We Can Stop the Cancer Epidemic Only If We Change Our Diets

If we look at breast cancer as a model to illustrate why cancer incidence has
skyrocketed in this century, we can observe that in spite of modern medicine
there has been a slow, steady climb in the death rate from breast cancer.
Efforts to detect cancer earlier with mammograms and breast exams have not
impeded the climb in statistics showing that an increasing number of women
are still dying from this cancer. The failure to prevent cancer has exacted an
increasing toll: as of 1993 the disease attacks one in eight women in America.

The evidence linking diet to breast cancer has been known for years. As is the
case with most other diseases, however, the public is the last to know. In
Japan, for example, breast cancer was rare, but Japanese women who migrated
to this country soon had the same rate of cancer as American women—at least
400 percent higher than in Japan. We discovered that the decreased rate of
cancer was due not to genetics but primarily to the amount of fat in the diet.

In Japan, until about 50 years ago, less than 10 percent of calories came
from fat,compared to 40 percent in the American diet, even in the 1940s.
Today, however, the Japanese eat more and more meat, fat, and fast foods.
Predictably, the rate of breast cancer as well as other cancers in Japan is rapidly
increasing.Similar findings have been made within the United States. For
instance, studies comparing vegetarian to nonvegetarian groups show much
less cancer among vegetarians, especially those avoiding dairy products.