the China study | Nutrition Services | Nutritionist Dr. Diana Artene

„The China Study“ Part II – Are the dairy products carcinogenic?

Diana Artene — Tue, 20 Dec 2016 20:31:41 +0000

As I promised, in this second part of the analysis of the book called “The China Study” I will explain if the dairy producs are carcinogenic or not.

Friendly consideration: because the idea that milk is a carcinogenic has become as popular as the idea that we have to eat the fruit between meals so as not to ferment the bacteria that are non-existent in the stomach, it will be a loooooooooooooooooooong and scientifically detailed article.

If you just want to have fun reading a personal opinion about dairy products and cancer, close this article, it’s not for you.

For those who want to understand why we recommend cancer patients to continue to consume milk, fermented dairy and cheese during both treatment and the relapse prevention period, I will begin by answering in detail one of the written comments in response to first part.

And I think it’s important to do this because I think this commentary mirrors the ideas transmitted in a popular way from one patient to another and from benevolent people to the oncological patient:

– “Things are never simple. Let’s ask ourselves: Why did not Asian people consume dairy for 6,000 years? Dairy is known to be acid products. And in the Asian diet abounds vegetables”.

Ignoring the fact that the author of the comment does not know that blood alkalinisation is as dangerous to health as acidification, what I do not understand is how you can write a valid comment like “things are never easy” in the same phrase that you write that “Asian people dit not consume dairy for 6,000 years“.

– Which Asians have not consumed dairy for 6,000 years?

The fact that some believe the Asians do not consume dairy ignores how geographically Asia is, it is just a guess based on the popular image promoted by green grass fans on the other side of the fence – a kind of Utopian China where live mythical antioxidant survivors.

Here are two Chinese milk advertisements of the 1930s and 1933s respectively, the first describing the mother who feeds her healthy baby with milk, and the second – an elderly woman who says she is healthy because she drinks a glass of milk daily in the morning and in the evening.

– So, did Asians not consumed dairy for 6,000 years, and then the marketers decide to start to advertise in 1930 to introduce a new product to the Chinese market?

In the database used by researchers quoted by Campbell himself, the inhabitants of one of the 65 regions studied – Tuoli – consumed on average 865.5 g dairy/day, but not because milk ads were so effective as to persuade even the Asians who did not consume dairy 6,000 years ago to consume them, but simply because the Tuoli region looks like this:

According to this database, the inhabitants of Tuoli:

1) had an average daily consumption of:

865.5 g dairy products
371.6 g wheat flour products
121 g of meat.

2) consumed extremely rarely or not at all:

Potatoes – 5-6 times a year
Vegetables – twice a year
Fruits – maximum once a year
Legumes – never
Nuts – never
Eggs – never
Fish – never
Vegetable oil – never

So these Asians lived with dairy, bread and meat, most of them being shepherds.

Considering that milk has an average content of 80% casein and an average protein content of about 4 g/l, we can calculate that casein intake in the Tuoli region was 27.39 g/day.

ANow let’s compare the risk of mortality through cancer due to a daily intake of 27.39 g of casein and one of 0 g by comparing them to:

– vegans from Jiexiu, Jingsing, Huguan, Cangxi, or Songxian regions = average intake of 0 g casein/day

with
– omnivores from the Tuoli region = average intake of 27.39 g casein/day.

And I invite you to do this as a parallel to Campbell’s famous study in which mice fed 20% of casein –they say – have cancer.

And I write “they say” because you can read even in that study că that none of the mice actually did cancer, but only precancerous lesions, of which 95% were self-healing, the researchers assuming that the remaining 5 % will turn into cancer at some point.

Here are some graphs based on the data obtained by researchers who analyzed the food intake of the people in the 65 regions of China with a vegan or omnivorous diet:

Nevertheless, according to Campbell:

“People who ate the most animal-based foods got the most chronic disease. Even relatively small intakes of animal-based food were associated with adverse effects. People who ate the most plant-based foods were the healthiest”.

