerous physicians and underwent an angiogram, which
documented severe atherosclerosis of the iliac arteries (major blood vessels in
the leg). Immediate angioplasty of the arteries in the legs was recommended.
The patient was informed there were no alternatives. Primary hypogonadism
(low testosterone levels) was also diagnosed, which was thought to be the
source of his impotence. He was given injections of testosterone every two
weeks for the condition.

96

Kevin fasted for only 12 days. During the fast he continued to suffer from the
above symptoms. After the fast he was first fed a small quantity of fresh fruit

and vegetable juice. He progressed to melon by the end of the fourth day and
was then fed raw salad and vegetables. On the fourth day of refeeding he

began exercising on a stationary bike. By the seventh day of refeeding Kevin
was able to walk 20 minutes without any discomfort in the legs, calves, or feet.

Upon discharge, Kevin was instructed to follow an extremely low-fat, low-

protein diet, high in complex carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals, and fiber, and
derived from fresh fruit, vegetables, and grains. When he returned for follow-

up four weeks later, he was walking long distances without symptoms, his
intermittent claudication had not returned, and he no longer required the

testosterone injections as he was no longer impotent.

A fascinating aspect of fasting patients with atherosclerosis is the marked rise
in cholesterol seen during the fast. Frequently patients whose cholesterol levels

have gradually decreased to around 150 as a result of adopting a zero-
cholesterol, plant-based diet see their cholesterol levels almost double during

fasting. This large increase can occasionally continue for months after the fast
is terminated. This probably reflects the breakdown of atheromas (cholesterol-

laden blood vessel blockages) with release of their cholesterol contents.

Wayne, a 53-year-old man with a history of three prior angioplasties and an
arthrectomy, had recurrence of his angina immediately after each of these four

separate procedures. He brought his cholesterol level down from 280 to 159 by

adopting a zero-cholesterol, plant-based diet, but continued to have angina
while following the diet, so we began a fast about three months later. His

cholesterol level on day 7 of the fast was 380; on day 14 it was 365. His angina
ended on day 3 of the fast. He completed a 21-day fast and his angina has not

returned. The cholesterol level normalized again to around 150 three months
later. In individuals with arterial pathways narrowed by plaque, the cholesterol

levels usually increase during fasting. Young patients or those who have
followed vegetarian diets for years prior to their fast, who obviously do not

have fatty plaque lining their blood vessels, do not illustrate this rise in
cholesterol.

A Complete Recovery Is Possible—Don’t Settle for Less

It is my belief that these nutritional approaches are the medicine of the future.

People who are at risk for heart attack or stroke because of high blood
pressure, angina, or significant blockages in their coronary arteries can

significantly extend their life span, avoid invasive medical procedures, and
eliminate potentially dangerous medications for heart disease and high blood

pressure. Taking advantage of today’s state-of-the-art nutritional approaches

makes this possible.

In my medical practice, I motivate and support patients who wish to regain

control of their health. Many patients require ongoing guidance and close

medical supervision during this transition. Patients quickly realize that eating a
plant-based diet for better health is enjoyable and easy, not a sacrifice, and

97

they become enthusiastic as they watch their medical problem improve and

eventually resolve. I believe this type of medical care is more rewarding for the
physician as well as the patient. Inevitably, more physicians will be embracing
this type of care in the future.

Making significant dietary changes allows people who suffer with coronary

heart disease, high cholesterol, overweight or obesity, adult diabetes, high
blood pressure, and/or certain digestive and rheumatic degenerative diseases

first to reduce and then to eliminate their dependence on medications and to
avoid major palliative surgeries, such as heart bypass and angioplasty.

A change to a low-fat, plant-centered diet is also the most effective way to

permanently lose weight and gain more energy. This, along with smoking
cessation and regular exercise, reduces the risk of chronic diseases that are the

leading cause of illness, death, and health-care expenditures in the United

States.

Helping my patients adopt an optimal nutrition approach that will reverse,

retard, or prevent disease represents the most conservative approach to the

treatment of many chronic, degenerative ailments and diseases. I believe this
conservative approach is also the most progressive.

98

Chapter 6

Recovery from Diabetes Through Optimal

Nutrition

One in 20 people has diabetes in this country. Diabetes, our seventh leading
cause of death, is also a nutritionally related disease, one that is both
preventable and reversible through nutritional methods. Like many other
chronic diseases, diabetes is increasing in prevalence in the United States.

There are basically two types of diabetes: type I, or childhood-onset

diabetes, and type II, or adult-onset diabetes. In type I, which generally occurs
earlier in life, children incur damage to the pancreas, the organ that produces
and secretes insulin, so they have an insulin deficiency. In type II, the
individual still produces near-normal levels of insulin, but the body is resistant

to it, so the level of blood sugar, or glucose, rises. The end result is the same in
both types of the disease: the individual has a high glucose level in the blood.

Both types of diabetes accelerate the aging of our bodies. Having diabetes

greatly speeds up the development of atherosclerosis, or cardiovascular
disease. Diabetes also ages and destroys the kidney and other body systems.

Forty thousand amputations per year are due to complications of diabetes. It is
the leading cause of blindness in adults and of kidney failure.

Diabetics, regardless of the type, have abnormal blood lipids, meaning they

have higher levels of triglycerides and lower levels of HDL (the “good”
cholesterol) in their blood than the general population. The overproduction of

triglycerides in particular is probably related to the increased flux of glucose
and fatty acid substrates to the liver.1 Unfortunately, at any given cholesterol

or triglyceride level, diabetics have a much higher risk of coronary heart
disease, compared to the nondiabetic population.

In both types of diabetes, the high glucose level in the blood damages the

body. In conjunction with blood lipids, it inevitably causes a significant
acceleration of the atherosclerotic process, hardening and narrowing the blood

vessels: Atherosclerosis accounts for 80 percent of all diabetic deaths. Diabetics
have more than four times as many heart attacks as nondiabetics. One third of

all patients with insulin-dependent diabetes die of heart attacks before age 50.2

Diabetics should be made aware that they can protect themselves from
becoming part of these morbid statistics. But diabetics are typically given the
wrong recommendation by the professionals caring for them. You would expect
that any dietary recommendations designed for diabetics would attempt to
reduce the risk of a heart attack, stroke, or other cardiovascular event.
Unfortunately, this is not the case. In fact, the typical dietary recommendations
suggested to diabetics by their doctors and dieticians have been shown to allow
the advancement of athersclerosis in normal patients, let alone diabetics.3,4

99

Both interventional studies and large epidemiologic (population-based) studies

have shown conclusively that certain diets promote cardiovascular disease and
diabetes, and that other nutritional practices can prevent and reverse them.

The Lifestyle Heart Trial is just one of several studies that document that the

standard recommendations (utilizing a diet in which 30 percent of calories

come from fat) allow the progression of heart disease even in nondiabetic
patients. These recent studies were designed after it was noted in numerous

population-based studies that cardiovascular deaths were virtually nonexistent
in rural populations consuming vegetarian diets. In these same populations

diabetes was unknown. Researchers noted that deaths from heart disease
increased as populations gradually increased their consumption of animal-

based foods, and that diabetes started to appear as animal foods and other rich
foods were consumed.5

All animal foods are rich in fat and protein and deficient in fiber and the

antioxidant nutrients that protect against heart disease and cancer. Many
studies looking at populations consuming around 30 percent of calories from fat

illustrate that such populations have a substantial amount of cardiovascular
deaths, and all studies done on populations that consume less than 15 percent

of calories from fat show that heart disease and diabetes are virtually
nonexistent.6

Heart disease is the leading cause of death in diabetics. The point here is that

the standard diabetic diet, which recommends 30 percent of calories from fat
and usually includes salad oils, chicken, fish, and lower-fat dairy foods, is still

too heavy in animal-based foods, which cause heart disease. Such a diet is

risky for all people, but for the diabetic this degree of fat, cholesterol, and even
protein is exceptionally hazardous. As the evidence indicates, it is a deadly diet

for the diabetic.

A high-protein diet is especially risky for diabetic patients because such a diet
places a significant stress on their kidneys, accelerating the progression of

kidney failure.

Fat Is the Chief Enemy of the Diabetic

At in the diet of the diabetic not only accelerates the disease process but also

interferes with the uptake of glucose by the cells, thus further raising the blood
glucose level.

Experiments described in the medical literature have tested the effects of

high-fat diets on insulin intolerance. In one study, healthy young medical
students were fed a very high fat diet containing egg yolks, heavy cream, and
butter, and within two days all of the students had blood sugar levels high
enough to be labeled diabetic.7 Complex carbohydrates have been shown to
have the opposite effect.8

Fat in the food we eat prevents the proper utilization of insulin, and more

insulin is needed to process the glucose when fats are included in the meal.

100

Additionally, the fat on one’s body makes the cells resistant to insulin, and the

pancreas must produce more insulin to compensate. This is due not only to the
additional insulin demanded by the extra body mass of fat cells, but also to the
fact that the fat in and around normal tissue, like muscle and internal organs,
interferes with insulin uptake into these tissues. The major contributors to fat
in the American diet are animal-source foods such as meat, fowl, fish, and
dairy products, as well as cooking or salad oils.

Insulin Is the Accomplice in Crime

After World War I, when insulin was first discovered, the medical profession

thought diabetes would be totally curable as a medical problem. Diabetes was
believed to be due to insulin deficiency, and everyone thought that since insulin

would now be given to patients there would be no more problems. It seemed
this way for a few years, but terrible things started happening to patients with

diabetes who were given insulin to control their blood sugar levels. They
developed eye disease, kidney disease, and, most important, accelerating

atherosclerosis leading to blood vessel disease and early heart attacks. Their
problems were worse than ever.

Decades later, when the insulin assay became available and doctors were

able to measure insulin levels in their patients’ bloodstreams, they found most

interesting results: the insulin levels of type I (childhood-onset) diabetics were
indeed low, but the levels in type II (adult-onset) diabetics were not only not

low, but also were higher than those of people without diabetes.

It became clear that type II diabetics is a disease of insulin resistance, not
insulin deficiency. Type II diabetics produce plenty of insulin, but for some

reason still not enough to drive the glucose from the bloodstream into the cells.

If we measured the insulin level in prediabetic people (those who will become

diabetic years later), we would find insulin levels much higher than normal.
These persons consume excesses of fat, sugar, protein, and refined or

processed foods and have excess fat on their bodies; as a result their pancreas
must secrete increased amounts of insulin to overcome the insulin-blocking

effects of their fat cells and the fat they ingest.

All overweight individuals, whether diabetic or not, have abnormally high
levels of circulating insulin. In fact, being overweight can force one’s body to

manufacture up to four to five times as much insulin as a normal person. Many
obese individuals eventually become diabetic. About 85 percent of adult

diabetics are significantly overweight.

Some of the obese may never become diabetic because their pancreatic

reserve may enable them to continue to produce this excessive amount of

insulin for years. Even if they never become diabetic, however, the high levels
of insulin contribute to their cardiovascular risk by increasing the process of

atherosclerosis. Insulin increases the rate at which cholesterol-laden plaque
builds up on arterial walls. The abnormally high levels of insulin produced by all

overweight individuals, diabetic or not, is an independent risk factor for early

101

cardiac death.

