“Vegans Are The Longest Living People On The Planet”

The Dr. Pedro Silva ‘s internist, specialist in neurology and master ‘s degree in nutrition, has over 40 years of medical practice and has treated more than 300,000 people in Chile (where he was born in 1949) and in other countries, using integrative medicine methods .

From his Chilean mentor, Dr. Manuel Lezaeta, Pedro Silva learned that in dietetic education we find solutions to many health problems. Now it is he who teaches that maxim.

Interview with Dr. Pedro Silva

– What makes naturopathic medicine an irrefutable way to preserve human health?

—Naturopathic medicine, to play its role, must seek healing through a healthy life, in harmony with nature, counting on a diet that has to be natural.

That is to say, vegetarian, and if possible mainly raw food, because it makes no sense to crucify in the fire all the wonderful substances that vegetables contain and that nature finds it difficult to form. By cooking or boiling food in a pot, we destroy all that potential in a second.

—And what motivates so many people to go to naturopathic medicine?

—In general, the people who come to our consultations have already knocked on many doors of different medical specialties without having found results, and then they orient themselves, as an escape route, towards natural medicine.

Obviously, the naturopathic doctor must always be honest and state that results will be obtained to the extent that the person is able to adjust their lifestyle and use the vital agents of nature, food, plants, water, light, exercise, and even meditation, which is very important.

The person gains confidence because he is in front of a friendly doctor with whom he talks freely, who asks questions, who answers questions, who takes his time.

– The detractors of naturopathic medicine say that, if it works, it is purely as a placebo effect …

—The placebo effect is present in every medical act, it is trust, a tremendous medicine that is present in any medical activity, be it allopathic, naturopathic, homeopathic, Ayurvedic …

When the person perceives that they could do well, from that moment on, a powerful healing energy is already being generated without our having intervened.

But the goal of natural medicine is the conquest of health as biological normality, not symptomatic cure. That is to say, that the body in its entirety, with all its organs and functions, works well again.

The importance of diet, best vegan vegetarian

– Is it possible to educate people today, with so much advertising pressure, to follow a balanced diet?

—That is where the role of the doctor by vocation is, who is able to guide the patient’s will towards a curative feeding program.

But on the way crises occur, cases of intoxication: the patient assumes a type of vegetarian, raw food, with fresh fruits and vegetables, and begins to eliminate toxins – uric acid, calcium oxalate crystals -, eliminates them from the tissues , especially of joints and muscles, and crisis -positive- start that can be tremendously symptomatic.

If you have been well trained, you will cope with it with confidence, and you will see that your body detoxifies to be healthy.

—However, in the evolutionary process that made us human, the carnivorous diet released energy from the digestive system to the brain …

—There is a deep error, man never developed as a carnivorous being: he began his march as a frugivorous vegetarian, with an arboreal diet.

Our food is in trees, plants, seeds, which contain all the essential nutrients and principles for the body to be properly nourished. It began to eat meat when it began to move from its natural ecosystem to the extreme north. Until then he lived in harmony. Leaving that ecosystem, he began hunting and became a warrior, rather than a gentle being.

—I think you have a negative concept of the lifestyle of the northern countries. In contrast, the Mediterranean diet deserves your trust …

—The Mediterranean diet is a more suitable diet for this civilization than the one followed in many northern countries, which is pathological, centered on meat.

In Latin America thousands and thousands of hectares of Amazon rainforest are being destroyed to grow vegetables that are exported to the United States, not for the Americans to eat, but to feed the cattle and they eat the meat.

The Mediterranean diet is much more in harmony with the original diet, which was vegetarian. The people who live the longest on this planet are vegetarians, vegetarians, vegans.

Vitamin B12 and veganism, the eternal question

– Veganism is always blamed for not meeting the needs of vitamin B12, present especially in meat and seafood, but you are of the thesis that we can acquire it from our own bacterial flora …

– Higher animals are classified as herbivores, frugivores and carnivores. And few are omnivores: the bear or the pig.

