Diabetes

[Silverstarqueen]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Noakes
is a South African Doctor who was sued by the Nutritionists association because he tweeted to a mother that it was safe for an infant to be on a ketogenic diet.
It took years for the lawsuit to wind through the courts and he was ultimately exonerated because his team had all the evidence.
A not well known fact is that babies are in a state of nutritional ketosis when they are born and can last quite long under adverse conditions because of their fat stores.

Infants can survive on their fat stores for a time when born.
However the nutrition that babies are designed to survive on consists of
4.4 g fat
3g protein
8,8 g Carbohydrate
per 100ml. (with some variation from feed to feed).
Therefore the calories from fat vs carbohydrate is just about equal.
Again , what they can survive on for some medical reason, and what they were designed to survive on normally are not necessarily the same thing.

[Grandan]

I think it is important to identify the carbohydrate in human mothers milk, it is lactose and that is a long ways from glucose or fructose. Not to mention the numerous other minerals, protein and micronutrients. Also a high percentage of water.

[Grandan]

I have not bought in to this theory that the human body was designed to run only on fat and protein. These diets work precisely because our bodies and appestats are geared to eat carbohydrates when available. There are many indigenous groups which have survived very well on mainly carbohydrates, some fat, and some (often hunted animal) protein. And there are indigenous groups which survived on mainly hunting. So that tells me that our body is adaptable, as a survival means, it can do very well on either, or combinations of fat, carb, protein. What our bodies were never meant to live on is processed foods, such as we have an abundance of now: potato chips, corn chips, breads of a hundred different types, food soaked in fat and deep fried in fats, white flours, sugar. And we were never designed to live on food that didn't take a lot of work to acquire (farming or hunting or combination of). So the sheer abundance adds to the problem that processed food is easy to get, and quick to eat in large amounts. If you add in, that a large part of the population has moved from the bush/country where food took work to acquire, long days of hard work, and now much of the population is living in the city: far far less physical work, or even effort to transport anything from A to B. Humans have survived regular periods of starvation by developing an ability to eat large amounts of food, if and when available, and to store it as fat, to carry us thru the times of famine. This is not a small effect, most animals have it to some degree.

Until the last 50 years or so we did not have advertising continually right in our homes, to eat all this processed food. Juicy burgers with cheese and bacon dripping made to look larger and juicier than reality. Huge servings of processed potatoes and sugary drinks and desserts. Advertising is very powerful, particularly aimed at people trying to limit their intake. Do we allow advertising of cocaine and opiods on tv, billboards along the highways? Retail outlets by the hundreds in every city? Drive thru service for everyone from cradle to grave? Drugstores lined with more junk food than medications gas stations with every imaginable junk food ? So we have the makings of a metabolic pandemic. Getting people back to whole, unprocessed unsugared, unsalted, not fat laden, foods, and used to not eating tons of it, with very little physical output, would be the solution(I doubt it is possible to actually accomplish tho), the normal balance of nutrients, in their naturally available form, would go a long way to preventing metabolic problems.

The issue is that humans adapted to a diet that was low on carbohydrates and fructose for the past 50,000 years. The past 100 years is just a blip on that timeline. Humans adapted to a diet high in fruit at the end of summer and that helped us fatten up for food scarcity over the winter. Now we have fruit and high calorie foods available year round and our physiology promotes fat storage.
Some people are more adapted to grains than others due to where their forebears have lived for hundreds of generations. Sensitivity to carbohydrates is a spectrum. Some are more tolerant than others and they can consume high carbohydrates with no Ill effects. The important thing is to know what your tolerance level is.
One of the most important factors is the amount of natural fibres in the foods you eat. It is that fibre that feeds your microbiome.
Another important factor is the type of oils or fat we consume with some oils being very hard to digest and having a poor balance between omega 3 and omega 6.
What we do know is that the high carbohydrate diet that makes up the standard American diet has increased diabetes, heart disease and a plethora of other diseases that are entirely caused by diet.
The consumption of sweet potatoes in the traditional Okinawans diet is a far cry from French fries deep fried in canola oil served up with ketchup.

[Silverstarqueen]

Earliest foods of humans which came out of Africa, before cooking was used, (800,00-1.2 M years ago)included meat and plant foods, in Europe:
"These microfossils included traces of raw animal tissue, uncooked starch granules indicating consumption of grasses, pollen grains from a species of pine, insect fragments and a possible fragment of a toothpick."

