Super Immunity

Joel Fuhrman, M.D.

• Publisher: HarperOne
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9780062080653
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Diseases & Allergies

From world-renowned health expert and New York Times bestselling author of Eat to Live and Eat for Life Dr. Joel Fuhrman comes a practical nutritional plan to prevent and reverse disease—no shots, drugs or sick days required.

Why do some of us get sick with greater frequency than others? What makes us more susceptible to illness? Is there a secret to staying healthy? Dr. Fuhrman doesn't believe the secret to staying healthy lies in medical care—rather, the solution is to change the way we eat.

With more than 85 plant-based recipes, a two-week menu plan, and lists of super foods that boost immunity, Dr. Fuhrman's proven strategies in Super Immunity combine the latest data from clinical tests, nutritional research, and results from thousands of patients.

Inside Super Immunity, you'll find:

• The big picture— Learn everything you need to know about healthy eating for a healthy life.
• A 2-week meal plan— Take the guesswork out of changing your diet with planned meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day of the week.
• 85 immunity-boosting recipes— These delicious plant based recipes make eating healthy easy and crave-worthy.

Live longer, stronger, and disease free with this proven plan to change your diet and change your life.

" Super Immunity is a much needed book that contains the key to ending the cycle of sickness that plagues many of our lives. This is enlightened medicine, at last!" (Dr. Alejandro Junger, New York Times bestselling author of CLEAN)

CHAPTER ONE

Food Equals Health

Before I began to incorporate Dr. Fuhrman’s ideas into my own diet, I was always getting colds and suffering from almost chronic sinus infections. Heck, I almost died of pneumonia twice. But now I am never sick. I haven’t had a cold in three years. I track my nutritional intake and I can see for myself that I am now eating a diet that meets and exceeds the recommended intake of almost all vitamins and minerals. And now I understand why I was so sickly before: I was getting so little nutrition. Thank you, Dr. Fuhrman.

—Aram Barsamian

Historians and archaeologists have revealed that ancient civilizations all over the world recognized that certain foods could provide health-promoting and disease-protective benefits. The historically documented use of certain foods and food extracts from dried plants for healing indicates that the early application of the knowledge about the health-giving functions of plant-derived compounds dates back thousands of years.

Natural plants are complex packages of biologically active compounds. The term “phytochemicals,” which means “plant-chemicals,” was coined to represent these thousands of plant-sourced compounds that have functional effects in animal tissues with subtle but profound effects on human health and immunity. With the recent discovery that superior immune function in humans is dependent on a broad array of these plant-derived chemicals, we can appreciate that food supplies us not only with the basic nutritive functions, but also with a secondary level of nutrition that adds a complex layer of disease resistance and longevity benefits. These secondary benefits have not been adequately appreciated until recently.

Our evolution in a world of edible plants allowed the human body to take advantage of the complex biochemical compounds found in plants that we could use to support superior functioning of our cells. In recent years we have discovered fascinating and enormously complex interactions within our cells—interactions by which a combination of phytochemicals support defensive and self-reparative machinery we never knew the human body possessed.

Phytochemicals are bioactive, plant-derived chemical compounds important for the growth and survival of the plant; they came about for the benefit of the plant world. However, the human immune system evolved dependent on these phytochemicals for its optimal functioning. Some people, objecting to the connotations of the word “chemical” (with its connection to artificial and toxic compounds), prefer to use the word “phytonutrients,” so you will often see those words interchanged. However, the word “chemical” is really what we might call agnostic, disconnected from particular dogma; and the widely established word “phytochemical” is the correct term to represent the broad array of these newly discovered compounds with complicated health effects.

Superior nutrition is the secret to Super Immunity, and it is relatively simple. It does not take years of study and contemplation to become an expert in human nutrition as long as you understand the principles that govern your basic food choices and food preparation. Just like the complicated and synergistic nature of the human immune system, natural plants are complicated and wondrous life forms; they contain thousands of intricate cells and biochemicals working in harmony. Animals and plants developed a fragile, interconnected, and symbiotic relationship on earth, and now human beings rely on plants for our health and survival. When studying the survival potential of animals and humans, we must realize that we are dependent on the health and quality of the food grown from the earth to sustain us: the health of the food we eat ultimately determines our own health. When we eat healthy food, we become healthy; when we don’t, we develop disease. Essentially, we are made from the food we eat. As it is commonly said, we are what we eat.

Unfortunately, when we cultivate nutritional deficiencies in our body over long periods of time, especially in our formative years, it can create cellular damage resulting in serious illnesses in later life that can be difficult to resolve. In addition, these deficiencies result in inferior immunity.

The great news for all of us is that the recent advancements in nutritional science have created an opportunity to earn great health via what we eat. And, as you will discover, it is not only the powerful compounds in foods such as berries and pomegranates that are so protective, but these compounds—when combined with those found in green vegetables, mushrooms, and onions in the diet—fuel the miraculous self-healing and self-protective properties already built into the human genome, together resulting in Super Immunity.