Simplier, Campbell argues that “people with the highest consumption of animal food were the most unhealthy, and those who fed plants were the healthiest“.

Now, look at the graphs above and judge with your own brain the validity of this statement.

This is just one of many examples of what Campbell’s quoted studies say and what Campbell says that these studies say.

So – leaving aside more or less famous personal opinions – let’s answer the following 3 questions based on the current scientific literature:

Are carcinogenic milk proteins?
Does milk or dairy daily consumption increase the risk of mortality in cancer patients?
Does milk or dairy daily consumption increase the risk of cancer in healthy people?

1) Are carcinogenic milk proteins?

Campbell’s famous statement that we can activate / inactivate “cancer” by simply lowering casein intake is another example of the difference between what the studies quoted by him say and what he says say these studies say:

“casein proved to be so powerful in its effect that we could turn on and turn off cancer growth simply by changing the level consumed”

It would be absolutely brilliant to treat cancer so easily!

Just as I wrote in the first part of this series of articles, the studies quoted or made by Campbell did not „prove“ the carcinogenicity of casein in any way, but rather that increased intake of casein increases the survival of mice exposed to a substance carcinogens such as aflatoxin.

Studies show that the casein intake:

prolongs survival – Engel and Copeland, 1952
has antimutagenic effect – Van Boekel et al., 1993
has anticancerogenic activity both in vitro and in vivo – Goeptar et al., 1997
stimulates the immune system – Parodi, 1998
stimulates the apoptosis of intestinal malignant cells – Perego et al., 2012

And other milk proteins:

provide anticarcinogenic protection in case of exposure to carcinogens – McIntosh et al., 1995
stimulate the immune system – Meisel and FitzGerald, 2003
inhibit the growth of malignant cells – Meisel, 2004
have antimutagenic effect – Parodi, 2007
inhibit angiogenesis – Tung et al., 2013
support the efficacy of treatment and the healing of the patient with cancer – Chen et al., 2014
improve prognosis of patients with advanced cancer (stage III, IV) – Engelen et al., 2015

2) Daily milk or dairy consumption increases the risk of mortality in cancer patients?

Consumption of yoghurt and buttermilk can provide protection against breast cancer – van’t Veer et al., 1989
Consumption of 6 servings of dairy products per day is not detrimental to patients with rectal cancer – Karagas et al., 1998
Consumption of fermented dairy contributes to the preservation of intestinal integrity during radiotherapy – Salminen et al., 1998
Milk consumption during paclitaxel chemotherapy increases the effectiveness of treatment and decreases the incidence of side effects – Sun et al., 2011
Consumption of skimmed milk and dairy products does not increase the risk of mortality in patients with prostate cancer diagnosis – Petterson et al., 2012
Milk consumption lowers the risk of mortality in colon cancer patients – Yang et al., 2014
Consumption of milk and dairy products lowers the risk of mortality by cardiovascular disease, diabetes and cancer – Elwood et al., 2008
And, in general, it helps to counteract side effects of oncological treatment:

anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory effect – Mukhopadhya and Sweeney, 2016
antihypertensive effect – Pepe et al., 2013
supports type II diabetes prevention and sarcopenic obesity – McGregor and Poppitt, 2013
associates a lower level of uric acid – Choi, Liu and Curhan, 2005
improves hepatic transaminase levels and contributes to the reduction of total cholesterol and LDL-cholesterol – Nabavi et al., 2014

3) Daily milk or dairy consumption increases the risk of cancer in healthy people?

