
The China Study (ISBN 1-932100-38-5) is a 2005 book by T. Colin Campbell, Jacob Gould Schurman Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Biochemistry at Cornell University, and one of the directors of the China Project, and his son, Thomas M. Campbell II.The book examines the relationship between the consumption of animal products and illnesses such as cancers of the breast, prostate, and large bowel, diabetes, coronary heart disease, obesity, autoimmune disease, osteoporosis, degenerative brain disease, and macular degeneration. The "China study" referred to in the title is the China Project, a "survey of death rates for twelve different kinds of cancer for more than 2,400 counties and 880 million (96%) of their citizens" conducted jointly by Cornell University, Oxford University, and the Chinese Academy of Preventive Medicine over the course of twenty years.The authors introduce and explain the conclusions of scientific studies, which have correlated animal-based diets with disease. The authors conclude that diets high in protein, particularly animal protein (such as casein in bovine milk) and diets high in animal fat are strongly linked to diseases such as heart disease, cancer and Type 2 diabetes.The authors advocate a whole-foods, plant-based diet (a type of vegan diet which also restricts refined carbohydrates and highly processed foods) as a means to minimize and/or reverse the development of chronic disease. The authors also recommend that people take in adequate amounts of sunshine in order to maintain sufficient levels of Vitamin D. The authors criticize "low carb" diets (such as the Atkin's diet), which include restrictions on the percentage of calories derived from complex carbohydrates.