- For a variety of motivations, soy seems today to be cast
either as the cure or cause of nearly every ill known to man.
-
- On one side, you have nutritionists and researchers touting
soy's many alleged benefits (and yes -- some receive a lot of money from
the soy industry, including some of the best known vegetarian researchers
on the subject). On the other side are a few researchers who loudly repeat
again and again the results of one questionable study, or who latch onto
and look to amplify wherever possible some admittedly troubling but highly
preliminary research results, using these to try to create an anti-soy
hysteria.
-
- By the way, the same people and industries targeting
soy are curiously silent when it comes to broadcasting the known, far better
documented and generally more serious and far-reaching health problems
associated with consumption of meat and dairy products.
-
- As the saying goes when reading releases and reports
from either side: follow the money to find the probable bias.
-
- John McDougall, MD, has a terrific article about soy
in his latest newsletter. (It's not online, but you can get info to subscribe
on his site at http://www.drmcdougall.com/newsletter.html I highly recommend
this health newsletter -- it's one of the best out there.)
-
- McDougall discusses the high fat content of soybeans
(46% fat, 38% protein). (Yes, eating lots of soy can make you fat!)
-
- And he talks at length about phytoestrogens in soy, which
he says are the key to soy's health benefits -- and risks.
-
- After an explanation of what is known about phytoestrogens,
McDougall says the bottom line is that not enough research has been done
to allow us to fully understand them and their effects on the body.
-
- Soy isoflavones are theorized to protect against cancers
like breast cancer because they lower estrogen in the body.
-
- Some animal research supports this hypothesis, he says,
but there have been no large, long-term clinical human trials to support
it.
-
- While isflavones may or may not turn out to protect against
cancer, it may turn out that the reverse is true, and plant estogens may
work the other way. He notes that some fear phytoestrogens may cause problems
by artificially altering the hormonal balance, and says there is cause
for concern.
-
- In the study of 48 women with benign or malignant breast
disease, for example, a daily supplement of 60 grams of soy (45 mg of isoflavones)
was linked to breast-tissue proliferation (a sign of increased risk of
breast cancer).
-
- But McDougall says more research is needed before we
can conclusively say how these plant estrogens affect the human body, and
the jury is still out.
-
- Many of soy's purported health benefits are based on
circumstantial evidence, says McDougall, such as the fact that populations
with a traditionally high soy intake have lower rates of many "Western"
diseases.
-
- Soy *may* have something to do with it, he says, but
then again it may not.
-
- McDougall feels the focus on soy ignores the many other
factors that enter into the equation, such as fat and fiber intake, environmental
and chemical contaminants, and level of physical activity.
-
- Regarding the study in Hawaii that found that men were
more likely to have cognitive impariment or Alzheimer's disease if they
ate tofu more than twice a week, McDougall remarks that this is just one
isolated study, and further research is clearly needed to clarify the results.
-
- Earlier this year when considering whether it would permit
health claims for soy, the FDA rejected the abstract of the Hawaii study
for a few reasons, including the fact that if the study results were valid,
there would be more dementia and Alzheimers in Japan than in Hawaii (because
more soy is consumed in Japan) -- but the reverse is true, suggesting it
wasn't an effect from soy consumption the researchers may have been seeing.
-
- Bill Harris, a vegan MD who lives in Hawaii, strongly
suspects that if the results of the Hawaii "brain-aging" study
turn out to be valid, it may be that aluminum -- used in the refining of
some soy products in Hawaii -- is the actual culprit. Harris went out
and had soy products from Hawaii tested against soy products from the mainland.
He had a lab do the tests and paid for them himself.
-
- The lab found the levels of aluminum in the Hawaii products
to be signifcantly higher. See http://www.vegsource.com/harris/brain_aging.htm
Harris quotes a number of studies which support the relationship between
aluminum consumption and Alzheimers, and he recently sent me another published
in a French medical journal in July 2000 showing that traces of aluminum
in drinking water significantly increased the risks of dementia and Alzheimer's
disease.
-
- [Am J Epidemiol 2000 Jul 1;152(1):59-66 Relation between
aluminum concentrations in drinking water and Alzheimer's disease: an 8-year
follow-up study. Rondeau V, Commenges D, Jacqmin-Gadda H, Dartigues JF]
-
- This was a large study of 3,777 people with a followup
after 8 years which suggested a strong cause/effect between aluminum and
the kinds of brain problems reported in the Hawaii study and attributed
by the researchers to tofu.
-
- The aluminum factor currently seems like a very possible
explanation for the alleged "brain aging" properties of soy --
many Hawaiian tofu-eaters are eating a lot of aluminum, too. Not so curiously,
none of the soy manufacturers which Dr. Harris contacted with the results
of his study ever responded. It would probably be very costly for those
Hawaiian soy manufacturers to replace their tubes and processing equipment
with non-aluminum parts.
-
- So what to do to be prudent Don't eat soy products from
Hawaii...!
-
- In his newsletter McDougall also points out the fact
that the health claims about soy which are supported by the most evidence
-- are the positive effects of soy on cholesterol and cardiovascular health.
-
- There are some 40 studies showing soy lowers cholesterol,
even when you remove the fiber.
-
- McDougall's bottom line is that soy *can* be part of
a healthy diet, but he says if you don't eat it already, don't start just
because you think it's "health food." He advises using soy like
a condiment to add variety and versatility to a plant-based diet. Sprinkle
soy cheese on your baked potato, pour soymilk on your cereal in the morning,
have a soy/veggie burger now and then, but stick to veggies, fruits and
whole grains as the foundation of your diet.
-
- MainPage
http://www.rense.com
-
-
-
- This
Site Served by TheHostPros
|