Download The Right Price

Written by Sally Fallon
Interpreting the Work of Dr. Weston A. Price
"I am deeply interested not only in your health individually
but in the efficiency and welfare of your families. It is particularly important in these
times of industrial and financial stress, that children shall not suffer defects which may
mark and handicap them for their entire life." So wrote Dr. Weston A. Price, author of
Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, the classic work on the relation of diet to disease,
to his nieces and nephews in the year 1934, signing the letter, "Lovingly, Uncle Weston."
"Fortunately, an adequately defensive nutritional program can be provided without much
expense and indeed often more cheaply than the currently selected foods. There will be
no necessity for any child of yours to develop dental caries or tooth decay if the simple
procedures that I am outlining shall be adequately carried out. . .
"There are two ways in which I could make suggestions relative to the mineral and
vitamin problem in the selection of food, the one on the basis of detailing a special menu
for each day, which is very unsatisfactory, and the other would be in the form of general
principles which should control and guide you in selectng the foods which will meet the
body's daily needs. I would suggest the latter and the following is an outline of the
principles involved."1
This letter, which resides in the archives of the Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation,
provides us with a look at the principles that motivated Dr. Price and neatly summarizes
his philosophy. His motivation was quite simply the unselfish desire for all peoples to
obtain their natural birthright of good health; and the principle that guided him
throughout his career--a principle most people have difficulty comprehending, even
today--was that only a good diet, one that supplied the body with an abundance of
nutrients, can confer good health, epitomized by broad facial development during the
growing years and freedom from dental decay throughout life. What Price provided was
the general principles of a healthy diet and a list of the richest sources of fat-soluble
vitamins, rather than special menus and elaborate plans. The practical application-menus, plans, sources and how-to's--was a task left to those who followed in his
footsteps.
NUTRIENT DENSE FOOD
"We have a sense of hunger which expresses itself as appetite and we eat until this is
satisfied, but this only applies to that part of our food which produces power and heat.
We have almost no sense of hunger for the minerals and other chemicals and vitamins
that are needed for building new and repairing old tissues."2 Price may not have been able
to pinpoint the exact nutrients needed for various individual health conditions, nor all the
nutrients contained in various foods, but he understood this fundamental law of nutrition,
that without provision of the nutrients we need, no body can be built strong and resistant
and no lasting healing can take place.
Instead of nourishing food, modern medicine gives drugs, the chief modus operandi of
which is to sequester nutrients from one part of the body and carry them to the part that is
diseased or injured. This is akin to robbing Peter to pay Paul, rather than simply making
sure that Paul has all the nutritional wealth he requires. A perfect example is synthetic
adrenal cortex extract, such as Prednisone, which can provide what seems like miraculous
relief--immediate "healing"--of conditions as diverse as sports injuries, colitis and
psoriasis. Drugs like prednisone work by stimulating cells throughout the body to give up
cholesterol and other nutrients, and then carrying them to the site of injury. The problem
is that you can only rob Peter for so long before he becomes bankrupt; then either the
injury returns or a new problem breaks out somewhere else. And once the cells have
become depleted, drugs like Prednisone no longer work. Continuing medication is akin to
whipping a dead horse.
Price explained the situation in clear scientific terms: "Most people need from 2000 to
3000 calories a day, according to the nature of their physical activities. Similarly, we
need two grams of phosphorus and one and one-half grams of calcium a day in our food
in order to keep up the body's daily requirements. Our problem, then, is to get enough of
the minerals and vitamins without exceeding our limit in calories. . .
"It is not wise to fill the limited space with foods that are not doing our bodies any
particular good. You would be interested to know that while you would have to eat 7 1/2
pounds of potatoes or 11 pounds of beets or 9 1/2 pounds of carrots to get the daily
phosphorus requirement, all of which would provide too high a number of calories, you
would obtain as much phosphorus from 1 pound of lentils. This would also provide the
calcium. You would also supply the entire day's requirement of minerals from 0.8 pounds
of fish or 0.6 pounds of cheese. . . .3
"There is a misapprehension regarding the value of fruits as food. Of course fruits are
desireable as an adjunct, but most of them are very low in minerals. You would for
example, have to eat 37 pounds of apples a day or 26 pounds of oranges to get your two
grams phosphorus and when these fruits are sweetened into jams or jellies, you would
have to eat 32 pounds of orange marmalade a day, which would provide 33,000 calories;
few of us could take care of more than 3000 calories. . . it would take three large loaves
of white bread a day to provide our requirements for phosphorus, but this would give us
10,000 calories, an amount which it would be physically impossible to utilize. Eating this
with skimmed milk would be one of the surest way to produce dental caries and in some
cases might even produce convulsions."4
REMEMBER THE ACTIVATORS!
Thus, as Price perceived so clearly, the only way for humans, with their limited ability to
take in food, to properly nourish themselves is to eat mostly nutrient-dense foods; and the
emerging science of biochemistry confirmed the dietary habits of primitive peoples by
revealing just which foods best meet these requirements--all of them animal foods, and
not necessarily steak or chicken but seafood, and milk products and organ meats from
animals raised on mineral-rich soil. These were the very foods valued so highly by the
peoples Price studied.
While noting that the diets of primitive peoples differed in their particulars--from the
mostly animal diet of the Alaskan Eskimos to the tropical diets of South Sea Islanders-Price took pains to point out the common underlying characteristics of these diets,
namely the high level of minerals and the very high level of fat-soluble activators. By
activators, he was referring to vitamins A and D, and what he called Activator X (now
believed to be Vitamin K2), found only in certain sea foods such as shellfish, fish livers
and fish eggs, in butterfat and organ meats from animals eating rapidly growing green
grass, and in lesser amounts in eggs from pastured chickens and the fat of certain animals
such as the guinea pig.
