A Delicate Balance, the Consequences of Eating an Animal-Based Diet
The powerful film documentary, A Delicate Balance is for anyone concerned about their health and the environment. Three years in the making and three years in distribution, this film was created to raise awareness and help educate people on how human, animal, environmental and planetary health are negatively impacted by the consumption of meat and dairy.
The film features candid interviews with many of the world’s leading experts across several fields including medical and nutritional researchers, medical doctors, cattle ranchers, environmentalists, and politicians, and explores the consequences of an animal-based diet on the human body, human health, the animals and our environment.
A Delicate Balance was produced to stem the loss of unnecessary sickness, disease and death resulting from consuming an animal-based diet, and to reduce the suffering of animals, and empower people to make positive lifestyle changes to improve health and the health of our planet. The choices in your shopping basket and on your plate – are the most important choices you make everyday.
Film Length: 1 Hour / 25 Minutes
Originally Released: 2008, Australia
Quotes From the Film
Our human invincibility is an illusion. Our ill health is rapidly approaching catastrophic proportions.
Where we are in the medical profession right now is we are actually selling sickness to people.
The American Cancer Society reports today that 47% of men and 38% of women will develop cancer in their lifetime, and 1 in 4 will die prematurely. There’s hardly anyone in the world today that does not have a family member or friend dying of cancer.
According to the National Cancer Institute, the number of Americans expected to be diagnosed with cancer will double in the next 50 years. The time to pay attention and heed the warnings and educate ourselves — is right now.
The current epidemic of bad health today is that people are dying unnecessarily, so what is the reason for our ill health? Dr. Neal Barnard is the founder of Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM), and written nine books,and has over 40 publications about the causes of disease. He says, the consumption of animal products has killed more people in the U.S. in the last century—more than all of the auto accidents, all of the natural disasters and all of the wars combined.
Over the years, since 1839, protein tended to be associated with animal-based foods. Protein from animal-based foods was considered to have a higher quality, but that assumption has done more harm than any other discovery in the world, possibly.
Both animals and people have to eat a variety of plants to optimize health. The ideal diet is to eat a variety of vegetables, grains, nuts, seeds, beans, legumes.
The China Syndrome research study, was research that involved 6,500 people in China done during the 1990s. It represents the largest study in the world of its kind, and revealed consumption of animal protein either directly or indirectly contributes to increases in a wide variety of diseases including cancer, heart disease, diabetes and a whole host of auto-immune disorders.
When you cook meat—cancer causing molecules form. The higher the cooking temperature the more they form. Should you eat meat raw—no. Meat has bacteria. Meat is risky if you undercook and overcook it, both. Carcinogens are also found inside meat itself. Breast and colon cancer are known to be highly connected to eating meat.
Beef and the cancer risk. Colorectal cancer is highly associated with red meat, especially with processed meat. The amount of meat we should consume is—Zero.
Animal protein tends to increase cancer risk for multiple reasons.
When animal-based protein is eaten then damaged DNA turns our consumed animal protein into carcinogens. It is the actual protein contained in the flesh in animals that causes our cells to turn against us.
A low animal protein diet represses cancer formation and promotion. An animal-based diet progresses cancer promotion and progression. A plant-based diet does the opposite.
To turn on the cancer promoting effect all you have to do is eat small amounts of animal protein daily.
All animal protein plays a role in the creation, cause and promotion of cancer. But the worst is from dairy—Casein in dairy.
Howard Lyman, a former cattle farmer, says the first thing you should take out of your diet is dairy. Casein has been shown to stimulate the growth of cancer cells like pouring gasoline on a fire. It’s in cow, goat and sheep milk and products.
Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in the Western world, it represents about 20% of cancer, and it is directly caused by casein in dairy. Vegetarians who consume dairy have a higher incidence of IGF-1 (Insulin-Like Growth Factor-1), which causes cancer. Men with the highest intake of dairy have 4-times the risk of cancer, compared to low dairy consumers.
Do we have a cure for cancer? Absolutely! Food, the right kind – plant-based whole foods have a remarkable effect on being able to reduce the incidence of cancer.
The most powerful weapon against cancer is changing the foods you eat. Cholesterol from eating animal foods is associated with increasing heart disease and clogging arteries, but also with causing cancer. Blood cholesterol is associated with the creation of cancer as well as heart disease.
There is a link between breast cancer and consuming the fat in animal sources. Animal protein causes breast cancer.
Animal protein has a tendency to block Vitamin D toward becoming an active form of Vitamin D, which then can contribute to the formation of a number of cancers.
Osteoporosis is not helped by consuming high levels of calcium. Just the opposite. When calcium is consumed at high levels it works to minimize the calcium absorption in the intestinal tract.
The risk of dying of cancer has actually increased by 6% from the 1970s through the 1990s, despite the billions of dollars spent on cancer research. Dr. McDougall says it’s the rich-man’s diet, eating feast foods full of animal protein.
Animal protein and cholesterol cause heart disease. It affects 1 in 2 men and 1 in 3 women. It kills someone in the U.S. every 30 seconds. Women die 8 times more frequently of heart disease than cancer over her lifetime.
A pure vegetarian diet with no dairy or eggs effectively stops heart disease from progressing and prevents heart disease. The basic causation of heart disease is the Western diet of high animal foods.
50% of children now have fatty streaks in their arteries marking the beginning of heart disease.
