Reply #27: Real men should eat soy [View All]

Eat your soy, boys
Sally Squires, The Washington Post
Jun 15, 2004

". . . Real men should eat soy," said Kenneth Setchell, professor of pediatrics at the Cincinnati Children's Medical Center, who has studied soy for 30 years. "Generally, men are put off by soy. It tends to be sort of a woman's thing. That's a great pity, because the evidence that soy protects against prostate cancer is quite strong."

While there have been worries that men who consume large quantities of low-carb soy bread, soy cereal or other soy-filled foods may get a little too in touch with their feminine sides, research findings have generally not borne out those fears.

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Most concerns about soy have centered around the fact that it is a rich source of isoflavones, substances that mimic the effects of the female hormone estrogen. To determine what these plant-based chemicals might do, Steven Zeisel and his colleagues at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill fed megadoses of soy to men as part of a recent National Cancer Institute study.

Nipple discharge, breast enlargement and slight decreases in testosterone occurred with the megadoses. But "we still couldn't find anything that was serious, and we went up to doses that are probably 30 times what you could get from normal foods," Zeisel said.

And if you stick with foods rich in soy as opposed to supplements, researchers say, there's no evidence of harm, unless you happen to be among the one in every 1,000 people who are allergic to soy. . ."

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http://www.postgazette.com/pg/04167/331753.stm