After years of this unusual stress, the pancreas starts to tire out and
eventually can secrete only normal amounts of insulin in response to the high
demand by the body. This occurs because we all lose some beta cell function as
we age (beta cells are the cells in the pancreas that secrete insulin) and
excessive demand causes an acceleration of this process. Now, 8 to 20 years
later, the pancreas finally says “enough is enough” and slowly stops producing
high levels of insulin. At this point the glucose level in the blood begins to rise,
and the person may notice the first signs that something is wrong, such as
increased urination. Diabetes is then diagnosed. These are the major factors
causing adult-onset diabetes.

The seeds of diabetes are planted by high insulin levels many years before a

person becomes a diabetic. This is when the damaging effects of the elevated
insulin begin to hurt the body, long before the disease is diagnosed. When a

person first develops the signs and symptoms of type II (adult-onset) diabetes,
the problem has existed for a long time. Typically the body has been battling

with excessive insulin requirements and the pancreas has been overworked to
exhaustion for more than ten years before the level of glucose rises in the

bloodstream. If we could have tested insulin levels of an individual every year
for ten years before diagnosis, we would have found high and rising insulin

levels.

When the diagnosis of diabetes is first made, the individual may already have
other related medical complications. In fact, many of these patients actually

come to physicians because of these complications, such as a heart attack, and
then the physician notices this person’s glucose is a little high. But such

individuals so often never knew they had diabetes until a medical complication
of diabetes made them come to the doctor. This is because excess insulin is

very damaging to the body—especially to the circulation, including the large
blood vessels as well as the small ones in the eyes and kidneys. All those years

of excessive insulin secretion take their toll, resulting in extensive damage to

the body.

The tendency of the pancreas eventually to lose the ability to produce such
excessive amounts of insulin may be influenced by genetics. Thirty to 40 years
ago the Pima and Tohono O’odham Indian tribes of the American Southwest ate
cactus, roots, berries, beans, corn, and greens. Diabetes was unknown in their
ancestry. Eventually these Native American tribes adopted the standard
American diet. As a result, more than half of these Indians presently become
diabetic by the age of 35, although before 1945 diabetes was unknown in this
population.9

Multiple other studies show similar patterns when societies adopt modern

diets.10,11 Therefore, the inherited tendency to develop diabetes may be there,
but that does not mean we have to stress our bodies so much that this

inherited weakness becomes evident.

When Earl Ray, a Pima Indian who lives near Phoenix, switched back to a

102

more traditional Native American diet of mesquite meal, beans, and cactus

fruit, his weight dropped from 239 pounds to less than 150 pounds and his
severe diabetes was controlled without medication.

So fat and glucose are not the only villains. The high levels of insulin present

in diabetics also promote hardening of the blood vessels and aging of the body.
Findings from numerous studies have shown that insulin blocks cholesterol

removal, stimulates the formation of atherosclerotic plaques, and contributes to
the delivery of cholesterol to the cells. Insulin also promotes other damage

such as smooth muscle and connective tissue proliferation.12,13 This leads to
even more blood vessel stiffness and damage, because the muscular wall of the

blood vessel becomes thicker. and less elastic as the interior lining becomes
laden with atherosclerotic plaque, thus increasing the diabetic’s risk of stroke

and heart attack.

So insulin is a great villain. In fact, if you want to have your blood taken for
just one blood test that will be the best indicator of your risk for heart attack in

the next ten years, get a serum insulin level, not a serum cholesterol.

Insulin obviously has some essential functions in the body. It allows the

uptake of glucose by the cells, thus giving our cells energy, but it also drives

the growth of fat and helps us store our excess nutrients in the form of body
fat. Extra insulin also can slow down one’s metabolic rate .as it efficiently aids

the process of packing away more fat on the body. So the heavier one
becomes, the more insulin the body needs to make, and the more insulin the

body produces (or is given), the fatter—and the more diabetic, or insulin-
resistant—one becomes.

So it is absolutely essential that type II diabetics maintain a slim physique.

Sometimes type II diabetics who think they are not overweight can loose ten
pounds of fat they didn’t think they had and, like magic, their glucose levels
normalize.

Standard Recommendations for Diabetes

Now that you understand the mechanism that leads to the development of
adult-onset, or type II, diabetes, let’s look at the current methods for treating
diabetes. The American Diabetic Association recommends restricting fat intake
to 30 percent of

103

calories from fat. Patients follow an exchange diet to keep daily calories
constant. A low-protein diet is sometimes recommended only after the kidneys
show damage.

The 30-percent-of-calories-from-fat recommendation is the same number

used by the American Heart Association and other governmental authorities in

this country. When this diet fails to adequately control blood sugar levels, oral
medication is used to stimulate the pancreas to produce more insulin. When

this fails, insulin injections are used to attempt to bring glucose levels near
normal. When this fails, both insulin and oral medication are used.

The Remedy Is Worse Than the Disease

The administration of insulin and oral medications attempts to address only one

aspect of the problem—the increased blood sugar levels. Because insulin
increases one’s appetite and increases glucose uptake by the cells, the diabetic

patient becomes more diabetic and eventually requires more insulin, and so on.
Increased insulin is responsible for increased death from heart attacks. Giving a

type II diabetic insulin is like giving an alcoholic more alcohol.

Hypoglycemic pills (the oral diabetes medication) are not as bad as insulin;
however, they too have been shown to increase the risk of dying from heart
disease 2.5 times more than that of diabetics treated by diet alone. They can
cause dangerous side effects such as jaundice, anemia, skin rashes, and even,
though rarely, death.” But the main problem is that the blood-sugar lowering
effect of these medications is achieved mainly through stimulating the
pancreatic islet cells to produce more insulin. Attempting to stimulate the

104

weakened pancreas eventually takes its toll, aggravating the loss of beta cell
function. Thus, again, the person is likely to become more diabetic. The oral

medications also increase glucose and fatty acid uptake in skeletal muscles and
fat cells, helping the person gain weight more easily and become more

diabetic.15,16

Both insulin and oral hypoglycemic agents can also cause potentially life-
threatening episodes of hypoglycemia, or low blood sugar. Both medications,

when compared to diet control, accelerate the aging of the diabetic, accelerate
the complications of the disease, and aid in the early death of the diabetic.

Today’s typical treatment combined with the usual American Diabetic

Association diet is a proven dangerous approach. The ADA-recommended diet
has been shown to promote heart disease in patients who do not have
diabetes. Therefore, in the diabetic it is an extremely foolish practice. Feeding a
diabetic a high-fat diet including multiple daily servings of chicken, meat, fish,
and dairy products will greatly accelerate his or her death. Then, when we
combine this with the typical treatments offered by most physicians, it is no
wonder diabetics suffer from multiple medical complications and die an
unnecessarily early death. I can only view today’s treatment of diabetic
patients as malpractice, yet it is the standard of care. If they are not given this
basic information, we are depriving them of their opportunity for wellness and
normal life spans.

A Plant-Based Diet Is an Effective

When Elizabeth first came to me she weighed 222 pounds, she was taking 115
units of insulin daily, and her fasting blood sugar levels were between 250 and

300. Her prior physician was concerned that her diabetes was still so poorly
controlled on increasing doses of insulin. He did not know what more he could
do and suggested adding an oral hypoglycemic medication to the high dose of
insulin to see if the sugar levels could be better controlled.

Instead, Elizabeth saw me and we started a more effective approach. I cut

her insulin back to a total of 70 units daily as she began following my dietary
suggestions. She phoned two days later to report that her blood sugar levels

were running between 130 and 152, so we cut the insulin back to 40 units per
day. She returned for a follow-up visit a few days later, one week after her

initial appointment, and was doing so well that she had stopped her insulin
completely the day before. Her sugars were now running below 150 and she

had lost 7 pounds during that first week. She went from using 115 units of
insulin a day while her diabetes was under poor control to requiring no insulin

at all, and this took place in merely one week’s time. She is continuing to lose
weight.

The diet plan to reverse diabetes and enable patients to eliminate their

dependence on drugs is one derived from vegetables, fruits, grains, and

legumes. Refined and overly processed foods, convenience foods, and foods
that are high in refined carbohydrates, salt, and other additives should all be

avoided for good health. The diabetic, who is even more sensitive to the

105

harmful effects of the American diet, should take care to consume a natural
plant-based diet with an abundance of raw vegetables in the form of large

salads every day. It is essential that the diabetic avoid concentrated vegetable
oils including margarine, olive oil, corn oil, and other fats. Nuts, olives and

avocados are also best left out of the diet due to their fat content.

A large green salad, eaten daily, is the only food that has shown a significant
correlation with longer life in scientific studies.17,18 Guar and other water-

soluble fibers in beans, oats, barley, and fruit are also important, and are
present in large quantities in a plant-based diet. No sweets except for fresh

fruit should be eaten. Fruit juices and dried fruit should also be limited or
avoided.

Weight loss in even the slightly overweight diabetic is essential, so regular

exercise is an important part of the prescription. Both aerobic and weight
training or Nautilus-type exercise should be done on a regular basis to keep a

very high muscle-to-fat ratio in the body. The goal is to make the body “lean
and mean.”

When following the above recommendations, patients lose weight and their
blood sugar levels drop immediately. Additionally, the low protein content of

this diet protects the kidneys.

This program is so effective that I have developed the position that a diabetic
patient who is not a strict vegetarian is either ill-informed or foolish. Doctors

who know this information are irresponsible if they do not explain it to their
patients.

Nutritional Supplements Are Not the Answer

Many nutrients are often touted as effective remedies for the diabetic.
Chromium, for example, has been shown to improve glycemic control in

diabetics who are chromium deficient. Supplementation with vitamin E has also
been shown to have a favorable effect on blood sugar control in diabetics.19
Vitamin C supplementation to 1,000 mg per day has been shown to retard. the

damaging effects of glucose on body proteins, thus lessening the damage from

the high glucose levels in diabetes and retarding the aging process.20

The point to remember is that every nutrient that has been shown to have a

favorable effect on glucose control is present in abundance in fresh fruits and
vegetables and deficient in processed foods, dairy foods, and animal foods.

When we consume a diet of primarily raw and conservatively cooked plant
foods, we consume very high levels of these nutrients, plus nutritional factors

that have not yet been discovered or isolated and that are essential for optimal

health. More than six hundred antioxidants have been identified so far, many of
which work synergistically (strengthening the protective effects of the other

nutrients they accompany) with other compounds to produce observed effects,
such as LDL oxidation. Obviously, we can get adequate amounts of all these

beneficial nutrients only by eating an abundance of unprocessed natural foods
(many of the protective nutrients are lost in processing). Merely adding

supplements to an inadequate diet will never suffice.

106

If you are on the optimal diet already, will taking extra amounts of vitamins E

and C and chromium be important? The answer is probably not. A natural
plant-based diet already provides more than 1,000 mg of vitamin C, for
example. Only time and further research will tell if the diabetic will benefit
further from supplementation once he or she is eating optimally. If you are on
the standard American diet or a diet recommended by the typical health
professional, similar to the suggestions of the American Diabetic Association (a
diet that I consider dangerous for diabetics), then it would make sense to
supplement your diet with other nutrients such as superoxide dismutase
complex, rutin, bioflavonoids, and carotenoids, since those diets are
significantly lacking in essential protective nutrients, especially antioxidants.

Fasting Can Aid in Recovery from Diabetes

Fasting can play an important part in the recovery from adult-onset diabetes.
In fact, early in this century, many years before insulin was ever used to treat
diabetics, fasting was used as an important therapeutic modality to prolong life
in diabetic patients.21 It was reported at that time that even in severe cases of
adult diabetes, the signs and symptoms of the disease resolve with fasting.
Glycosuria and acidosis resolved with recovery occurring even in the weak and
emaciated patients.

