This result is very much in line with multiple other studies showing similar trends (and you can reap far greater benefits, the more plant protein you eat). Let’s make no mistake though—and I’m assuming most readers, including doctors, hadn’t seen that JAMA study: If a new drug or treatment came out which showed such a huge percentage mortality benefit, it would be blasted all across the media, and make billions of dollars. Think about that for a moment, it’s also emblematic of where we have gone wrong as a society, in placing minimal value on natural everyday measures we can take to drastically improve our health and wellbeing. Whether it’s eating more plant-protein (which includes foods such as lentils, chickpeas, beans and quinoa), consuming a handful of blueberries in the morning, always going for whole brown carbs— or going outside for a brisk walk everyday—- you will find thousands of studies which show far greater benefits than many of the medications we swear by. Remember, that for any new drug or therapeutic treatment to be considered a success, it needs a “number needed to treat (NNT)” of 20. This means that only 5 percent of people will have any benefit from it. Dig deeper into a lot of data on expensive medications we are using, and you will find that many of them may have a very dubious 2 or 3-point benefit on a 100-self measured scale, or exclude a large number of real world patients we use the treatments on (e.g. those above a certain age or with serious comorbidities). I can pretty much guarantee though that eating an apple a day or sitting down and meditating every morning, would benefit almost 100 percent of people! This was the subject of my first book, High Percentage Wellness Steps— a focus on natural steps that bring you far greater benefits than many everyday drugs we use.
I am an internal medicine doctor and believe in modern day medicine. Vegetables and exercise are not going to cure my hospital patients of their ailments! Drugs such as broad spectrum antibiotics and clot-busting therapeutics are nothing short of miraculous. But I’d also like to help as few people as possible become hospitalized in the future and save them from chronic illness. Prevention is always better than cure. I always tell my clinic patients, that health, like a lot of things in life, is simply a numbers game. It’s all about what little things you can do to lower your chances of illness and hopefully improve your odds. And going back to the original study, replacing as much animal with plant protein as possible, is a big proven step in the right direction which I encourage everyone reading to consider doing.

Suneel Dhand is a physician, writer, and YouTuber. He is Co-Founder at DocsDox. Follow him on YouTube and Instagram.