Print

From The Desk of T. Colin Campbell PhD Part 1

Dear Reader,

I am a Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Biochemistry at Cornell University, having completed my PhD in 1962 at Cornell, then returning as a full professor in 1975. I was then awarded an endowed chair, Jacob Gould Schurman Professor, in 1985, before retiring in 2000.

My program at Cornell included the full gamut of academic activities, including teaching, public lecturing, consulting, policy making and the running of a large laboratory research program mostly funded by the National Institutes of Health, with smaller amounts provided by the American Institute for Cancer Research and the American Cancer Society. I also organized and directed, with colleagues in China and England (the University of Oxford), a nationwide survey of diet, lifestyle and disease associations in 130 villages (65 counties) in rural China in an effort to better understand, for a dozen different cancers, why these diseases concentrated geographically in some counties and much less so in other counties.

My laboratory work, with many students and other colleagues, was focused on dietary protein, originally for its great health value, and especially for the so-called high quality protein available in animal-based products. This was consistent with my personal views (I was raised on a dairy farm), with my PhD dissertation research, and with the consensus of the nutrition community.

My interest in protein began in the Philippines with my coordination of the technical assistance provided to a nationwide project on feeding malnourished children who were thought to be seriously deficient in protein. It took a rather different focus, continuing for the next 27 years doing experimental research in the laboratory investigating how and why the feeding of animal-based protein (e.g., casein, the major protein of cow’s milk), but not plant-based proteins, profoundly enhanced experimental cancer development.

The findings of that research, which were published in a series of peer-reviewed scientific articles in the very best research journals, indicated a substantial difference in the ability of animal and plant based proteins to enhance cancer–at least in experimental animals. It also begged many questions as to whether this difference paralleled similar differences for other diseases and whether other nutrients distinguished by their presence in animal and plant based foods might also show similar effects–especially in humans.

This was the research background that influenced the experimental design of the China study and the subsequent analysis and interpretation of the findings. Namely, I was interested in determining whether the proportionate amounts of animal and plant based foods played a role in determining health and disease conditions for humans. Most importantly, I was interested in the total effects for all components of animal and plant based foods as they work together.

The China Study, in some unique ways and in spite of its limitations, provided some very provocative results. These findings suggested that even relatively small intakes of animal based foods (from 0% to 20% of total calories) could encourage biological processes that, over a lifetime, would give rise to higher risks for a wide variety of diseases typically found in Western societies (e.g., cancers, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, etc.). It is important to note, at this point, that these findings DID NOT PROVE specific cause and effect relationships. These findings were, however, important stepping-stones to a larger truth that considers both the context of our laboratory based work and the work of other researchers that had been developing for many years, indeed for many decades in some cases.

My own views on diet and health are constrained, as best as I can manage, within an environment of doing properly designed experiments and of undertaking proper analysis and interpretation of the findings. I have been especially conscious of the limitations of research.

It was at this point that I chose to write a book for the public, while co-authoring it with my son, Tom, a book that was written as much for my own education as well as that for others. I was especially interested in seeking the most comprehensive understanding of the concept of nutrition. Throughout my own research career, I had come to understand that nutrition is not the summation of the activities of a couple dozen identifiable and well-known nutrients. Rather it represented the comprehensive and integrated effects of virtually countless food nutrients and nutrient-related chemicals to maintain health and prevent disease, found in Nutrient Rich Foods.

Returning to the theme of our book, I am proposing that the evidence supporting the ability of nutrition to promote health and prevent disease is exceedingly impressive. My journey to this view began as a highly individualized focus on the independent activities of specific nutrients and gradually expanded to include patterns of nutrients and patterns of effects. Even now, my contemporary view of nutrition continues to expand to an ever-larger array of lifestyle conditions, reaching into societal, economical, philosophical, environmental and political domains of interest. For me, it is easy to visualize that many of the larger issues and problems of our society are not only interdependent but, indeed, many of the problems that we now experience can be minimized if not eliminated by what we decide to eat.

One of the most direct ways to think about which foods to favor is to consider the concept of ‘nutrient richness’; this, of course, assumes that we know which foods are nutrient rich. On the basis of my own experimental research gained over the past 45+ years, it is clear to me that these are the whole plant foods: whole vegetables, beans – legumes, fruits, raw nuts and seeds, and cereal grains. This also means that, as much as is feasible, we should avoid or minimize the consumption any foods that stray from this group. These include animal foods and fragments of plant-based foods (like sugar, white flour, oil) that are often used to make ‘junk’ foods.

My concept of nutrition is about ‘wholeness’, keeping intact those parts of the plants that are rich in nutrients and whose biological activities are highly integrated once they are consumed, digested, absorbed and metabolized. These would especially include the outer layers of these foods, where most of the nutrients are located.