McDougall's Medicine: A Challenging Second Opinion

It is one of the best decisions we ever made at our house, changing what we eat. One of the best things about it is we can now eat as much as we want. It's really just a matter of changing your tastes to like veggies, grains and fruits instead of the high fat flesh products. One of the reasons we changed was because we noticed that even cutting back on the standard american diet is still not good. You really have to change your diet (not a change just to lose weight and then go back, but a true change). Our local school serves french fries four days a week (I know, vegetarian, but it's not good). This told us how far society has come to try and fix things with a pill or shot and how much change had to start with me and my home. This book really speaks the best medicine is what we eat.

I reduced my lipids from sky-high to normal by following McDougall's advice. It is comical to see other reviewers trashing the book and claiming that starch makes you fat. It is processed foods devoid of fiber and high in animal content that make fat. I met McDougall in person and the man is thin as a reed. So am I (now). I went to my university library to check McDougall's claim (in 1986) that the story on cholesterol had been known for 20 years already. I checked out a medical research book entitled 'Cholesterol'. All of the information McDougall cited on cholesterol is in that book, written in the 1960's. This is one of the oldest medical stories in the USA and the Atkins fanatics are still trying to start a meat religion. The best conclusion is that Atkins collapsed and died of congestive heart failure while obese and his family covered it up claiming he fell accidentally and then got pumped with fluid in the hospital. No, sorry. The Atkins propaganda machine may be going strong but the diet will kill you.

Its a 15 year old book. And of course Dr. McDougall has written many other newer books on similar subject matter. Even so, it would sure be nice if he would revise this one. A real classic.

This is an extraordinarily good book that explains in detail how the standard American diet causes most of the major chronic diseases that people suffer from today, and also explains what you can do about it. Each chapter focuses on a different disease. Dr. McDougall explains how the standard medical approach treats only the symptoms, but not the causes, of such chronic diseases. He then demonstrates (with extensive references to the scientific literature) how a low-fat diet based primarily on vegetables, fruits, grains, and legumes can help to prevent and/or cure these diseases. This book was published in 1986, but it remains both valid and useful today. (Indeed, it seems like every day another scientific study is published demonstrating the importance of eating a mostly plant-based diet.) The only slight drawback is that the book does not give much information about the practical implementation of the eating plan. (For readers interested in such information, I would recommend "The McDougall Plan" and "The McDougall Program: 12 Days to Dynamic Health.")

I have referred this book to friends for over ten years, and have bought many copies over the years to give to friends with severe health problems. I applaud Dr. McDougall's work in, and emphasis on, preventive medicine. He shows a person how to take control of their own health. You don't have to be sick. You don't have to be a victim of genetics or the victim of the pathology-based symptom-treating medical community. I loaned the book to a friend a number of years ago when he was experiencing chest pains and was scheduled for angioplasty. He declined the angioplasty, changed his diet, and has not had chest pains again. He then loaned it to a friend who had had a massive heart attack - his friend changed his lifestyle, too. I wish Dr. McDougall would revise and update the book to include his writings on other health problems that can be treated with a change in lifestyle - e.g., depression and multiple sclerosis.