In these early studies on fasting done at the Hospital of the Rockefeller

Institute for Medical Research in New York, the physicians employing this
therapy noted that “fasting has not appeared harmful even in these few cases
where it has not been successful.” Even in these early investigations the

importance of keeping the patient permanently “below weight” after the fast
and the importance of restricting the quantity of fat in the diet to maintain the
benefit gained from the fast were repeatedly emphasized. The authors stated,
“Anyone can readily convince himself that, in a suitably severe diabetic who is
symptom-free for days or weeks (after a fast) and on a fixed diet, the addition
of some quantity of butter or olive oil to the diet will bring back the glycosuria,
ketonuria and other symptoms immediately or within a short time.”

Unfortunately, now that physicians are able to control these symptoms with

drugs, these pearls of knowledge gleaned by researchers from the days when
no drugs were available are largely ignored.

More recent studies reporting on the fasting of diabetic patients have likewise

shown excellent results,22,23,24 and confirm the changes I see with my patients.
They concluded that, following a prolonged fast, the diabetic patient shows a

substantial improvement in insulin function independent of the degree of
weight loss, and restoration of pancreatic function can occur that does not

occur with weight loss alone. Complete remission of diabetes was reported in
many patients.

Fasting should not be used early in the treatment, but rather after many

months on the diabetic reversal diet, when the person has lost most of the
excessive weight. At this point an extended fast can remove the last bit of

107

difficult-to-lose weight and, more important, can give the pancreas a chance to

rest so it can reset its sensitivity to glucose and recover its normal function.
The fast is useful especially when the person is doing fairly well, but still has

mildly elevated fasting glucose levels after following the optimal diet and
having restored normal or near normal weight.

If the fast is used correctly in the type II diabetic (type I diabetics should not

fast), it increases beta cell sensitivity to glucose, which can restore integrity to
the pancreas and allow it to reestablish its sensitivity to glucose. This is an
important therapeutic modality to bring diabetics whose sugar levels are
relatively well controlled with optimal diet to the point where, after a fast is
completed, the blood sugars remain entirely within the normal range while the

same diet is continued.

Using fasting in a later phase of the treatment program results in restoration

of pancreatic function so that patients regain normal blood sugar levels and, in
many cases, have no further findings indicative of diabetes. Fasting too early in

the treatment program may temporarily slow the metabolic rate, actually
making further weight loss more difficult, especially if the individual is not lean

after the fast.

When Bill first came to see me, he had already suffered from one heart
attack. He was taking an oral hypoglycemic medication for his diabetes, as well
as other drugs. I stopped his oral diabetic medication at the first visit, and he
began my recommended diet for diabetes. When Bill returned two weeks later
his blood sugar levels were around 140, much better than they had been on
the medication, with his previous diet. His blood pressure remained high,
however (180/95 while taking the Tenormin, a bloodpressure-lowering
medication), and we decided to begin a fast rather than add further medication
at this time. When he arrived a week later to begin his fast, he already had lost
about 10 pounds since I had first seen him about three weeks earlier. All
medications were stopped and he fasted 20 days. When Bill completed his fast,
he had lost 20 more pounds, and not only did his blood pressure remain around
110/70 without medication, but also his fasting glucose levels stayed under

120, within the normal range.

Occasionally, a diabetic patient who is significantly overweight may need to

eat correctly, exercise appropriately, fast, continue to eat correctly for a few
months, and fast again. In this manner the overweight diabetic grows lean and

strong. By combining exercise and extremely low fat, high-fiber, plant diets
with fasting, the patient builds a new body. Both the patient and I develop

excitement at the new, lean, trim, muscular body that eventually reveals itself
from under the old cloak of fat. Like training for and competing in the Olympic

Games, these patients reach their own sustained triumph as they recover and

maintain their health.

The combination of fasting, which places the least demand possible on the
patient’s overworked pancreas, with the lower insulin demands of the new diet
gives the pancreas its well-earned rest and enables the body to accomplish
internal house-cleaning and to repair cells damaged by years of diabetes.

108

Importantly, since all diabetics have significant blood vessel disease with
hardening of the arteries diffusely throughout their vessels, the fast is able to

address the damage already done. Like no other therapeutic modality, fasting
removes the risk of a cardiovascular accident or other complication that was

practically inevitable without this intervention.

Before insulin was discovered earlier in this century, many patients with
diabetes were treated in the manner described—by very low fat diets and

fasting. The medical profession abandoned the practice after insulin was
discovered because physicians of the time thought diabetes was licked and that

no one should have to deprive him- or herself of food in order to get well.
Insulin gave diabetics the freedom to continue to be fat, to continue to abuse

their bodies, and to continue to allow their body to age and weaken from the

effects of diabetes without having the immediate symptoms of dry mouth,
frequent urination, and weakness. But now we know better.

So we must get diabetics off their treatments. If the sugars are not

adequately controlled with diet alone, then fasting must be used. If the diabetic
is motivated and truly wants the best opportunity for a long healthy life, we
should not use medication at all in type II diabetes; instead, we should utilize
aggressive nutritional intervention with fasting, the most effective treatment
for these patients.

My results, obtained from diabetics adopting this natural approach, show that

over 95 percent of type II diabetics can come off medications with much better
blood sugar control than they had on insulin or oral medication. With the
dietary modifications alone, type I, or childhood-onset, diabetics are able to
reduce their insulin requirements by almost half. But more important, they can
improve their overall health, retard the destruction of their bodies, and
significantly reduce complications and the risk of early cardiac death.

All physicians should inform their patients about the optimal

recommendations to maximize their life span and minimize their risk of
suffering from disease complications. Then at least the patient can make an

educated and informed choice. If this prescription is followed, heart attacks and
strokes will become rare. Diabetes will diminish in incidence and practically

disappear from our society.

We can help ourselves, our friends, and our children adopt eating habits they
can live with so that they can be free of the fear of heart disease, stroke,

diabetes, and many other serious illnesses. Passing on to you this valuable
information gives you the power to free yourself from medical treatments, to

control your own life, and to choose your own health destiny.

NOTE: No patient on medication should make dietary changes
without the assistance of a physician, as medication
adjustment will be necessary to prevent excessive lowering of
the blood sugar level, or hypoglycemia.

109

Chapter 7

Autoimmune Disease:
A Superior Approach

A patient’s wife wrote, ―My husband has been seeking medical help

for the past two and a half years for rheumatoid arthritis. He was
going for blood tests every two to six weeks. He was using Azulfidine,

Prednisone and Methotrexate along with other prescribed drugs. He
was about to begin gold shots when he changed physicians. Thank

God he did! He would not die from the arthritis, but from the side

effects of the treatments. After three months Dr. Fuhrman has my
husband off all drugs.‖ The patient added, ―Six months ago I prayed I

would die; now I’m ready to live again.‖

—Mr. and Mrs. Priatt

From the Priatts’ unsolicited remarks one can see why I am so enthusiastic
about the treatment of autoimmune diseases with diet and fasting. I have
consistently watched my patients recover from what they have been told are
incurable illnesses.

There are more than a hundred clinical syndromes labeled as autoimmune

disease. Those discussed in this chapter are serious medical illnesses. They

cause pain, suffering, and early death. Drugs, the present-day treatment, have
extremely serious side effects. As a matter of fact, the toxic effects of the drugs

can be worse than the diseases themselves. It is not uncommon that patients
are unable to tolerate the medications prescribed by their physicians.

The good news is that in the majority of cases these diseases respond

predictably to fasting and plant-based diets. To get optimal results, these diets
must be modified for the particular needs of each patient.

It is also predictable that in spite of well-conducted scientific investigations

and the clinical experience of many physicians, this effective nutritional
treatment of autoimmune disease is generally ignored. This is unfortunate,
because optimal nutrition alone can prevent the suffering of millions.

It is important to note that the fact that a particular autoimmune disease is

not discussed in this chapter does not mean it will not be helped or alleviated by
this approach. Autoimmune illnesses that I will not discuss, but that do typically

respond to this type of treatment include Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, nephritis,

Sjogren’s syndrome, connective tissue disorders, and others. Even some
diseases not generally classified as autoimmune actually improve with this

approach because they have mechanisms the same as or similar to those
outlined in this chapter. These include asthma, allergic disorders such as

rhinitis, and various dermatologic disorders such as eczema, urticaria, and

110

dermatitis herpetiformis.

What Is Autoimmune Disease?

The body’s defense system against foreign invaders is called the immune
system. This finely tuned system is constantly adjusting itself with checks and
controls in an attempt to remove substances foreign or toxic to it.

Sometimes the body’s internal defenses make a mistake; they see an enemy

where in reality there is none, or they respond uncontrollably to a minor insult.
The term autoimmune disease was coined to reflect the body’s
misinterpretations.

Normally, the intricate activities of the immune system effectively distinguish

between the body’s own cells and cellular debris and foreign infiltrators. In

autoimmune disorders this recognition breaks down, and the body’s own cells
are attacked. In effect, the body loses its ability to tell the difference between

foreign substances and itself. When this occurs, the immune system generates
antibodies against its own tissues, and may begin to attack, inflame, and

destroy itself.

The miscommunication of the body’s internal defense structure happens for
two reasons: one, because the cells may have been altered in some way that

makes them appear foreign to immune recognition, and two, because some
aspect controlling immune activity has gone awry.

All cells have protein and lipid projections on their outer walls that serve as

identifying markers to the immune system. Antibodies are designed so that
they can bind with a cell’s outer surface projections, much the way a key fits
into a lock. Thus the antibodies can attach themselves to the cell and recognize
whether the cell looks normal or not. If through this contact with the surface of
the cell the immune markers tag the cell as abnormal, other, larger
components of the immune system will be attracted to destroy the so-labeled
body cell.

As we place disease-causing stressors on our body throughout our lives, our

cells can become biochemically weak and congested with self-generated

wastes. Eventually, as waste accumulates within the cell, it overtaxes the cell’s
detoxifying ability. More and more waste is then forced into the cellular wall,

which will eventually mark the cell as aged and abnormal to immune
surveillance. The immune system will at this point begin its job of attacking this

cell in an attempt to remove it. Therefore, in many autoimmune illnesses,
cellular detoxification via nutritional management and fasting is essential for

achieving improvement or recovery because these measures allow the cells to
reduce their load of metabolic wastes and therefore appear normal again to

immune surveillance.

In multiple sclerosis, for example, part of the myelin sheath that protects
nerves is attacked and destroyed. For some reason these cells look abnormal to

the immune system. In hemolytic anemia red blood cells are attacked and

111

destroyed, and in Graves’ disease thyroid cells are attacked and stimulated,
causing excessive secretion of thyroid hormone.

In rheumatoid arthritis, the immune system attacks and inflames the joints.

In psoriasis, the attack is directed against the skin, and in inflammatory bowel

disease (ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s) the digestive tract becomes the site of
the immune hyperactivity. Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a chronic

inflammatory disease that can affect various parts of the body, especially the
skin, joints, blood, and kidneys.

Besides recognizing cellular deviance, the immune system can cause damage

for other reasons, especially from the formation and accumulation of immune
complexes in our tissues.