The man, on the other hand, is clearly a frugivorous vegetarian, and Darwin classified him in that category. With their prehensile hands to grasp the fruits of the trees, teeth that have nothing to do with those of carnivores, a long intestine – two or three times longer than theirs – and a diet with a huge variety of foods , is a privileged one of nature.

Herbivores consume a great deal of vegetation to maintain their massive structures. They have a kind of associated microflora, which is a true biochemical laboratory, and in that long intestine they manufacture amino acids, vitamins, including B12. That is, large herbivores have no other source of B12 other than the intestinal flora, which produces it, and this also happens in man.

A study that we are completing indicates that the main source of B12 in vegans is bacterial synthesis, because this diet promotes a type of microflora made up of bifidobacteria and lactobacilli. This flora colonizes the last portion of the small intestine, where B12 is absorbed.

For vegans, the source of B12 is the acidophilic microflora, which makes it there, in the ileum, a sample of the wisdom of nature.

– Should the vegan commit himself to the protection of nature?

—The vegan, by definition, is an environmentalist, because it means that he aspires to full harmony with the environment, with nature, with oikos ; that is to say, the common home on this planet.

When one lives in harmony with nature, with its water sources, trees, supplies of fruits and seeds, one is living an ecological life.

—You have denounced the consumption of some foods for being responsible for the poor diet. For example, sugar. How do you teach yourself to give up something so palatable?

—The ideal is to eat fruits, which are wonderfully sweet, dried or dehydrated fruits: an apricot, a dried plum.

Fructose is much sweeter than glucose. In fact, there is great confusion: there are those who do not eat fruit because it is very sweet, but in reality its sugar content is very low, less than 10%, because the fruit is 85% water, but it has fiber and other nutrients. .

“And the milk?”

“I consider it dangerous.” It has been proven that milk – Dr. Campbell demonstrated in research that took him several decades of work – that casein, the protein from cow’s milk – and from other animals – is one of the main promoters of cancer, especially lymphomas and leukemias.

Harvard University itself removed milk from the food pyramid and replaced it with water.

—But milk had been considered a source of calcium and other nutrients …

—Cow’s milk is not a great source of calcium, it is rather poor.

There are countless vegetables richer in calcium than milk, such as oilseeds, which are also key to brain development: walnuts, almonds, hazelnuts … they not only provide minerals, calcium, phosphorus, but also essential fatty acids, such as omega-3, which allows extraordinary brain development.

– Bread has been considered basic in our culture, what role do you give it in your diet?

—The problem with bread is that wheat is the cereal most handled by the industry.

Bread made with other cereals, such as rye, oats, or use organically grown whole wheat should be consumed.

Beat cancer

—In their clinic they treat many cancer patients who arrive with a poor prognosis with immunotherapy and naturopathic medicine. What do you advise a person with cancer?

—To begin with, it is essential to adopt an alkaline, vegetarian diet, better even raw food, which excludes sugars, white flour, alcohol, saturated fats, etc.

Second, you should try to lead a positive life, have the conviction that you will be cured, that you will fight to heal.

And thirdly, you need to dedicate your time to systematic physical exercise. Exercise is key to allowing high oxygenation of tissues, and oxygen kills cancer cells, which are anaerobic. With these internal codes inserted in the mind and a greater contact with nature, it is possible to face the disease successfully.

The breakfast that Dr. Silva recommends to his patients, and that he himself has eaten for years, is a shake with seeds that includes 3 tablespoons of chia seeds, 2 of flax and 2 of sesame.

To prepare it, the seeds are activated by soaking them overnight in a covered bowl of cold water. This releases the mucilage and the next day the water is gelatinous.

It is put in the blender along with a cup of some sweet and sour fruit (apple, kiwi, banana, strawberries …), only one fruit at a time, and once blended, it is drunk or cooled briefly in the fridge.

Another recommended breakfast is whole grain oatmeal muesli. Two tablespoons are soaked overnight in a bowl of cold water. The next day honey, walnuts, almonds, raisins are added, if you want fresh fruit, and it can be blended or not.