Given that humans had suvived before that on bush meat,fish, grubs, plants, nuts, fruits, roots, grass seeds, it seems they had a balanced diet, not just animal protein and animal fats.
There appear to be very few societies which survived on just animal meat, and that due more to forced circumstances. Yes, the inuit adapted to that type of diet, but probably 90% of the worlds population did not.

[DanMidtdal]

There are more than one people who live on a mostly animal protein diet. I am not one of them. I include salmon and sardines to get the benefit of the micronutrients such as iodine and omega 3 fatty acids. I eat vegetables, nuts, seeds and dairy as well.
https://www.wired.com/2012/09/milk-meat ... he-maasai/

The Maasai are a pastoralist tribe living in Kenya and Northern Tanzania. Their traditional diet consists almost entirely of milk, meat, and blood. Two thirds of their calories come from fat, and they consume 600 - 2000 mg of cholesterol a day. To put that number in perspective, the American Heart Association recommends consuming under 300 mg of cholesterol a day.__ In spite of a high fat, high cholesterol diet, the Maasai have low rates of diseases typically associated with such diets.__ They tend to have low blood pressure, their overall cholesterol levels are low, they have low incidences of cholesterol gallstones, as well as low rates of coronary artery diseases such as atherosclerosis.

https://exoprotein.com/blogs/nutrition/ ... der-attack

For the nomadic Kyrgyz living in the Himalayas—there are just over a thousand in Afghanistan—plant life is scant at best. In turn, they must derive the vast majority of their nutrition from the animals they raise: camels, goats, horses, sheep, and, of course, yak.

The Kyrgyz do eat some dairy and grain, but, like the Inuit, their diet is dominated by meat. At times, they fry the meats in yak butter (which Keto dieters in particular would love), and they consume every edible part of the animals, including the eyes.

[Silverstarqueen]

So those who have descended from the Masai, the Inuit,and from those who traditionally lived on meat (or seal blubber and caribou, fish), will be able to live on those diets, with those hunter lifestyles , anyone who was likely to die young on those in the last ten-50 thousand years, probably didn't make it to reproduce. For the many populations who lived on a varied diet (which is most of the world), they generally did great, even those who were on their traditional diets of carbs, fats, and proteins seem to do well on their traditional diets, if they maintain traditional life-styles (intensive farming, fishing, or hunting). High rates of diabetes only seem to have arrived since people started having access to large amounts of processed foods, not balanced by long hours of working hard for a living. Until relatively recently diabetes was not common with omnivorous, or carnivorous diet and lifestyle. Eat the diet of your ancestors, (whether rice growers or dairy farmers), work hard, grow, catch, or hunt, your own food, and diabetes should be uncommon.
At any ate we now have a rather high rate of diabetes, fatty liver disease, metabolic problems, that lead to heart, kidney disease, and some cancers.

[DanMidtdal]

So those who have descended from the Masai, the Inuit,and from those who traditionally lived on meat (or seal blubber and caribou, fish), will be able to live on those diets, with those hunter lifestyles , anyone who was likely to die young on those in the last ten-50 thousand years, probably didn't make it to reproduce. For the many populations who lived on a varied diet (which is most of the world), they generally did great, even those who were on their traditional diets of carbs, fats, and proteins seem to do well on their traditional diets, if they maintain traditional life-styles (intensive farming, fishing, or hunting). High rates of diabetes only seem to have arrived since people started having access to large amounts of processed foods, not balanced by long hours of working hard for a living. Until relatively recently diabetes was not common with omnivorous, or carnivorous diet and lifestyle. Eat the diet of your ancestors, (whether rice growers or dairy farmers), work hard, grow, catch, or hunt, your own food, and diabetes should be uncommon.
At any ate we now have a rather high rate of diabetes, fatty liver disease, metabolic problems, that lead to heart, kidney disease, and some cancers.

Today there is an epidemic of polycystic ovarian syndrome. Women cannot get pregnant. It relates back to their diet high in refined carbohydrates and fructose. There are biological consequences.
The working hard part is not essential but regular movement is. A lifestyle of sitting at a desk all day and getting up rarely is not healthy in the long run.
Another factor that is coming to the fore more recently is our microbiome which also needs to be fed a healthy dose of complex fibres to maintain it's viability. This has lead to an epidemic of gut dysbiosis and an increase in autoimmune diseases due to leaky gut and breakdown of the gut mucosa.
We are very adaptable to many different diets but humans have not adapted well to the SAD diet (standard american diet) that is high in refined carbohydrates and HFCS (high fructose corn syrup) which is subsidized by the American congress. Large amounts of genetically modified corn has made it into the food chain, particularly meat, eggs and dairy. Then there are seed oils such as cottonseed (crisco) that are not easily digested by humans on top of the pesticides such as Glyphosate that are in too many of our crops.

