6 ms·

Note this from this study: "Low carbohydrate dietary patterns favouring animal-derived protein and fat sources, from sources such as lamb, beef, pork, and chick

by Leary 8y ago

Note this from this study: "Low carbohydrate dietary patterns favouring animal-derived protein and fat sources, from sources such as lamb, beef, pork, and chicken, were associated with higher mortality, whereas those that favoured plant-derived protein and fat intake, from sources such as vegetables, nuts, peanut butter, and whole-grain breads, were associated with lower mortality" So if you want low carbs, don't eat too much meat. Plant based diets, such as the Mediterranean diet have been shown lead to reduced all cause mortality in randomized control trials [1]. Getting your diet right really isn't that hard, just eat fresh plant based food. [1]https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1800389?query=featured_home https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1800389?query=fe...

totemizer 8y ago
I really wish to know why those people were on low carbohydrate diet though. It seems to me that most people don't do that without a good reason.
- nightski 8y ago
  Well, anecdotally for me it is just because of how I feel on such a diet. It takes a while for the body to adjust, but once it does I feel like I am on a high that never ends. No ups & downs, just pure focus and energy. Would it be like that for everyone? Who knows. But I have never felt this before on any other diet. That's why I stick with it. (Note I do about 5% carbs, 80% fat, 15% protein) Even if this ends up with higher mortality (which I highly doubt this claim, there is a lot of research and results it is in conflict with) - I'd rather live feeling like this than the alternative. I also question the meat claims because there is also a lot of evidence to the contrary. It seems like there may be a confounding variable in there that is skewing the results.
- nonbel 8y ago
  >"I really wish to know why those people were on low carbohydrate diet though." They weren't. It looks like the lowest in the study was ~20%, which is about the upper bound on what could be considered "low carb".
  - totemizer 8y ago
    Thanks for noting, I missed this crucial detail completely. :(
bkovacev 8y ago
When someone mentions Mediterranean diet the first association I have is fish, white cheese, olive oil, fresh fruit and veggies, and whole grain bread. Correct me if I'm wrong - but I wouldn't classify that as a plant based diet.
- GW150914 8y ago
  Cheese like haloumi and feta are very low in fat, and not necessarily more than a garnish in most cases. For another animal product I’d add yogurt, but you also missed the big plant staples. Lots of pulses like beans and lentils, lots of nuts and seeds, hummus, lots and lots of rice, barley, and wheat products, whole olives in addition to the oil, that kind of thing. Of course lamb and mutton are also a source of protein and fat along with fish, but traditionally greens and beans took up the majority of calories with dairy in second, meat and fish in third. So you’re not wrong, but cheese, fish, meat are all the tip of the pyramid, not the base. Of course as wealth has spreas people eat more fish and meat and cheese than they used to, and they suffer for it.
- mrnobody_67 8y ago
  The mediterranean diet study that was made the diet famous is fundamentally flawed as described in The Big Fat Surprise. It was done on a small population, self-reported, and during a time of war when supplies were short and people were eating atypical altered diet based on available food stuffs.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 8y ago
    I hadn't heard of The Big Fat Surprise, so I had a look around and found its author's Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz I quote from it: >>"Nina Teicholz is a journalist who became an advocate opposed to the idea that saturated fat is unhealthy and should be minimized in the American diet." So, to begin with, she's a journalist who wrote a book about fat. In fact, she advocated that people should load up their diets on fat, particularly saturated fat: >>Teicholz advised readers to "eat butter; drink milk whole, and feed it to the whole family. Stock up on creamy cheeses, offal, and sausage, and yes, bacon" This advice runs counter to the advice of public health organisations and the opinionts of scientists: >> Teicholz' claims were harshly criticized by the DGAC, the US Department of Health and Human Services, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, and others, including a petition signed by 180 scientists, and they called for BMJ to retract the article or issue corrections My underlining. I wouldn't trust that lady to tell me what to eat, or to criticise a scientific study's methodology. A journalist with a book has very clear incentives to "shake things up" by going against the scientific consensus. But, it's the opinion of experts that have studied the matter at length, who know the relevant bibliography well and understand its subtleties that one should trust more than outsiders who "rock the boat" for their own reasons. Finally- it's really dangerous to listen to someone who tells you that, that thing you love to eat (or smoke, or drink, etc) that you always knew was not very good for you is actually very healthy. You have a big, fat incentive to blieve them unconditionally.
