Neal
D. Barnard, MD, FACC, is a physician, clinical researcher,
author, adjunct associate professor of medicine at George Washington
University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, and president of the Physicians
Committee for Responsible Medicine. He is recognized as one of the world’s
leading experts in veganism and natural medicine and is a strong supporter
of a vegan, dairy-free lifestyle.
Dr.
Barnard, who founded the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine in 1985,
has spent his professional career speaking, educating and spreading awareness
about the benefits of veganism, as well as the life-threatening dangers that
come with consuming dairy, meat and cheese. In this episode of the Bottom Line
Advocator Podcast, Neal joined Bottom Line President Sarah Hiner to discuss the
following…
- How Dr. Barnard’s career shifted from psychiatry to nutritional science (1:55 – 5:07)
- Dr. Barnard’s dairy warning (6:54 – 12:25)
- Why dairy, meat and cheese are still recommended by major medical associations (15:18 – 17:52)
- Do European countries deal with the same dairy problem we do? (17:53 – 19:08)
- America’s very real cheese addiction (21:55 – 28:08)
- Why major multimillion-dollar athletes are going vegan and how that change has impacted their performance (28:09 – 30:07)
- Are all dairy foods created equal (milk, yogurt, whey protein, milk substitutes)? (30:20 – 37:48)
- If we can’t consume dairy, how do we maintain strong teeth and bones? (39:22 – 40:30)
- What does Dr. Barnard eat for breakfast? (40:30 – 41:05)
- BONUS SEGMENT: What does Dr. Barnard think of the “Impossible Burger”?
The Bottom Line:
In Dr. Barnard’s experience, no matter what the food pyramid and other health associations say, there is no question that there is a significant connection between dairy and disease. It’s tough to hear but important to understand.
Click here to purchase Dr. Barnard’s most recent book, The Vegan Starter Kit.
Full podcast transcript:
Sarah Hiner: You
know those commercials that say, “Milk does a body good”? Well, guess what?
Milk, cheese, dairy— it does a body bad. It does a body sick. So why is it that
the American Heart Association, Susan B. Komen, American Diabetes Association
and all these other health associations include dairy in their dietary
recommendations? That’s the question of the day and how to understand what
dairy is really doing to you. I’m Sarah Hiner, and this is The Bottom Line
Advocator podcast.
Sarah Hiner: I’m
Sarah Hiner, president of Bottom Line Inc, the number-one provider of expert-sourced,
expert-vetted, expert advice that empowers your life. I’m thrilled to be
talking today to Dr. Neal Barnard, founder and president of the Physicians
Committee for Responsible Medicine. He has authored more than 70 scientific
publications as well as 19 books, including the best sellers, Power Foods
for the Brain, 21-Day Weight Loss Kickstart, and his most recent
books, Dr. Neal Barnard’s Program for Reversing Diabetes, The
Scientifically Proven System for Reversing Diabetes Without Drugs, and The
Cheese Trap. Dr. Barnard is a frequent lecturer appearing throughout the
world and is an adjunct professor of medicine at George Washington University
School of Medicine. You can learn more about Dr. Barnard and his work at PCRM.org.
So welcome Neal, I’m so glad that you made time for us today.
Dr. Barnard: Well
thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today.
Sarah Hiner: Well,
with all that you do, with all of your speaking, with all of your writing, it’s
not easy to get on your calendar so I really appreciate it.
Dr. Barnard: My
pleasure.
Sarah Hiner: All
right. So before we talk about dairy, because in our conversations you have now
convinced this die-hard cheese lover, although I haven’t eaten it in years, but
I miss it every day, that it really is a surprising devil. But before we talk
about that, I want to just talk about you for a sec—because it’s so
interesting, when I was reading your bio and prepping for all of this, you
started out as a psychiatrist. You graduated from medical school as a
psychiatrist. So what brought you from psychiatry all the way over to diabetes,
advocator for veganism, food-focused, et cetera?
Dr. Barnard: Yeah.
Great question. First of all I should say that it’s not such a leap as one
might think because psychiatrists very often get into food issues because they
deal with compulsive easting, anorexia, obesity and all the things that come of
that. And also, I have to say when I’m meeting with patients who are suffering
with diabetes and weight problems, it’s sort of 20% medicine and the other 80%
is behavioral issues and how do we actually make the changes that will help us?
But what actually happened in my life was, after I was in practice, I became
concerned that doctors don’t do very much about preventing illness. We don’t do
anything about a heart attack until it comes into the emergency room. And we
don’t do anything about cancer until it shows up on a mammogram.
Dr. Barnard: And
I started to think that we really need to get involved in prevention and
improving diets way ahead of the game. And so I set up the Physicians Committee
for Responsible Medicine to do that. And in the course of our work, I was
working with the Diabetes Foundation, and they wanted me to work with them to
design some good clinical trials. And we ended up doing these research studies,
and I have to say, I was quite blown away by what happens when people throw the
animal products off their plate. I’m talking about a vegan diet. And I did not
grow up on anything like that. But I am very impressed by its health power and
it’s also appealing and it’s frankly good in every way.
Sarah Hiner: Yeah.