In order to protect us, our immune system first has to identify the object it

wants to attack. The antibodies attach themselves to foreign substances,

debris, and dead or abnormal cells. They identify this interior pollution so that
the other part of the immune system, the immune cells, can be attracted to the

area and gobble up or destroy the offending substance. When an antibody
attaches itself to an offending substance, called the antigen, an antigen—

antibody complex is formed.

These complexes are present in the blood in increased quantities in
individuals with autoimmune illnesses. When these complexes are not

effectively cleared from the bloodstream, they can become lodged in various

tissues, where they cause inflammation, much like a sliver of wood does when
it is caught under the skin.

In rheumatoid arthritis, for example, these complexes are deposited in the

joints, and redness, swelling, stiffness, and pain develop, followed by
destruction of the joint as the inflammation continues. The amount of immune

complexes deposited in the joints corresponds to the severity of the arthritic
symptoms.1

Autoimmune Disease Equals Digestive Dysfunction

The number one source of this excessive immune complex formation is
digestive tract malfunction, often called “the leaky gut syndrome.”

It has been shown in scientific studies that many people with rheumatoid

arthritis and other autoimmune diseases have increased intestinal tract
permeability.2,3 Because of genetic or other insults to the digestive system

earlier in life, autoimmune disease sufferers have an abnormality of the
digestive tract that allows incompletely digested foodstuffs to pass through the

intestinal lining and enter the bloodstream.

Proteins in foods are the chief culprits that can excite an abnormal immune
response. A protein is typically made up of thousands of amino acids linked

together. The digestive enzymes cleave the bonds between the amino acids

during digestion, allowing the individual amino acids to pass through the wall of

112

the digestive tract. When isolated amino acids enter the bloodstream, they do
not excite an (abnormal) immune response. During the process of digesting the

protein, however, if a piece of partially broken-down protein, known as a
peptide, is able to pass through the digestive tract wall by mistake, this peptide

can and will excite the immune system to react against it.

The peptide, containing perhaps a hundred amino acids, is now recognized
not as a nutrient like an individual amino acid, but rather as a foreign

substance that needs to be attacked and removed. Thus, the immune system
produces an antibody to this antigen, and an antigen—antibody complex is

formed.

It is clear that the intestinal tract is a critical interface between the external
world and our tightly regulated inner environment. When this critical line of

defense is disrupted, enzymes, bacteria-elaborated toxins, immunostimulating
peptides, and other unwanted substances may escape the mucosal defenses of

the digestive tract and enter the bloodstream. The result is circulating immune
complexes that can induce autoimmune disease, joint inflammation, and pain.

Meat and Other Animal Foods Are Implicated in Autoimmune

Illnesses

There is evidence that when peptides from animal proteins are absorbed, they

not only can lead to the formation of antibodies against them, but also can
cross-react against human proteins in the body. This may be because animal

meats have amino acid sequences that are similar to those found in human
tissue. Plant proteins are less likely to cause this reaction, even if their peptides

pass into the bloodstream, because they bear little resemblance to human

proteins.

When the immune system views the animal peptides in the bloodstream and

attempts to attack and destroy them, the antibodies created can continue to

attack other body tissues later. Because amino acid sequences in human body
proteins are similar to those of the animal peptides, these antibodies can attach

to and cause a reaction to one’s own tissues.

Excess protein in the diet creates a significant risk for the development of
autoimmune disease because, by nature, we are designed like the other large
primates to consume comparatively low amounts of protein.

When we eat an animal-food-based diet with servings of high-protein animal

foods at each meal, our capacity to digest this-food efficiently is strained.
Unlike the true carnivorous animals, which can secrete large quantities of acids
in their digestive tracts and huge amounts of protein-cleaving enzymes to aid
in the digestive process, the human animal cannot. Because we cannot
efficiently dissolve these proteins, more incompletely digested peptides are apt
to be absorbed. In addition, our intestines allow more bacteria species to
overgrow when this environment is rich with animal food-derived peptides. This
results in the absorption of toxic bacterial by-products, which can create an
inflammatory environment. So the overgrowth of various bacterial species

113

thriving in the gut of the average American contributes to immune dysfunction.

The excess of fat in the diet from either animal fats or excessive vegetable oil

can impede the ability of the body quickly to clear immune complexes from the

bloodstream. Excess fat hinders immune function.4 The immune complexes
created by gut leakage are not adequately removed because their removal is

impeded by fat consumption. The complexes then circulate for long periods and
eventually deposit themselves in our tissues. This impairment of the immune

system by fats is one reason the present-day Western diet is associated with
such a high rate of cancer and autoimmune disease.

So rheumatoid arthritis, the most common of the autoimmunetype illnesses,

is not merely a joint disease. It is a problem of the entire body, starting with
the digestive tract. Joint pain is one of the most common autoimmune

symptoms simply because the joints are particularly vulnerable to immune
insults.

The joints receive nutrients and remove wastes through the joint fluid. Joint

areas are extremely sensitive to decreased oxygenation because they have a
marginal blood supply to begin with. Instead of being directly fed by blood

vessels, the joints must receive their oxygenation via the joint fluid. When a
fatty meal is consumed, the blood thickens and red blood cells stick together,

which reduces the oxygenation of all tissues. This has a significant effect on the

oxygenation of joint tissues, increasing the sensitivity of joints to inflammation
and immune system damage. Decreased oxygenation alone can cause

inflammation.

Even young people who have not yet narrowed the major blood vessels
supplying the heart and major organs may have impairment of circulation to
the microscopic vasculature around the joints. Decreased oxygen causes
inflammation, which attracts antigen—antibody complexes to be deposited.
Decreased oxygenation also can prevent repair of the microscopic fractures
that occur in the joint area from normal activity. Additionally, because the area
around the joint capsule is poorly supplied with blood, it is less effective at
removing metabolic wastes and toxins that may accumulate in this area.

When the marginal blood supply to a joint is further compromised by

narrowing of the small blood vessels from atherosclerotic plaque or by the
sludging of blood (stickiness of the red blood cells) that occurs after a fatty

meal, the joint tissues become more prone to arthritic damage. This is one
reason why the joints are a common site for the manifestation of autoimmune

disease.

Drug Treatment of Autoimmune Disease Poses Serious Risks

Autoimmune diseases destroy the body by similar mechanisms, and they are
treated by similar drugs. When we look at the use of drugs to treat

rheumatologic or autoimmune illnesses, we see serious side effects as well as

damaging and dangerous long-term effects. What follows is only a partial list of
drug-related side effects.

114

NSAIDs (nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) such as salicylates

(aspirin and related compounds) have retained their preeminent position in the
treatment of rheumatic disease for almost a hundred years. Motrin, Naprosyn,

Feldene, and Ansaid are newer NSAIDs. Drugs in this category are generally
considered the safest of the medications used for autoimmune illnesses. They

are well known for the side effects of irritation of the stomach lining, ulcer
disease, and gastrointestinal bleeding. They can also cause diarrhea, nausea,

constipation, dry mouth, headache, dizziness, ringing in the ears, liver or

kidney disease, nervousness, swelling, and septic meningitis.5

Several studies have shown that NSAIDs actually accelerate the progression

of arthritis by further damaging the mucosal lining of the digestive tract.6 This

causes more intestinal permeability and more passage of incompletely digested
food and bacterial toxins that worsen the underlying autoimmune disease.

Steroids, such as prednisone, are effective medications for autoimmune

illnesses because they quickly suppress the inflammatory response. Side effects

include electrolyte disturbances, diabetes, increased susceptibility to infection
including tuberculosis, peptic ulcers (which may bleed or perforate),

osteoporosis, cataracts, obesity, moon face (the face becomes swollen and
round), buffalo hump (characterized by a lump of fatty tissue that grows in the

back between the shoulder blades), acne, nervousness, insomnia, depression,
schizophrenia, and suicide.

Withdrawal of prednisone can cause muscle and joint pain, as well as

weakness. These symptoms from the drug may be extremely difficult to
distinguish from the disease (such as rheumatoid arthritis) itself.7

Chemotherapeutic agents (also used to treat cancer and leukemia) such

as methotrexate and Imuran can be effective in controlling symptoms but have
dangerous long-term effects such as causing cancer. They work by attacking
the immune system, which also is the basis of their toxic side effects. Other
side effects include bone marrow destruction, platelet destruction with massive
bleeding, bleeding from the digestive tract, death due to gastrointestinal
perforation, hair loss, liver and kidney impairment, potentially fatal infections,
and both solid tumor cancers and leukemia.8,9

Gold, typically used for rheumatoid arthritis, can cause intestinal bleeding,

gold lung, severe skin rashes, life-threatening bone marrow disease (including
severe anemia), decreased platelets, kidney and liver damage, and hair loss.10
The use of gold compounds has been shown to be among the most common

drug-induced causes of death.11

Plaquenil, most often used for lupus or arthritis, can cause the following:
irreversible visual loss from retinal damage, anxiety, nightmares, psychosis,
hair loss, hearing loss, and skin eruptions such as psoriasis.12

Thousands of patients die each year or become seriously ill from the side

effects of the above medications. Obviously, it makes sense to try a safe,
conservative approach to getting well before spending a lifetime on these toxic,

115

dangerous drugs.

Diet Is Critical in Rheumatoid Arthritis

Arthritis sufferers spend more than $1 billion annually on drug treatment. One
million new cases are diagnosed every year, and the number is growing. Five
percent of America’s elderly population suffer from this disease. It is called the
“nation’s primary crippler.”13 Recent studies have refuted the previously held
notion that rheumatoid arthritis has a favorable outcome. Patients experience
progressive decline in joint mobility and generally get steadily worse in spite of
today’s toxic treatments. Such patients generally have a four- to ten-year
decrease in life expectancy.

More significantly, the prognosis is very poor for persons who have

progressed to multiple joint involvement. The five-year survival rate for
severely arthritic individuals with multiple joint involvement is about 45

percent.14 Similar low survival rates are observed in patients with other very
serious illnesses, such as Hodgkin’s disease and three-vessel coronary artery

disease.

Traditionally, when less toxic medications are unable to control symptoms or
when the side effects became intolerable, the physician will consider using
more powerful and more toxic chemotherapeutic agents, which have even more
dangerous side effects, including cancer.

In recent years, rheumatologists have been starting patients on the more

toxic chemotherapeutic agents earlier, or even as a primary approach, in a
purely theoretical attempt to slow down the progression of the disease. This

practice is prevalent even though there is little evidence to prove that it holds

long-term benefit for the patient. Although medications can reduce
inflammation and pain, the evidence collected so far indicates these drugs have

little or no effect on long-term outcome.15,16

Another recent study of arthritis patients reported that after 20 years of
treatments with the typical drugs including prednisone, methotrexate,

penicillamine, and oral gold, half the patients were either dead or disabled.17
The idea that drugs induce remissions was described as “fallacious.” The

unfortunate reality is that drug therapy often contributes to the suffering and
early death of the arthritis patient.

How can anyone argue that safe and potentially curative modalities such as

fasting and natural diet should not be tried first? In spite of numerous and
repeated proclamations by the American Arthritis Association and

rheumatologists to the contrary, rheumatoid arthritis is preventable and
reversible. Fasting and vegetarian diet have proven to be the only effective way

to achieve consistent remission in such patients.

The Arthritis Foundation boldly declares in their literature that there is no
special diet for arthritis, and that food has nothing to do with causing it.

Fortunately, there is solid evidence to refute this ill-informed and irresponsible

116

opinion.

