The high fiber theory definitely has its good sides, though. Another major factor of intestinal
obstruction is small feces. A diet rich in natural, soft vegetable fiber produces larger feces that retain a lot
more water than a diet consisting of refined and processed foods. The average British meal takes about 83
hours to pass through the intestinal tract with an average stool weight of only 104g. By contrast, British
vegetarians take about 41 hours and produce 208g of stools—whereas the average meal of a Ugandan
villager, consisting of low protein high-fiber diet, takes only 36 hours and generates 470g of stools a day.
Ugandans rarely suffer from constipation, and they don’t add bran to their foods.
It is much better for the body to obtain fiber from fresh fruit, salads, cooked grains, beans and
vegetables. Cooked vegetables in particular contain plenty of fiber, which helps the digestive process but
does not overwhelm the colon in the same way as added bran does. Also, the high water content of
cooked foods and fruits generally make the passage through the intestinal tract much easier. This brings
us to the next subject: Is eating raw and unprepared food better than eating cooked and prepared food?
The belief that regular bowel movement is important for health is very ancient. But the present theory
is based on Dr. Dennis Burkitt's discovery that relatively few rural black Africans suffer from cancer of
the colon. He attributed this to their relatively crude diet. The theory was that, as fiber made food travel
through the gut faster, it allowed less time for cancer-inducing agents to form. This, of course,
presupposed that food became carcinogenic in the gut.
3. Raw Whole Foods
There was no evidence that the above presumption is true. Neither was there any evidence that moving
food through the intestine at a faster rate decreases the risk of colon cancer. Moreover, the rural Africans'
lifestyle was far from that of the Western city dweller: their diet is different, but also they were not
exposed to so many pollutants, toxins or mental stresses. Indeed, there were many factors that could have
been responsible for a difference in disease patterns. Other communities—the Mormons of Utah, for
example—also enjoyed a low incidence of colon cancer yet they ate a low-fiber diet.
So Dr. Burkitt’s theory was unsubstantiated at the time and it was to be disproved in practice later as
the rural Africans moved into towns and adopted a Western style low fiber diet. Their incidence of colon
cancer has remained low and this has continued with the second generation. Nevertheless, these later
findings were never publicized. Burkitt’s theories caught the attention of the media. Always ready to
exploit a good story, they expanded what was at best a very weak hypothesis into a treatment dogma that
today teaches that fiber is a panacea for all manner of illnesses.
Commercial interests were quick to see the potential in the recommendation and jump on the bran
wagon. Burkitt’s recommendation was based on vegetable fiber. Bran (cereal fiber), on the other hand,
has a far higher fiber content. A practically worthless byproduct of the milling process, until then, bran
had been thrown away. Almost overnight, it became a highly priced profit maker. Although totally
inedible, backed by Burkitt’s fiber hypothesis, bran could now be promoted as a valuable food. But Dr.
Hugh Trowell, Burkitt’s partner and another strong advocate of dietary fiber, stated in 1974 that:
“A serious confusion of thought is produced by referring to the dietary fiber hypothesis as the bran
hypothesis, for many Africans do not consume cereal or bran.”