[Grandan]

This series of talks about the ketogenic diet by the people who did the research are very illuminating. Ketogenic diets were used to treat diabetes before the invention of insulin.

https://youtu.be/6qc22oMKlRo

[Silverstarqueen]

Hypocaloric ketogenic or low fat diet, both had same effect on fatty liver.
" Irrespective of diet, in all participants with NAFLD (n = 12), there was a marked decrease in liver fat ranging from −13% to −82% (p = 0.001). The effect was similar in the Ketogenic Combined (−56%) and LFD (−60%) groups. After the six-week intervention, liver fat fraction dropped below 5% in 7 of the 12 subjects, no longer meeting the definition of NAFLD in those subjects"
Thus my theory that the human system is adaptable to various nutritious diets.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8002465/

[hozzle]

Today there is an epidemic of polycystic ovarian syndrome. Women cannot get pregnant. It relates back to their diet high in refined carbohydrates and fructose. There are biological consequences.
The working hard part is not essential but regular movement is. A lifestyle of sitting at a desk all day and getting up rarely is not healthy in the long run.
Another factor that is coming to the fore more recently is our microbiome which also needs to be fed a healthy dose of complex fibres to maintain it's viability. This has lead to an epidemic of gut dysbiosis and an increase in autoimmune diseases due to leaky gut and breakdown of the gut mucosa.
We are very adaptable to many different diets but humans have not adapted well to the SAD diet (standard american diet) that is high in refined carbohydrates and HFCS (high fructose corn syrup) which is subsidized by the American congress. Large amounts of genetically modified corn has made it into the food chain, particularly meat, eggs and dairy. Then there are seed oils such as cottonseed (crisco) that are not easily digested by humans on top of the pesticides such as Glyphosate that are in too many of our crops.

Exactly...

At the grocery store I try to keep it simple... no refined or processed stuff (at least I try my best at it).

Sugar cane or sugar beets once refined becomes Refined Sugar.
Corn starch once refined becomes High Fructose Corn Syrup.
Wheat once refined becomes Flour.
Coca leaves once refined becomes Cocaine.

[DanMidtdal]

Hypocaloric ketogenic or low fat diet, both had same effect on fatty liver.
" Irrespective of diet, in all participants with NAFLD (n = 12), there was a marked decrease in liver fat ranging from −13% to −82% (p = 0.001). The effect was similar in the Ketogenic Combined (−56%) and LFD (−60%) groups. After the six-week intervention, liver fat fraction dropped below 5% in 7 of the 12 subjects, no longer meeting the definition of NAFLD in those subjects"
Thus my theory that the human system is adaptable to various nutritious diets.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8002465/

A dietary comparison over a 6 week period has a number of flaws that stand out for me. 6 weeks is too short to be really meaningful. It can take months not weeks to adapt to a ketogenic diet. Also 17 grams of sugar is a lot of sugar to ingest. It may not seem a lot compared to the SAD diet but it is a lot if you are overweight or obese and trying to lose weight. The number of participants is quite low, something that includes hundreds or thousands would start to show differences. The addition of exogenous ketones is a confounding factor. The date of the study is quite old now, something more recent with a better defined dietary composition would be more meaningful.
I would not place my bets on the basis of this study at all.
One study ongoing is the Framingham study which has been ongoing since 1948
This is but one of many research papers produced from Framingham
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/a ... act/364764

Based on 20 years of surveillance of the Framingham cohort relating subsequent cardiovascular events to prior evidence of diabetes, a twofold to threefold increased risk of clinical atherosclerotic disease was reported. The relative impact was greatest for intermittent claudication (IC) and congestive heart failure (CHF) and least for coronary heart disease (CHD), which was, nevertheless, on an absolute scale the chief sequela. The relative impact was substantially greater for women than for men. For each of the cardiovascular diseases (CVD), morbidity and mortality were higher for diabetic women than for nondiabetic men. After adjustment for other associated risk factors, the relative impact of diabetes on CHD, IC, or stroke incidence was the same for women as for men; for CVD death and CHF, it was greater for women. Cardiovascular mortality was actually about as great for diabetic women as for diabetic men.