That’s amazing. And we publish all this health information, and the challenge is
always, people have a hard time with prevention. Because as you said, the first
symptom of heart disease is they’re in the emergency room with a heart attack
and they’re not paying attention to it. I’ve literally had conversations with
people where they’re eating a big pastrami sandwich and they take Lipitor. And
they say they’re perfectly happy with that. The Lipitor handles it, and they’re
happy to go on eating their pastrami. And that to shift the mind-set…
Dr. Barnard: The
sad thing is that the Lipitor won’t handle it. It will certainly bring
cholesterol down a good bit, but that sandwich is also linked to colorectal
cancer. The saturated fat that’s in it is linked to Alzheimer’s disease. And
some of these things are pretty unforgiving. So we’re risk takers. When I was
in medical school, I used to smoke cigarettes. And I figured, Well, what are
the chances I’ll get lung cancer? As long as I quit before too long I’ll be OK. And that kind of bargaining is what we carry through to our food habits as
well. Sure a bacon double cheeseburger is linked to obesity and diabetes and
several forms of cancer, but maybe I’ll be all right or I’ll not eat it too
often, or something like that. Of course, we typically lose that bet.
Sarah Hiner: So
as a psychiatrist interestingly… So is part of it that humans—and we’re
watching this now in the land of immediate gratification and social media and
the immediate responses of everything—are humans just not able to conceptualize
long-term? So prevention. One day maybe I’ll get cancer…maybe. But right now,
I’m going to eat this cheeseburger and it’s going to taste good going down and
no I’m not going to die tomorrow from it. Is there something in human brains
that just don’t think about long-term consequences?
Dr. Barnard: Yes.
We’re sort of the eternal optimists, in that we assume…
Sarah Hiner: It
won’t be us.
Dr. Barnard: When
I’m scratching off my lottery ticket, I’m sure I’m going to become a
multimillionaire. And let me tell you, the odds of winning the lottery are the
same whether you play it or not.
Sarah Hiner: Although
they say you should go for the low pot prize. Everyone jumps on for those mega
billions, the biggest prize ever. I say go for the million and two million.
Dr. Barnard: Yeah,
you’re not going to win it. But the lottery we often win, unfortunately, is
that one that’s really predictable, which is if you eat meat, you’re going to
get either cardiovascular disease or some form of malignancy and very likely
Alzheimer’s disease as well. And I have to say, I think people are changing. I
think people are becoming much more health conscious, and part of that is that
groups like ours do research studies to show what foods can do. And also, I’ve
got to say, when you’ve seen your grandparents or your parents start to lose
their memory and to develop dementia, you’ll just make a list of all the
diseases you don’t want to get, and that happens to be number one. And so when
people learn that foods are part of the reason that their parents got this
problem, it makes that chicken salad sandwich not look so appealing anymore.
Sarah Hiner: Yeah.
OK, good point. All right, so meanwhile we need to educate them. So let’s talk
about dairy. Because again, vegan is a big commitment, but I wanted to focus on
diary because obviously people love it. Cheese lovers, everything, double
cheese burgers, the whole nine yards. And everything you say talks about diary
being…I’ll call it the devil. And yet, the American Diabetes Association, the
American Heart Association, Susan B. Komen, American Cancer Society—they are
all continuing to recommend dairy and include that in their dietary programs.
So what is so bad about dairy?
Dr. Barnard: Well,
I guess it’s important to remember what dairy products really are. They’re made
by a cow for only one purpose that Mother Nature ever thought about, which is
to nourish a calf. And if you want a calf to grow to be as big as a sofa within
a matter of months, you pack a lot of fat in there. And the fat that’s packed
into dairy is mostly saturated fat. That’s the bad one. That’s the one that
raises cholesterol levels, and the one that’s most linked to Alzheimer’s
disease. There’s also a huge amount of sugar as the milk comes out of the cow’s
utter into your glass or into your ice cream. And this is not table sugar added
to the milk…it’s lactose that the cow makes in order to provide the energy for
the calf. And if you’re avoiding whole milk and you’re having only skim milk,
the main nutrient you’re getting in it is sugar. So the very same person who is
afraid of a candy bar but is indulging in skim milk, they’re getting lots and
lots and lots and lots of sugar. Keep in mind also that cows make hormones all
day every day and because cows are typically pregnant—they’re impregnated
annually on farms—hormones get into the milk and the amount grows and grows as
the pregnancy proceeds.
Dr. Barnard: And
the amount is measurable, and we’ve seen in men poorer sperm counts…and in
women, higher breast cancer mortality in those people who eat the most cheese,
in particular, but probably also other fatty dairy products. So I’m sure I’m
cheering all the listeners up right now as we’re talking about all the bad
things in cheese. But it’s got fat, it’s got sugar. A cheese is saltier than
potato chips, ounce per ounce. And it’s got these icky hormones in it as well.
Sarah Hiner: OK,
but babies—human babies—drink mother’s milk and get that same stuff. So there’s
nutrients in your own species…in mammalian milk. So is the problem going awry
that we’re now taking this other species’ formula and then we’re continuing to
ingest that beyond when we need those nutrients? Because now…
Dr. Barnard: That’s
exactly right…it’s both those things. It’s the wrong species, and it’s also the
wrong time. Weaning is universal in nature. So a baby raccoon, a baby giraffe—they
drink milk from their mom and they stop because it’s not appropriate after that
age. And so for humans, it’s not appropriate to suckle when you’re five and six
and seven years old. But we’ve figured out a way to not get weaned, and that’s
to drink the milk of a cow. But what is of concern to me in particular is that
cow proteins are not the same as human proteins and the human body often
recognizes these proteins as foreign. Where this manifests, we believe, is
particularly in autoimmune conditions like type one diabetes, where the baby is
given a cow’s milk formula. The proteins trigger an antibody reaction so that
antibodies form in the baby’s body. Antibodies are little protein torpedoes
that are there to knock out viruses or bacteria. And they recognize a foreign
protein as a target. And so if you’re drinking cow’s milk, in some cases, the
body will make antibodies to it. And the problem is, once these little antibody
torpedoes form, they destroy all kinds of things and they are a chief suspect
in the destruction of the insulin-producing cells of the pancreas.