"An essential characteristic of the successful dietary programs of primitive races has been
found to relate to a liberal source of the fat-soluble activator group,"9 wrote Price. He
used the term activator because these fat-soluble nutrients act as catalysts for mineral
absorption. "A question arises as to the efficiency of the human body in removing all of
the minerals from the ingested foods. Extensive laboratory determinations have shown
that most people cannot absorb more than half of the calcium and phosphorus from the
foods eaten. The amounts utilized depend directly on the presence of other substances,
particularly fat-soluble vitamins.
"It is at this point probably that the greatest breakdown in our modern diet takes place,
namely, in the ingestion and utilization of adequate amount of the special activating
substances, including the vitamins needed for rendering the minerals in the food available
to the human system.
"It is possible to starve for minerals that are abundant in the foods eaten because they
cannot be utilized without an adequate quantity of the fat-soluble activators."10 This is the
crux of Dr. Price's teachings--that good health is impossible without the activators found
in a small list of carefully selected animal foods. Many health writers and practitioners
use his name, but few understand this basic principle.
ACTIVATOR X (Vitamin K2)
After Weston Price retired, he added an additional chapter to Nutrition and Physical
Degeneration in which he described "a new, vitamin-like activator," which he termed
Activator X, also sometimes called the Price Factor. According to Price:
a. it plays an essential role in the maximum utilization of bodybuilding minerals and
tissue components;
b. its presence can be demonstrated readily in the butterfat of milk of mammals, the
eggs of fishes and the organs and fats of animals;
c. it has been found in highest concentration in the milk of several species, varying
with the nutrition of the animal;
d. it is synthesized by the mammary glands and plays an important role in infant
growth and also in reproduction.11
Price found the X Factor in butter from cows eating rapidly growing green grass, fish
eggs, some (but not all) samples of cod liver oil and certain animal fats and organ meats.
The presence of X Factor in some sea foods can be explained by the fact that fish
consume plankton, the basic rapidly growing and dividing unicellular food of the sea. It
seems that animals form the X Factor from a substance uniquely present in young,
rapidly growing plants and store it in certain fatty tissues.
Deep yellow color in butter is a clue to the presence of the X Factor. Price found it in
organ meats, fish eggs, and some samples of cod liver oil. Seal oil was also found to be a
potent source, as was reindeer meat. Price was able to concentrate the X Factor in highvitamin butter oil, produced by a low-temperature centrifugal process applied to yellow
butter from cows eating rapidly growing green grass.
Price first became aware of the presence of the activator while performing a chemical test
called the Yoder test for determining vitamin D values. This suggests that Activator X is
similar to vitamin D, though the nature of this similarity is unclear. We can only conclude
that the substance probably contains a ring structure and has hormone-like activity.
After Price's death, a number of researchers commented on the X Factor and put forth
theories as to what it actually is, some of which widely miss the mark. For example,
Jeffrey Bland proposed that the X Factor was the omega-3 fatty acid EPA, but this cannot
be the case, first because EPA does not have a ring-like structure, and second because
EPA is present in all cod liver oil, whereas Price found the X Factor only in some
samples of cod liver oil. A company called Zenith Advanced Health Systems once sold a
formula that combined cod liver oil and flaxseed oil, claiming that the X Factor was an
unsaturated fatty acid (sometimes called vitamin F) found in flaxseed oil.
A letter from the Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation archives suggests that Activator X
is similar to or derived from "a special kind of oxygen-containing heterocyclic ring"
called 6-methoxybenzoaxazolinone which "acts as a sex-stimulant in voles."
Other researchers have suggested that the X factor is similar to or derived from vitamin
K, a nutrient involved in bone formation. Very preliminary work referring to
"Unidentified Growth Factors in Grass" or the "grass juice factor" may yield clues to the
precursors of the X Factor. Japanese researchers have identified a new vitamin called
Pyrrolo Quinoline Quinon (PQQ), similar to co-enzyme Q10, as an important nutrient
present in green plants and fermented food.
Green Pasture Dairy, producers of high-vitamin butter oil, is currently testing samples of
butter oil, cod liver oil and seal oil using Price's chemical test. The X Factor shows up in
these foods, but we have yet to identify its chemical formula. We'll keep you posted as
new findings emerge.
UPDATE: Price's X-Factor is most likely vitamin K2. See Chris Masterjohn's article for
full details: "On the Trail of the Elusive X-Factor: A Sixty-Two-Year-Old Mystery
Finally Solved"
THE VEGETARIANS
One of the purposes of Price's expedition to the South Seas was to find, if possible "plants
or fruits which together, without the use of animal products, were capable of providing all
of the requirements of the body for growth and for maintenance of good health and a high
state of physical efficiency." 12 What he found was a population that put great value on
animal foods--wild pig and seafood--even groups living inland on some of the larger
islands. Even the agricultural tribes in Africa consumed insects and small fish--and these
groups were not as robust as the tribes that hunted, fished or kept herds.
"It is significant," said Price, "that I have as yet found no group that was building and
maintaining good bodies exclusively on plant foods. A number of groups are endeavoring
to do so with marked evidence of failure."13
Yet, proponents of vegetarianism do not hesitate to invoke the name of Weston Price.
One of the earliest was Alex Jack, a prolific writer on the virtues of macrobiotics. In Let
Food Be Thy Medicine, Jack cites Weston Price in support of a diet that omits "beef,
whole milk and eggs" in favor of lowfat, high-fiber vegetarian foods.14 In his description
of Price's work, he makes no mention of the emphasis that Price puts on animal foods.
