Friends:

Hi.  I just visited a website that includes an interview with Aajonus
Vonderplanitz, the fellow who advocates eating raw fish, meat, etc... in
addition to raw fats and a measure of fruits and juiced vegetables.

I'm a graduate of Williams College and have a background in science (albeit
geology), and I've also read quite a bit about people like the Hunzas who
eat a diet diametrically opposed to Vonderplanitz, which brings me to my
point...

Dr. Nicholas Gonzalez, M.D., has been working in the field of nutritional
treatment of cancer for a number of years.  I did some lobbying work for an
alternative medicine lobbyist a few years ago, and in the process, had a
chance to meet Dr. Gonzalez and to hear him speak.

Dr. Gonzalez claims that a person's diet it largely dictated by which
nervous system (sympathetic or parasympathetic) dominates in a person.  For
example, parasympathetic dominant people need red meat as much as three
times per day, according to Dr. Gonzalez.

On the other hand, sympathetic dominants ("aggressive, type A businessmen
that get up at six and get more done by noon that the rest of us do in the
whole day") do well on foods like fruits and vegetables. (The quotes are
from an interview Dr. Gonzalez did with Townsend Letter for Doctors &
Patients in 1996.)

The lobbyist that I worked with is a personal friend of Dr. Gonzalez, and
she received a phone call late one night about two years ago.  It was Dr.
Gonzalez calling to tell her that he had just had dinner with the president
of a major company like Johnson & Johnson or Bristol-Myers, and that the
company had agreed to make his treatment a top priority and dedicate ten
million dollars to testing it.

Let me emphasize that Dr. Gonzales is not saying a vegetarian diet is bad,
in fact, he says it is good for certain types of people.  However, he
believes some body types must eat meat.  Here's part of what he said in the
Townsend interview (I'm going to leave it all in one long paragraph to
avoid confusion):

"It is absolute insanity to suggest that the whole human species, as
different as it is, could be put on one diet.  The human species occupies
every ecological niche from the arctic circle to equatorial rain forests
and there are different foods available in these regions, and people have
had to adjust.  There is no way one diet is suitable for everybody.  The
Eskimos are one of the most famous meat eating peoples.  They live in the
Arctic circle.  They have no growing season.  They have no fruits.  They
have no vegetables.  The only Eskimos that could survie are those that eat
a high fat, high protein diet...And they were among the healthiest people
in the world until they switched their diet to a Western one.  When they
cut their saturated fat consumption from 80% to 40%, they began to develop
our pattern of degenerative diseases.  For them, fat was the perfect fuel.
There was a study that showed that Eskimos lacked the enzymes to digest
complex carbohydrates.  Zookeepers know that if you raise a lion or tiger
on grains and beans it is going to die.  Eskimos need red meat as well, to
function effectively."

Myself, I tried raw food, strict vegetarianism - no eggs or dairy - for
about a year, then I was advised by my doctor to try the "Zone" diet to
control mood swings.  The zone diet definitely energizes me, but I've tried
it four separate times (with and without meat as a protein source), and
each time I've developed flu and/or bronchitis within 6-8 weeks afterward.
I've never tried raw meat, but it's certainly an interesting thought based
on the road I've traveled and the work of Aajonus Vonderplanitz and Dr.
Gonzalez.  Anybody have any thoughts or reactions?  Be well and God bless.

Cordially, David
David Shufelt  executive director, PrayerLift, Inc.
email: [log in to unmask]