Dr. Barnard: In
other words, the baby got type one diabetes because cow’s milk proteins
triggered the formation of antibodies that destroyed the baby’s own insulin-producing
cells. Now this is still a theory but there’s a lot of evidence for it and when
babies are never exposed to cow’s milk, their risk for type one diabetes goes
way down. But there are other autoimmune conditions, too—asthma, Sjogren’s
syndrome, rheumatoid arthritis—all of these tend to be less common in people
who avoid dairy.
Sarah Hiner: Now
they’re kind of skyrocketing though in recent years. Autoimmune, in general.
Dr. Barnard: Cheese
sales are going up, and so are all the problems that relate to it. Including
obesity, by the way. For all those people who are saying obesity must come from
sugar, sugar consumption has been falling for 20 years. Obesity continues to
rise, as does diabetes. And I think that the cheese products probably get a
huge amount of the blame for that.
Sarah Hiner: Well,
there’s an amazing chart that you show in some of your presentations with a
graph—as cheese consumption, so does obesity.
Dr. Barnard: The
average American gets 64,000 calories or more every year from cheese alone. If
you just left the cheese off your diet, you’re talking about an enormous
boatload of calories that you would never consume. You know it’s easy to say,
extra cheese on my pizza or throw some cheese on the burger or whatever—it’s a
massive load of fat and calories.
Sarah Hiner: And
again, so let’s go back to these diseases because we kind of brushed past them.
But I want people to hear it and realize, because, yes, prevention matters and
taking this out of your diet can make a huge difference with cancer. Because
these hormones…there are so many cancers that are hormone fit, right.
Dr. Barnard: For
women, we’re talking about breast cancer, ovarian cancer and endometrial
cancer, which is cancer of the uterus. For men, we’re thinking especially about
prostate cancer and testicular cancer. And maybe starting with men, there have
been many, many studies that have shown that milk-drinking men have a higher
risk for prostate cancer, and that’s true even if it’s nonfat milk. And could
it be the hormones? Maybe. Could it be the fact that the milk triggers the
production of something in a man’s blood called IGF-1, insulin-like
growth factor. Whatever the reason, we see that men who throw out the milk
carton and don’t consume milk, they are at much lower risk for this kind of
cancer.
Sarah Hiner: And
there’s another part with men, too. The more milk they drink, the lower their
sperm count.
Dr. Barnard: Yes.
Sarah Hiner: All
milk products or just cheese?
Dr. Barnard: Particularly
cheese. You’re speaking of some studies that were run first, I believe it was
in Rochester, New York, where surgeons did sperm counts on men and found that
the more cheese men ate, the worse their sperm counts. You look at morphology,
which is the shape of the sperm. And then motility, meaning does it move? And
then you just look at the count, which is how many of them are there? And all
of these things appear to be affected. And that raised this question—if milk
comes out of a pregnant cow, could these little traces of hormones, these
traces of estrogens, actually affect something like male fertility? Because
it’s only traces. But the answer seems to be yes because your body already has
the hormones that nature wanted you to have, if I can use that kind of term.
And when you start adding extra hormones in the form of milk and especially
cheese—because the hormones concentrate in the fatty part of the dairy product.
Then we do think it is probably enough to affect fertility. But, frankly,
fertility is not a life or death situation.
Dr. Barnard: What
is, is breast cancer. And in women who have been previously diagnosed with
breast cancer… This was a huge study in California. It was all women who had
been diagnosed…they’d been treated…they got one thing on their mind, which is I
don’t want my cancer ever to come back. Those women who consumed the most high-fat
dairy, that’s cheese, butter, whole milk.
Sarah Hiner: Ice
cream.
Dr. Barnard: They
had a 49% higher risk of dying from their cancer. 49% higher compared to those
women who tended to avoid these products.
Sarah Hiner: All
right, so this is crazy because again, I referred earlier on…the American
Diabetes association, Susan B. Komen, American Heart Association. They all
include dairy in their guidelines. And I’m not even going to the food pyramid,
which we know the politics of the dairy farmers and all of that. But why would
these medical associations be including dairy in their recommendations when
there’s so much research that shows a direct connection?
Dr. Barnard: I
don’t want to speak for these organizations, but they are run by people who
have dietary habits of their own and biases and prejudices of their own and
their own read on the literature, and they’re entitled to obviously make their
own opinion. But let me call out the American Heart Association for a moment.
The AHA has done a number of good things over the years, but one of the things
that has really raised eyebrows is—if you are McDonald’s or you are Kraft, and
you sell a product and you want to make sure that the American Heart
Association never says anything against you, you can pay $10,000 to the
American Heart Association and join the Industry Nutrition Advisory Panel. The
AHA has this panel for sale for manufacturers who pay 10 grand a year. What
they buy for that is special access, specifically, to the American Heart
Association’s policy makers. And so you get a chance to say why McDonald’s can
fit into a healthy diet and why cheese and so forth fits into a healthy diet.
And I have to say, with that kind of money, do you think the American Heart
Association is ever going to say that maybe the saturated fat in cheese is not
good for you?