First there is the epidemiologic evidence. In populations that consume

natural diets of mostly unprocessed fruits, vegetables, and grains, autoimmune

diseases are almost nonexistent. Rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis,
psoriasis, and psoriatic arthritis are exceptionally rare in China, Indonesia, and

Africa, where the populations consume vegetarian or near-vegetarian diets.18,19
The same is found with lupus. Whereas African blacks rarely develop this

disease, it has a high prevalence in the United States, especially among black

women.20

This cannot be because of heredity or racial differences. When people
migrate from China, Indonesia, Japan, and Africa to the United States and
begin to consume a rich western diet, arthritis and other autoimmune diseases
become common.

When these diseases do crop up in such populations, they are not severe.

The people generally have a milder form of the disease, without the joint
deformities and the significant reduction of life span that we see in this
country.21

So will placing people with rheumatoid arthritis on natural-food, plant-based

diets help our autoimmune-disease-ridden population? The results of studies
done on dairy-free, plant-based diets have been impressive. In a study at
Wayne University Medical School, fat-free diets were fed to volunteers, and
resulted incomplete remission of arthritis in the majority of participants. All the
participants relapsed when either vegetable oils or animal food was
reintroduced into their diets. The investigators concluded that the high-fat,
high-protein American diet causes rheumatoid arthritis.22

Fasting Can Be Effective in Treating Autoimmune Illnesses

Fasting is a remarkable anti-inflammatory intervention, more powerful than the

strongest and most toxic drugs at reducing inflammation. It is a crucial

management tool for the person suffering from autoimmunal disease, and,
when combined with appropriate dietary modifications, can induce a remission

of symptoms.

A supervised fast is the most effective way the individual with rheumatoid
arthritis can quickly eliminate pain and stop the degeneration of the body and

joints caused by the attack of the immune system.

A definite benefit is obtained when all dietary antigens derived from foods are

removed by fasting. When patients with rheumatoid arthritis are allowed only
water on a seven- to ten-day fast, joint pains are substantially reduced and

stiffness decreases. Fasting also reduces inflammation by altering excessive
activities attributed to the white blood cells and other components of the

immune system.

Over time, the markers of inflammation in the blood invariably fall as the fast

117

progresses. For example, the erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) falls to

about 5, well within the normal range.

When fasting, the intestinal tract has the opportunity to become quiet, which

in turn gives the immune system a much needed rest. Fasting not only stops
the input of all potential protein antigens and food-derived toxins, but also

allows the digestive tract to rest and heal, restoring its structural integrity.
After the fast, the system will not be as sensitive to potential food allergens

because of decreased amounts of potential immune-stimulating peptides
crossing the mucosal defenses.

Another positive aspect of the fast is its ability to increase microcirculation to

the joints. The negative nutrition associated with fasting mobilizes the fat
stores of the entire body, including the pathologic fat stores lining vessels in

the macro- and micro-circulation, thus supplying the joints with a more

adequate oxygen supply. This in turn enables the elimination of retained waste
in the joint capsule and allows the inflammation in the joints to subside. In this

manner the body is able to catch up on its internal housecleaning, and retained
antibody—antigen complexes are eliminated from the joints and connective

tissue. Thus the remarkable self-repairing process of the fast begins by
removing the triggers to immune hypersensitivity.

Fasting has been shown not only to reduce inflammation, swelling, and pain

in arthritis sufferers, but also to enhance the ability of the immune system to
fight infection.23 The studies done on fasting for autoimmune diseases have
consistently shown multiple benefits to the arthritic, especially when combined
with a dairy-free, vegetarian diet.24,25 Some of these studies were carefully
done in a crossover manner in which the examiners did not know which
patients were in ‘the fasted group.

Another important reason fasting is able to ameliorate the clinical

manifestations of rheumatoid arthritis is that it alters the fatty acid composition

of cellular membranes, taking away important triggers to the autoimmune

inflammatory process. This positive effect of fasting has been studied and
explained in detail in the scientific literature on fasting.26 It is remarkable to

watch the pain, stiffness, and swelling melt away as the fast progresses. The
predictability of this response is dramatic. It is exceedingly rare that we do not

see dramatic improvement that most often results in complete freedom from
pain by the time the fast is completed.

Clearly, when a properly conducted fast is combined with an optimal dietary

approach for each individual, the patient has the greatest chance of achieving a
total clinical remission.

The results of a study comparing two groups of patients who were tracked for

one year were published in the October 12, 1991, issue of The Lancet, a

respected medical journal. The control group was treated with the conventional
medical approach, utilizing drugs. The other group received no medication and

was placed on a seven- to ten-day partial fast, followed by a low-fat, dairy-
free, plant-based diet. The results, carefully monitored by blood tests and

118

physician examiners, documented the vast superiority of the dietary approach.

All clinical examinations were done by a physician who did not know the group
to which the patient had been allocated.

Food was reintroduced after the fast very gradually, which is important in

achieving consistent results in such patients. A “new” food item was introduced

every second day. If a patient noticed an increase in pain, stiffness, or joint
swelling within 48 hours, the item was omitted from the diet for at least seven

days. If symptoms were exacerbated on reintroduction of this food, it was

excluded from the diet for the rest of the study period.

The patients in the control group treated with drugs ate ordinary food. In the
intervention group, in the first three to five months after the fast the patients

were asked not to eat food that contained gluten, meat, fish, eggs, dairy
products, refined sugar, citrus fruits, salt, strong spices, preservatives, alcohol,

tea, and coffee.

After four weeks the intervention group showed a significant improvement in
the number of tender joints, pain score, morning stiffness, and grip strength.
The blood markers of inflammation, including the erythrocyte sedimentation
rate (ESR) and C-reactive protein also showed significant improvement.

The benefits to the fasting—diet group were still present after one year. The

evaluation of the whole course showed significant advantages for the fasting—

diet group in all measured indicators.27

These studies corroborate the clinical evidence of doctors utilizing this

approach to autoimmune disease, and the experience of thousands of patients
who have recovered their health through natural diet and fasting. In fact, there

are so many carefully done studies in the scientific literature on this subject28

that the conventionally held viewpoints should be considered irresponsible,

bordering on medical malpractice, since this nutritional approach is safe,
potentially curative, and may save the patient from a lifetime of toxic drugs.

Yet there is a mere handful of physicians at this time who practice this

approach.

In the Medical Tribune,29 a publication read by a great number of American
physicians, I recently noted a report documenting the beneficial effect of a
vegetable diet on autoimmune diseases including lupus, arthritis, and nephrotic
syndrome. A few months later in the same medical periodical I read an article
in which a rheumatologist stated that diet plays no role in the treatment of
rheumatoid arthritis. He stated, “It cannot be proven that diet influences this
disease.”30 I was reminded of all the proclamations over the last thirty years
stating that it cannot be proven that smoking causes lung cancer.

A week after reading the rheumatologist’s statement I wrote the following

letter to the editor, which appeared in the Medical Tribune of December 10,
1992.

Don’t Ignore the Diet in Arthritis

119

The recent article on state-of-the-art treatment for arthritis restated

the generally held opinion that diet plays no role in the treatment of
rheumatoid arthritis.

This is in spite of studies which document the effectiveness of

specific diets, studies even reported in the Medical Tribune.31 One

recent study placed patients with severe arthritis on a fast for 7-10
days, and then followed up with a low-fat, gluten and dairy-free,

plant-based diet. They then compared the results with the control

group that was treated with traditional medical protocols, including
powerful drugs. The diet approach was far superior in getting

results.32

I see the same impressive results when my patients try these
dietary approaches. I’ll give one case history out of many.

A 62-year-old woman with severe rheumatoid arthritis and other

problems was on nine different medications—Altace, Azulfidine,

Beclovent, digoxin, Ecotrin, Nasalchrome, Organidine, prednisone,
and Seldane. She hadn’t been able to close her hand to make a fist in
10 years and had pain in multiple joints.

Despite visiting numerous physicians and having received almost

all of the treatments mentioned in the article on arthritis, she was
still getting worse. We decided to begin a fast, followed by a plant-
based vegetarian diet. After the medically supervised fast the arthritis

was gone.

Her ESR had dropped from 42 (on prednisone) to 13 (off
prednisone) and she is still on the diet now, five months later. She
has continued to remain free of symptoms. She no longer requires
any of the nine medications she had needed before coming to my
office six months ago. She has regained the physical strength and
movement that was lost over 10 years ago.

In addition, she has lost 35 pounds, her high blood pressure and

other medical problems have resolved.

In these days of methotrexate, gold salts, steroids, and the other
big guns in our medical arsenal of treatments, it might seem

preposterous that something as simple as diet might benefit arthritis.
However, in light of the results that are now documented with plant-

based diets, I consider statements rebutting the role diet plays in the
treatment of arthritis to be ill-informed and perhaps irresponsible.

Joel Fuhrman, M.D.

Belle Mead, N.J.

After this letter appeared, I received numerous enthusiastic calls from other
physicians around the country, requesting further information, corroborating

120

my findings, and referring me their patients.

Psoriasis

Psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis also respond favorably to the combination of

fasting and dietary intervention. In one medical study, eight out of ten patients
noted improvement in their psoriasis after a short fast (seven to ten days).33
My experience has shown that most patients’ psoriatic lesions improve if they

fast long enough. Substantial results often require a long fast ( 1 4 to 30 days),
maintenance of a thin body, and a careful diet after the fast is completed.

I frequently note that when people with psoriasis and eczema fast, the

results of their liver-function tests routinely elevate early and then normalize as
the fast is taken to completion. Without the normalization of the liver from the

detoxifying effect of a more prolonged fast (three to five weeks), reappearance
of skin lesions may occur upon reintroduction of food. Invariably when the

psoriasis sufferer overeats and puts on too much fat after fasting, the problem
once again emerges.

Systemic Lupus bythematosus

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), or simply lupus, as it is often called, is

yet another autoimmune disease with serious consequences. A variety of body
systems may be involved, including joints, the skin, and the kidneys. Excessive

female sex hormones, particularly estrogen, influence the immune system,

making females more susceptible to lupus. There is an increased chance of
developing lupus during pregnancy or with the use of birth control pills because

these are situations in which estrogen levels increase dramatically.

While conventional therapy with steroids and cytotoxic agents can help to
control symptoms, it does not treat their underlying cause. Unfortunately, the

scientific literature is biased toward chemotherapeutic agents, which produce
severe side effects, rather than “unconventional” treatments such as dietary

modification.34 I can usually spot the lupus sufferers as they walk into my
office. After years of taking dangerous steroids such as prednisone, their bodies

are swollen like balloons.

Recent evidence suggests that certain foods are common offenders in
aggravating the symptoms of lupus. Understandably, the reactivity of

autoantibodies in lupus sufferers strongly cross-reacts with commonly ingested
animal proteins. Blood serum from those with SLE can also react with proteins

from plants. These proteins can be found in soy beans, corn, spinach, and
carrots.35 Though the animal-food-based proteins are the prime offenders, this

indicates that occasionally plant foods should be tested for immune reactivity
as well.

Alfalfa sprouts are also to be avoided in cases of lupus because ingestion of

alfalfa seed sprouts or L-canavanine, a prominent constituent of alfalfa, causes
SLE-like diseases in primates.36,37 L-canavanine is also present in other
legumes, or beans, so these, too, often need to be avoided.