Moderate intake of milk and dairy products does not increase the risk of cancer – Davoodi, Esmaeili and Mortazavian, 2013
Men who consume milk frequently have a 60% lower risk of colon cancer than those who do not consume milk – Jing Ma et al., 2001
A low consumption of fermented dairy is associated with an increased risk of pancreatic cancer – De Mesquita et al., 1991
Consumption over two portions of dairy is associated with a lower risk of breast cancer ER + in menopausal women – McCullough et al., 2005
Increased intake of buttermilk and yogurt may lower the risk of bladder cancer – Larsson et al., 2008
Consumption of fermented dairy products lowers the risk of liver cancer – Rayes, El-Naggar and Mehanna, 2008
Consumption of milk and dairy products lowers the risk of colorectal cancer – Aune et al., 2012
Consumption of milk and dairy products does not increase the risk of lung cancer – Yu et al., 2016
Consumption of milk and dairy products is associated with a decrease in the risk of colon cancer, bladder cancer, gastric cancer and breast cancer – Thorning et al., 2016
The meta-analysis of 22 cohort studies that analyzed 1,566,940 people and 5 case studies that analyzed 33,372 Asian people over a 10-year period demonstrates that a minimum intake of over 400 ml of yogurt or dairy products per day is associated with a low risk of breast cancer – Zang et al., 2015
The meta-analysis of 10 population studies analyzing the eating habits of 534,536 people claims that daily intake of at least 250 ml of milk reduces the risk of colorectal cancer – Cho et al., 2004
The meta-analysis of 52 studies analyzing milk intake from the perspective of fat, growth hormones, IGF-1 and estrogen contaaining does not support the association between dairy consumption and breast cancer risk – Parodi, 2013
The meta-analysis of 45 studies that analyzes 26,769 cases does not support the epidemiological assumption that dairy intake would increase the risk of prostate cancer – Huncharek, Muscat, Kupelnick, 2008
The meta-analysis of 17 case studies and 6 population studies analyzing a total of 3,256 cases suggests that milk intake does not increase the risk of gastric cancer, dairy consumption lowering this risk – Guo et al., 2015
The meta-analysis of 19 studies examining the consumption of skimmed milk, whole milk, yoghurt and lactose does not support any association between the intake of these foods or lactose in particular and the risk of ovarian cancer – Liu et al., 2015
The meta-analysis of 32 studies of milk, yogurt, dairy and cheese consumption claims that the intake of these foods is not associated with an increased risk of lung cancer – Yang et al., 2016

Here are dozens of studies that claim that dairy products are not carcinogenic for healthy people and that milk and dairy intake decreases the risk of mortality and supports the effectiveness of oncology treatment.

If you are diagnosed with cancer and you are tempted to remove milk and meat from food, packed with various pseudo-treatments such as veganism, detox, bicarbonate, red beet juice, wonder mushrooms, and vitamin supplements C or other antioxidants instead of or with oncology, please think:

– How powerful should these malignant cells be that only 1, 2 or 5 cm from you endanger the survival of your entire body?

The malignant cell is the queen of survival, a real chameleon relaxed in front of such simplistic strategies, strategies that it will use to survive, evolve and multiply precisely because you deliver it on a platter:

has the ability to use antioxidants to inactivate free radicals that could prevent it from multiplying and damaging it by generating apoptosis – Seifried et al., 2003
has the ability to survive and develop without glucose when conditions become unfavorable – Alfarouk et al., 2011
is a black glucose hole – Kroemer and Pouyssegur, 2008;

co-administration of antioxidant supplements reduces side effects, but decreases the effectiveness of radiotherapy – Bairati et al., 2005
co-administration of antioxidant supplements decreases the effectiveness of chemotherapy and radiotherapy – Lawenda et al., 2008

I will write a more detailed article on the harmfulness of antioxidant supplementation during oncology treatment because the use of such pseudo-oncological products can even transform the cancers that are initially treatable into incurable cancers.

What I want to emphasize now is that by oncological nutrition we can only support the efficiency of allopathic treatment, not cure a disease like cancer!

Anyone who claims otherwise has no idea what he’s saying – on the money, the health and, unfortunately, sometimes even on the life of the oncological patient.

Utopical China painted in pink by Campbell sells cancer patients, through pseudo-oncological industry traders, high hopes elevates to a universal panacea.

