Forks Over Knives Page #2

farm life had a deep

and lasting influence

on both Campbell and Esselstyn.

To make it successful, you

had to have persistence,

staying power, and

tenacity of purpose.

I guess it's ironic in the

sense that we're both

now advocating not

consuming the products

that we were busy actually

producing with our families.

During Campbell and

Esselstyn's lifetimes,

the American diet has

changed dramatically.

Near the beginning

of the 20th century,

Americans each ate about 120

pounds of meat annually.

By 2007, that

figure had exploded

to no less than 222 pounds.

In 1913, we ate about 40 pounds

of processed sugar

each per year.

However by 1999,

our consumption of all

refined sweeteners

had risen to over 147 pounds.

In 1909, Americans consumed

around 294 pounds of

dairy products apiece.

But by 2006, our

yearly intake of dairy

had more than doubled

to 605 pounds.

By the early 1950s, Campbell was

off to college at Penn State

while Esselstyn went to Yale.

As part of Yale's rowing team,

Esselstyn won an olympic

gold medal in 1956.

During this same decade,

the pace of American

life was accelerating,

even with our food.

The late '50s was the heyday

of the drive-in burger joint.

The supermarket was just

beginning to thrive

in the newly built,

post-World War II suburbs.

This was when the so-called

convenience foods were born,

like the legendary

foil-wrapped TV dinner,

not to mention a host of other

tasty processed delicacies

devised to make our lives

easier and better.

By now, Colin Campbell

was in graduate school

at Cornell university,

which had one of the

most prestigious

nutritional science

departments in the country.

His research was on animal

nutrition and biochemistry.

But it was focused more

on feeding animals

for their ability to

be able to produce

meat, milk, and eggs,

protein containing.

And so my own research

was focused on protein,

making sure we got enough.

It was considered to

be the vital nutrient.

It was one of the first

nutrients discovered

and without protein,

the animal would die,

so it was a life force.

In fact, in the

even early 1900s,

there were statements made

that this is the stuff

of civilization itself.

Protein was also

nearly synonymous

with animal-based

foods like meat.

It still is today

all over America.

Why do you think meat is

important in our diet?

Protein.

- Protein.

- Protein.

- Protein.

- Protein.

- Protein.

- Protein.

- Protein.

- A lot of protein in it.

We need protein, don't we?

You can't live without protein.

The idea that plants had protein

also didn't come into play

until maybe the late

and then it struggled

through the years.

No matter what source

the protein came from,

in the late 1950s, most

scientists believed

the world needed a

lot more of it.

We had a lot of starving

and malnourished

children in the world.

And so in my community, in

the nutrition community,

there were discussions

about why so.

You know, what could be done?

And one of the

prominent thoughts

was to make sure they

get enough protein.

I certainly went along

with this view.

At about the same time,

Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn

was just beginning

his medical career

at the world famous Cleveland

Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio.

Surgery soon became

his specialty.

There's something awfully

satisfying about

if you can remove the disease.

For instance, if a

patient had gallstones

you could remove them.

If it was a gastric ulcer

or a stomach ulcer,

you directly could

take care of that.

If it's a hernia,

the same thing.

During the 1960s,

heart disease was on

the rise in the U.S.

What doctors commonly call

"coronary artery disease"

is usually caused by a

condition of the arteries

that supply the

heart with blood.

What happens is that over time,

a fatty substance in the

bloodstream called cholesterol

builds up in the

coronary arteries,

restricting the blood

flow to the heart.

This can ultimately

cause several problems,

from severe chest

pain, called angina,

to heart attacks.

Cholesterol is a

natural substance

produced by all animals,

including humans,

and it's an essential component

of our cells' walls.

But when we consume

dietary cholesterol,

which is only found

in animal foods

like meat, eggs, and

dairy products,

it tends to stay in

the bloodstream.

This so-called plaque

is what collects

on the inside of

our blood vessels

and is the major cause of

coronary artery disease.

In the late 1960s, a colleague

of Dr. Esselstyn's

at the Cleveland Clinic

made a major breakthrough

in the treatment

of this condition.

In fact, Esselstyn

shared space with him

in the clinic's

surgical locker room.

His name was Dr. Rene Favaloro.

Rene really sparkled

in the operating room.

And in 1967, he did

this first bypass graft

at the clinic...

coronary artery bypass graft.

This revolutionary new procedure

was accomplished by removing a

vein from the patient's leg,

then stitching it on the heart's

blocked coronary artery

to allow the blood to flow

around, or bypass, the blockage.

Today, over 500,000 Americans

go under the knife annually

for heart bypass surgery.

Costing around $100,000 apiece,

these operations alone

constitute a staggering total

of nearly $50 billion.

Joey Aucoin lives

in Tampa, Florida,

where he owns and operates

a landscaping company.

I tell everybody...

the joke with everybody with me is:

I don't eat to live,

I live to eat.

And I... my whole life, I

ate whatever I wanted.

In 2004, doctors discovered

Joey had a dangerously high

cholesterol level of 320

and a hazardous blood

sugar level of 480.

This not only made him

a type 2 diabetic,

but a prime candidate for a

heart attack and a stroke.

This is my daily pill regiment.

Um, I got two pills I

take for my diabetes.

Then I got one for cholesterol,

one for high blood pressure,

and then I take Byetta, which

is an injectable medicine,

every morning before breakfast

and every night before dinner.

And that's what I've been doing

for almost four years now.

And I know it makes me tired,

and I just...

I just don't feel normal.

I only sleep four

hours a night or so.

I just hate takin' 'em.

In the mid 1960s,

Dr. Campbell was in

the Philippines,

trying to get more protein

to millions of

malnourished children.

To keep costs down,

he and his colleagues decided not

to use animal-based protein.

The program was beginning

to show success.

But then, Dr. Campbell stumbled

onto a piece of information

that was extremely important.

It centered on the more affluent

families in the Philippines,

who were eating relatively high

amounts of animal-based foods.

But at the same time,

they were the ones

most likely to have the children

who were susceptible to

getting liver cancer.

This was very unusual,

since liver cancers are

mainly found in adults.

But just the mere fact that

they occurred in children

said, you know, there's

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