Dr. Barnard: And
it gets worse. They will sell their name to be on a cut of meat. This pork chop
is heart-healthy because it meets a certain standard or something like that. Is
this corruption?
Sarah Hiner: Follow
the money trail.
Dr. Barnard: To
its credit, the American Medical Association years ago threw these people out.
They were taking money from various industry sources. They got caught, and they
cleaned house. And I’ve got to say, I think the American Medical Association
has been a standard for others to follow. We’ve got to understand, are we for
heart disease or do we want to stop it? And if we want to stop it, we’ve got to
call out who’s causing it. It’s the same thing as the tobacco industry giving
money, which it used to do, to various health organizations and members of
congress and everybody else. And now we’ve got the meat industry doing much of
the same thing and dairy as well.
Sarah Hiner: OK.
So let me flip sides and just play devil’s advocate for one brief moment. How
come European countries that eat dairy—I know there was that big book about how
come French women aren’t fat. You know the Swiss who obviously eat a lot of
cheese, a lot of those countries. I’m going to presume, or let me just ask. Do
they have the same problems with dairy that Americans do? And if not, why not?
Dr. Barnard: Yes,
they do. As a matter of fact, there has long been viewed a north-south gradient
in France and in Italy. Things are changing dramatically in recent years. But
it used to be, 1960s you would talk to a chef in Marcé. I’m talking about
places in the south of France. And they would never cook with butter and cream
and all these things. Those were northern foods. There was meat in the diet,
but it wasn’t a big thing and the idea of having meat every day—that was a
northern habit. Things have changed in these European countries, and now meat
is coming in everywhere and cheese is big all over the place. And obesity and
diabetes are rising there just like here. I don’t mean to say they’re as bad as
we are. I’m sorry to say that they are not.
Sarah Hiner: Well,
I wasn’t sure if there was something different in the cow’s milk, in the
hormones, in the source of the dairy itself that was different in Europe versus
here.
Dr. Barnard: Really
not. No. A cow in Brussels is not dramatically different from a cow in New Jersey.
Sarah Hiner: And
the milk that comes out of that cow is from a high-hormone cow, no matter what.
Dr. Barnard: Every
single one of them in Europe and in the United States has the hand of a farmer
up her rectum once a year. Whereas that hand grasps the uterus and the other
hand inserts the semen to artificially inseminate them. They go through that
process, they are impregnated. They’re pregnant nine months out of every year
in Europe, just like in the United States. The hormones get into the glass of milk,
and we’re swallowing them down along with the saturated fat, cholesterol, and
salt.
Sarah Hiner: OK.
Dr. Barnard: I
hope I’m not cheering you up.
Sarah Hiner: Well,
I got a little distracted with that image. Fortunately, I’d seen it before so I
knew as you were saying it. But I’m not sure what any listeners are doing in
their heads right now—imagining the poor cow and the arm and all of that.
Dr. Barnard: Let
me say why I mention this. There are a lot of people who are concerned about
how animals are treated. And for me, as a doctor, I have found it very helpful
for people… Let’s say you’ve got a 16-year-old kid who says, “I just don’t
like the idea of slaughtering chickens and so forth for what I’m eating. I want
to go vegan.” That kid just made a lifesaving decision. Not for the
animals. Well, I guess for the animals. But for himself or herself. So my point
is, that if people are motivated by animal welfare, their coronary arteries are
going to be glad. And so many people imagine that a cow just makes milk. The
cows have to be impregnated. They are impregnated by artificial insemination,
and then the calf that results from the pregnancy is taken away because the
farmer wants to sell the milk. And if she’s a female calf, she will be raised
in a hutch in isolation, and she’ll then be artificially inseminated when she’s
ready. If the calf is a male, he will be killed quite promptly for veal. And
then when the cows are about four…a cow normally lives about 20 years in the
cow’s actual lifespan. But by about age four, they’re all just slaughtered for
low-grade hamburger because the farmer isn’t getting as much milk as he did
when the cow was two or three.
Dr. Barnard: And
so you then artificially inseminate her daughters and granddaughters, and take
their milk and take their kids away. It’s frankly, I have to say as a person
who has animal agriculture folks in my own family, it’s a creepy, creepy
business, and it’s something that I think has no part in a civilized society.
Sarah Hiner: Well,
and I think something that most people have no clue about whatsoever—what the
reality is. Let’s jump subjects a little bit. Let’s talk about cheese
addiction. And that cheese actually has these mild opioids in it. That pizza
being the number-one most addictive food on a list.
Dr. Barnard: You
know, it’s a funny thing. When we were doing research studies, NIH… We do
these all the time. I remember an NIH-funded trial that I was doing back in
2003 through 2005. And we were using vegan diets for people with type two
diabetes, and they got dramatically better. They would lose weight, their
diabetes would improve…everything else. But I kept hearing from one person
after another, “The food I really miss is cheese.” It wasn’t ice cream, and it
wasn’t a chicken wing. They wanted cheese. And I thought, What is that? They kind of would describe it the way an alcoholic would describe his last
drink—it was this great fun. They’re describing it like a drug. So we started
looking into it. And what we found is quite surprising. There actually are
opiate traces in cheese itself. They’re in milk, but they are concentrated in
the cheese.
Sarah Hiner: And
this isn’t infused in it. It is actually part of the chemical structure of the
cheese.
Dr. Barnard: Yes.