A combination of these compounds is more effective than a single agent, even in a high dose. For example, taking a large dose of vitamin C or vitamin E is not very effective, especially if no deficiency existed prior to dosing. Likewise, although certain phytochemical compounds have more profound, long-acting, and powerful free-radical-scavenging effects than do known antioxidant vitamins such as C and E (more on antioxidants and free radicals later), supplementing with a hefty dose of a natural phytochemical extracted from a green vegetable would not offer as much protection as combining it with the hundreds of other beneficial compounds found in nutrient-rich foods. Acting cooperatively, these newly identified micronutrients work together to fuel an assortment of mechanisms that both prevent cell damage and also kill heavily damaged cells that cannot be adequately repaired, before they become dangerous to the body.

My “nutritarian” approach, which includes and mixes the most powerful and protective foods in the diet, is natural, comes without toxicity, and can prevent many human tragedies—not just revving up our immune system against infection and cancer, but also preventing heart attacks, strokes, and dementia.

The American Dietary Disaster, or Death from Processed Foods

Because the modern diet in America and much of the world today is so rich in processed foods and animal products and so low in natural vegetation, especially vegetables, almost all Americans are dramatically deficient in plant-derived phytochemicals, and the effects are far-reaching and dangerous.

Twenty-five years ago, we worshipped vitamins and minerals, and nutritional scientists hardly knew phytochemicals existed; now those compounds are considered the major micronutrient load in natural foods, and their effects are recognized as broad and profound. In other words, we now know that vitamins and minerals are not nearly enough. To have normal immune function we require hundreds of additional phytochemicals, found in natural plants. Supplements are appearing in the marketplace that contain these beneficial compounds and they show promise, but nothing can match the immunity-building power of a diet that contains an adequate amount and broad array of these health-enhancing substances from unrefined plant foods.

Today, the American diet takes over 60 percent of its calories from processed foods—a percentage that has increased gradually but inexorably over the last hundred years. This category encompasses most foods made with added sweeteners, with white flour, and with oils. Processed foods include the following: white bread, bagels, chips, pasta, donuts, cookies, breakfast bars, cold cereals, soft drinks, pretzels, condiments, and premade salad dressings. These processed foods are generally mixed with additives, coloring agents, and preservatives to extend shelf life, and they’re placed in plastic bags and cardboard boxes.

USA FOOD CONSUMPTION DATA

USDA Economics Research Service, 2005; www.ers.usda.gov/Data/FoodConsumption/FoodGuideIndex.htm#calories.

Soft drinks, sugar, corn syrup, and other sweeteners now occupy a major share of the dietary pie. The amount of cheese and chicken has also increased significantly in the American diet over the last century, with the consumption of calories from animal products now at over 25 percent. With so many animal products and processed foods in the modern diet, there is little room for unrefined or unprocessed vegetation.

Americans consume less than 10 percent of their calories from unrefined plant foods such as fruits, beans, seeds, and vegetables. However, that 10 percent figure is misleading, because about half the vegetable consumption in America is white potato products, including fries and chips! If you remove the white potato from consideration (not a particularly nutritious food), the other produce would amount to less than 5 percent of the American diet.

The modern diet is not slightly deficient in just a handful of micronutrients; it is grossly deficient in hundreds of important plant-derived, immunity-building compounds. These are not optional; you can’t have a lifetime of good health without them.

To identify these important antioxidants and phytochemicals deficient in the American diet, we must recognize a broad class of beneficial compounds, including the whole carotene family (including lycopene, beta-carotene, alpha-carotene, lutein, and zeaxanthin); and an assortment of other compounds that maximize cell function, thus enabling the healing properties of immune cells—compounds such as alpha-lipoic acid, flavonoids, bioflavonoids, polyphenols and phenolic acids, quercetin, rutin, anthocyanins and proanthocyanins, allium compounds, allyl sulfides, glucosinolates, isothiocyanates, lignans, and pectins. All these classes of compounds impact our health; and without them our health, and especially our immune system, dramatically suffers.

No matter how many different dietary theories there are out there, pretty much everyone agrees that vegetables are “good for you.” But just how good they truly are has been debated. Sadly, the data from observational studies is often flawed simply because most people don’t eat enough vegetables to have a measurable impact on their health! However, some long-term observational studies do indeed demonstrate that vegetable consumption is the most important factor in preventing chronic disease and premature death.¹

The Nature and Function of Antioxidants

Since neither processed foods nor animal products contain a significant load of antioxidant nutrients or any phytochemicals, the modern diet is dramatically disease-promoting. In other words, we are eating ourselves to sickness. Antioxidants are vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals that aid the body in removing “free radicals” and controlling free-radical production...