Day 036 - 13 Oct 94 - Page 36
1 the majority of them from plant products. These
2 cancer-blocking agents and suppressing agents have been
3 identified in allium and cruciferous vegetables, legumes,
4 grains, nuts, fruits and green tea. Implicit in the
5 chemical diversity and the spectrum of biological activity
6 of these inhibitors is the recognition that they may play
7 an important role in modulating the effect of diet in
8 human cancer risk. Changes in cancer risk in epidemiology
9 studies are often correlated with a higher degree of
10 confidence with the intake of certain food groups (e.g.
11 vegetables and fruits) rather than with the intake of a
12 specific vitamin, mineral or chemical. This caveat
13 reinforces the difficulty of extrapolating information
14 from an experimental design involving a purified diet
15 which tends to magnify the effect of a particular
16 nutrient, e.g. fat, without considering the contribution
17 of a host of minor compounds with powerful
18 anticarcinogenic activity and which are present normally
19 as part of the human diet."
20
21 I read all of that because I thought it right to do so.
22 Dr. Barnard. Do you have any comment upon it?
23 A. Certainly. His comments are interesting and
24 appropriate. First of all, a high-fibre/low-fat diet
25 means a diet with considerably more plant material in it.
26 So, to the extent that Beta-carotene or phytoestrogens
27 oestrogens or other constituents of plant products may be
28 protective, a high-fibre low-fat diet is more likely to
29 provide them. They do tend to go together as a package.
30 That is why it is most responsible for people to say that
31 in diets that are risky, one does not simply just say a
32 high-fat diet alone, although that can be discussed, but a
33 high-fat low-fibre diet will tend to be low in the types
34 of micro-nutrients that he has described. Soyabean, for
35 example, which contains phytoestrogens also contains
36 fibre. A diet that contains soya is likely to have some
37 of some fibre and phytoestrogens in it at the same time.
38
39 Also, regrettably, it has been argued, particularly by
40 Dr. Burkitt, human beings are on a purified diet to a
41 degree where there is a rather large amount of fat added
42 to it and some natural constituents removed from it, and
43 they are not on the diet to which they are best
44 biologically adapted.
45
46 Q. I am going to read you something Dr. Barnard: "These
47 arguments against fast foods use lack of balance to
48 dramatise a point that will be seen instantly to be
49 ludicrous if presented reasonable. No one in their right
50 mind would live exclusively on sausages or hamburgers or
51 meat pies or sweets or crisps", what you know as chips,
52 "but the arguments are present as if they would". You
53 are not presenting an argument of that kind I hope, are
54 you?
55 A. I am not suggesting that people exist only on
56 hamburgers or something of that nature. What I am
57 suggesting is that the overall diet to the extent to which
58 fat intake is increased or fibre intake is decreased, that
59 diet is not as healthy, and that strong evidence suggests
60 that certain cancers will be more common.