They’re in the dairy protein, which is called casein, C-A-S-E-I-N. And
the casein protein, like all proteins, is a string of beads. And each bead is
an amino acid, and in your digestive tract, those beads break apart into
individual beads that you can absorb. Except in milk, the casein protein breaks
apart to release some individual amino acids, but it also releases strings of
four or five or six or seven amino acids and they go to the brain and they can
attach to the very same receptors in the brain that morphine will attach to. So
they’re called casomorphins. And they’re not that strong. The strongest
of the casomorphins is called morphiceptin. And it has about one-tenth
of the brain-binding power compared with pure morphine. Pharmacy-grade
morphine. So call it maybe 10%, something like that. So it’s not enough to get
you arrested, but it’s more than enough for a person to really like cheese. And
they think, Oh I just like that funky smell or It’s got the nice
mouth feel. And they’re completely unaware of what’s happening in their
brain as they’re ingesting it. It has this druglike effect. It has the same
effect, by the way, on the intestinal tract. If a person ever ate too much
cheese and got really constipated, that’s the other narcotic effect of the
cheese.
Sarah Hiner: That
it makes you constipated? Oh because morphine creates constipation.
Dr. Barnard: Yeah.
If you ever had surgery—you had an appendectomy or something—and you got a
Demerol injection and then you found you were all blocked up afterward.
Narcotics stop your intestinal movements, and people who overdo it on cheese
very often report this massive constipation. And I believe it is partly because
there’s no fiber in cheese, of course. But it’s also because of the narcotic effect
of the cheese. But the one we’re worried about is that the narcotic morphiceptin and its cousins, the other casomorphins, there’s a whole group of them, when
they attach to the brain and they stimulate the brain receptors, they cause a
narcotic effect that causes a person to want to eat that food.
Dr. Barnard: And
so, why are people getting this massive amount of saturated fat in their diet
and cholesterol and sodium? And why are they then gaining weight? And why are
they then having a high cholesterol level? And why do they then need Lipitor
and antihypertensives and all these things? It’s a drug habit. In the same way
as why there’s a person who smokes cigarettes. Why are they at risk for things,
and why do they need medical care? And why does an alcoholic have the problems
that they do? If you are hooked on cheese products and you’re rationalizing it
because you just like the taste, there’s something much more fundamental going
on.
Sarah Hiner: Well,
it’s so funny. I, for the most part, have not eaten wheat, sugar or dairy for
the last 20+ years. But I like cheese, too. And every so often you’re out at
somebody’s house, and they have cheese and crackers for an appetizer, and I’ll
have a little bit of it because every so often you’re entitled. And it really
is amazing. There is this—you can’t just have one. It’s like the Lays potato
chips commercials. And I can definitely feel that and feel that addictive
quality of it even in that little piece of time. So it’s almost like you can’t
limit it. You can’t say, just have a little bit of it. That it has to be all or
none in order to overcome it.
Dr. Barnard: I
think what you said is an extremely common experience and a really important
one. And yet there’s a flip side to it as well, and that’s disgust. Like a
smoker. When you’re a smoker you want a cigarette and a cigarette makes
everything better. You got a headache, well at least you can have a cigarette.
You might still have a headache, but you feel better. If the world is treating
you wrong, then a little cheese on a cracker and a glass of wine is going to
make everything a whole lot better. But in the same way as a smoker can say, “Enough
is enough, I don’t want my clothes to stink, I don’t want to cough, I don’t
want to be at high risk for cancer and heart disease.” And then you find that
your desire for a cigarette turns into disgust, and you don’t want to be around
people who smoke. When people really see cheese for what it is, for being the
product of an abused animal that’s filled with hormones and saturated fat and
it’s bad for you, they look at this stuff and they’re no longer attracted to
it. They find it gross, and if it ends up on their pizza, they scrape it off.
Dr. Barnard: I
know that’s funny to think of if you are kind of in the midst of active cheese
aficionadom, but it’s a common experience. The same way as a person who wakes
up really hung over throws out the bottle and they’re kind of disgusted by it.
That’s what happens with cheese, too.
Sarah Hiner: Interesting.
Well the other thing that I found when I cut those foods out of my diet—because
I was a big child of the ’60s, big sugar intake, et cetera. And I thought, Oh
my God, I’ll never be able to just cut that out of my diet. And I didn’t
realize until I stopped eating that food, how bad it made me feel. So to the
point of disgust, right? So now I can easily not eat it because I know that I’m
going to feel horrible afterward.
Dr. Barnard: Yes.
And you know who’s really taking it to a fine point are athletes. This
started… I’m going to say it probably started with the ultra-long-distance
runners who felt that if they were eating cheese and meat, they just couldn’t
compete very well. It’s probably because the saturated fat makes their blood
more viscous and thick. And so their tissues don’t oxygenate very well and
their brain doesn’t oxygenate, which is why you fall asleep after that fatty
meal. So Scott Jurek and Brendan Brazier and Rich Roll and these really just
top-level athletes, are all vegan and nobody can touch them. And then it got
into tennis. And we were talking about autoimmune conditions. Venus Williams
had an autoimmune condition called Sjogren’s syndrome. She tanked. And so she
got the dairy out of her diet and went vegan. And then Serena said, “Well if
you’re doing it, then I’m doing it, too.” And then on the male side of the
tennis court, Novak Djokovic who won Wimbledon and the US Open and wins
everything else, he actually has a vegan restaurant that he’s opened in Monaco.
