Was There Really A Year-Long Experiment On Humans Eating A Carnivore Diet?
by:
A. Lloyd Tucker
While researching for some of my writings, I came across an article that started off:
"I'm a dietitian and I don't want you eating a Carnivore diet"...The author went on to expound on how the all-meat diet had never been proven healthy and how one must have copious vegetables in their diet... I'm afraid I was not so very kind in my critique of her article in my comments on medium.com. I've since gone back and removed my remarks with the intention of--someday in the near future--re-writing it more courteously. I say all this to tell you that one of my first thoughts when I read her article was "yes, it has been proven to be safe over and over again."
Anyone who has been researching or studying nutrition for any extended time should know--at least--two paradoxes that exist in this scientific field: which are the French paradox and the Inuit paradox. These two human studies—cultures—have been taking place for not just one year but centuries and we will touch on each of them in our studies here at 'Bent Miles Health. The French paradox deals with high amounts of saturated fats eaten in a culture that suffers far fewer heart attacks than Americans. The Inuit paradox deals with a culture whose diet is almost exclusively high-fat meats and lays claim to one of the healthiest populations on Earth.
But the question is: Was there a year-long study on this topic? And, yes! There was! It was conducted back in the early 1900s by an American-Canadian explorer named Vilhjamur Stefannsson and you can read about his exploration encounters by clicking on the two links below.
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/all-meat-diet
https://physicalculturestudy.com/2015/01/07/vilhjalmur-stefanssons-all-meat-diet-part-one/
I’ve been aware of the all-meat diet, carnivore diet, for many years, I had never considered it for me until I started the low carbohydrate diet. So, I set a goal of trying it for a period of 30 days. I lasted for 26 days and was so stopped up, that I had to do something; I returned to including copious amounts of fiber in my diet. So, I don’t promote it; nor, do I discourage it. I think it can be healthy if done properly—insuring you have a 2:1 fat-protein ratio. The fat and protein should be from healthy non-grain-fed animals.
As I've indicated previously, we will investigate the various nutrients required of the human body and the best way these nutrients are provided to and/or by the body. So, let's get started.
I suppose it might be about time for a bit of a nutritional biology class; let's start with the four major nutrient types. If you count water—what I consider the most important nutrient ingested daily—there are seven human nutrients listed under two umbrellas:
Macro Nutrients—needed in large quantities
Fats
Proteins
Carbohydrates
Water
Micro Nutrients—needed only in small to trace amounts
Vitamins
Minerals
Phytochemicals
We will try to break these nutrients down into bite-sized discussions in a series of articles over the ensuing months. If you have any suggestions on how to better address the topics or others that you would like discussed, please let us know in the comments section.