Alex3917 8y ago
> just eat fresh plant based food. The easiest way to do this is to batch prepare things heavy in monounsaturated fats: avocados/guacamole, olives, almond butter, walnuts, etc. Then prepare things with polyunsaturated fats the day of, like wild salmon. Basically if you don’t eat enough good fats you’ll eat bad fats, and if you don’t eat enough bad fats you’ll eat sugar or carbs. So you want to make it easy for yourself to eat good fats, and then round out the rest of your diet with other stuff. Things like Israeli/Persian/Arabic salad also store pretty well in the fridge for four days, so that’s another easy way to prepare veggies in advance.
- agumonkey 8y ago
  I need some extremely solid textbook on *saturated fat/fatty acids because I've read a few medical books (randomly picked) and ended with contradictory reasonings and conclusion. Basically, some say that having single bond chains leads to less viscous molecules => less deposits. But some say that is double bonds which leads to less deposits.
  - wozniacki 8y ago
    ...because I've read a few medical books (randomly picked) and ended with contradictory reasonings and conclusion. Could you list some of those books?
    - agumonkey 8y ago
      Humm one is cardiology book (in french) by jacques de praepe (I bought it), the others I don't remember, a mix of pubmed publications, lab textbooks on researchers webpage, youtube videos.
    - agumonkey 8y ago
      ps: I'm reading 'fats of life' by Glen Lawrence. I'll report if it gives a clear picture. One good thing from the first pages, is that it explains that fat is implied in a lot of subsystems. Fatty acids that are bad for your vascular system can help to avoid cancer, arthritis and other kinds of conditions... so it's not a one dimensional question. I like that.
XzetaU8 8y ago
A few thoughts regarding today's big carb study in The Lancet: - This study will get tons of press, with misleading headlines all over the place. Like this one we already saw: "Low carb diets shorten your life unless you are mostly vegetarian." - Nobody actually knows which diets are best for longevity, as it's an impossible question to answer without a trillion dollar randomized trial. Supercentenarians eat a wide variety of diets, calorie/methionine restriction helps in some animal studies, etc. A collection of observational evidence (like in the Lancet paper) is helpful for noticing overall patterns, but can't say much about actual diets. One high-carb diet could be high in candy and cake, and another high in fruit and tubers. The Lancet study wasn't able to address diet quality. - The Lancet paper is not one study, but two: a long-term observational study in the US, plus a meta-analysis of international cohorts. - The "easy" conclusions (low carb bad, high carb bad, high meat bad) are not so easy. The broadest way to cut dietary data is by macronutrient, so the result interpretations aren't always useful. Those with high and low carb intake are more likely to be on a diet, for example, and dieters can be more likely to have health conditions they're trying to address. - When you meta-analyze heterogeneous data sets, problems arise. There's no good way around this, since the different data sets are from different research groups, and individual-level meta-analysis is thus rarely possible. [1] https://www.facebook.com/Examinecom/posts/2146299502057199?__xts__%5B0%5D=68.ARAnVkrdTt4DI4byAsXLdDcaY-R5S6dLeNhXXB30GsfmUd0LvspFrfjEj6KZ3Q8d1N8EBJWROM3ck1X_u6nScBhW5S8eBbFANpBgdcUVc1Z8O3dBnY0ESty9xgGoG6LqxAZXlS10dn0R&__tn__=-R https://www.facebook.com/Examinecom/posts/2146299502057199?_...
- JamesBarney 8y ago
  > Nobody actually knows which diets are best for longevity, as it's an impossible question to answer without a trillion dollar randomized trial. Supercentenarians eat a wide variety of diets,calorie/methionine restriction helps in some animal studies, etc. But all of the super centenarians ate very little meat, with the exception of some fish in a few populations. And we don't know for certain whuch diets will help you live the longest, but the knowledge and evidence we do have very heavily favors a diet that is primarily plant based, low in protein, and has very little chicken/pork/beef.
  - 8y ago
rhinoceraptor 8y ago
This was not a low carb diet study. The lowest carb group were eating at least twice as many carbs as what any reasonable person would consider low carb. Also, if you look at table 1, you can see the "low carb" group was the highest smoking, most diabetic, more male, highest hypertensive, and least exercising group. Is it really a surprise that these people have higher mortality?
- gHosts 8y ago
  > Participants completed an interview that included a 66-item semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (FFQ), modified from a 61-item FFQ designed and validated by Willett and colleagues,16 at Visit 1 (1987–89) and Visit 3 (1993–95). Retrospective self reported questionaire. Pah. Around about the weakest evidence you can get as to what their actual diet was. I would rate this study as "Junk Science".