And then it got in Formula One, the pinnacle of racing. Lewis Hamilton’s been
the five-time world champion. He openly talks about his vegan diet, and I
wouldn’t be surprised if his reactions would be slowed if he had a cheese
sandwich for lunch.
Dr. Barnard: But
now, it’s the basketball players and then the football players. They want to be
big and muscular, but they don’t want flab. So the Tennessee Titans, maybe 12
or 15 of their players have been doing this. And they had their best season
last year than they had in a long time. Anyways, it’s been a funny thing. If
you want to be alert and feel good and so forth, getting that junk out of your
diet really, really helps. If your goal is just to do well in your weekend or
afternoon running or whatever, the people on a plant-based diet, they just
perform better and they feel better.
Sarah Hiner: That’s
great to know. All right, so let’s go through some of the dairy foods. So let
me rephrase it. Are all dairy foods equally evil to cheese? So yogurt, organic
milk? Are there different grades of cheese? If it’s goat’s milk or sheep’s milk
or is it all simply classified evil and it’s all got the hormones and the salts
and the fats?
Dr. Barnard: Well,
keep in mind that people buying goat’s milk, they don’t buy it because it’s
healthier. They buy it because it has an image of being on a small farm on the
hillsides outside of town. And if anything, it’s a little bit worse. The fat
content is a little bit worse. And the ethical issues are the same. Keep in
mind they have to impregnate the goats and the kid is not going to suckle from
mom. Your point is to make goat cheese. So the kids, the baby goats, become
part of goat yoga until they’re not cute anymore, and then you hang them up by
the leg and slit their throat. So no, it’s not any better. The way to make milk
better…if you have whole milk and you take away the fat and make skim milk,
that’s a step in the right direction. But now you’ve got sugar in it. So if you
take the sugar out, it’s even better. And if you take the hormones out and all
the other junk out, I guess you’d be left with Perrier, but that would be
better, too. I’m kidding. But the point being, if you can just take all the
milk out of the milk it would be better.
Sarah Hiner: So
milk’s all the same. Yogurt, same thing? Are yogurts any better?
Dr. Barnard: Yogurt
is romantic milk. It comes from Greece. Didn’t I have a nice vacation in
Greece? Yogurt is milk that you threw a bacterial culture in. It then ferments
the lactose and gives it that funky smell. And then people talk about folks in
Russia eating it and miraculously living to old age. And these are mythological
things that gullible people believe. It still comes from a pregnant animal…it’s
still got hormones in it. If it’s low-fat yogurt its number-one nutrient is
sugar. So it’s not health food.
Sarah Hiner: So
all of it’s the same. OK. How about whey protein powder? So whey is dairy-based.
Dr. Barnard: Yeah,
whey is an amazing phenomenon. To make cheese, you add brevibacteria—B-R-E-V-I,
brevibacteria—to make a nice muenster. By the way, between your toes, the brevibacteria
are what makes your feet extra funky if you haven’t taken a shower in about two
weeks.
Sarah Hiner: So
the same bacteria in cheese is on my feet.
Dr. Barnard: Isn’t
that cute to think?
Sarah Hiner: That’s
delicious.
Dr. Barnard: Brevibacteria,
that’s what makes the cheese have that strong smell. So once that’s in there
and then you add rennet, which is an enzyme that came out of a calf’s
stomach or else is genetically engineered, the enzyme then makes the solids all
clump together. And then you have that liquid left that you’ve got to get rid
of—that liquid is whey. And you drain it off, and that leaves you with a solid
cheese. So you’ve got now a big tank full of whey, which is this liquid full of
lactose and some other parts of the milk. And so the cheese factory would throw
it in a landfill or put it in a barrel and ship it away, and they couldn’t
figure out what to do with this whey. And they got a brilliant idea, which is
that bodybuilders will buy anything. So they would dehydrate the whey and sell
the whey protein as a powder. You can charge more for it pound per pound than
for cheese. And so guys who are trying to build their muscles are told, “Here’s
this dairy protein and if you eat it, it will help you.” Now needless to say,
it’s effects are slim to none, but people will buy it. And that’s the whole
idea with whey protein. And do you need it or does it have any benefit? I would
say no.
Sarah Hiner: And
it still has the same, I’ll call it, core dairy issues. All right so how about…
Dr. Barnard: Yes,
but it’s different. It’s not casein, so it doesn’t have the casomorphins in it
to my knowledge. It’s just a dehydrated protein that some people will react
badly to.
Sarah Hiner: Well,
let’s talk about milk replacements then. So what do you think of all the nut
milks, the soy milk, the rice milk, the oat milk—all these substitutes? So the
good news is that people are moving away from a lot of the milks and to these
substitutes. Are they good, or do they have their own devilish issues?
Dr. Barnard: Well,
the most important thing about them is they’re not cow’s milk so you don’t have
to impregnate a soybean. So it doesn’t have estrogens in it. And that’s true
for cashew milk and almond milk and so forth. However, let me say something
special about soymilk. Because it does have what are called isoflavones,
which are sort of hormonelike compounds. And they may actually adhere to the
estrogen receptor, and so some people have wondered if soymilk or tofu or other
soy products might increase the risk for breast cancer. And the science on this
has been fascinating. In the same way as if you put your foot down in your car.
you might put your foot down on the gas or you might put your foot down on the
break. They have opposite effects. You have more than one estrogen receptor in
your body, and if something adheres to, say, the estrogen receptors on breast
cells, are they encouraging the growth of cancer cells, or are they stopping
the growth of cancer cells? And back in 2004, I believe it was, there was a big
meta-analysis published. And what they found is that women who consumed the
most soy products, particularly soy milk and tofu, had about 30% less risk of
developing breast cancer compared with other women.
