the Palaeodiet

To move from the idea that you are what you eat to you are what you ate. (and the assumption that the human digestive system hasn't evolved much over the last ~10k years)

Frits Muskiet is a clinical chemist in Groningen (Nl). He states that we have moved far away from the diet our bodies have evolved with. This he thinks causes many health problems and he regrets that most of his colleagues focus on gene-expression as the primary cause of disease, which actually is only related to 5% of diseases associated with affluence. Our habits and diet are of greater influence than medical researchers acknowledge. The human body did not evolve to eat the amount of grains or milk products that we use, nor the levels of fat, sugar and salt.

The pleodiet consisted of:

  • larvae, worms
  • shellfish, fish
  • eggs
  • frogs
  • plants, roots, fruit

exercise and fresh air of an out-door life.

What's the norm.

In European medicine we have set values to levels of all kinds of chemicals which are based on averages among the population. Muskiet argues that we should not set our targets using the current population, because our blood is a reflection of our current diet. Instead we should take the levels of cholesterol, omega-3 acids, glucose, hormones, etc, from people that live in conditions and with diets close to that of prehistoric man (like the Bushmen or the Masai.) Levels of cholesterol and many other chemical linked with diseases of affluence are markedly lower than the European norm. Mothers milk in Europe doesn't even meet our own standard any more, he says, there is a great lack of omega-3 and an overload of linoleic acid. Muskiet shows that all Dutch people actually have much too high levels of cholesterol and triglycerides and lack vitamin-D and omega-3 acids and many have problematic sugar metabolic rates.

http://www.rug.nl/corporate/nieuws/opinie/010_08?lang=en

  • paleodiet.txt
  • Last modified: 2016-08-06 18:09
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