„…that it is better to tell the cancer patient to eliminate milk and meat, drink red beet juice and take antioxidant supplements than leave it so confused without trying to help it with an advice!“

Quoted studies

P.S. Are laptele impact estrogenic?

Unele dintre pacientele cu cancer mamar cu care lucrez nu consumă lapte de teama impactului estrogenic.

– Conţine laptele estrogen?

– Evident da, chiar 17β-estradiol – cel mai activ tip de estrogen.

Doza maximă admisă de OMS (Organizaţia Mondială a Sănătăţii) este de 5 μg 17β-estradiol/kg corp.

De exemplu, o femeie de 60 kg poate avea un aport alimentar maxim 60 x 5 μg = 300 μg 17β-estradiol pe zi.

1 l lapte contine 0,1571 μg17β-estradiol – Zeitoun si colab., 2015

Dar 95% din estradiolul ingerat este inactivat gastro-intestinal – Parodi, 2012

Această inactivare gastro-intestinală a estradiolului ingerat face ca, din cele 0,1571 μg aduse de 1 l lapte, doar 0,007855 μg să ramână active.

Deci, cantitatea de lapte pe care ar trebui să o consume într-o zi o femeie de 60 kg pentru a genera impact estrogenic este de 38.192 litri.

Articolul „The China Study“ Part II – Are the dairy products carcinogenic? apare prima dată în Nutrition Services | Nutritionist Dr. Diana Artene.

„The China Study“ – part I – How to make a big deal out of nothing?

Diana Artene — Wed, 21 Sep 2016 20:04:10 +0000

Because I work with cancer patients and because many are completely shocked by the fact that I recommend eating meat and dairy despite the existence on Earth of the book entitled “The China Study”, in this article and in the following one I will present the aspects that invalidate the main assumptions in this book called „study“.

First of all, I would like to point out that there is no diet to cure cancer.

No diet, no dietary supplement and no plant remedy cures cancer. NONE.

Cancer is a piece of our own body that managed to become so adaptable, aggressive, and capable of camouflage like a chameleon – it knows all our defensive secrets inside out, it uses all our defense mechanisms against its own body.

As a patient – the belief that the natural healer can cure your cancer with antioxidants, mushrooms, teas, sins forgiveness, Karma cleanses, or ginseng powdered magic pills sprinkled with star dust can be understood based on the confusion and on the feeling that you just lost of control over your own life, feelings commonly associated with a cancer diagnosis.

But to promote that you – the “Carpathian quack” – can naturally cure cancer on your own equals either an incapacity to understand what you’re fighting with, or an equally callousness, both sold to desperate patients for hard earned money and end of life hopes.

A true pseudo-medical industry has flourished on the basis of the confusion and despair of oncological patients.

However, because of its high adaptability and aggressivity, cancer treatment requires one of the most multidisciplinary approaches possible. And, even so, the war with cancer is not won by default because the malignant cells are extraordinarily unpredictable.

By oncology nutrition we do not cure cancer, we only support the effectiveness of oncology treatment, counteracting side effects as much as possible and only when this is possible without influencing treatment efficacy.

Oncology nutrition means moderate consumption of high quality food of both vegetable and animal origin, consumption carefully adapted to the body weight, body composition, appetite impairment, any other non-oncological associated pathologies the individual patient might have, and to the actual oncology treatment stage and its side effects.

Extremes such as “you can eat everything” are just as damaging as the extremes “don’t drink milk (1), don’t eat meat (2), or take a waggon of antioxidants” (3).

Firstly, I would like to underline that oncology nutrition is just highly personalised clinical nutrition simply because we cannot starve cancer. There are many mechanisms behind this avoidance extreme dietary recommendation, but the main ones are the following:

malignant cells are a true “black hole” for glucose because they have much more glucose transporters than any normal cell could ever have (4) – and it simply doesn’t matter if this glucose is obtained by the tumour from consuming glucose from rice, corn, potatoes, pasta, bread, sweets, fruits, honey; or from the glucose produced inside the body from amino acids or glycerol when glucose intake is restricted
malignant cells can use antioxidants to survive despite treatment administration, which is exactly why the antioxidant co-administration can decrease the efficacy of oncological treatment (5).

