[Bruce Paine]

Teresa,

People die.

And people die of cancer.

Eating a macrobiotic diet does not guarantee that one will never get cancer and or die from it, it just greatly lessens the possibililty of getting cancer.

It's hard to say anything about Aveline Kushi's sickness and passing because I did not know her that well and had not seen her since 1987.

So the most that I could talk about (her sickness and death) would be what others have told me and that is pretty much the same thing as gossip.

One thing I can say about her is that during her life she accomplished many things including written and co-wrote many books (many with her own poetry and illustrations), she taught many people how to cook (and many of her students are famous cookbook authors and cooking teachers), she helped found one of the greatest natural foods stores chains, distributors, introducing many foods such as miso, tamari shoyu, sea vegetables, umeboshi, kuzu, etc. for the first time, a world famous maagazine,and so on and so forth including a world famous schooland healing center that continue after more than 30 years from when it started, and she has directly affected many tens of thousands of people around the world and maybe many more indirectly, plus she has had 5 children, four of which have had a tremendous impact on macrobiotics and the natural foods movement and already one grandchild that is making a big impact on the macrobiotic movement and the list goes on and on so I wsould say that that tiny woman had a very rich and fufilling life all the way up to the time of her passing and she continues to have a positive impact on many people, so to to sit around and gossip and harp about her sickness and death without really knowing anything about her whole life and especially all the facts I feel would be a disservice and a dishonour to her and her family.

If there is some good reason that anyone needs to know what happened to Aveline, I suggest that they contact people that were very close to her during her last years, who unfortunately are not big Internet users and especiallly (I believe) are not members or even visitors of this website.

And in the interim, let's talk about the things that we do know about her in her accomplishments and the efect that she has had on the movement that has touched us in so many ways.

Also, we don't need any one person to live a perfect life for us to find benefits in macrobiotic philosophy and diet, so I suggest that we focus more on how macrobiotics works and how we can use it to improve our health and well being.

Thank you, very much.

Bruce Paine