How Not To Die

Michael Greger, Gene Stone

📅 Finished on: 2022-06-09

🥐 Nutrition

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Eating a balanced, plant-rich diet helps you live longer

Found on Reddit, a nutrition book with lots of scientific research. It opened my eyes to how much it could help me live longer and ease many of the leading causes of death, with plenty of documentation and experiments. I appreciated how Dr. Greger makes this information free to help people and openly criticizes parts of the pharmaceutical industry. A long read, at times a bit repetitive in making the same points, but important for my future.

I did not like that some of the theories are a bit shaky (many are only in vitro or with small samples), but he says “eating a bit more of this won’t hurt; do it while scientists keep researching.” OK, but there is some bias. He tends to emphasize his viewpoint, and in this case I can live with it, but it costs a star.

14 diseases that kill the most and how we could protect ourselves from them:

1. 💔 Heart Disease

Largely caused by high levels of bad cholesterol, the advice is to avoid dairy and meat, which are associated with increases in cholesterol.

2. 💨 Lung Disease

Obviously quit smoking, since smoking is responsible for 90% of these deaths, and he suggests broccoli, which reduces the harmful effect of DNA mutations in smokers.

3. 🧠 Brain Diseases

Strokes are associated with high blood pressure, and one of the best enzymes to prevent it is sirtuin, which is suppressed by AGEs found in milk and meat. Other advice: sleep well, eat fiber-rich foods, vegetables full of potassium like beans and potatoes, and citrus.

Alzheimer’s is caused by plaques in the brain’s blood vessels caused by a faulty gene. The doctor’s advice: regular exercise, saffron (even if expensive, it might help), blueberries, strawberries, and other berries that contain polyphenols.

4. 🥙 Digestive Cancers

Excess iron (very high in meats) has been linked to cancer. In particular, chicken fat can greatly increase pancreatic cancer, probably due to the interaction between antibiotics and chickens. Advice: eat vegetables, berries, apples, citrus, turmeric, and nuts.

5. 🩹 Infections

Eggs are often associated with salmonella, especially if cooked in a regular pan. Preparing chicken is the main reason kitchen sinks have more fecal bacteria than toilet seats in the United States, and two thirds of pork carries Yersinia bacteria. Advice: eat fruits and vegetables to strengthen the immune system (notably blueberries and cardamom), focus on broccoli and other cruciferous vegetables, legumes to help your gut flora, and mushrooms for IgA in saliva.

6. 🍬 Diabetes

Abnormal fat levels can impact insulin function, often in people with obesity. Many people have diabetes and prediabetes in America, but it has been found that vegetarians have 50% to 75% the likelihood of receiving a diabetes diagnosis. He also recommends whole grains.

7. 💝 High Blood Pressure

Salt is one of the main causes of high blood pressure. Since it is abundant in foods, we need to be careful not to consume too much. Recommended: regular physical activity, vitamin C, and a vegetarian diet, since meat companies often add salt to increase weight by up to 20%, plus whole grains and flaxseed.

8. 🍻 Liver Disease

Associated with a high consumption of alcohol, or fatty liver (NAFLD), caused by sugars, animal fats, and cholesterol. Avoid soda. He recommends eating oatmeal and drinking coffee, along with anthocyanins such as berries, grapes, blueberries, red onions, and plums. The more colorful the foods, the better (red onion > white onion).

9. 💉 Blood Cancer

He talks about leukemia, myeloma, and lymphoma, and how chicken is strongly associated with these cancers: 50 g of chicken per day increases the risk by 56 to 250 percent. He advises a plant-based diet, with lots of cruciferous vegetables that have sulforaphane, very effective at tackling cancer cells. Also eat vegetables with antioxidants, like red cabbage.

10. 🧽 Kidney Disease

Kidneys degrade over time, being huge filters, but you can slow the decline by avoiding animal phosphorus (in sodas and chicken) and by avoiding animal foods.

11. 👩 Breast Cancer

Alcohol and high melatonin are associated with breast cancer, which can be very common but many survive. Helps: red wine and purple grapes, avoiding stress and poor sleep habits that affect melatonin, walking at least an hour a day, lots of fiber, soy, tofu, and apple peel.

12. 😢 Depression

Arachidonic acid can increase the risk of depression, and it is found in eggs and chicken. People with depression have higher levels of monoamine oxidase enzymes, and to lower them you can use (without side effects) apples, eggs, onions, green tea, cinnamon, nutmeg. The doctor recommends regular exercise, sesame seeds, pumpkin (rich in tryptophan), antioxidants in vegetables, and saffron. Often antidepressants have the same results as placebos.

13. 💧 Prostate Cancer

Eggs and dairy increase the risk of prostate cancer, especially cow’s milk. In addition, milk is associated with a high rate of fractures in women and mortality. The best foods are cruciferous vegetables and flaxseed, and of course a vegetarian diet.

14. 🤲 Parkinson’s

Nicotine can help, but it is better to get it from tomatoes and peppers. Dairy is strongly correlated with Parkinson’s, possibly due to galactose. Berries and coffee could help.