Katherine Alexander describes Price's work in her book Get a Life --Detoxification Made
Easy but then goes on to recommend a lowfat "detoxification" diet based on plant-source
protein and skimmed milk, along with a great amount of green juices--something never
recommended by Price. She makes no mention of the fat-soluble activators, so necessary
for mineral metabolism and for the function of the family of detoxification enzymes.15
Paul Saul, editor of the Doctor Yourself Newsletter claims that "researchers such as. . . .
Dr. Weston Price. . . have repeatedly shown that ‘primitive' peoples or laboratory animals
eating a natural, nearly vegetarian diet simply do not have serious diseases."16 Dr. Saul
cites Cornell University's China study for this claim, while at the same time providing a
link to the Weston A. Price Foundation's website.
Alive Publishing in Canada, in what is otherwise a fairly accurate description of Price's
research, states that Weston Price "found that the ancient cultures that displayed
remarkable longevity ate predominately vegetable-source foods."17
POLITICALLY CORRECT
Many commentators have attempted to weld Price's work to political correctness. An
example is The Appetites of Man: An Invitation to Better Nutrition from Nine Healthier
Societies, published 1978.18 The authors describe the diets of nine traditional peoples,
naming foods like raw camel, cow and goat milk products, coconut and organ meats. But
then they caution against saturated fat from coconut oil and state that the healthiest fats
come from nuts, seeds and vegetable oils. According to the authors, primitives ate "lean
game" but preferred fish with its "lower fat and more complete protein than meat."
WESTON PRICE ON COD LIVER OIL
Weston Price prescribed cod liver oil to his patients but he also warned against giving too
much. "There are two great sources of fat soluble food activators, namely the pastures of
the sea and those of the land. Many people have the opinion that fish oil, particularly cod
liver oil, would be a complete substitute for the fat soluble vitamins of land plant origin
[that is, of land animals that eat plants]. In my clinical and technical investigations of the
activators for inducing mineral metabolism, I have continually found evidence indicating
that cod liver oil contains products that are very seriously toxic to humans and other land
animals and can do much harm when given in large doses, even only as large as
frequently advocated."20
Price gave cod liver oil along with grass-fed butter, or high-vitamin butter oil, in the
context of an improved diet, usually one that included calcium-rich whole milk. He cites
a study in which cod liver oil given by itself to pregnant mothers caused slight
calcification of the placenta and slight fontanelle closure (slight in comparison with the
calcifying effects of synthetic vitamin D) whereas cod liver oil given with calcium had no
detrimental effects. Cod liver oil is a wonderful source of vitamins A and D but cannot be
expected to provide much benefit when given in the context of a diet of processed,
devitalized foods. It is also important to note that Price gave high-vitamin cod liver oil,
which provided liberal amounts of A and D without an overdose of unsaturated fatty
acids.
METABOLIC TYPING
An egregious example of getting Price wrong can be found in The Metabolic Typing Diet
by William Wolcott and Trish Fahey.19 From the foreword by Etienne Callebout, MD, we
learn: "Then in the mid-1980s I heard about a group of scientists and clinicians in the
United Sates who had, over a period of years, evolved a unique way of addressing this
problem, with a system they called metabolic typing. Researchers such as William
Kelley, George Atson, and Roger Williams had built upon the work of scientists and
clinicians of an earlier era: men like Weston Price, Francis Pottenger, and Royal Lee.
What they all shared was a profound interest in a concept that Williams described as
"biochemical individuality," or the idea that no two individuals are alike on a biochemical
or physiological level [emphasis added]."
The fact is that Weston Price did not express particular interest in biochemical
individuality; rather, he consistently stressed the fact that, in spite of the differences in
actual foods eaten by primitive peoples, the intake of nutrients was remarkably similar,
from northern climates to the tropics.
To continue: "As far back as the 1930s, Weston Price embarked on extraordinary
anthropological expeditions to remote corners of the globe and uncovered the link
between modern eating habits and the incidence of chronic degenerative illness. He also
discovered that there is no such thing as a standard ‘healthy diet.' Due to tremendous
variations in climate, indigenous food supplies, environmental conditions and the
principles of evolution, adpatation, and heredity, different cultural and ethnic groups,
over a period of many centuries, developed distinctly different kinds of dietary
requirements . . ."
Note how the observed differences in foods eaten has morphed into "distinctly different
kinds of dietary requirements," which is a complete contradiction of Price's message.
Then from the preface by the author: "There is no such thing as a healthy diet, and there
never has been. There's nothing intrinsically healthy or unhealthy about any given food."
This statement completely turns the work of Weston Price on its head. Price took great
pains to point out the fact that the difference between healthy and unhealthy food is one
of nutrient density.
In Chapter 1 the authors continue their fraudulent summation: "The most noteworthy
observer of the declining health of primitive cultures was Dr. Weston Price, a remarkable
medical reseacher who began his career as a dentist in Ohio in the early part of the
twentieth century [is]. . . . The Myth of the Universal Diet" This statement is
accompanied by a page of photographs from Nutrition and Physical Degeneration.
To continue: "For example, many people who currently inhabit tropical or equatorial
regions have a strong hereditary need for diets high in carbohydrates such as vegetables
and fruits and grains and legumes. These foods provide the kind of body fuel that is most
compatible with the unique body chemistry of people who are genetically programed to
lead active lifestyles in warm and humid regions of the world. Their systems are simply
not designed to process or utilize large quantities of animal protein and fat." No mention
here of coconut and pork, fatty components of South Sea diets specifically mentioned by
Dr. Price.
