"The China Study" criticisms?

[Capita]

Im currently reading the book "The China Study" and want to do one of my reports on it for one of my classes how ever the book makes some pretty bold statements stating that almost all autoimmune diseases are caused by diets high in proteins more specifically animal proteins, cancers are controllable with a low protein diet example rats fed aflatoxin were given different diets of varying amounts of protein the group at 5% protein did not develop any cancer vs 20% protein had a 100% cancer rate, and (this one i need explained) that animal proteins increase blood acidity and the body in order to neutralize the high acidity takes Ca from the bones leading to things such as osteoporosis(what I don't get is how plant biased proteins differ supposedly it doesn't increase acidity as much but still does slightly but he doesn't explain why).

 

Anyway I was just looking to see if this book is really considered complete garbage before I presented a whole report on it. As usual there are some critiques that try and disprove the book but over all many scientist seem to agree with the general idea of the book. It seems that he may have went a little extreme with implying nutrition being a direct cause of many diseases but it seems that at least his idea of what is a good and bad diet seems to have good correlations and studys supporting it.

[Mr Skeptic]

Well the way it works is, you want enough protein to build your tissues and organs, and you want to burn carbohydrates as fuel. You can burn protein as fuel but it is messier.

[CharonY]

Actually it is not.

Regarding the OP, I am not familiar with that book. However, it looks to me like overselling points and possibly cherry picking studies. I would check out the cited studies and see, what others with possibly different outcomes may be around.

[Capita]

I should have mentioned that I only read the first 50 pages or so and the first 2 or so chapters only describe what will later be explained in detail. So far though a lot of what is stated seems to make sense if the study's are in fact true. A big contributor so far seems to be the idea that increased blood acidity from animal biased proteins leads to hypercalcemia which leads to things like osteoporosis subsequently the lowered levels of PTH circulating in the system leads to less active vitamin D and leads to a list of many autoimmune diseases like diabetes and multiple sclerosis. I cannot really find any peer reviewed or credible web sites to accept or refute the study's only some nutrition sites saying things to get you to but a product.

 

Also in what way is gluconeogenesis not messier than regular cellular respiration? It is highly endergonic and can result in ketosis.

[CharonY]

Gluconeogenesis has little to do with energy creation or respiration per se. The only exception, of course, is for the brain, which requires glucose. In other tissues amino acids are simply entering the TCA and provide reduction equivalents for oxidative phosphorylation. For some amino acids this pathway is much shorter than glycolysis.

[Capita]

Ahh i miss understood your definition of messy I thought you were implying that it would still create energy as well as the TCA.

 

So I see that in gluconeogensis that a bicarbonate ion is used in the step converting pyruvate to oxaloacetate but I cannot see if it yields over all more H ions to compensate for it.

 

Also I am having trouble figuring out the over all pka values of amino acids. Values for the carboxylic, amino and side chain(when applicable) are calculated but it does not have a overall pka value of each one. The values also need to represent the pka's of when it will be in the body as it will deprotinate.

 

By the way I appreciate the help:-)

[ecoli]

ah good luck. My mother read/ loves that book and was very influential on her way of thinking about health and nutrition. Of course, I think she's a little whacko.

 

I'm skeptical of the general claims, but there seems to be something to the specific claims. I do think, in general, modern medicine tends to overlook the importance of diet in health.

[Mr Skeptic]

I do think, in general, modern medicine tends to overlook the importance of diet in health.

 

I think it is more ignore than overlook. We know diet is important, but we also know that the patient is likely to just go to a doctor who doesn't scold him on his poor choice of food. Cholesterol and sugar are pretty much the only exceptions, and see how much attention people pay to that. Nope, we want a convenient pill, preferably one that is "free" (paid for by our insurance).

[CharonY]

Amino acids do create energy, just not directly as glycolysis. In fact, the majority of energy created (in most cells) is done by oxidative phoshphorylation. The required reduction equivalents are for the most part created in the TCA cycle. The TCA cycle is the central hub of metabolism, allowing interconversion of required molecules (e.g. from sugars to fatty acids and amino acids as well as vice versa) and, as mentioned, creation of reduction equivalents oxidative phosphorylation.

Again, gluconeogensis is the process of creating sugars as building blocks, but is not an element of energy creation.

[jen_a_n]

I also read in there that animal based proteins are more efficient at building amino acid chains than vegatable based proteins and therefore making you more suseptable to kinks in the chain (i.e prions). I dont think this book is garbage at all, theres some really interesting statistics in there and a lot of data to back his claims. He also says a lot about the government earning money from dairy and meat industries and that is part of the reason why both are so heavily promoted.

[ecoli]

Just ran across this article. Think it may be a useful criticism for you. http://www.cholesterol-and-health.com/China-Study.html

[karolaj]

I find it most interesting that although sugar, high fructose corn syrup and refined starches like flour and white rice show statistical correlation with disease in the study, Dr. Campbell ignores them. If you watch the movie, they also ignore the fact that besides animal products, sugars and prcessed foods are removed in the diet therapy reported. Therefore, the question becomes; Is it removing animal products or did the people in the studies get better because sugar, high fructose corn syrup and other refined starches were removed from their diet? I suggest the book "Good Calories, Bad Calories" by Gary Taubes for some very interesting reading.