Dr. Barnard: And
now we have maybe 35 or 40 studies, and they show the same thing. That soy
products seem to reduce cancer risk. And then what was really important was,
women who have had cancer in the past. Because some of them have been told by
their doctors, “I think you shouldn’t have soy because it might affect
your estrogen balance.” There have been at least five studies on this now.
And they show that of women who previously were diagnosed and treated for
breast cancer, those women who consumed the most soy product have about a 30%
reduction in their likelihood of having their cancer come back and killing
them. In other words, if you followed this well-meaning but ill-informed advice
to avoid soy, and you’re not having soy products, you are at higher risk of
dying of your cancer than if you’re eating the soy products. Substantially so.
So it’s the opposite of what the kind of common myth is. That the myth was
well, you better avoid soy. It turns out that the soy avoiders are the most
likely to get cancer and the most likely to die of cancer.
Dr. Barnard: Now
let me be clear. Soy is not necessary. You don’t have to have it. It’s always
better than what it replaces. So if you’re having soy sausage or soy milk, that
is way better than pork sausage or cow’s milk. But you don’t have to have it.
It’s totally optional. And that’s true for the other milks as well.
Sarah Hiner: So
do you have any preference among all of them, or it all depends on your own
personal taste, and as long as they’re not dairy, it’s fine?
Dr. Barnard: I
think it depends on taste. Now soymilk is much higher in protein. And there are
new pea protein milks that are high in protein as well. Almond milk and rice
milk are much lower in protein. Now that doesn’t matter too much because you’re
going to get plenty of protein in the other foods that you eat. A vegan diet is
not low in protein. But if you are looking for extra protein, soymilk is going
to be a good choice for you.
Sarah Hiner: OK.
I think the other aspect of this, I’ll call it, unpeeled learning about soy or
the evolved learning about soy, is so true throughout all of medical
discoveries. That it evolves. So something is good today, it’s bad tomorrow. Something
is the savior today, and it’s not tomorrow or it’s terrible today and it’s good
tomorrow. To constantly be open to and understand that what we know, what is
fact, is not necessarily fact.
Dr. Barnard: Yes.
Now if that’s because we just didn’t know and we were guessing, and then
research proves what’s true, that’s helpful. What’s unfortunately also true is
that you have industries out there trying to promote their products with bad
science. This happened a number of years ago. There was a researcher working
for the dairy industry who made the claim that if you have a low-calorie diet
that includes milk, you’ll lose more weight than if you have a low-calorie diet
that doesn’t have the milk in it. And I have to tell you, nobody could
replicate that research.
Sarah Hiner: There’s
a whole bunch of bad research design.
Dr. Barnard: And
the egg industry is guilty of the same thing. If there is one thing that is
very clear in science, it’s if you eat eggs, your cholesterol level is likely
to rise. And yet the egg industry has been working very hard to help people to
not be aware of that. And the dairy industry has been trying to make dairy fat
look innocuous. In my view, these are dangerous industries that care about
money…they do not care about your health or your children’s health.
Sarah Hiner: All
right…so everybody has been so indoctrinated that we need milk and dairy
products for strong teeth and bones. So what do you do? What’s the
recommendation to be able to have those strong teeth and bones?
Dr. Barnard: Well,
what people are thinking about is calcium. And a little bit of biology 101 here—cows
do not make calcium. Calcium is an element. It’s in the earth. And it goes
through the roots of grass. And so if a cow eats grass, some of that calcium
gets in the cow’s milk. But if you eat green leafy vegetables… hopefully not grass…but
if you eat broccoli, kale, collards, Brussels’s sprouts, whatever it is, that
calcium goes into your body. And the absorption of the calcium from broccoli or
these other foods I mentioned is higher, on the order of 50%…60% compared to
32% for cow’s milk. There are some exceptions. Spinach is a very selfish
vegetable. It has a lot of calcium, but the absorption is not very good. So the
point is, you do need calcium, but green leafy vegetables are the source nature
figured you were going to have.
Sarah Hiner: All
right. That’s excellent. So what do you eat for breakfast?
Dr. Barnard: What
did I eat for breakfast? I have different things different days. Today I
actually made some blueberry pancakes, and I did have a soy sausage thing that
I bought. But other days it might be something else. Big bowl of oatmeal with
cinnamon and raisins is a typical one. And I haven’t had cow’s milk in a really
long time. But for me, I grew up in North Dakota and all that stuff was normal.
But I’m happy to say as a doctor, I’m on a healthier path.
Sarah Hiner: And
you look great. You look at you and you look like a 35-year-old. There’s a
picture…
Dr. Barnard: Keep
saying that.
Sarah Hiner: Unless
I’m watching really old videos of you. But no. All right, well, Dr. Neal
Barnard, thank you so very much. You have so much rich information. PCRM.org is your website and for Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine and your
books. You’re of course in our Bottom Line database of articles. So thank you
very much.
Dr. Barnard: Oh
thank you. It’s been great talking with you today.
Sarah Hiner: I’m
talking to Dr. Neal Barnard about the surprising dangers of dairy. Including a
little-known fact that cheese actually contains mild opiates that make it
addictive and it triggers the same brain receptors as heroine and morphine. Dr.