by Leary 8y ago

totemizer 8y ago

I really wish to know why those people were on low carbohydrate diet though. It seems to me that most people don't do that without a good reason.

nightski 8y ago
Well, anecdotally for me it is just because of how I feel on such a diet. It takes a while for the body to adjust, but once it does I feel like I am on a high that never ends. No ups & downs, just pure focus and energy. Would it be like that for everyone? Who knows. But I have never felt this before on any other diet. That's why I stick with it. (Note I do about 5% carbs, 80% fat, 15% protein) Even if this ends up with higher mortality (which I highly doubt this claim, there is a lot of research and results it is in conflict with) - I'd rather live feeling like this than the alternative. I also question the meat claims because there is also a lot of evidence to the contrary. It seems like there may be a confounding variable in there that is skewing the results.
nonbel 8y ago
>"I really wish to know why those people were on low carbohydrate diet though." They weren't. It looks like the lowest in the study was ~20%, which is about the upper bound on what could be considered "low carb".
- totemizer 8y ago
  Thanks for noting, I missed this crucial detail completely. :(

bkovacev 8y ago

When someone mentions Mediterranean diet the first association I have is fish, white cheese, olive oil, fresh fruit and veggies, and whole grain bread. Correct me if I'm wrong - but I wouldn't classify that as a plant based diet.

GW150914 8y ago
Cheese like haloumi and feta are very low in fat, and not necessarily more than a garnish in most cases. For another animal product I’d add yogurt, but you also missed the big plant staples. Lots of pulses like beans and lentils, lots of nuts and seeds, hummus, lots and lots of rice, barley, and wheat products, whole olives in addition to the oil, that kind of thing. Of course lamb and mutton are also a source of protein and fat along with fish, but traditionally greens and beans took up the majority of calories with dairy in second, meat and fish in third. So you’re not wrong, but cheese, fish, meat are all the tip of the pyramid, not the base. Of course as wealth has spreas people eat more fish and meat and cheese than they used to, and they suffer for it.
mrnobody_67 8y ago
The mediterranean diet study that was made the diet famous is fundamentally flawed as described in The Big Fat Surprise. It was done on a small population, self-reported, and during a time of war when supplies were short and people were eating atypical altered diet based on available food stuffs.
- YeGoblynQueenne 8y ago
  I hadn't heard of The Big Fat Surprise, so I had a look around and found its author's Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz I quote from it: >>"Nina Teicholz is a journalist who became an advocate opposed to the idea that saturated fat is unhealthy and should be minimized in the American diet." So, to begin with, she's a journalist who wrote a book about fat. In fact, she advocated that people should load up their diets on fat, particularly saturated fat: >>Teicholz advised readers to "eat butter; drink milk whole, and feed it to the whole family. Stock up on creamy cheeses, offal, and sausage, and yes, bacon" This advice runs counter to the advice of public health organisations and the opinionts of scientists: >> Teicholz' claims were harshly criticized by the DGAC, the US Department of Health and Human Services, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, and others, including a petition signed by 180 scientists, and they called for BMJ to retract the article or issue corrections My underlining. I wouldn't trust that lady to tell me what to eat, or to criticise a scientific study's methodology. A journalist with a book has very clear incentives to "shake things up" by going against the scientific consensus. But, it's the opinion of experts that have studied the matter at length, who know the relevant bibliography well and understand its subtleties that one should trust more than outsiders who "rock the boat" for their own reasons. Finally- it's really dangerous to listen to someone who tells you that, that thing you love to eat (or smoke, or drink, etc) that you always knew was not very good for you is actually very healthy. You have a big, fat incentive to blieve them unconditionally.