A meat-based diet can make you impotent. If you block the arteries to men’s private parts, then they won’t work. It’s because men are eating unhealthy foods. Eating a healthy enough vegan diet over a long enough period of time, then you won’t need a prescription of Viagra.
There are 40 types of auto-immune disorders with the highest number including: diabetes, MS, rheumatoid arthritis, thyroid and kidney disease, and muscle inflammation. The damage done is not reversible; the only remedy is drugs that repress the entire immune system.
How does eating animal foods trigger our immune system to attack our cells? Animal proteins can enter our blood stream without being broken down, and can enter our system like foreign invaders and our tissue then attacks the invaders.
Finland has some of the highest milk consumption in the world, the result is Type-1 Diabetes and is almost 40% more common in Finland than Japan, where milk consumption is the lowest in the world.
A pure vegetarian, non-dairy diet can either slow down or reverse diabetes.
Diabetics who eat a low fat vegan diet do the best to reduce or eliminate their diabetes.
Multiple Sclerosis (MS) progression can be reduced and stopped on a low fat, plant-based diet.
Early stage MS patients consuming a meat-based diet often die of MS.
Milk, dairy products, low Vitamin D levels, high animal-based diets, combined with living in colder climates (MS) – contribute to the development of auto-immune diseases.
Animal milk and other dairy products cause osteoporosis. The consumption of milk and dairy causes the leaching of calcium from the bones. Studies have shown American women 50+ have the highest hip fracture rates and EU women even higher who drink high quantities of dairy. Over 40 research studies show that 70% of bone fracture rate is caused by the consumption of animal protein. There is an avalanche of evidence for this cause-effect.
Dr. Greger says, the reason we’re told to drink milk is for strong bones, based on dairy industry advertising. But the medical research studies all show that low consumption of dairy is not a risk factor for osteoporosis. The best calcium on the planet is all the dark green leafy vegetables—by far.
UCSF – high intake of vegetables and low intake of animal products have a very low incidence of bone fractures and osteoporosis.
Women on an animal protein diet lose 4x the amount of calcium. Animal protein leads to a condition that contributes to calcium loss.
Iron? We can definitely get adequate amounts of iron from plants.
We’re the only country on the planet that feeds baby cows adult cattle blood, which causes Mad Cow Disease—it’s banned everywhere else in the world but in the U.S. This infected tissue not only harms them, the baby calfs can barely walk, but it infects us and is toxic – and for people who eat them.
Fish – most people think that eating fish is healthy, especially for the heart. Fish and seafood contain a significant amount of fat and cholesterol. Fish harbor a lot of bacteria, especially at cold temperatures. Bacteria in the fish, release free radicals. Fish and shellfish can contain extremely high levels of chemicals and toxins.
Fish is not a boon to good health. Fish consumption does not improve heart health or heart disease.
Many people believe we have always eaten the flesh from animals. But this is only a recent phenomenon. Man has no sharp talons, curved beak, claws, has short intestines, no sharp teeth and canines are dull — means we are not carnivores. We are herbivores. We don’t have either acidic saliva nor large amounts of hydrochloric acids needed to digest meat, as true carnivores have. Our long digestive tract, which herbivores have, causes the putrification of meat and animal foods, so they rot in our intestines too long. Our canine teeth are only canine in name—they are not similar at all to canines of cats or other carnivore animals.
Deforestation – is the first step in animal agriculture. Native forests need to be cleared in order to create land for grazing animals. We feed the majority of grains we grow to animals and livestock, instead of to us humans. Now 60% of the world’s population is malnourished and starving, if we fed these grains that go to feed animals – we could eliminate starvation.
People don’t realize when they eat one chicken they are actually directly causing damage and destruction to the land, water, air and earth.
Fish farming – farmed fish must be fed wild fish to survive. So we’re actually catching even more wild fish in order to feed the farmed fish for human consumption. So we’re not preserving the oceans at all, it’s contrary to the notion of conservation of the oceans. We have so far wiped out 80% of the harmony in the oceans – the prawn fishery bi-catch is 10 times the amount of prawns. It’s the worst waste of all.
What You Can Do Today
- Stop eating all animal based foods, including all dairy products
- Learn to cook pure vegan meals and transition to a vegan 100% plant-based diet
- Plant organic gardens
- Drive a green car
- Recycle!
How You Can Help the Film & Spread the Message
Visit the film website
Buy A Delicate Balance DVD
Host a film screening
Read more about the Experts in the film
Connect with them on Facebook
Tweet about the film
Share the film, share their message, tell friends and family about A Delicate Balance
Film Credits
© Copyright on all content by: A Delicate Balance
Produced & Directed by: Aaron Scheibners
Producer: Robille Frederick
Edited by: Mark Everett Olson
Narrated by: Dr. Adrianna Scheibner
A film by Phoenix Philms
Featured in the Film
- Colin Campbell, PhD, Jacob Gould Schurman Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Biochemistry
- Neal Barnard, M.D., Associate Adjunct Professor, George Washington University
- Michael Greger, M.D.
- Caldwell B. Esselstyn Jr., M.D.
- Professor Thomas Lyons
- John McDougall, M.D.
- Noam Mohr, M.S.
- Howard Lyman
- Maneka Gandhi
- Professor Emeritus David Pimentel, Agriculture Life Sciences, Cornell University
- Peter Singer, Ira W. Decamp Professor of Bioethics
- Walter C. Willett, M.D.
- Fredrick John Stare, Professor of Epidemiology and Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health