" . . . Of course, it's entirely possible that your native dietary needs are both clearly
defined and not too hard to fulfill. For instance, maybe both your parents come from a
purebred Greek lineage, in which case you'd have little trouble accessing fish, pasta,
garlic, olive oil, salads, beans, and wine--roughly the kinds of foods that kept your
ancestors healthy and fit. Similarly, if you're of Asian extraction, you'd likely do well
with rice and sea vegetables and soy [emphasis added]."
What follows is a recommendation of one of three different diets depending on what a
short self-administered quiz reveals to be your metabolic type. All of the diets are
woefully low in fat--the high-carb diet diet allows 15 percent (presumably of calories) fat,
the mixed diet allows 20 percent fat and the protein diet allows 30 percent fat. The diet
that comes closest to that of Price's primitives is the protein diet, which emphasizes organ
meats, fish eggs, shell fish and fatty fish. Yet the primitives who ate this type of diet also
consumed very high levels of fat--often up to 80 percent of calories. The authors give
passing reference to the fat-soluble vitamins but insist--without any references--that
vitamin A is bad for certain types and vitamin D is bad for other types.
Price's research demonstrated that the nutritional requirements needed for good health are
remarkably consistent--just much higher than admitted by most commentators. The
universal need for high levels of nutrients means that in fact, our dietary requirements can
be very difficult to fulfill, and that great wisdom and care is needed in the production and
choice of our food--from the farm to the kitchen table. These high requirements are very
unlikely to be fulfilled with any of diets as described in The Metabolic Typing Diet.
WHAT ABOUT SYNTHETIC A AND D?
Synthetic vitamin D or vitamin D2, produced by irradiating ergosterol (a plant-based
sterol) from yeasts with ultra-violet light, was available in Dr. Price's day and often given
as drops in a preparation called viosterol. In expressing his concerns about the use of this
synthetic preparation, Price refers to a study by Dr. Wayne Brehm published in the Ohio
State Medical Journal.21 Brehm studied the effect of various courses of vitamin D
treatment on 540 obstetrical cases in two Columbus, Ohio hospitals. During pregnancy,
Group 1 received calcium and synthetic vitamin D, Group 2 received calcium alone;
Group 3 received synthetic vitamin D alone, Group 4 received calcium and cod liver oil,
Group 5 received cod liver oil alone and Group 6 had no supplementation. Those
receiving synthetic vitamin D alone had moderate to marked placental calcification and
moderate closure of the fontanelle (a sign of abnormal calcification). Those receiving
synthetic vitamin D plus calcium had extensive calcification in the placenta, marked
closure of the fontanelle and marked calcification in the kidneys. In other words, the
synthetic vitamin D had the opposite effect of natural vitamin D, causing calcification of
the soft tissues rather than the bones.
Vitamin D3 is said to be "natural" vitamin D because it is manufactured by the irradiation
of cholesterol (an animal-based sterol) with ultra-violet light. Unlike D2, D3 is not toxic,
but it is not the same as vitamin D from food either. Price cites a study published in the
Journal of the American Medical Association, 1938, which describes eight distinct
factors in vitamin D and refers to information indicating the presence of at least twelve.22
"Clearly," he writes, "it is not possible to undertake to provide an adequate nutrition
simply by reinforcing the diet with a few synthetic products which are known to represent
certain of these nutritional factors."23
As for vitamin A, although Price did not refer to the synthetic form, called retinol, we
know that as with vitamin D, vitamin A exists in food as a combination of isomers. Use
of retinol, which is added to many processed foods, is associated with birth defects, and
possibly also with bone problems, while use of natural vitamin A in cod liver oil is
associated with protection against birth defects and strong, healthy bones.
THE ACID-ALKALINE THEORY
Price was dismissive of certain dietary theories that had become popular in his day. One
concerned the use of mostly alkaline foods (fruits and vegetables) instead of acid foods
(meat and whole grains) as a way to prevent dental caries. This theory was suggested by a
Dr. Martha Jones in a paper entitled " Our Changing Concept of an Adequate Diet in
Relation to Dental Disease," and has appeared in many forms thereafter, even raising its
hoary head in health books today.
Said Price: "An important source of misapprehension is the literature and teachings of
faddists. Such, for example, is the misapprehension of many people that they must use
only alkaline producing foods and that a great danger is associated with the use of acid
producing foods. In the primitive races I have found practically no difference between the
acid balance meat diet of the isolated Eskimos of the far north and the less acid vegetable
and milk diet of other groups as efficient factors in the control of caries. . . our bodies
have a mechanism for maintaining proper acid and alkali balance in the blood and this
varies through only a very narrow limit whether the balance of the total food eaten is acid
or alkaline."24 What is important for the prevention of tooth decay--and Price stresses this
point over and over again--is adequate minerals and fat-soluble vitamins, whether from
animal foods, seafood or dairy products, and the absence of refined foods, especialy
white flour and sweeteners.
Price actually published a paper on this subject, "Acid-Base Balance of Diets Which
Produce Immunity to Dental Caries Among the South Sea Islanders and Other Primitive
Races,"25 in which he compares the amount of acid ash and alkaline ash minerals in the
diets of primitive Swiss, Gaellics, Eskimos, native Americans and South Sea Islanders. In
all but the South Sea diet, acid ash foods predominated. But the important point is that the
overall mineral content in every primitive diet was at least four times, and sometimes
more than ten times, higher than the mineral content in the modernized diet.