(JAMA 241:2035-2038, 1979)

[Silverstarqueen]

Hypocaloric ketogenic or low fat diet, both had same effect on fatty liver.
" Irrespective of diet, in all participants with NAFLD (n = 12), there was a marked decrease in liver fat ranging from −13% to −82% (p = 0.001). The effect was similar in the Ketogenic Combined (−56%) and LFD (−60%) groups. After the six-week intervention, liver fat fraction dropped below 5% in 7 of the 12 subjects, no longer meeting the definition of NAFLD in those subjects"
Thus my theory that the human system is adaptable to various nutritious diets.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8002465/

A dietary comparison over a 6 week period has a number of flaws that stand out for me. 6 weeks is too short to be really meaningful. It can take months not weeks to adapt to a ketogenic diet. Also 17 grams of sugar is a lot of sugar to ingest. It may not seem a lot compared to the SAD diet but it is a lot if you are overweight or obese and trying to lose weight. The number of participants is quite low, something that includes hundreds or thousands would start to show differences. The addition of exogenous ketones is a confounding factor. The date of the study is quite old now, something more recent with a better defined dietary composition would be more meaningful.
I would not place my bets on the basis of this study at all.
One study ongoing is the Framingham study which has been ongoing since 1948
This is but one of many research papers produced from Framingham
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/a ... act/364764

Based on 20 years of surveillance of the Framingham cohort relating subsequent cardiovascular events to prior evidence of diabetes, a twofold to threefold increased risk of clinical atherosclerotic disease was reported. The relative impact was greatest for intermittent claudication (IC) and congestive heart failure (CHF) and least for coronary heart disease (CHD), which was, nevertheless, on an absolute scale the chief sequela. The relative impact was substantially greater for women than for men. For each of the cardiovascular diseases (CVD), morbidity and mortality were higher for diabetic women than for nondiabetic men. After adjustment for other associated risk factors, the relative impact of diabetes on CHD, IC, or stroke incidence was the same for women as for men; for CVD death and CHF, it was greater for women. Cardiovascular mortality was actually about as great for diabetic women as for diabetic men.

(JAMA 241:2035-2038, 1979)

I agree that 6 weeks is not that long,it is only one study, there are in the last few years a lot more now comparing HF-low carb, to Higher car-lower fat. For my own self, I have done keto diets for many months, and have done higher carb diets for many months. What I found concerning was the effect on my liver enzymes. And now there are studies(not a enough yet to be definitive), that a high fat diet (while it may cause weight loss), may have other side effects that are not so desirable. I can only conclude that the devil is in the details (or possibly in the genetics of adaption for some people). The fact keeps coming back to me that people ate high-ish carb diets for tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of years, and yet, diabetes on the current wide scale is a relative new disease. Many people who switched from their traditional diets, then went to the SAD of high fat, refined carbohydrates,(and sedentary life style) and that's where things go wrong. If someone is eating keto, and they lose weight, all looks good, but they still are not likely going out to hunt for their food or living in subzero conditions like the Inuit. So a key part of the lifestyle is missing. We are living in our temperature controlled environments, do not have to go to much effort to get a fat laden cheeseburger, so even if we chuck the bun and skip the fries and soft drink, is it really the best choice of diet?
Lately I have been experimenting with higher carb diet, too soon to be sure, but my weight has not changed. Maybe this effect will not last, but I won't know unless I try it will I? I am noting things like my brain and muscle function, inflammatory reactions. Which shake of the genes did I get, the you can eat higher carb genes, or you can eat keto genes? I think a lot of people evolved on a varied diet. Most people are descended from populations which had to starve regularly, so unless someone is living on a hypocaloric diet for part of the year, where is that diet in the popular view? Even Fung Followers, are generally not eating low cal, or forgoing food for weeks. I have always said the best diet is the one which works for you.
The practices of some keto dieters, such as having a cream laden cafe latte for breakfast, does not make sense to me, and not many societies did well with practices like that. Without much research, thousands of people are doing this sort of thing, and I am concerned that we could see some bad effects 50 years from now. Sure, if you are running marathons, high fat might work, but the vast majority are still sitting at home, and might work out 30 min or take a jog, not the same thing. Maybe it's safe, definitely there should be more research of large numbers of people over longer times before this diet is endorsed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQt4CNnCyUg&t=22s