121

Lupus flare-ups have also been reported after ingestion of large amounts of

foods containing psoralens (celery, celery salt, parsnips, figs).38 Psoralens are

chemicals that increase photosensitivity in those who are sun-sensitive.
Hydrazines, the chemicals believed responsible for many cases of drug-induced

lupus, are also present in mushrooms, some food dyes, tobacco smoke, and
most cooked foods, especially cooked meats and other fatty foods.

Hair dyes contain high levels of hydrazines and other related chemicals that

are absorbed through the scalp. People exposed to hair dyes also have a
significantly increased risk of lupus.39,40

Dr. Paul Agris, a physician researcher on lupus and food sensitivities, has

noted numerous physicians who have described cases in which patients with
SLE have had dietary modifications influence the way they feel and the severity

of their lupus symptoms.41 The foods typically involved animal-based foods, not
plant products.

The evidence of the powerful role diet plays in SLE and other autoirnmune

and collagen vascular disease stems from multiple animal studies. These
studies note how mice and other animals with lupus fed a low-fat diet had

significantly lower ANA positivity (a marker of disease activity in the blood) and
improved survival, when compared to animals with lupus on a higher fat

diet.42,43

Not only have certain fats been implicated by animal studies, but also some

proteins, especially cow’s milk proteins, have been strongly implicated in lupus
and other autoimmune illnesses. Interestingly, mice with lupus live many times

longer when their diet is free of cow’s milk.44

Beef and milk are probably the most offensive of all foods to the lupus

sufferer, and are repeatedly implicated in investigations.45 Animal products
typically combine a high-protein content with a high-fat content, a combination

inadvisable to those suffering with autoimmune illness. Vegetable oils should
also be eliminated from the lupus diet. This is because any fat—whether

derived from animal or plant—increases body fat and the level of circulating

estrogen, and this too contributes to the immune malfunction in lupus.

As soon as a person is diagnosed with lupus, he or she should immediately

begin a medically supervised fast to initiate a remission. Breaking the fast

carefully under proper guidance is extremely important. Upon completion of the
fast the following foods should be avoided for a prolonged period of time:

1. All animal foods, including dairy and eggs
2. All legumes, except for peas and lima beans

3. Celery, corn, alfalfa sprouts, mushrooms, spinach, and figs.

Exposure to all chemicals should be carefully avoided as well. Specifically, avoid
cigarette smoke, hair dyes, and pesticides. All plant food should be organically

grown or pesticide-free.

122

The fundamental problem in lupus seems to be that once autoantibody
production is triggered, it fails to shut down. This is the case even after the
removal of potentially inciting factors. Many lupus sufferers make
autoantibodies against their own suppressor T cells. This causes innumerable
problems because suppressor T cells are the cells that can modulate or turn off
the immune’ response. A vicious cycle is thereby created. Unrestrained by
suppressor T cells, antibodies flourish and destroy more tissues, more
suppressor T cells, and so on. This is why a fast is needed, and is especially
important early in the disease because fasting can turn off this self-destructive

autoimmune process. The fast allows the body to finally turn down the
triggered, revved-up immune system that is out of control: Then, when an
appropriate diet is followed after the fast, the patient can stay well.

It is very difficult to inhibit this vicious cycle by dietary change alone, though

it does occur in some people. A good example is the case reported in The
Lancet of a 16-year-old girl with a continually worsening condition in spite of
aggressive steroid therapy. Against her physician’s advice, she tapered herself
off the steroids and embarked on a healthy, well-planned vegetarian diet. In a
short time, her antibody titers (indicators of disease activity) normalized,
urinary protein excretion decreased, and serum albumin rose.46

When a physician pays close attention to the causes of lupus and

concentrates on detoxification through fasting and diet, the results are

predictable. However, when the disease has advanced and the patient has been
taking toxic medication for years, the results are more unpredictable and less

favorable. Even so, a natural approach should still be tried in advanced cases
because improvement and even remissions are still possible.

Sarah, a 37-year-old woman, was diagnosed with lupus in 1987. Since her

diagnosis she had been treated with numerous potent medications to suppress
inflammation. She did not improve, however. By 1992 she suffered from

neurological complications (headaches, dizziness, loss of balance, and nausea).

She also complained of joint and chest pain. Frustrated by her deteriorating
condition, and upon the recommendation of a friend who was familiar with my

approach to treating autoimmune disease, she made an appointment to see me.

After undergoing a 20-day fast in the fall of 1992, Sarah was placed on a low-
fat, low-protein diet, specifically devoid of dairy products. Although initially

weak from her underlying disease and the fast, she rapidly regained her
strength. She was now off all medications and all her lupus symptoms had

resolved. Moreover, her lupus antibody level and ANA titer (a measure of
disease activity), both previously high, tested normal.

Though this approach might seem highly unusual to some, it is not only safer

than the current treatments, but also, when started early in the disease
process, can offer complete remission from the disease. The patient can live a

completely normal life free of both the effects of the disease and the effects of
the toxic drug treatments.

123

Dorothy, a 43-year-old woman with lupus for more than ten years, was on
five different medications when she first came to my office. Her prednisone (a
steroid medication) dose had recently been raised to 25 mg. by her
rheumatologist because she had had continual flairs with stabbing chest pain,
joint pains, and skin rashes. She also had significant anemia and a rapid
heartbeat. During the first month, we gradually discontinued her medications
so she could begin a fast.

After a person has been on steroid medication for such a long time, extreme

caution must be followed during the fast because their adrenal function will still
be suppressed from the chronic use of steroid medications. For this reason and
because of her rapid heart rate, Dorothy was fasted for only one week. I was
unsure whether this short a fast would offer her significant results, given the
severity of her condition.

A few weeks later, Dorothy informed me that her joint pain was gone. Two

months later she was back to full-time work, for the first time in many years.

She needed no medication. She felt great and was exercising and lifting
weights and looked like a completely new person. We were both thrilled with

her results.

The underlying cause of disease must be treated whenever possible. While
the specific etiology of lupus even now is still not well defined, there is

sufficient evidence to attempt this most conservative, safe, and ultimately

effective approach before using the “big guns,” such as steroids and
chemotherapeutic drugs, which have numerous hazardous side effects. If a

patient is treated early enough with this nondrug approach, drug-based
treatment of lupus can usually be eliminated.

Inflammatory Bowel Disease: Ulcerative Colitis and Crohn’s Disease

Ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease are inflammatory diseases involving the

lining of the intestines. They are considered idiopathic, meaning that the cause
of the disease is unknown. Colitis involves the large’ intestine, or colon. It is

accompanied by pain and loose stools that can contain blood and mucus.
Crohn’s disease affects mostly young adults. Separate areas of the bowel can

be ulcerated or inflamed though other segments between the ulcerations can
be unaffected.

The abnormal interaction between the immune system and the digestive tract

causes these diseases to evolve. Rarely, colitis may be caused by infection, and
anyone with inflammatory bowel disease should initially undergo appropriate

stool analysis to rule out infectious causes such as parasites or bacterial
pathogens.

Patients with these physically and emotionally devastating diseases may have

as many as 20 bloody bowel movements daily. Sometimes, even the strongest
medications cannot help.

As with other autoimmune disease, inflammatory bowel disease is common in

124

the developed countries. This is clearly related to the animal food and cow’s-

milk-rich diet we feed ourselves and especially our children. How we are fed at
a young age is crucially important and can have a profound effect on our future
health.

In recent decades the incidence of irritable bowel disease has rapidly

increased in our children.47 Rather than raising infants as nature designed on
an early diet exclusively of breast milk with the later addition of natural plant

foods, many parents raise their children primarily on substances that breed
illness: formula, then sugary foods, bottled fruit juices, processed foods, cow’s

milk, and other high-fat animal products.

Prolonged breast-feeding and the delayed introduction of other foods in other
countries may point to the cause of our own high incidence of autoimmune

illnesses and especially inflammatory bowel disease. It is well established that
the digestive tract in the bottle-fed infant is exposed to insults from potentially

pathogenic microorganisms and offensive food antigens. The rich levels of

secretory IgA (an immunoglobulin) in mother’s milk protect against these
digestive problems.48 Therefore, the continuation of breast-feeding when solid

food is first introduced is especially important in the second half of the child’s
first year.

The damage from our aberrant infant feeding practices in this country cannot

be overemphasized. It has been repeatedly noted in the medical literature that
the exposure to cow’s milk (a food obviously designed for infant cows, not

humans) increases the risk not only of adverse reactions to this milk, but also
of developing allergies to other foods.49

Potentially damaging cow’s milk proteins are also present in many cow’s-

milk-based infant formulas. In the genetically sensitive individual, the lack of
breast-feeding or abbreviated breast-feeding, combined with the early

introduction of cow’s milk, could significantly contribute to the later
development of inflammatory bowel disease.

Cow’s milk protein has been implicated as a causative factor in ulcerative

colitis for more than three decades.50,51 In some clinical trials, remission and
relapse were correlated with milk intake.52 Scientific investigations have

illustrated that cow’s milk proteins are so inflammatory in ulcerative colitis

patients that the way in which lymphocytes react to cow’s milk may serve as a
marker of active disease.53

Obviously, it is important for all inflammatory bowel disease sufferers to

avoid any and all dairy products. The harmful and disease-producing effects of
cow’s-milk-based food fed to our infants span the broad spectrum of

autoimmune diseases, frequent infection, and decreased immunity to disease in
general. Milk is a contributing factor to all the other diseases mentioned in this

chapter, as well as to ulcerative colitis.

Evidence now suggests that the increased intake of dietary sugars,
acetaminophen, and other non-narcotic analgesics may also exacerbate Crohn’s

125

disease.54 Therefore, the intake of refined sugars, or too many sweet fruits,

may also need to be carefully monitored in those with Crohn’s disease or other
autoimmune diseases.

If we exceed the capacity of our digestive apparatus to absorb sugar, the

unabsorbed sugars can be fermented by bacterial action lower down in the gut,
forming acetic acid, lactic acid, alcohol, and other irritating products. Both
sucrose and gluten have been implicated in inflammatory bowel disease for
decades.55,56 One reason for this may be the way these elements affect
bacterial activity in the gut. Therefore, it is often necessary for patients to
religiously avoid breads and cereals in order to completely remove from their
diet gluten that is contained in grains such as wheat, barley, oats, and rye.

Clearly no specific diet is appropriate for all patients. The diet must be always

modified to the severity of the illness and the uniqueness of each individual.

When the disease is relatively mild or takes a mild form—such as proctitis—
often all that is needed is a change in diet that eliminates sugar, fats, oils, and

dairy products. When the disease is more extensive and aggressive, however,
more broad dietary intervention is needed.

Elimination diets have repeatedly been shown to be beneficial to those with

any type of autoimmune illness. An elimination diet begins with either a fast or

with eating only a few foods. Gradually, other foods are added, usually only
one new food daily, and then that food is eliminated if it triggers a reaction or

causes additional symptoms. One study of inflammatory bowel disease patients
who followed elimination diet regimens reported a remission rate of 62 percent

after one year and a cumulative remission rate of 45 percent after five years.57

Exclusion diets have also been studied and shown to be highly effective in
those with Crohn’s disease.58 An exclusion diet consists of only a liquid that
has in it vitamins, minerals, glucose, and water, but no food. It is like a partial
fast. In one study, after 14 days on the supplemented fast, 78 of the 93
patients (84 percent) achieved remission. Those who achieved remission with
this partial fast were then split into two groups. One group received further
treatment with prednisone and the other group was slowly reintroduced to
foods. Only a single new food was introduced per day. Any food that provoked
symptoms of diarrhea or pain was thereafter excluded. The researchers found
intolerance to many foods in various patients. These foods included corn,
wheat, milk, yeast, egg, potato, rye, apples, mushrooms, and oats. Coffee, tea,
and chocolate were also revealed as exciting factors.