Price made it clear that the aklaline diet idea had caused much suffering: "It is my belief
that much harm has been done through the misconception that acidity and alkalinity were
something apart from minerals and other elements. . . An illustration of this is the
following case: A girl was brought for assistance and study who still had her childhood
face at sixteen years of age. There had been marked delay in physical develoment and
function other than this growth factor. I was advised that the nutrition of this child had
been very largely guided by the literature of the Defensive Diet League which, as one of
its principal premises, has urged the keeping down of the acid-producing foods."26
Having analyzed the diets of the various groups, Price noted, "It is of particular
significance that when all of the foods of these various primitive groups are reduced to
their chemical and activator content they are found to be relatively equivalent. This
strongly indicates the direction in which the dental profession can profitably move in the
matter of the prevention of decay."27 Unfortunately, the majority of the dental profession
today has no inkling of this fundamental principle.
FOOD COMBINING
Another misconception becoming popular in Price's day was the theory of food
combining, namely, that proteins and carbohydrates should never be eaten together. An
early advocate was Henry Ford; more recently the notion was popularized in the bestselling Fit for Life, by Harvey and Marilyn Diamond. Said Price: "I have seldom found
anywhere in the world such a high percentage of physical excellence with high immunity
to our modern degenerative disease as among these people of the South Sea Islands.
Their diet practically every day consisted of eating the proteins from the animal life of
the sea with the carbohydrates of their land vegetables, many of which were very rich in
starch. This was equally true of the Gallics in the Outer Hebrides, living almost entirely
on oats and sea foods."28
LOW-CARB?
Another common misconception about the diet Price recommended is that it was a lowcarb diet. Price frequently warned against high-carbohydrate refined foods such as sugar
and white flour, but he did not advise his patients to avoid high-carb foods like fruits,
whole grains or root vegetables. These he considered an important adjunct to the diet. He
was particularly enamored of poi, the fermented taro preparation of the South Sea
Islanders.
"There is no objection to having the children fill up on bulky foods such as potatoes and
vegetables, if the daily mineral and vitamin requirements have been satisfied first,"29 he
advised his nieces and nephews.
Nevertheless, it is probably easier for westerners to obtain high levels of nutrients from a
diet in which carbs are minimized. But that does not mean one should overdo on protein.
Price did not advocate a high-protein diet. "The protein requirement can be provided each
day in one egg or a piece of meat equivalent to the bulk of one egg a day,"30 was his
Depression-era advice. The best protein foods, according to Price, are nutrient-dense
organ meats, shellfish and small oily fish such as anchovies or sardines, eaten with the
bones. In addition, he recommended one quart of whole milk per day for children, to
ensure adequate minerals and fat-soluble activators.
DENTAL DEFORMITIES
One of the most interesting aspects of Weston Price's studies is the light he sheds on the
causes of dental deformities-- narrow jaws, crowded teeth, overbites and underbites--a
condition he referred to as the "underdevelopment of the middle third of the face." Price
convincingly argued that this lack of development was nutritional in origin, akin to
building a house with substandard building materials. Without proper nutrients in the
form of minerals and fat-soluble activators--the bricks and mortar of human
biochemistry--the facial bones cannot be built strongly enough to support broad facial
structure. His findings have yet to be accepted in the mainstream. Most orthodontists tell
their patients that crowded teeth are "just genetic" or due to thumbsucking.
The theory prevalent in Price's day to explain the sudden appearance of crooked teeth in
populations exposed to western influence was race mixing, resulting in a "degenerated"
type of facial structure. Price premptorily--and bravely, considering the attitudes of his
day--dismisses this notion. "The blending of different racial stocks produces typical
characteristics of either or both ancestral patterns. When, however, marked divergences
appear without mixing of racial stocks, the result is not due to heredity, but occurs in
spite of heredity."32 He then follows with numerous examples of facial narrowing in
offspring of parents of the same race, and excellent facial structure in offsping of parents
of different races who maintained a traditional diet.
Another theory, popular with many pioneers in orthodontics in the early 1900s and
resurrected by R. Corrucinni of the University of Illinois at Chicago, is called the
"Disuse" theory, namely that malocclusions are due to changes in chewing habits.33
Professor Carl Johnson, DDS, PhD, attributes this theory to Weston Price: "Price
attributed both to dietary change and to changes in chewing habits." This statement is, of
course, incorrect, as anyone who has read his entire book would know. Price attributed
the change in facial structure entirely to dietary changes. According to Johnson, the
attribution of tooth decay to lack of trace elements in the diet "is no longer mainstream"
but the Disuse theory is"good science because it can be tested." He then cites several
studies in which malocclusions increased in children after processed food was introduced
to a community. The refined carbohydrate foods caused deformities, he asserts, not
because they were lacking in nutrients, but because they were "soft" and "sticky,"
resulting in underuse of the lower jaw.
Primitive peoples certainly had strong jaws, which allowed them to eat hard and grisly
food, but to attribute this strength simply to greater exercise ignores much contradictory
evidence. Facial narrowing can be detected in babies at birth, before they have ever
chewed anything. And, as Price pointed out, facial narrowing always accompanies
narrowing of other structures, such as the pelvic opening, which no tortured logic can
associate with chewing habits. It's not even clear that native diets are more difficult to
chew. The South Sea Islanders consumed mostly seafood and poi--a quintessentially soft
and sticky high-carbohydrate food.
THE RAW FOODISTS
The all-raw folks also claim Dr. Price. Yet, Price never advocated an all-raw diet. He
described the use of cooked foods in every culture he visited and specifically
recommended that grains and most vegetables be cooked. His advice to his nieces and
nephews: "The cooked vegetables are better since raw vegetables are usually too bulky to
allow very much mineral to be obtained from them."31 He never recommended raw
vegetable juices, and most certainly not as a major part of the diet.
