And if you did a little more research you'd find that very few subscribe to vegetarianism. Read Grain Brain, Wheat Belly and Why We Get Fat. They are real eye openers (along with your arteries)

Most people including doctors and scientist agree that man is an omnivore. It is his natural state. One problem with a vegetarian diet is that, as Dr Esselstyn's cohort Dr Ornish freely admits, it is very difficult to stay on. Man craves meat and fat and needs fat, including saturated fat in his diet to remain healthy.

I personally also have a problem with a doctor that recommends us eating pure gluten in the form of seitan when we are finding more and more people are gluten intolerant. Gluten has been shown to cause all kinds of medical problems, yet Dr Esselstyn recommends it as a meat alternative.

I don't tell anyone what to do. I simple relate what's been working for me. If I eat a lot of starchy carbs, I gain weight, a lot and very quickly. My blood pressure goes up and my triglycerides go through the roof. The only way that I had any success on Dr Esselstyn's program was to eat lettuce and celery. And Like Dr Ornish says, most people aren't going to do that.

There are more and more scientist, doctors, nutritionists and regular people accepting the low carb high fat way of thinking.

My observation is that as we've gone more and more to a low fat diet, we, as a society have gotten fatter and less healthy. In my opinion that is because the fat in our diet has been replaced by sugar which is toxic.

It's an interesting subject to think about. I agree that man is an omnivore. Since we live in a culture where meals mainly revolve around meat, and vegetable side-dishes are thought of as secondary in importance, it's no surprise that that most people agree. But I'm not so sure that it's our natural state.

If you go back to a time before weapons were developed, it would be difficult to catch most animals. We are not fast runners, compared to most animals. And if you did manage to catch one, what would you do without a knife to cut it up? Our teeth are not designed to tear into raw flesh and our jaws are not that powerful.

As man became more advanced and more successful at catching wild game, it was good because the main object was survival. They didn't have to worry about getting cancer, heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, etc., because they wouldn't live long enough to develop those degenerative diseases.

But now that it's been established that the maximum life span is 122+, the question is what's the best diet to carry us through our old age. Now our concern is: How can we avoid all the many degenerative diseases that cave men didn't have to worry about.

And it's up to each person to decide what their goal is: 1) Find a good middle of the road (moderation) diet. 2) Find a diet that's better than the Standard American Diet or 3) Find the best diet that will provide maximum health and longevity.

In my opinion, the Grain Brain lifestyle is better (#2 above) than the Standard American Diet, provided it is followed carefully and precisely as stated. Although, I doubt that many will follow it precisely as stated as it calls for all animal protein to be organic - grass-fed. I'm guessing that most people won't follow that rule for very long.

I choose to move beyond the "better" diet in search of the "best". And the best, in my opinion, doesn't include meat, dairy and eggs. The best diet would call for unmodified grains but would keep them to a minimum.

Barry
I would think this list is by number of Rx's written. Is there a top 9 for cost? I suspect that would look very different and be populated by non-generic heavily promoted drugs

You are right. I thought any list by cost would skew the results towards name Brands and not reflect true usage. I'm sure such a list exists, but I didn't look for it.