I have almost finished reading The China Study a book published a little while ago about the "evils" of the Western diet.  At first, I was calling this book the most disturbing book that I have ever read, but after getting into it a little you quickly realize that the author doesn’t have any real agenda other than to offer you his scientific opinion about the foods that we eat in the West.
 
Basically he looks at "Diseases of Affluence", which most of us (80+ percent) are going to die of:
  • Heart Disease & Stroke
  • Obesity
  • Diabetes
  • Cancer
  • Autoimmune Diseases (MS, Lupus, Arthritis)

These are diseases that occur much more regularly in countries (and people) that are rich.  Basically, the author goes on to site studies and other scientific tests that show that if you eat a mostly plant based diet (normally eaten in poor countries) then you will have a much smaller chance of contracting any of these diseases. 

Now, at first I thought that was crazy; mainly because our normal Canadian upbringing has really taught us that we really only need to watch what we eat if we are at "high risk" of something and even then there is likely some drug or another that we can take to fix this.  Funny enough though even if you don’t agree with the findings in the book, if you start to look at some "serious" nutritional guides (Canada’s Food Guide) you will notice that milk and meat although part of your diet should be a very small portion and you should be eating a lot of Fruits, Vegetables and Grains.

 

Ultimately the author doesn’t guarantee you long life and happiness just the ability to choose how you are going to die.  Do you want to have angioplasty, by-pass surgery or diabetes or do you want to live healthy until it is time to go? 

 

The choice is yours