Forks Over Knives Analysis

This year 76 million Baby Boomers in America are entering their fifties and sixties, yet this generation is not the only one suffering from diseases derived from an unhealthy diet. Advances in medicine have continued to preserve lives, but still researchers have not found a miracle that fully sustains the quality of everyday life. Overcrowding and neglect is the fate of patients seeking long-term medical attention if individuals continue to lack nutritional knowledge, and depend on the care of others to survive. Heart disease and diabetes type two are factors that lead to a life of dependency and make a significant contribution to the large population needing medical care. These specific diseases take years to develop and can last a life time. Acting to prevent them includes consuming an adequate diet and managing an active lifestyle. Prolonging physical health with the use of nutrition and ecercise can insure a longer, happier life as well as, alleviate the need for medical assistance for daily activities for those with diabetes and heart disease.

Ask any person on the street what is the one issue that consumes more than half of the nation and the answers will vary from cancer to the outcome of the 2016 presidential election. Most Americans are blind to the modern day plague that consumes even the nation's youth. What is this black death that promises health complications in the future, obesity affects more than two-thirds of American adults and one-third of American children. The term obesity is defined as the condition of being grossly fat or overweight. The “American diet” of processed foods is the root of the problem. The nation's health conditions have declined since the 1970’s and reached an all time low in the early 2000’s. The solution lies within the 18-27 year olds of the country

Every year, 1.2 million people are diagnosed with cancer and more than 500,000 people die from the disease. According to the National Cancer Institute, over 30% of these deaths can be attributed to diet. This means that the average person can greatly lower his risk of getting cancer simply by changing his diet. There is, of course, no guarantee against cancer, but the lifestyle choices that we make now can have a huge impact on our lives in the future. (http://www.aicr.org/expert1.htm)

Apart from healthcare issue, the country has adopted the fast-moving life style, which has pushed most of our citizens to succumb to obesity as a result of fast foods. In fact, a recent report by the UN has ranked the United States as the most obese country in the world. Parramore (2012) outlines that, “Obesity is currently being considered as a national crisis in the United States and that it contributes 100,000 to 400,000 deaths per year. Statistics at the CDC and Prevention in 2010 indicate that 35.7% of the American adult is obese.” Many input trends exist in the American society, “First and foremost, people are highly used to fried foods, sugary drinks, and processed meats among others. There is also the sedentary lifestyle that has been adopted by many,” (Huffington Post, 2013). In fact, most of us love relaxing without exercise and too much television watching. These are some of the factors that contribute to obesity. The result is health complications problems such as diabetes, stroke, and heart disease just to mention but a few. These affect the longevity of life.

Michael Pollan says in his argument that the western diet is chiefly to blame for a majority of health deceases, he says “the scientist who blame our health problems on defiances of these micronutrients are not the same scientist who see sugar-soaked diet leading to metabolic syndrome and from there to diabetes, heart deceases, and cancer” (421) Due to all this negative impact to our health Pollan says that the food industry needs new theories to better redesign processed food and the medical community to make new drugs to beget deceases.

Positing that most of our major health issues, including heart disease, cancer and diabetes, can be prevented (and even in some cases reversed) by following a vegetables-and-whole-grains diet, this dense documentary would rather inform than entertain. Its hale heroes are the nutritional scientist T. Colin Campbell and the surgeon Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn Jr., whose combined decades of research into the harmful effects of animal proteins are summarized, along with an extensive history of our worldwide dietary decline.

Essential's work, as well as that of Dr. Colin Campbell, whose studies of the primarily vegetable-based diets in China show they have fewer diseases such as cancer. That is the type of disease that skyrockets when patients begin eating huge amounts of red meat. (It is true that, among other things, paleontologists have shown that men tend to be meat-eaters, however, when you look at the history of man and meat, you begin to see a corollary between the cattle industry's use of performance-enhancing drugs such as steroids to get their products to market faster and, in the meantime, the customer, faces and eats many useless drugs, for most people. There are some people who do need them, but they are a very rare minority and are monitored by physicians.)