But the fact that we recommend moderate consumption of meat, fish, eggs and dairy products during oncological treatment – besides the moderate consumption of fruits, vegetables and whole grains – does not mean that we recommend the consumption of roasted eggs, donuts, bacon, fried cheese or soda drinks.

Even Campbell himself said that such simplistic thinking is idiotic:

“Everything in food works together to create health. The more we think that a single chemical characterises a whole food, the more we stray into idiocy”.

(“The China Study”, page 106)

Secondly, I would also like to underline that:

Epidemiology studies results are correlations, not causality evidence.
And correlations are invalid if the issue at hand can be generated by other bias factors that have not been taken into account by the researches that did that particular study.

So, despite the popularity, the book entitled “The China Study” at most raises hypotheses, it does not bring any causal evidence about the link between foods and cancer.

The main findings associated with a cancer risk presented in this book – findings listed on the Cornell University website – are the following:

Plasma cholesterol in the 90-170 milligrams per deciliter range is positively associated with most cancer mortality rates. Plasma cholesterol is positively associated with animal protein intake and inversely associated with plant protein intake.
Breast cancer is associated with dietary fat (which is associated with animal protein intake) and inversely with age at menarche (women who reach puberty at younger ages have a greater risk of breast cancer).
For those at risk for liver cancer (for example, because of chronic infection with hepatitis B virus) increasing intakes of animal-based foods and/or increasing concentrations of plasma cholesterol are associated with a higher disease risk.
Colorectal cancers are consistently inversely associated with intakes of 14 different dietary fiber fractions (although only one is statistically significant). Stomach cancer is inversely associated with green vegetable intake and plasma concentrations of beta-carotene and vitamin C obtained only from plant-based foods.
Western-type diseases, in the aggregate, are highly significantly correlated with increasing concentrations of plasma cholesterol, which are associated in turn with increasing intakes of animal-based foods.

Before we discuss about the fact that the increased risk of cancer associated by Campbell to animal-based foods can be at most be interfered indirectly through hypercholesterolemia potentially associated with the fat contained by such foods as no conclusive association “animal protein” is made.

Thus, it would be logical to ask ourselves some questions:

– What is the essential difference between “animal protein” and “vegetable protein”?

– Why would vegetable protein intake be protective while animal protein intake harmful?

– And doesn’t categorising all animal-based foods’ as “bad” based on the inferred impact of a single isolated substance increases the risk of idiocy, according to Campbell’s own words?

Leaving aside the fact that there is a multitude of animal proteins and a multitude of vegetable proteins, their simplistic definition of as “animal protein” or “vegetable protein” can only be made on the basis of their essential amino acid content.

Humans do not feed with proteins, but with foods that are digested up to amino acids to be absorbed through the intestinal wall.

The only difference between “animal protein” and “vegetal protein” is that the vegetal protein does not contain all the essential amino acids.

– So, if the “animal protein” is somehow carcinogenic because it has all the essential amino acids, why would the combination of vegetal protein recommended to the vegans to ensure the proper essential amino acid intake be as carcinogenic as the intake of meat?

Because, basically, if we consider not only the generic concept of “protein intake”, but also the fact that the eaten food must be digested up to amino acids in order to pass through the intestinal wall, all we have after protein digestion are:

all essential amino acids – after digesting proteins of animal origin
only a part of them – after digesting proteins of plant origin
all essential amino acids – after digesting a mixed meal composed of plant proteins with complementary amino acid intake

But nowhere in this book called “study” is it demonstrated that animal protein intake feeds cancer, increases cancer risk or that it decreases in any way the survival of cancer patients. Paradoxically, the mentality behind the nutritional recommendations in “The China study” is completely unrelated to any protein, being inferred from fats not from proteins:

Hypercholesterolaemia increases the risk of cancer and mortality.

