Dr. Burkitt's F-Word Diet

"Dr. Burkitt's F-Word Diet"

The famous surgeon Denis Burkitt
is better known

for his discovery of a childhood cancer
now known as Burkitt's lymphoma

than for his 1979 international bestseller

Don't Forget the Fibre in Your Diet.

Anyone asked to list the twenty or more
most important advances in health

made in the last few decades
would be likely to include none

of what Dr. Burkitt considered
to be among the most significant.

What was the #1 most important
advance in health

according to one of the most famous
medical figures of the 20th century?

The fact that "Many of the
major and commonest diseases

in modern Western culture are universally
rare in third-world communities,

were uncommon even in the United States
until after World War I,

yet are now common in anyone
following the Western lifestyle."

So it's not genetic;
they're lifestyle diseases,

which means they must
be potentially preventable.

Those eating the standard
American diet have high rates

of all of these diseases.
Here are two examples.

We had rates similar to that of the
ruling white class in apartheid Africa,

whereas the rates in the Bantu population
of rural Africans were very low.

These native Africans ate the same three
sisters diet of many Native Americans,

a plant-based diet centered
around corn, beans, and squash.

In fact it was reported that
cancer was so seldom seen

in American Indians a century
ago, they were considered

practically immune to both
cancer and heart disease.

What is meant by "very low"
rates among rural Africans?

1300 autopsied over five
years in a Bantu hospital

and maybe one case of ischemic
heart disease, our #1 killer.

Their rates of heart and intestinal
disease is similar to poor Indians,

whereas wealthier Indians, who ate
more animal and refined foods,

were closer to those in Japan
until, of course,

they moved to the U.S. and
started living like us.

And you can do similar charts for all
these other so-called Western diseases,

which Burkitt thought related
to the major dietary changes

that followed the lndustrial Revolution:

a reduction in healthy plant foods,
the source of starch and fiber,

and a great increase in consumption
of animal fats, salt, and sugar.

His theory was that it was the fiber.

None of these diseases,
including our #1 killer,

are common in communities where large,
soft stools are customarily passed.

His thought was that all of
these major diseases may be caused

by a diet deficient in whole plant foods,
the only natural source of fiber.

Fiber? In a survey of 2,000 Americans,

over 95% of graduate school-educated
participants and health care providers

weren't even aware of the daily recommended
fiber intake. Doctors just don't know.

If a floor is flooded as
a result of a dripping tap,

it is of little use to mop up the
floor unless the tap is turned off.

The water from the tap represents
the cost of disease,

the flooded floor the diseases
filling up our hospital beds.

Medical students learn
far more about the methods

of floor mopping than about turning off taps.

And doctors who are specialists
in mops and brushes

can earn infinitely more than
those dedicated to shutting off taps.

And the drug companies
sell rolls of paper towel,

so patients can buy a new roll every
day for the rest of their lives.

To paraphrase Ogden Nash,

modern medicine is making great progress,

but just headed in the wrong direction.

Preventive medicine, is,
frankly, bad for business...