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There are signs that you can notice when you eat too little protein. An obvious sign is the reduction in muscular mass, e.g. if your arms and thighs become thi

There are signs that you can notice when you eat too little protein. An obvious sign is the reduction in muscular mass, e.g. if your arms and thighs become thinner. A less well known sign is the swelling of both feet (bilateral feet edema), when you might begin to feel that your shoes are too small, which is caused by a too low albumin concentration in the blood. (However there are also other possible causes for feet swelling, like diabetes, so a blood test is necessary to confirm the cause.) The low albumin concentration in the blood can be detected by a blood test before causing noticeable effects, like the swelling of the feet. Normal daily protein intakes are between 1 g and 1.5 g of protein per kg of body weight. For those who do intense physical activities more than that is required. There have been some earlier recommendations of lower protein intakes, like 0.8 g per kg, but later studies have discredited those recommendations as being too low, especially for old people, who need to eat enough proteins to avoid the loss of muscular mass.

amelius 2y ago
Interesting theory, but how do you explain that most prisoners don't end up as stick figures with swollen feet? Because I suspect they don't have a diet with protein powder.
- adrian_b 2y ago
  Bread can easily provide enough proteins at a very low cost, if its quantity is large enough (e.g. 500 g of wheat flour per day) and if it is supplemented with a small quantity of another food that can provide enough lysine, e.g. beans or meat or dairy. The problem of getting proteins mostly from bread is that you also need to do enough physical activity to avoid gaining weight. This is a serious difficulty for a computer programmer, but it is unlikely to be a problem for a prisoner or for a manual worker. It is likely that at least in a country like USA, the ratios for prisoners have an adequate protein content, even if they may be not tasty. In countries where prisoners were treated less well, for instance in the Eastern Europe countries occupied by the Russians after WWII, where the political adversaries of the communists have been either killed or jailed, the prisoners who have survived their prison term were really stick figures at the return from prison, so your images about prisoners must be biased by the US prisons. In the Hollywood movies, many prisoners look like boxing competitors, but in many countries you will never see such well-fed prisoners.

amelius 2y ago

Interesting theory, but how do you explain that most prisoners don't end up as stick figures with swollen feet? Because I suspect they don't have a diet with protein powder.

adrian_b 2y ago
Bread can easily provide enough proteins at a very low cost, if its quantity is large enough (e.g. 500 g of wheat flour per day) and if it is supplemented with a small quantity of another food that can provide enough lysine, e.g. beans or meat or dairy. The problem of getting proteins mostly from bread is that you also need to do enough physical activity to avoid gaining weight. This is a serious difficulty for a computer programmer, but it is unlikely to be a problem for a prisoner or for a manual worker. It is likely that at least in a country like USA, the ratios for prisoners have an adequate protein content, even if they may be not tasty. In countries where prisoners were treated less well, for instance in the Eastern Europe countries occupied by the Russians after WWII, where the political adversaries of the communists have been either killed or jailed, the prisoners who have survived their prison term were really stick figures at the return from prison, so your images about prisoners must be biased by the US prisons. In the Hollywood movies, many prisoners look like boxing competitors, but in many countries you will never see such well-fed prisoners.