The Jungle Effect

After noticing that populations with identical genetics develop Western disease when eating Western diets, the author runs around the world learning about indigenous diets. She targets countries that have a particularly low incidence of specific disease. The following are the pairs of countries and the disease their diets prevent: Iceland=depression, Crete=heart disease, Camaroon=colon cancer, Okinowa=breast and colon cancer, Mexico=diabetes. While this was all common sense, what was new to me was the importance of the quality of the food. For example, Icelanders eat a lot of fish from the ocean. Icelanders who moved to Canada who started eating lake fish, started suffering from increased rates of depression.

Once I started making the connection between specific disease and the quality of ingredients, the food industry's incentives became very clear to me. If they could sell me something that could pass for a tomato, but cost them less to make, they would do it. We'd all be sicker, and think we were eating healthful food stuffs.

Back to the book. She shares her information in the form of a frame tale with in a frame tale (inception?). Each adventure starts with the story of a patient who suffers from a disease, which then frames her travels to a country. I'd say the book is about half story, and half information. What's nice is that she's published the recipes she collected here. I'm looking forward to trying out a couple. The book concludes with a short interview with the author. She said she wishes she was able to visit India, I couldn't agree with her more :)

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