Foods of animal origin contain cholesterol, so they raise cholesterol.

Foods of plant origin do not contain cholesterol, so they lower cholesterol.

Inference 1: Foods of plant origin decrease cancer risk.

Inference 2: Foods of animal origin increase cancer risk.

Foods of plant origin contain animal protein.

Conclusion: Foods of animal origin increase cancer risk.

But there are a lot of BUTs.

The database used by Campbell to draw these conclusions did not belong to him, the “evidence” behind his book being published in 1990 by Zhongguo by Shan Shi, Sheng Huo Fang Shi He Si Wang and Junshi Chen in Diet, Life-Style, and Mortality in China: A Study of the Characteristics of 65 Chinese Counties.

And, despite the opinion of many natural healing gurus, this database is not about the fact that due to the traditional Chinese diet China’s population has a lowed risk of cancer or a lower cancer related mortality. Not even close.

Unfortunately, China occupies one of the leading positions in cancer statistics, and the rural residents of China have a much higher cancer incidence and mortality than those living in the cities (6).

The study on which Campbell’s book is based is an epidemiological study based on a questionnaire in which respondents were asked to check boxes of pre-filled tables with various foods and written fixed quantities – the foods they had consumed in the last 3 days, followed by blood and urine analysis. Then the statical results obtained from this questionnaire were correlated with the cancer related mortality calculated for that particular area 10 years prior to the study.

Junshi Chen and his colleagues chose to do this epidemiological study because the rural Chinese people of the 1980s used to live their entire life in the same region without altering their lifestyle and diet, and because of the vast geographical areas there are very large differences in lifestyle and nutrition from one Chinese region to another: the inhabitants of some areas being traditionally almost vegan, while the inhabitants of other regions traditionally consuming ± 1 kg of dairy products per day simply because they were shepherds.

But these researchers quoted by Campbell found only a mild correlation with no statistical significance between animal protein intake and cancer (+ 3% overall risk for mortality due to any type of cancer) and a slightly higher correlation for vegetable protein intake and cancer (+ 12% overall risk for mortality due to any type of cancer):

Risk of cancer mortality correlated to the animal protein intake

Lymphoma: -18
Bladder cancer: -9
Colorectal cancer: -8
Leukemia: -5
Nasopharyngeal cancer: -4
Cervical cancer: -4
Liver cancer: -3
Cancer of esophagus: +2
Breast cancer: +12

Risk of cancer related mortality correlated with vegetable protein intake

Lymphoma: -4
Bladder cancer: -3
Colorectal cancer: +19
Leukemia: +15
Nasopharyngeal cancer: -40*
Cervical cancer: +12
Liver cancer: +12
Cancer of esophagus: +18
Breast cancer: +1

But correlations without * are not statistically valid and the obtained values increase in statistical significance when they have two or three asterixes (p<0.05 = * statistically significant; p<0.001 = ** more statistically significant; p<0.0001 = *** very statistically significant).

Also, in order to be able to raise a risk factor hypothesis, we must take into account any other confounding factors that can also be correlated with the particular risk we are trying to evaluate.

For example, for breast cancer – besides non-statistical correlations generated by the consumption of proteins, be it animal or vegetable – there are other correlations, some significant, some not:

Hyperglycemia: +36**
Wine consumption: +33*
Alcohol consumption: +31*
Fruit intake: +25
Workplace in industry (as opposed to agriculture): +24
Sweets and flour products intake: +20
Beer intake: +19
Legumes intake: +17

I underline again that these are “correlations” – either positive = risk factor, either negative = protective factor; either statistically valid if they have *, either with no statistical significance if they do not have *. Correlations are not causal evidence.

And Junshi Chen and his collaborators have not found any statistically significant correlations between animal protein intake and cancer risk or with cancer related mortality.

