Book Review: Eat to Live: The Revolutionary Formula for Fast and Sustained Weight Loss by Joel Fuhrman, M.D.

When I read the book Eat to Live, I wanted to give Dr. Fuhrman a standing ovation. It's not often you find a medical doctor whose practice revolves around changing patients' diet in order to cure their diseases.

The cover and first few pages of the book give the reader the impression that it is all about weight loss. However, Dr. Fuhrman wastes no time in showing that his eating program succeeds in bringing about healing of all sorts of chronic and degenerative conditions.

Within a month, most of his diabetics are off insulin. Heart disease symptoms disappear. Sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis and lupus recover completely. IBS dramatically improves, and cholesterol and blood pressure are lowered forever.

How does Dr. Fuhrman do it? By teaching his patients to “eat to live” by following a nutrient-rich diet. I love the title of Chapter 1: “Digging Our Graves with Forks and Knives.” Weight reduction surgery, diets, and drugs are not the answer to America's every-growing obesity problem, Fuhrman asserts.

He also lists results seen in laboratory animals that have been fed high-nutrient, low-calorie diets. They are nothing less than remarkable, including

• protection from cancers,

• lack of diabetes,

• slower cellular aging, and

• improved defenses against environmental stresses.

Eat to Live could easily be touted as a natural remedy/alternative medicine handbook. Fuhrman addresses the root cause of disease in Western society, that is, the junk we put in our mouths. Then he provides a solution to our food-induced diseases. The most natural solution there is.

Are you ready? This might just blow your mind...

STOP EATING THE JUNK. START EATING HEALTHY FOOD.

But before you break out your USDA Food Pyramid and start trying to plan menus around it, let us recall who created that pyramid, shall we?

The U.S. Government, under the strong influence of greedy lobbyists.

In other words, the pyramid was not created by nutritionists and health care practitioners. It was not created by people who actually know what healthy eating looks like.

So, what does Dr. Fuhrman's Eat to Live plan look like? For the first six weeks, a patient's daily diet includes 

• unlimited vegetables, raw and cooked (with an emphasis on raw and greens), the goal being two pounds of vegetables;
• at least four pieces of fresh fruit;
• beans and legumes;
• a limited amount of cooked starchy vegetables and whole grains; and
• a handful of nuts and seeds.

Here is where Dr. Fuhrman and I part ways. He then makes all animal products off limits. He also advocates a low fat diet, and is a fan of soy.

Now, I agree that someone who has been eating wrong and is very ill should eliminate animal products for a time, as animal products are very acidifying. However, his proposition is that excessive consumption of animal products are part of what cause disease. He bases his thinking on The China Study, a controversial dietary experiment with many questionable conclusions. The main conclusion is that a plant-based diet is the healthiest.

The problem with The China Study is that it completely ignores the fact that in traditional societies whose diets are composed mainly of raw milk, raw meat, raw eggs, and/or fish, chronic and degenerative diseases are unheard of, and the people tend to live longer than Westerners. These same people eat only small amounts, if any, of fruits and vegetables.

I would argue that it's not animal products per se that are the problem in America's health today, but rather the kind of animal products we eat. (See this article for further explanation.)

The same goes for fat. Raw fat, as found in nature, is healthy. Unfortunately, it's not the kind we usually eat.

Furthermore, the evidence against the consumption of soy is mounting. This article explains why soy is not a health food.

All that aside, I believe Eat to Live is, overall, a worthwhile read. If you are suffering from any “Western” disease and are tired of all the medications and herbal supplements that have done nothing for you, Eat to Live will be a great help to you.

If you have heard about people healing themselves through nutrition and have been skeptical, Dr. Fuhrman will do an outstanding job of teaching you why food can and must be our medicine.

Do you eat to live or live to eat? I hope you will come to the conclusion that if you want to live a long, healthy, drug- and pain-free life, you must learn to eat to live.