It is logical to deduce from Price's writings that the decision of whether or not to cook a
certain food should be made on the basis of whether or not heat treatment liberates
nutrients or inhibits their availability. Pasteurization greatly reduces the mineral
availabilty of milk, so milk and milk products should be consumed raw. Cooking
destroys vitamin C in many fruits, so these are best eaten raw.
On the other hand, cooking makes the minerals in most vegetables more available, so
they should be cooked--and then eaten with a source of activators, such as butter or
cream. Bones yield their minerals by cooking into broth. And studies carried out
subsequent to Dr. Price's research reveal that grains and legumes must be soaked or sour
leavened to neutralize mineral-blocking phytic acid.
A SMALL PRICE
In the face of so many misinterpretations, getting Price right is a first step of utmost
importance for those who wish to regain and maintain their health. And for parents, effort
expended in the application of his principles to the diets of their children is a small price
to pay for the incalculable benefits in physical health and mental outlook they will
bequeath to their offspring.
As for the host of degenerative diseases that now plague the "civilized" world, diseases
for which countless remedies both conventional and holistic have been proposed, Price's
findings point to only one lasting solution: nutrient-dense food.
As Price saw so clearly, chronic disease manifests not so much as a collection of
symptoms, but is itself a symptom of malnutrition's inexorable conclusion--death to the
organism and die out of the species. "The accumulating evidence suggests the
consideration of disease being, in many cases, more correctly speaking, a symptom and
that individuals often, instead of dying because they contract disease, primarily develop
disease because they are dying."34
Sidebars
SOME INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT DR. WESTON A. PRICE (18701948)
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Weston Andrew Valleau Price, the ninth child in a family of 12, grew up on a
farm in Newburg, Canada. This backwoods Canadian family produced an
inventor, a medical doctor, two dentists, a Methodist minister and a resourceful
farmer son.5
The Price family lineage goes back through a long line of Celtic princes, traced as
far as 230 AD. The name derives from ap Rees or ap Rice, a family centered
around the town of Brecon in Wales.
Price's nephew, Willard DeMille Price (son of Albert, his inventor brother), was a
famous writer, explorer and traveler whose reports were often featured in the
National Geographic magazine.
Price became interested in diet as a prime factor in dental decay after he was
stricken with typhoid fever in 1893. At the time he was practicing dentistry in
Grand Forks, North Dakota. His older brother Albert nursed him back to health,
but during his illness Weston's teeth had decayed alarmingly. He went back to the
family farm to convalesce where not only his health improved, but his dental
deterioration was arrested. The following spring, he and his uncle William
Delmage camped for an extended period in the back country of Canada, living on
salmon, small game and berries. Delmage was a man of great intuitive wisdom
who understood the role of natural food sources for refurbishing and sustaining
the body. The backwoods diet worked wonders for Weston Price.
Weston shared an interest in electricity with his brother Albert. He taught "applied
electricity and electro-therapeutics" at Western Reserve University (now Case
Western Reserve University) from 1897 to 1904. After he left the faculty in 1904,
his subject matter was dropped from the curriculum.6
In 1899, Weston Price and his wife Florence built the Bon Echo Inn on the shores
of Mazinaw Lake in southeast Ontario. Florence suggested the name Bon Echo
because of the marvelous echo that rebounded from the face of the granite cliff on
the opposite shore. The remote site presented an incredible challenge and building
the 28-room inn was "a feat which never could have been accomplished without
the indomitable presistence of Dr. Price and his sublime indifference to the almost
incredible difficulties that beset him at every turn," according to Merrill Denison,
a later owner of the Inn. Dr. Price and his wife operated the Inn during the
summers until they sold it in 1910. The site later became Bon Echo Provincial
Park.7
Dr. Price and his wife lost their only son Donald to complications from an
infected root canal, which Price himself had put in. Price went on to write a 1000page tome on the problems of systemic dental infections from root canals.
After selling the Inn, Price established a dental practice in a house at 8926 Euclid
Avenue in Cleveland, Ohio. (He lived several blocks away on Lamont Street.) At
the height of his career, the practice included several dentists on the first floor and
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a laboratory on the second floor where Mr. Howdy, a chemist of German origin,
performed analyses for fat-soluble activators in hundreds of samples of butter and
other foods sent to Dr. Price from all over the world.
Dr. Price was a devout Methodist who taught Sunday school at his neighborhood
church. However, later in life he expressed dismay over the fact that Christian
missionaries were so often the vector for the introduction of modernized foods
into native populations.8
QUACKWATCH ON DR. PRICE
Stephen Barrett of Quackwatch.com, the self-appointed arbiter of correctness in the fields
of medicine and nutrition, describes Weston Price as "a dentist who maintained that sugar
causes not only tooth decay but physical, mental, moral, and social decay as well." He
dismisses Price's monumental research project as "a whirlwind tour of primitive areas" in
which he "examined the natives superficially, and jumped to simplistic conclusions.
While extolling their health, he ignored their short life expectancy and high rates of infant
mortality, endemic diseases, and malnutrition. While praising their diets for not
producing cavities, he ignored the fact that malnourished people don't usually get many
cavities."
He then puts his own politically correct spin on Price's findings: "Price knew that when
primitive people were exposed to ‘modern' civilization they developed dental trouble and
higher rates of various diseases, but he failed to realize why. Most were used to ‘feast or
famine' eating. When large amounts of sweets were suddenly made available, they
overindulged. Ignorant of the value of balancing their diets, they also ingested too much
fatty and salty food. Their problems were not caused by eating ‘civilized' food but by
abusing it. In addition to dietary excesses, the increased disease rates were due to: (a)
exposure to unfamiliar germs, to which they were not resistant; (b) the drastic change in
their way of life as they gave up strenuous physical activities such as hunting; and (c)
alcohol abuse."