Barnard has been educating the public about the dangers of animal proteins and
helping them to overcome diabetes, obesity and related diseases for nearly 35
years. His message is just one from the thousands of experts featured in our
twice-monthly newsletter Bottom Line Personal, who provide their expert
advice to guide readers into action in their own lives. In addition to Dr.
Barnard’s insight into health, diet and nutrition, Bottom Line Personal is filled with actionable advice on all aspects of your life, including
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Sarah Hiner: Neal,
one of the big buzzes around my office and around people I know, is this thing
called the Impossible Burger. And a bunch of us went out the other day to taste
the Impossible Burger because the lovers of it say it looks and smells and
tastes just like a burger. To me it sounds disgusting. I wouldn’t order it. I
had a bite of their’s. But what’s the story with it? Everyone says, Oh, no, no,
no, it’s perfect…it’s great…it’s impossible that it can be so good.” Do you
think it’s impossibly good?
Dr. Barnard: What
it is—it’s a patty that’s made with water and wheat protein and coconut oil and
potato protein and a bunch of other things. And it is better for the
environment, which is the main reason it’s on the market. You don’t have to
feed a whole bunch of feed grains to cows and harm the environment through all
the things that animal agriculture does. And it’s better than meat in certain
ways. When you heat it up, the carcinogens that meat might have are not in the
Impossible Burger. That said, there are far better veggie burgers than the
Impossible Burger. If you have an Impossible Burger, it’s got about 53% of its
calories from fat…41% of its calories specifically come from saturated fat.
That’s the coconut fat in it. I am hoping that as this burger evolves, they
will take the coconut fat out and use a healthier one. You could almost feel
your arteries snapping closed when you take a bite. And I have to say, I don’t
think personally it tastes any better than any other veggie burger. What
happens now, is people have been lured in by the name and the marketing and
this ridiculous claim that it tastes just like meat and the heme iron is the
magical ingredient and all this nonsense.
Sarah Hiner: Well
and I think that they’re appealing to all of us who really want to eat
cheeseburgers and they’re trying to be good so that… You said that the reason
they’re doing it is for the environment. I would say they’re doing it because
of gluttony. Because people really want to be eating their cheeseburgers and
they’re pretending that they’re better.
Dr. Barnard: They
are better for the environment and they do have some health advantages but
other health risks. If you are looking for a vegan burger, what you’re tasting
in a burger—whether you buy it at McDonald’s or whether it’s a veggie burger—you’re
tasting the ketchup and the pickle and it’s kind of that grilling flavor with
it. And to my taste, the Impossible Burger doesn’t taste any better than any
other veggie burger, but it has way better marketing. So if you go to the
store, there are many brands of vegan burgers. I would read the labels and I
would have the ones that are lower in fat than the Impossible Burger. Now
having said that, if the product really does get people to eat it instead of a
beef burger or a chicken patty, that’s a step in the right direction and that’s
a good thing. But the idea that a person’s going to stay there, it’s not good.
Because to tell you the truth, this product wipes out the health benefits of a
vegan diet.
Sarah Hiner: So,
you and I were talking before. You mentioned that you had some vegan sausage
for breakfast. In general, I avoid what I’ll call fake foods. If it’s not the
way that God grew it, I don’t have reformulated versions of sausage. Either I
eat the whole disgusting, what they do to make a sausage, which I don’t, or I
skip it. But you seem to be, I’ll call it OK with recompiled versions of food.
Dr. Barnard: Sure.
First of all, these transitions would have an enormous benefit for people who
are making that transition, and that’s a really good thing. But if you’re
having ground-up soybeans mixed with water that you put on a nonstick pan and
you put it on your plate, there’s nothing wrong with that whatsoever. Now is it
ground up and does that mean it’s processed? Sure. In the same way that
spaghetti comes from wheat that’s been processed. So that’s not bad. My gripe
with the Impossible Burger is that they mix it up with coconut oil. My own view
is that coconut oil is great for shining your shoes, but you should not swallow
it. Let me emphasize again—if a person is eating a beef burger or a chicken
burger or a turkey burger, and they make a switch to a veggie burger including
the Impossible Burger, that’s a good move. So good on them for doing that. But
once you’re in this side of things, don’t stay there. There are much healthier
ones that taste just as good.
Sarah Hiner: And
are there any ingredients besides coconut oil that they should flag when
they’re reading the ingredients on these boxes that means it’s filled with junk
fillers versus quality fillers?
Dr. Barnard: Yeah.
Well you can look on the label. Look at the saturated fat content. You want
that to be zero or as close to zero as possible. On the Impossible, 41% of the
calories come from saturated fat. That’s the one that snaps your arteries
closed. To be fair, cheese is 70% fat and most of that is saturated fat, so
don’t get me wrong—cheese is terrible and beef and, frankly, chicken. 30% of
the fat in chicken is saturated fat. So I don’t want the people to think that
if you’re having turkey sausage or something, that this is somehow healthy. It
is not. So getting to plant-based foods is a really good choice. But that’s not
the end of your dietary search…that’s the beginning of it. Once you have gotten
the animal products off your plate and you’re taking your health seriously, now
you want to choose the healthier foods. And to be clear, those are vegetables
and fruits and whole grains and beans. Don’t forget your vitamin B-12 because
you’re going to need that too for good health. But you don’t need these really
high-fat products.
Sarah Hiner: All
right. Neal Barnard on the Impossible Burger. Thank you so much.
Dr. Barnard: My
pleasure. Thank you.