[hozzle]

I agree that 6 weeks is not that long,it is only one study, there are in the last few years a lot more now comparing HF-low carb, to Higher car-lower fat. For my own self, I have done keto diets for many months, and have done higher carb diets for many months. What I found concerning was the effect on my liver enzymes. And now there are studies(not a enough yet to be definitive), that a high fat diet (while it may cause weight loss), may have other side effects that are not so desirable. I can only conclude that the devil is in the details (or possibly in the genetics of adaption for some people). The fact keeps coming back to me that people ate high-ish carb diets for tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of years, and yet, diabetes on the current wide scale is a relative new disease. Many people who switched from their traditional diets, then went to the SAD of high fat, refined carbohydrates,(and sedentary life style) and that's where things go wrong. If someone is eating keto, and they lose weight, all looks good, but they still are not likely going out to hunt for their food or living in subzero conditions like the Inuit. So a key part of the lifestyle is missing. We are living in our temperature controlled environments, do not have to go to much effort to get a fat laden cheeseburger, so even if we chuck the bun and skip the fries and soft drink, is it really the best choice of diet?
Lately I have been experimenting with higher carb diet, too soon to be sure, but my weight has not changed. Maybe this effect will not last, but I won't know unless I try it will I? I am noting things like my brain and muscle function, inflammatory reactions. Which shake of the genes did I get, the you can eat higher carb genes, or you can eat keto genes? I think a lot of people evolved on a varied diet. Most people are descended from populations which had to starve regularly, so unless someone is living on a hypocaloric diet for part of the year, where is that diet in the popular view? Even Fung Followers, are generally not eating low cal, or forgoing food for weeks. I have always said the best diet is the one which works for you.
The practices of some keto dieters, such as having a cream laden cafe latte for breakfast, does not make sense to me, and not many societies did well with practices like that. Without much research, thousands of people are doing this sort of thing, and I am concerned that we could see some bad effects 50 years from now. Sure, if you are running marathons, high fat might work, but the vast majority are still sitting at home, and might work out 30 min or take a jog, not the same thing. Maybe it's safe, definitely there should be more research of large numbers of people over longer times before this diet is endorsed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQt4CNnCyUg&t=22s

I certainly hope you are watching gluten in this diet. Gluten affects even those that do not have celiac disease.

[hozzle]

...The practices of some keto dieters, such as having a cream laden cafe latte for breakfast, does not make sense to me, and not many societies did well with practices like that. Without much research, thousands of people are doing this sort of thing, and I am concerned that we could see some bad effects 50 years from now. Sure, if you are running marathons, high fat might work, but the vast majority are still sitting at home, and might work out 30 min or take a jog, not the same thing. Maybe it's safe, definitely there should be more research of large numbers of people over longer times before this diet is endorsed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQt4CNnCyUg&t=22s

You do realize that the Keto diet is basically a rebranding of the Atkins diet, and that was introduced 50yrs ago.

[DanMidtdal]

The key to avoiding Diabetes is to avoid sugar in all its forms particularly High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS), avoiding drinking juices but rather to eat the whole fruit instead and to avoid highly refined foods and instead eat whole foods that contain the complete fiber and nutrient package.
Around the globe the people eating traditional diets (whether high or low carb) did not encounter the diseases of our modern era until they switched to the staples of the SAD diet, ie. pasta, wonder bread, breakfast cereals and sweetened drinks.
As I mentioned earlier, resistance to carbohydrates is a spectrum with degrees of tolerance across that spectrum.
If you follow Robert Lustig Jr. he has proven that carbs will make you fat but sugar will make you sick.
One of the principals that Jason Fung advocates for is to reduce the insulin spikes caused by calorie dense foods such as that breakfast muffin, cereal or a bagel. High carbohydrates will have you looking for more food within hours whereas fat (olive oil, butter etc.) will keep you satisfied. We are designed to burn fat, that is why it is used for storage in our bodies because it is so efficient. Cabohydrates on the other hand have very limited storage capacity in the liver as glycogen and will not last more than about 12 hours before the glycogen can be depleted and the body then must turn to stored fat for energy.
By becoming Keto adapted, the body always runs on fat. Eating too many carbs can easily disrupt that process, driving up insulin which then tells the body to convert the glucose to fat and store it.
To help understand the intricacies of the process Jason Fung's book series, The Obesity Code, The Diabetes Code and The Cancer Code are all good information.