Aside from contradicting himself--implying that Price was wrong to blame sugar for the
tooth decay he observed in modernized populations but then stating that "indulging" in
sweets suddenly made available was a contributor to caries-- Barrett makes several
statements that don't stand up to the facts:
1. "Whirlwind tour" and "superficial examination." Price spent considerable time in
each place he visited and carefully examined thousands of mouths, noting the
presence of cavities and dental deformities. This part of his research was
extremely precise and scientific, and it was published in many peer reviewed
journals of his day. His research project took him over 10 years to complete.
2. "Jumped to simplistic conclusions." Price's conclusions were based on his
research. He demonstrated the relationship between the decline in nutrients in
primitive diets and the increase in disease. He clinched his argument with case
studies showing the reversal of tooth decay and degenerative disease using a diet
rich in nutrients. He also quoted from numerous scientific studies that supported
his findings and conclusions.
3. "While extolling their health, he ignored their short life expectancy and high rates
of infant mortality, endemic diseases, and malnutrition." Price extolled the health
of those groups who were healthy, and described the high rates of infant
mortality, endemic diseases and malnutrition in the groups that were not healthy.
Much of the value of his research comes from the fact that he was able to observe
healthy and unhealthy groups of the same racial stock side by side, and thereby
demonstrate the correlation between diet and disease. Although we will never be
able to ascertain the life expectancy of the primitive peoples he studied, Price
noted great longevity among certain groups, such as the Eskimos and the South
Sea Islanders.
4. "Malnourished people don't usually get many cavities." Reference, please? In fact,
malnourished people do get cavities. Price proved that cavities are a sign of
malnutrition.
5. Once modernized, the tribal peoples "ingested too much fatty and salty food."
Price showed that the primitive, protective diets were in fact rich in fatty foods,
and also included some salt. Has any scientist yet claimed that salt causes tooth
decay?
6. The health decline that Price observed was due to "exposure to unfamiliar germs,
to which they were not resistant." Price was amazed to find that the primitive
African tribes he studied were resistant to the infectious diseases associated with
Africa. By contrast, the whites on their devitalized diet suffered greatly from these
diseases. Even though exposed to TB, Swiss villagers and Gaelic seafaring
peoples were completely immune as long as they consumed their native diet.
Infectious disease did indeed cause much suffering among nonindustrialized
peoples as soon as they abandoned their traditional diets; the same dearth of
nutrients that made them susceptible to these diseases also made them susceptible
to tooth decay and a change in skeletal structure in the next generation.
7. The health decline that Price observed was due to "the drastic change in their way
of life as they gave up strenuous physical activities such as hunting." Lack of
exercise can in no way explain the great increase in degenerative disease,
including tooth decay, that modernized tribal peoples experienced when they
changed their way of life.
8. The health decline was due to "alcohol abuse." Alcoholism became a huge
problem in these communities after contact with the West. But the introduction of
strong alcoholic beverages (many primitive peoples consumed mildly alcoholic
beverages) occurred simultaneously with the change in diet, and the drastic
lowering of food quality created deficiencies that can lead to alcoholism. Note
Barrett's moralistic tone in the word "abuse," just as he moralizes about
"overindulgence" in sugar. Apparently the blame lies not with the West for
introducing these substances, but with the once-primitive peoples who "abused"
and "overindulged" because they are "ignorant." For Barrett, the frailty of people
unlike himself is congenital, not, as Dr. Price suggested, the inevitable
consequence of processed foods.
NUTRITION AND MORAL CHARACTER
Many commentators have criticized Price for attributing "decline in moral character" to
malnutrition. But it is important to realize that the subject of "moral character" was very
much on the minds of commentators of his day. As with changes in facial structure,
observers in the first half of the 20th century blamed "badness" in people to race mixing,
or to genetic defects. Price quotes A.C. Jacobson, author of a 1926 publication entitled
Genius (Some Revaluations),35 who stated that "The Jekyll-Hydes of our common life are
ethnic hybrids." Said Jacobson, "Aside from the effects of environment, it may safely be
assumed that when two strains of blood will not mix well a kind of ‘molecular insult'
occurs which the biologists may some day be able to detect beforehand, just as blood is
now tested and matched for transfusion." The implied conclusion to this assertion is that
"degenerates" can be identified through genetic testing and "weeded out" by sterilizing
the unfit--something that was imposed on many women during the period and endorsed
by powerful individuals, including Oliver Wendell Holmes.
It is greatly to Price's credit that he objected to this arrogant point of view: "Most current
interpretations are fatalistic and leave practically no escape from our succession of
modern physical, mental and moral cripples. . . If our modern degeneration were largely
the result of incompatible racial stocks as indicated by these premises, the outlook would
be gloomy in the extreme."36 Price argued that nutritional deficiencies affecting the
physical structure of the body can also affect the brain and nervous system; and that
while "bad" character may be the result of many influences--poverty, upbringing,
displacement, etc.--good nutrition also plays a role in creating a society of cheerful,
compassionate individuals.36
Response to Some Common Objections to the Work of
Dr. Weston Price
Objection: Weston A. Price is actually a dentist who traveled around the world and
looked at the diets of primitive cultures who spend most of their day doing manual labor,
but also eat a diet rich in animal foods.