Relapses occurred in 66 percent of the steroid-treated group, while only 30

percent of those treated with the elimination diet showed any signs of

recurrence. This study corroborated my personal experience that each patient’s
special needs and individual tolerances need to be taken into consideration at

all times.

Frequently, when the disease is active and there is bleeding, individuals
cannot tolerate any uncooked food. They are best fed with stewed or steamed

126

vegetables exclusively. Persons who are actively bleeding should consume a

diet of soft (steamed or stewed) vegetables until they can embark upon a fast.
The diet should be composed of vegetables such as stewed zucchini, sweet_
potato, squash, and new potatoes (no skin). All food should be chewed
exceptionally well. No fruit juices, citrus fruits, or tomatoes should be eaten;
even other fruits may need to be avoided. Avoid cereals and all grains except
for well-cooked rice. Raw vegetable juice (cabbage or lettuce juice with a little
carrot juice added) is usually nonirritating. Taking large amounts of essential
fatty acids, such as flax oil, borage oil, evening primrose oil, or fish oils, is
sometimes helpful as a natural anti-inflammatory to help patients avoid or
lessen the need for medication.

Fasting should not be avoided in those with Crohn’s disease, even if they

respond to the above dietary changes without fasting. Fasting is an important
element if a sustained remission is to be expected. The fast allows the entire

system to restore its cellular and immunogenic integrity. The inflamed bowel
can rest and heal because the main irritant to the system—food—is withdrawn.

With any autoimmune illness, fasting should be employed at the earliest

possible point. In many instances, however, fasting must be delayed until the
patient is slowly tapered off medications. During this period prior to the fast,

the inflammatory bowel disease sufferer should be eating primarily stewed,

baked, and steamed vegetables.

Once an adequate remission has been obtained from the use of the modified
diet in conjunction with an extended fast, foods should be introduced very
gradually, beginning with the stewed and baked vegetables that we used
before the fast. In time, the diet can gradually be broadened to include more
raw and high-fiber fruit, vegetables, and grains. Nuts, seeds, and legumes may
be consumed sparingly. Later on, after a remission has been induced, high-
fiber diets have actually been shown to be of definite benefit.59,60

A physician experienced in caring for these patients through nutritional

means can obtain excellent results in minimizing or avoiding the use of toxic
drugs, such as prednisone, and preventing radical bowel surgery, which is so
often performed in these cases.

One of my patients has a strong family history of ulcerative colitis. She and

all of her siblings have the disease. She fasted for three weeks to place the
disease in remission. Now she undergoes an extended fast every few years to
ensure that she maintains her remission. Periodically, we order blood tests to
check for markers of inflammation even though she is well and has no
symptoms. In this manner, we can detect early signs that a flare-up may occur
and then, if indicated, she can begin another fast before an actual flare-up of
the disease develops.

Superior Nutrition Is Essential After the Fast

One of the reasons why certain diets have not been shown to be universally
successful with autoimmune diseases is that just eliminating a few foods from

127

the pitiful American diet is not sufficient. Also, there is no particular diet that is

just right for everyone. Each patient may need certain modifications to avoid
consuming foods that excite an excessive immune response and those they do
not digest well.

Sometimes patients with severely leaky guts may have to avoid certain foods

that may be perfectly fine for another patient with the same illness. For
example, a very small percentage of arthritis patients note that their condition
is worsened by the consumption of foods in the nightshade family, such as
tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, and white potatoes. Citrus fruits or wheat
products are also common offenders. The foods that need to be avoided can
often be identified by blood or urine testing.

Ferric nitrate urine testing can be useful to help identify foods that are not

digested properly. During this test, the person eats only one food; then the first
urine passed after that meal is tested to see how much sediment it contains.

One can learn how efficient digestion of that particular food was, and whether
or not the body was flooded by immune complex formation after eating it. In

this manner we can customize the diet to ensure it is the best possible one for

each.

A review of the scientific literature regarding autoimmune disease and food

allergy shows that patients consistently improve when care is taken to

customize a diet through elimination of those foods that may be sensitizing for
that individual. The improvement is often striking when the proper diet is

designed individually for each patient.61 Very often researchers first employ the
fast in their treatment because fasting is well known to bring about a quick

remission of symptoms.62 Once the symptoms are improved .or resolved as a
result of the fast, it is easier for the physician and the patient to determine

which foods can exacerbate the pain. By carefully reintroducing foods slowly,
one at a time, and by eliminating any food that causes an increase in

symptoms, each individual can recognize optimal nutrition.

The human body contains powerful self-remedying forces. If we can unleash
this healing potential by removing the causes of illness and remove all

impediments to healing, the results can be truly remarkable.

The greatest enemy to healing is the well-meaning physician who initially
starts the patient with autoimmune disease on powerful drugs. Treatments
build complications and prolong the illness so that the sufferer now has multiple
reasons for systemic toxicity. One also should be in touch with his or her body
to know if overeating, insufficient rest, or dietary indiscretions will cause
symptoms. Through healthful living and avoiding suppression of early

symptoms with drugs, we can avoid the development of chronic disease or the
return to the former disease condition once a recovery has been achieved.

The sooner a person is placed on drugs, including the stronger and more

toxic medications, the more difficult and prolonged is the healing process when
he or she finally decides to get off the drugging merry-go-round.

128

Massage, hot baths, herbs, mineral salts, acupuncture, serums, and electric

therapies have all been found to be ineffective, though some have afforded
temporary relief, because no true healing can take place unless the causes of ill
health are removed. The primary cause of illness can be summed up in one
word: toxicosis. The self-pollution that destroys our bodies from the inside out,
from wrong living and wrong eating, is a dangerous life-style to continue.

Unfortunately, many patients have been drugged and treated for so long that

by the time they are ready or aware that there is a way to get well from their
condition, they already have skeletal deformity, fused joints, and some degree
of irreparable damage.

That doesn’t mean we can’t improve their condition, but by failing to use this

nutritional approach earlier, they have denied themselves the ability to achieve
a complete remission of their illness.

Many of the people who are taking multiple medications when they first seek

my services cannot be placed on a fast initially. First, we must decrease their
dependency on medication. Tapering medications such as prednisone may take

many weeks while they are improving from the dietary change. We utilize the
fast at a later stage when they can more comfortably stop their medications.

Sometimes I recommend natural anti-inflammatory substances, which do not

have the same toxicity as drugs, to help us taper off the medication. These
natural anti-inflammatories include fish oils, borage oil, and flax oil, taken

either alone or in combination, to help lessen the need for more toxic drugs.
These can be especially useful in reducing the need for prednisone in arthritis

and colitis patients, and have been shown in multiple studies to do so.63 Other
nutrients, such as fructo-oligosaccharides, and beneficial bacteria are

occasionally indicated to help enhance the healing of mucosal epithelial

tissue.64

One of my patients with severe rheumatoid arthritis appeared to be doing
very well. She exhibited less and less joint pain as she followed the diet I had

prepared for her. We slowly tapered her prednisone and other drugs over a
three-month period. About one week after she was finally off all drugs, she

phoned to tell me she had suffered a severe flare-up of her condition, and was
immobile in almost every joint in her body. She was ready to give up and go

back on prednisone at this time. Fortunately, I convinced her that this was the
tune to begin her fast. Her symptoms resolved quickly while fasting and now,

years later, she has never had a reoccurrence of her rheumatoid arthritis
symptoms.

If the fast is followed by a low-protein, natural food, vegetarian diet and the

individual avoids irritating foods that have been found to cause the immune
system to over-react, he or she can be forever cured of the autoimmune

illness. Fasting is the starting point. It should be thought of as the initial
preparation of housecleaning before embarking on a new way of eating and

living that will support health and not cause the body to break down again.

129

Many people will feel this approach is too sacrificial, that it requires too much
discipline, or takes too long. Some are looking for instantaneous health, so

they continue to search for “cures” that don’t exist. However, the people I see
generally state they are “sick of being sick” and are glad to finally get to the

bottom of their conditions and attempt to remove the cause. They don’t find
the diet restrictive, as there is sufficient variety among their choices. Rather,

they enjoy the foods and their new-found health. They usually show
determination and a positive enthusiasm, and accordingly earn the desired

results

130

Chapter 8

Overweight and Other Chronic
Medical Conditions Respond to

Fasting
This is the first time I have felt well since my
honeymoon. I finally have control and insight as to my
own body. I feel young and beautiful again. Thank

you, Dr. Fuhrman.

— P. REILE

Fasting Is Effective for a Large Variety of Ailments

I was fortunate enough to be exposed to the benefits of fasting when I was

very young. I have been able to observe its usefulness over the years for
thousands of people. Today, there are a mere handful of physicians practicing

this approach in the country. But many patients with grave conditions seek this
type of help after all other approaches have failed. First, though they embarked

on another journey, spending years searching for and seeing all the top
specialists in the field and spending huge sums of money. They tried various

drugging treatments, yet still became worse. They hadn’t yet come to the
understanding that drugs do not remove the cause of disease, and they were

given more and more toxic substances to ingest by well-meaning physicians.
While these drugs were consumed in hope of lessening their symptoms, the

causes of disease continued to press on with their nefarious influence, allowing
the disease to progress and worsen. Then, they often spent many more

thousands of dollars on alternative practitioners and were given more “cures”

to no avail. Finally, after years of searching, these determined but still suffering
individuals were told there is a method of care based on human physiology,

and they decided to try it as a last resort.

Unlike other methods of disease treatment, fasting is not based on giving
cures, because to expect a cure or remedy to undo years of wrong living and

self-abuse would be the same as believing in magic. Neither magic, nor getting
something for nothing, works in the health and disease care arena. We cannot

suspend the laws of cause and effect by ingesting medicinal substances.
Instead, fasting is based on unchanging biological laws that insist the cause of

disease be removed.

After hearing about a natural food diet and therapeutic fasting, individuals
may enthusiastically give it a try and get well. It is also possible that they may

become excited about the sensibleness of this approach and the prospect of
finally recovering their health, but then go home to their friends and family and

become discouraged after being told that they would be crazy to attempt such
an “outrageous” treatment. They might even call a few doctors they know only

to be told that fasting is risky, dangerous, and stupid.

131

It continually amazes me how “expert” opinions can be given on something
with which someone has had no experience, knows nothing about, and has
never researched. I once had occasion to speak to one such well-meaning
physician who was furiously opposed to fasting. I told him I had read, and was
thoroughly familiar with, more than five hundred medical journal articles on
therapeutic fasting. I inquired as to which ones he was familiar with to help him
reach his opinion. His answer was that he had not read any of them. He
actually had zero knowledge about the subject and began to ask me questions.
He was consumed with the same vague fears and questions the typical layman

would have. Though still having doubts, after our conversation he admitted he
had given his opinion too hastily, and had much more to learn.

The physicians who regularly utilize therapeutic fasting in their practice see

so many remarkable recoveries that getting well is the expected, the normal
outcome. This is because nature heals when given the opportunity.