For instance, their respondents from one of the areas with the highest animal-protein intake (Tuoli) had lower rates of cancer related mortality risks than those from areas with almost zero animal protein intake (Huguan).

So 1: Ignore the fact that Campbell nutritional recommendations are contradicted by the very researchers he quoted as proof.

These were other researchers.

Despite the fact that a researcher like Campbell quoted their correlations as arguments in support of his conclusions, these other researchers might have been wrong.

It seems incredible, however, that he used his 1983 study to prove that the “animal protein” feeds malignant cells by “activating” cancer, because – unlike popular opinion believed by many – the results of his own study was not that 20% casein-fed mice developed tumours, and that mice fed with 5% lived happily ever after, learning their grandchildren about the benefits of veganism (7).

His own study protocol was as follows:

two groups of mice were fed for 2 weeks with either 5% casein or 20% casein while administered aflatoxin.
then each group was divided into two, and each of the two new subgroups was fed either with 5% casein or with 20% casein for another 12 weeks.

And please keep in mind that aflatoxin was the carcinogen in this whole story, not casein (8).

You can see the results in Tables 1 and 2 of the picture below (with the mention that you can read the entire English study by clicking on the link to the study quoted under No. 7).

So, Campbell’s own results were the following:

The group fed with 5% casein during the administration of the aflatoxin carcinogen developed severe hepatic lesions (hepatomegaly, cholangiofibrosis, and bile duct proliferation)
The group fed with 20% casein on the duration of the aflatoxin carcinogen developed only rare moderate hepatic lesions (no colangiofibrosis or bile duct proliferation)

And this was no surprise for him, Campbell demonstrating in another of his earlier studies that aflatoxin is far more carcinogenic in case of insufficient protein intake (9).

– And I would sometimes like to ask those who advise cancer patients to become vegans: Do you understand that you basically advise these poor sick people to adhere to a diet that increases the toxicity of carcinogens?

Nowhere in this study, Campbell has shown that mice fed with 20% casein have cancer or those with 5% did not. What his study demonstrates is that hepatic lesions developed by 5% casein fed mice are different and more severe than those developed by mice fed with 20% casein.

Campbell points out that:

biliary duct hyperplasia and cholangiofibrosis are not pre-neoplastic lesions;
the lesions developed in 20% casein-fed mice “probably have a higher tendency towards tumour growth”;
although in the next paragraph he writes that most of these lesions regress, transforming back into normal tissue, and that only a few of them persist, probably generating tumours.

None of the mice in the Campbell’s study died of even developed cancer, regardless of their diet.

– How does that sound as a scientific evidence that animal protein intake is carcinogenic?

As I write above, using such a study to support the casein harm looks unbelievable. And it looked unbelievable also to the Indian researchers Mathur and Nayak, who tried in 1989 to recreate Campbell’s results using the same aflatoxin protocol while feeding 5% and 20% casein monkeys, not mice (10).

The results of this study demonstrated once again what Campbell had actually obtained = a higher casein intake provides hepatic protection and increased survival even in the presence of aflatoxin exposure:

most monkeys fed with 5% casein died before 70 weeks before they started developing liver tumors
monkeys fed with 5% casein that survived for more than 90 weeks developed preneoplastic liver lesions
monkeys fed with 20% casein did not develop any preneoplastic hepatic injury (the exact words of the researchers are: “The animals in the high protein group surviving even beyond 90 weeks do not show any preneoplastic / neoplastic lesions”.)

Thus, unlike Campbell – whose study showed the same protective effect of casein, but who chose ignore his own study results in order to present his his own personal view – Mathur and Nayak concluded that the protein-caloric malnutrition combined with the intake of aflatoxin contaminated foods explain the increased incidence of liver cancer in areas where these two factors co-exist.

I will explain more about casein and aflatoxin in particular and about the importance of dairy intake during oncological treatment generally in the part II of this article.

So 2: Please ignore the fact that a higher intake of casein protects the liver and increases survival even when exposed to a carcinogen as strong as aflatoxin.