Response: Actually not all of the groups Price studied ate diets rich in animal foods. All
of the ones who were healthy, however, did eat at least some animal products. Many of
these subsisted largely on animal products while some subsisted largely on plant
products. Among those who were healthy and ate a small percentage of their calories as
animal products, they selected very nutrient-dense products such as whole insects and
frogs, shellfish, and so on. To give you an example of the difference between a small
amount of very nutrient-dense animal foods and no animal foods at all, consider vitamin
B12: 64% of vegans, 43% of lacto-ovo-vegetarians and 16% of the elderly in one study
were found to have stage III (relatively advanced and becoming serious) vitamin B12
deficiency. (Herrmann et al. Usefulness of holotranscobalamin in predicting vitamin B12
status in different clinical settings. Curr Drug Metab. 2005; 6(1): 47-59. One could satisfy
the B12 requirement with a serving of meat per day, on the one hand, or with a serving of
clams per month. This is not the only important nutrient from animal foods but just an
example of how even small amounts of animal foods can make a diet fundamentally
different from one that is free of animal foods if they are the right ones.
Objection: Dr. Price recommends a diet that is high in fat (especially saturated fat),
cholesterol, and protein and is low in carbohydrates. This diet is similar to the Atkins
Diet, and we do not recommend these types of diets because of the many health risks
associated with consuming high amounts of protein and fat and low amounts of
carbohydrates and fiber.
Response: The diet Price used with his patients included whole milk, whole wheat, stews
made from bone broths, meats and organ meats, fruits and vegetables. It was not devoid
of plant foods or very low in carbohydrates. The Weston A Price Foundation and Sally
Fallon's book Nourishing Traditions do not recommend specific carbohydrate and fat
guidelines. Nourishing Traditions recommends limiting protein intake to 15-20% of
calories and experimenting to find the right balance of carbohydrates and fats that will be
determined by ancestry, circumstance and other factors.
Objection: Weston A. Price's scientific stances are not based on solid clinical research.
Most of Dr. Price's positions are based on observations made while studying other
cultures, not on clinical trials.
Response: Price followed the scientific method from start to finish. He began by making
observations, and where possible, he made observations that could control for the
different variables he was looking at. From these observations, he formulated a
hypothesis that tooth decay was a specific manifestation of general physical degeneration
and that its cause was nutritional deficiencies, and its solution the provision of nutrients
through whole foods grown on rich soils. He tested his theory in several experiments with
lab animals and humans and developed quite a following because of the clinical success
with his patients. Within his book, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, he provides Xray photos of cavities refilling by secondary growth of the dentin on his dietary protocol
that allowed the caries to heal without the need for oral surgery. He also performed an
extensive analysis of over 20,000 samples of dairy products sent to him at two-week or
four-week intervals from all over the world and created charts of the seasonal fluctuation
of the amounts of fat-soluble vitamins in the butter and found that in each district, the
government records for pneumonia and heart disease showed a pattern inversely
associated with the fat-soluble vitamin content, which was one of many pieces of
evidence supporting his theory that tooth decay and other degenerative diseases shared a
common nutritional cause.
REFERENCES
1. Weston A. Price. Letter to his Nieces and Nephews, 1934. PPNF archives.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Donald Delmage Fawcett, "Weston A. V. Price, Truly a ‘Great' Uncle," PPNF
Journal.
6. Frederick Clayton Waite, AM, PhD, History of the School of Dentisty or Western
Reserve University, 1940.
7. Bon Echo Provincial Park newsletter, 2002, page 10.
8. Personal Communication, Donald Delmage Fawcett, nephew of Weston A. Price
9. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 259.
10. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 269.
11. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 438.
12. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 109.
13. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 282.
14. Alex Jack, Let Food Be Thy Medicine, One Peaceful World Press, 1999.
15. Katherine Alexander, Get a Life - Detoxification Made Easy
16. doctoryourself.com, Vol 3, No 16. July 5, 2003.
17. http://alivepublishing.com, October 10, 2005
18. Sally DeVore and Thelma White, The Appetites of Man, Anchor Books, 1978.
19. Wolcott, William and Trish Fahey, The Metabolic Typing Diet, NY: Random
House, 2000.
20. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 300.
21. Brehm W. Ohio State Medical Journal 1937:33;990.
22. Bills, CE. Journal of the American Medical Association, 1937:108;12.
23. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 257.
24. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 299.
25. Weston A. Price, Dental Cosmos, September 1935.
26. Ibid.
27. Ibid.
28. Ibid.
29. Weston A. Price. Letter to his Nieces and Nephews, 1934. PPNF archives.
30. Ibid.
31. Ibid.
32. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 302.
33. http://www.uic.edu/classes/osci/osci590/7_1Anthropology. htm, October 10,
2005.
34. Weston A. Price, American Journal of Health, June 1931, XXI(6):613.
35. AC Jacobson, Genius (Some Revaluations), New York, Greenburg, 1926
36. Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, PPNF, p 395.
This article appeared in Wise Traditions in Food, Farming and the Healing Arts, the
quarterly magazine of the Weston A. Price Foundation, Fall 2005.
About the Author
Sally Fallon Morell is the author of Nourishing Traditions: The
Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats (with
Mary G. Enig, PhD), a well-researched, thought-provoking guide to traditional foods
with a startling message: Animal fats and cholesterol are not villains but vital factors in
the diet, necessary for normal growth, proper function of the brain and nervous system,
protection from disease and optimum energy levels. She joined forces with Enig again to
write Eat Fat, Lose Fat, and has authored numerous articles on the subject of diet and
health. The President of the Weston A. Price Foundation and founder of A Campaign for
Real Milk, Sally is also a journalist, chef, nutrition researcher, homemaker, and
community activist. Her four healthy children were raised on whole foods including
butter, cream, eggs and meat.