Pollan believes that Western diet is the primary cause of many of the different ailments that are impacting contemporary society. A few of the most notable include: heart disease, high blood pressure and diabetes. This is because there is no vested interest in supporting primary care and preventive medicine. As the health care industry wants to create drugs that can treat these conditions. Yet, they do not deal with the root causes of the problem. Instead, they allow the individual to engage in a pattern of destructive lifestyle choices. This increases the profit margins for everyone inside the health care industry by taking this approach. (Pollan)

“Forks Over Knives”The documentary “Forks Over Knives” discussed the work of two researchers thatexamined the connection between a plant-based diet and a significant improvement in overallhealth. More specifically, the researchers put food to the test and not just any foods but a Wholefood, plant-based diet instead of animal-based foods. Campbell and Esselstyn served as pioneersfor their research on the claim that most ailments that afflict us today such as Cardiovascularissues, diabetes, cancer can be reversed or controlled by the way we eat. Dr. T. Colin Campbellis a Nutrition scientist and brought up an interesting observation which was that wealthierchildren who consumed higher amounts of animal-based foods were more prone to becoming illor diagnosed with liver cancer. In addition, Dr. Esselstyn, a Top surgeon and elite healthcareprovider, stated that most of the diseases that he treats are not as common in other parts of theworld where the diet is different.

The Effectiveness of Forks Over Knives In his documentary Forks Over Knives, Lee Fulkerson sheds a light on the main cause to heart diseases and diabetes through the help of Dr. Colin Campbell and Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn who have spent many years researching the negative effects of consuming refined, processed, and animal based foods. Fulkerson also seeks guidance from Dr. Lederman and Dr. Pulde to show, through example, what a whole food, plant-based diet can do from people who are struck with these life-threatening diseases as well as someone, like Fulkerson, who lives life without any major diseases but can still benefit greatly from the diet switch. With the use of statistics, research and science, real-life examples, and visual aids Fulkerson

In the ted talk “Teach every child about food”, speaker Jamie Oliver, talks about the unhealthy eating habits of children all across America. He comes straight out by telling us the present generation of kids are implemented with 10 years of less life expectancy than their parents. The main focus of the talk is directed towards bad health and how it leads to the state of obesity, which is considered a global issue. Oliver gives a solid statement regarding his talk, “ Obesity costs you Americans 10 percent of your health-care bills, 150 billion dollars a year.” Furthermore, he visualizes his proof with a chart stating heart disease to be the number one cause of deaths in America, which is nearly 30 percent. To wrap up his presentation, Oliver makes a final statement that he envisions a food revolt, in his own words “ to educate every child about food and to inspire families to cook at home again.

Forks Over Knives is a documentary dedicated to spreading knowledge of the effectiveness of a whole-foods, plant-based diet. It was directed by Lee Fulkerson, produced by John Corry, and distributed by Virgil Films and Entertainment. The documentary was released May 6, 2011, a time ridden with diabetes and heart disease. America in 2010 had seen over 20 million cases of diabetes. Over 600,000 people died of heart disease. America was in crisis mode – desperate for a solution to keep residents healthy and alive. Fulkerson believed he had found that solution – a diet that cut out animal products and heavily processed foods. He wrote this film with the intention of spreading that diet. Forks Over Knives is targeted towards people who have

Currently, in our society, we live in a world of fast food, grocery stores, and fast paced convenience. This has grown to the point of a dependency on prepackaged goods. With this trend, obesity, heart disease, and diabetes has become a growing epidemic. Since it has been so many generations of depending on fast food, then suffering from health problems when we reach our golden years has become a normal part of life. Unfortunately, we have reached a turning point in our life where they age to develop numerous health problems has become even younger. Fortunately, with our technology, we are able to pin-point to the cause of this problem; our diet, unlike in the times of the Salem witch hunts. Due to archaeological research we were able to conclude

When it comes to America and death, heart failure invites the Grim Reaper even more than cancer. Heart disease is the number one leading cause of death in America, leaving a yearly toll of 720,000 heart attacks and 600,000 deaths. To help prevent heart failure, one should eat a diet low in total fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, and sodium. Yet, is the toll of heart failure truly a surprise after looking at all of what America is really eating? Life in America is all about the delicious junk food, whether or not it is slowly killing the consumer. This is why people should limit the junk food that they consume; it is simply a death sentence to the body, mind, environment and economy.

Growing up in the United States, there are many things that I had just accepted as the norm. Eating a diet heavy in meat and dairy are staples in the diet of the average American that those who differ are considered strange. Interestingly, the United States is also referred to as one of the unhealthiest nations in the world. How could we be so unhealthy, when we are such a developed country that has access to the best medical care and information. The documentary “Forks Over Knives” focuses on exactly this point. It claims that there is a fundamental problem with the diet of Americans, particularly our heavy consumption of meat and dairy. This documentary asserts that the cure for all of our health related problems is to switch to a whole