Furthermore, the correlation between hypercholesterolemia and an increased risk of cancer is very far-fetched (11).

At nowadays’ hypercholesterolemia incidence, we could perorate bizarre correlations like:

The school is carcinogenic because it keeps children nailed down in school benches for long, long hours – sedentariness increases cholesterol, so attending school increases the risk of cancer.
Pokemon reduces the risk of cancer because the egg has to be walked 10 km – so when you play Pokemon you are no longer sedentary, thus playing Pokemon lowers your cholesterol, thus playing Pokemon reduces the risk of cancer.

Jokes aside, even if we accept that hypercholesterolemia would be so carcinogenic as Campbell paints it to be – despite the fact that current scientific literature does not support this hypothesis – to conclude that foods of animal origin increase the cancer risk because their intake might generate hypercholesterolemia is scientifically incredible.

The hypothesis that “the intake of foods of animal origin is the cause of hypercholesterolemia:

– puts under the same label:

Fried schnitzels and steaks of lean meat baked in the oven – simply calling them both “meat” (12);
Fried oil with extra virgin olive oil – simply calling them both “vegetable oil” (13);
Fried potatoes or chips with baked or boiled potatoes – simply calling “potatoes” (14).

– does not take into account that we can make cholesterol inside the body from carbohydrates consumed in excess (15).

Of course, we can educate people with the Dr. Google, but researchers should not allow even researchers like Campbell to ignore any other lifestyle factors that can lead to hypercholesterolemia or any other pathologies or medications that can potentially increase both cholesterol and the cancer risk.

For example, it seems to be common sense to believe that increased fiber intake protects against colon cancer (16).

But – leaving common sense aside because it’s no longer that common these days – many of the respondents of the Junshi Chen study quoted by Campbell were infected with schistosomia – a risk factor for both hypercholesterolemia and colon and bladder cancer (17, 18).

Thus – because this parasite can cause both hypercholesterolemia and cancer – it would be logical to exclude schistosomia infected respondents from a population you study in order to draw a valid scientific conclusion about risk factors that can cause cancer.

But Campbell did not exclude them, hiding under the carpet also the fact that schistosomia increases the hypercholesterolemia and cancer risk.

So 3: If you agree to consider animal protein carcinogenic because animals have cholesterol and plants don’t, please ignore any other possible causes of hypercholesterolemia.

In marketing, there is a principle that sells well and can even make blackened bananas go viral:

Keep

Simply

Stupid

Congruently, Campbell keeps it as simple and as stupidly possible:

„Hypercholesterolemia increases the cancer risk.

Foods of animal origin contain cholesterol, thus their intake increase cholesterol, thus their intake increases cancer risk.

Foods of plant origin don not contain cholesterol, thus their intake does not increase cholesterol, thus their intake decreases cancer risk.

– So what if the researchers you are quoting concluded that plant protein intake is correlated with a higher cancer mortality risk?

– So what if you name casein a carcinogenic despite your own studies results?

– So what if hypercholesterolemia is not considered carcinogenic?

– So what if the patients whose cancer you claim to be caused by animal protein intake also had schistosomia?

Despite your very own scientific evidence, you are Campbell and you decided to follow marketing guidelines and to keep things simply stupid: „Consumption of any quantity of animal food increases the cancer risk and mortality through cancer“.

– Why should anyone use their logic when a biochemistry professor makes clinical recommendations based on extrapolations contradicted by the quoted epidemiological data and by his very own results?

Quoted studies

(1) McCullough, Marjorie L., et al. “Dairy, calcium, and vitamin D intake and postmenopausal breast cancer risk in the Cancer Prevention Study II Nutrition Cohort.” Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers & Prevention 14.12 (2005): 2898-2904.

(2) Gilsing, A. M. J., et al. “Vegetarianism, low meat consumption and the risk of lung, postmenopausal breast and prostate cancer in a population-based cohort study.” European journal of clinical nutrition 70.6 (2016): 723-729.

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