Alex3917 8y ago

> just eat fresh plant based food. The easiest way to do this is to batch prepare things heavy in monounsaturated fats: avocados/guacamole, olives, almond butter, walnuts, etc. Then prepare things with polyunsaturated fats the day of, like wild salmon. Basically if you don’t eat enough good fats you’ll eat bad fats, and if you don’t eat enough bad fats you’ll eat sugar or carbs. So you want to make it easy for yourself to eat good fats, and then round out the rest of your diet with other stuff. Things like Israeli/Persian/Arabic salad also store pretty well in the fridge for four days, so that’s another easy way to prepare veggies in advance.

agumonkey 8y ago
I need some extremely solid textbook on *saturated fat/fatty acids because I've read a few medical books (randomly picked) and ended with contradictory reasonings and conclusion. Basically, some say that having single bond chains leads to less viscous molecules => less deposits. But some say that is double bonds which leads to less deposits.
- wozniacki 8y ago
  ...because I've read a few medical books (randomly picked) and ended with contradictory reasonings and conclusion. Could you list some of those books?
  - agumonkey 8y ago
    Humm one is cardiology book (in french) by jacques de praepe (I bought it), the others I don't remember, a mix of pubmed publications, lab textbooks on researchers webpage, youtube videos.
  - agumonkey 8y ago
    ps: I'm reading 'fats of life' by Glen Lawrence. I'll report if it gives a clear picture. One good thing from the first pages, is that it explains that fat is implied in a lot of subsystems. Fatty acids that are bad for your vascular system can help to avoid cancer, arthritis and other kinds of conditions... so it's not a one dimensional question. I like that.

XzetaU8 8y ago

A few thoughts regarding today's big carb study in The Lancet: - This study will get tons of press, with misleading headlines all over the place. Like this one we already saw: "Low carb diets shorten your life unless you are mostly vegetarian." - Nobody actually knows which diets are best for longevity, as it's an impossible question to answer without a trillion dollar randomized trial. Supercentenarians eat a wide variety of diets, calorie/methionine restriction helps in some animal studies, etc. A collection of observational evidence (like in the Lancet paper) is helpful for noticing overall patterns, but can't say much about actual diets. One high-carb diet could be high in candy and cake, and another high in fruit and tubers. The Lancet study wasn't able to address diet quality. - The Lancet paper is not one study, but two: a long-term observational study in the US, plus a meta-analysis of international cohorts. - The "easy" conclusions (low carb bad, high carb bad, high meat bad) are not so easy. The broadest way to cut dietary data is by macronutrient, so the result interpretations aren't always useful. Those with high and low carb intake are more likely to be on a diet, for example, and dieters can be more likely to have health conditions they're trying to address. - When you meta-analyze heterogeneous data sets, problems arise. There's no good way around this, since the different data sets are from different research groups, and individual-level meta-analysis is thus rarely possible. [1] https://www.facebook.com/Examinecom/posts/2146299502057199?__xts__%5B0%5D=68.ARAnVkrdTt4DI4byAsXLdDcaY-R5S6dLeNhXXB30GsfmUd0LvspFrfjEj6KZ3Q8d1N8EBJWROM3ck1X_u6nScBhW5S8eBbFANpBgdcUVc1Z8O3dBnY0ESty9xgGoG6LqxAZXlS10dn0R&__tn__=-R https://www.facebook.com/Examinecom/posts/2146299502057199?_...

JamesBarney 8y ago
> Nobody actually knows which diets are best for longevity, as it's an impossible question to answer without a trillion dollar randomized trial. Supercentenarians eat a wide variety of diets,calorie/methionine restriction helps in some animal studies, etc. But all of the super centenarians ate very little meat, with the exception of some fish in a few populations. And we don't know for certain whuch diets will help you live the longest, but the knowledge and evidence we do have very heavily favors a diet that is primarily plant based, low in protein, and has very little chicken/pork/beef.
- 8y ago

rhinoceraptor 8y ago

This was not a low carb diet study. The lowest carb group were eating at least twice as many carbs as what any reasonable person would consider low carb. Also, if you look at table 1, you can see the "low carb" group was the highest smoking, most diabetic, more male, highest hypertensive, and least exercising group. Is it really a surprise that these people have higher mortality?

gHosts 8y ago
> Participants completed an interview that included a 66-item semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (FFQ), modified from a 61-item FFQ designed and validated by Willett and colleagues,16 at Visit 1 (1987–89) and Visit 3 (1993–95). Retrospective self reported questionaire. Pah. Around about the weakest evidence you can get as to what their actual diet was. I would rate this study as "Junk Science".