The China Study by Thomas Campbell

LESSONS FROM CHINA 73

four dozen different kinds of disease, including individual cancers,
heart diseases and infectious diseases.^6 We gathered data on 367 vari-
ables and then compared each variable with every other variable. We
went into sixty-five counties across China and administered question-
naires and blood tests on 6,500 adults. We took urine samples, directly
measured everything families ate over a three-day period and analyzed
food samples from marketplaces around the country.
The sixty-five counties selected for the study were located in rural
to semi-rural parts of China. This was intentionally done because we
wanted to study people who mostly lived and ate food in the same area
for most of their lives. This was a successful strategy, as we were to learn
than an average of 90-94% of the adult subjects in each county still
lived in the same county where they were born.
When we were done we had more than 8,000 statistically significant
associations between lifestyle, diet and disease variables. We had a
study that was unmatched in terms of comprehensiveness, quality and
uniqueness. We had what the New York Times termed "the Grand Prix of
epidemiology." In short, we had created that revealing snapshot of time
that we had Originally envisioned.
This was the perfect opportunity to test the principles that we dis-
covered in the animal experiments. Were the findings in the lab going
to be consistent with the human experience in the real world? Were our
discoveries on aflatoxin-induced liver cancer in rats going to apply to
other types of cancer and other types of diseases in humans?

FOR MORE INFORMATION

We take great pride in the comprehensiveness and quality of the

China Study. To see why, read Appendix B on page 353. You'll find

a more complete discussion of the basic design and characteristics

of the study.

THE CHINESE DIETARY EXPERIENCE

Critical to the importance of the China Study was the nature of the diet
consumed in rural China. It was a rare opportunity to study health-re-
lated effects of a mostly plant-based diet.
In America, 15-16% of our total calories comes from protein and
upwards of 80% of this amount comes from animal-based foods. But in