Still, despite these studies on fasting and plant-based diets, the world largely

ignores this treatment because it is contrary to the present system of medical

practice. Doctors would have to remodel their entire approach to health and
disease, and many physicians would have to admit that most of what they do is

not needed or useful. This is not going to happen soon. We must expect
powerful opposition to the method of care presented here.

Too often, scientific experiments prove nothing. Frequently, the source of the

money dictates the answer. Yet these experiments are all we have to go by and
are crucially important when we are testing potentially dangerous drugs that

may have various hazardous effects. Fasting and adopting an optimal diet
designed to aid one’s condition; on the other hand, are health supporting. They

will make a healthy person even healthier.

Most physicians who have knowledge and expertise in therapeutic fasting

advise it for those wishing to maintain their body in optimal health and to
extend life. It is not merely for the sick. Many of these physicians, including

myself, have personally undertaken long fasts, and may do so periodically. For
example, Dr. Alec Burton, an osteopathic physician who has fasted more than

thirty thousand patients, undergoes a two-week fast every few years for the
long-term health benefits that accrue from the rejuvenating effects of the fast.

I too, plan to undergo another fast in the near future even though I am in
excellent health.

The point I am making is that fasting improves one’s health, rather than

insults it with dangerous drugs or unnecessary and potentially deadly surgery.
If fasting does not lead to complete recovery from a certain condition, it will not
hurt you, either, and will actually improve your health.

Patients who choose this method of care generally become the most

enthusiastic supporters of fasting once they have undergone the experience.
They are excited to have avoided surgery or a lifetime of drug use. Many
different conditions are aided by fasting, a few of which I shall discuss in this

132

chapter.

Using Fasting to Conquer Uterine Fibroids

When I fasted my first patient with uterine fibroids, and watched the tumor

shrink by 78 percent after two weeks of the fast, even I was surprised by how
effective fasting was for this condition. In Randi’s case, we knew that prior to

the fast the tumor had been getting larger with more severe bleeding for years.
Many physicians encouraged her to have it surgically removed. Randi chose to

fast instead.

Pelvic ultrasounds done by a radiologist both before and after Randi’s fast
documented the cubic size of the tumor and the exact percent of shrinkage that

occurred. Her fibroid tumor measured 473.6 cubic centimeters before the 14-
day fast and 105.8 cubic centimeters after. Of additional note was that this

patient also had rosacea, a chronic distressing skin condition with extreme

redness around the nose and cheeks. The rosacea disappeared with fasting and
did not return.

More than half a million women have hysterectomies each year. Many of

them experience depression, painful intercourse, and urinary problems after
surgery. Fasting not only allows the fibroid to shrink, but also often sets into
motion a process in which the fibroid continues to shrink after the fast. The
pain and pressure from fibroids and the excessive bleeding predictably respond
to this method of care. Avoiding unnecessary surgery is precisely why many
patients choose to undergo a therapeutic fast.

Using Fasting to Conquer Benign Tumors

Fasting is a safe and effective approach for not only fibroid tumors, but also
most noncancerous tumors. Nasal polyps, lipomas, benign ovarian tumors, and
benign tumors of the breast often respond favorably to therapeutic fasting,
especially when the person is not very overweight.

When an individual has lots of fat on his or her body, the likelihood of

reducing a tumor through fasting is uncertain because the body will likely use

the fat stores as the primary energy source rather than the tumor. The best
way to utilize fasting to shrink a benign tumor in severely overweight persons

is for them to adopt an excellent diet and exercise program for some months
prior to fasting. After they are in better shape, they can undertake the fast and

expect more predictable results.

Fasting can also be utilized to aid in the diagnosis of a suspicious mass such
as an ovarian tumor. Since noncancerous or benign ovarian tumors typically

respond rapidly to a fast, one may undertake a fast and then recheck with

ultrasound to see if the tumor has shrunk. If, after a ten- to fourteen-day fast,
the tumor stays the same size, then it is more likely that the mass may

represent cancer and should be surgically removed.

Cancerous tumors should not be expected to respond to a fast. If a

133

cancerous tumor does shrink or disappear because of fasting, it is most likely it
was not cancer to begin with, and the diagnosis should be carefully
reconsidered. Generally, fasting should not be recommended for patients with
cancer. An individual with advanced cancer may be advised to fast, not to
improve his or her condition, but to lessen pain and hasten death. When a
person is suffering from advanced disease and will soon die, he or she may die
more comfortably while fasting.

Cancers are generally unregulated growths. Their behavior is uncontrolled,

and the cells multiply rapidly, disseminate (metastasize), and invade
surrounding structures. Factors such as hormones, adequacy of blood supply,
and various unknown influences can affect their growth. Noncancerous tissue,
on the other hand, is more responsive to bodily control because benign tumors
behave more predictably, are generally more slow to grow, and follow normal
rules. The nutritional and hormonal changes that occur in the fasting state,
especially as body fat stores are largely depleted, cause the body to recognize
noncancerous tumors and target and tap them as a source of extra
(unessential) tissue for nourishment. The body has less influence over the
behavior of cancerous tumors, which often seem to have their own,
independent agenda.

Using Fasting to Conquer Sinusitis, Allergies, and Asthma

Sometimes even relatively minor chronic conditions can be troublesome to a
patient—conditions such as recurrent or chronic sinusitis and allergies. Even

when these conditions become advanced and patients are advised to undergo

sinus surgery, I routinely watch them rid themselves of the problem by
adopting the fasting/optimal diet approach.

One patient who came to me had been advised to have sinus surgery the

following week for chronic congestion and obliteration of his left sinus cavity, as
demonstrated on a CT scan. He had been complaining of allergic rhinitis, facial

pain, and troubling congestion for years. He came to me for a second opinion in
the hope of avoiding surgery. I suggested we delay surgery for a few weeks

and try a more conservative natural approach first, to see if it would help.

Thinking he had nothing to lose, he agreed, but felt he would still require
surgery within a few months. The plan was for him to undergo a fast in two or

three months after following a nontoxic, high-antioxidant diet to maximize his
immune response. At the follow-up visit one month later, before he fasted, he

noted his symptoms had significantly lessened. In fact, by the time I saw him
at the next follow-up one month later, his symptoms had completely resolved,

his CT scan had normalized, and he did not need to fast. Obviously, his
condition was not resistant enough to require a fast. He decided to continue the

healthy diet and was pleased with the results. Fasting can be very helpful for
cases of resistant sinus congestion, and can even shrink nasal polyps.

Asthma also predictably responds to fasting, and it does so in resistant cases

in which even medication cannot adequately control symptoms. Asthma has an
inflammatory and possibly an autoimmune component and could even be

compared to the diseases mentioned in Chapter 7.

134

Many diseases of an “allergic” nature represent an oversensitivity of the

immune system. It is always prudent to remove known allergens in the
sensitive individual. However, when does anyone consider why this individual is
so hypersensitive or allergic? Improving one’s health can enable allergies to
resolve. It’s exciting to see someone eating and enjoying a food that they
hadn’t been able to eat in years because of food allergies. This happens
routinely on the fast; allergies simply go away as the person’s health improves.

The hyper-reactivity of the asthmatic’s airways may be caused by sensitivity

to allergens, and may also be brought on by infections, irritants, exercise, or
even emotions. Yet in every case there is an underlying abnormality—an

irritability of the airway that leads to inflammation, spasm, and narrowing of

the air passages. This excessive irritability decreases and even resolves when
the body is allowed to detoxify through fasting.

It is also well established that some medications used to treat asthma, while

giving short-term relief, actually worsen the condition in the long run and
increase the risk of asthma-related death.1,2 The discontinuance of these

medications can improve asthma control. Only through aggressive nutritional
management can the individual’s overall health improve enough so that less

asthma medication is utilized.

The more severe the asthma and the greater the dependency on medication,
the longer it takes to achieve a recovery when we apply natural methods.
Establishing a complete recovery for the severely asthmatic patient can be
relatively difficult compared to many other diseases, but perseverance pays off.
I have found that a long fast, or sometimes two fasts with impeccable dietary
habits in between, is usually essential for the resolution when the patient has
been dependent on multiple medications for many years.

The beneficial effects of fasting in asthmatics have been well documented in

the Russian medical literature.3,4 One recent study concluded that fasting is the
only nonmedical way to improve asthma control. After observing the results
obtained from many years of collecting case histories and reviewing other
studies, Russian physicians concluded that fasting should be considered the
treatment of choice in patients with complicated, serious bronchial asthma.5
They reported that fasting not only decreased the allergic inflammatory
process, but also increased resistance and immunity to bacterial infections.
Their clinical trials illustrated that more than 75 percent of patients had greatly
improved conditions or never had symptoms of asthma again after fasting.

Fasting and natural diet should be the treatment of choice for all asthmatics.

A rare exception to this would be asthma symptoms caused by a toxic
exposure, such as occupational asthma, where all that is needed for recovery is

identifying and removing the offending substance. We should not wait until any
disease becomes so severe that it is difficult to remedy when a safe and more

effective method of restoring normal function, like fasting, can be utilized.

One must recognize that, as with all diseases, many years of drugging takes

135

its toll: the longer the patient waits to utilize this effective natural approach,

the more difficult it will be and the longer it will take to bring about a recovery.

Of course there are limitations to what one fast can do. Occasionally, when

the fast is trying to address many years of self-abuse, the patient either is not
willing to fast long enough to achieve a complete recovery or will require

another fast to allow the process of healing to continue. The earlier that
corrective therapy is employed, the greater the chance of a lasting recovery.

Fasting and natural diet, though essentially unknown as a therapy, should be

the first treatment when someone discovers that he or she has a medical
problem. It should not be applied only to the most advanced cases, as is

present practice.

Beth was a severe asthmatic and had a history of recurrent hospitalizations
before she came under my care. At first we avoided further hospitalization only

by keeping her on high doses of inhaled steroids, as well as other medication.
Frequently, we had to add oral steroids in addition to the inhaled steroids when
her condition took a turn for the worse. She was never in good control of her
asthma even with high doses of medication and always endured wheezing and
poor air flow. She awoke nightly to use her breathing machines.

Although she followed a careful diet, we saw no improvement. We talked

about fasting, but she was not able to set a definite date to begin a fast
because of her work responsibilities and her fear of undertaking a prolonged

fast. I encouraged her to speak with some patients who were fasting and to
observe firsthand how comfortable they were, and to speak to other patients

who had undertaken long fasts to ask about their experiences. She took my
advice, and after seeing patients fasting in comfort and talking with them about

their experiences, she decided to fast. But it took her an additional two years of
suffering with her severe asthma before she finally was able to get the time off

from work and to gather the courage to begin.

Slowly, through the first week of the fast, as Beth’s breathing improved, we
tapered her medication. Within four days of beginning the fast she developed a

red, itchy rash all over her arms and legs. This represented the elimination of
retained toxins that her body had never effectively been able to remove while

she was eating and taking medication, especially because she was habitually on

steroids. I assured her that this type of rash is extremely common in patients
who have been on steroids in the past, because these medications suppress the

body’s self-cleansing and detoxification mechanisms, permitting the retention
of tissue waste products.

Taking an oatmeal bath a few times daily helped relieve her itching. The rash

began to clear, her breathing improved, and by the eighth day of the fast we
were able to safely stop all medications. Beth continued her fast for 21 days
and for the first time in years was on no medication or inhalers. I was unsure
whether or not she still had a touch of asthma left; her peak flow
measurements (a measure of expiratory air flow measured by a handheld
device that the patient breathes into as forcefully as possible) were still slightly