On NPR's health blog today: Commenters Bite Back On The Paleo Diet page

[butterphly01]

Commenters Bite Back On The Paleo Diet : Shots - Health Blog : NPR

[Lewis]

See also:


Eat like a caveman? Health experts wary of the high-protein Paleo diet

Eat like a caveman? Health experts wary of the high-protein Paleo diet | The Montgomery Advertiser | montgomeryadvertiser.com

Prize quote:

“I would describe it as a very low-carb diet and low in a lot of nutrients, vitamins and minerals,” said Angie Scheetz, registered dietitian and wellness coordinator at the National Institute for Fitness and Sport. “It’s not something I would recommend.”

I'm not sure how the dietitian makes out 22% to 40% carbohydrate[*] (Cordain's recommendations in The Paleo Diet) to be very low carb, but never mind. Unfortunately, she doesn't say which "nutrients, vitamins and minerals" it's low in and how she's determined that.

It seems a little sad to me that we live in a public culture where it's possible to make potentially damaging statements about something, and thereby perhaps affect public perceptions and discourse, in an offhand manner without feeling one needs to establish what the truth is or substantiate what one claims.

________________
[*] Of course Cordain is hedging his bets (and perhaps trying to keep clear blue water between himself and the low-carb movement) and seemed to me to more-or-less to admit in the interview with Eenfeldt that if you follow his recommendations so far as food selection goes it's actually hard to get above 25% of calories of carbohydrate.

[magnolia1973]

Come now, everyone knows that white bread and sugar is full of key nutrients. I mean, without your sugar free non-fat yogurt and oatmeal you will weaken and die.

It's so bizarre that Paleo and Primal are criticized for lacking in nutrients when the whole point is the consumption of nutrient dense foods. I think people just don't read all the info and perhaps just read about the people on here who live on bacon and coconut oil.

I mean- take a look at the recipes section and what people eat- wonderful recipes full of nutrition. I mean, does putting the burger on a bun make it healthier than putting it on a bed of roasted veggies? People just don't think.

[fiercehunter]

I used to really like to listen to NPR when I was younger, like the theme song.

[primalswan]

My family I eat SO much better on Paleo than we did on "healthy" CW. For comparisons sake, what we would have had prior to Paleo and what we ate yesterday:
BFAST:bowl of oatmeal with a crap ton of brown sugar or 2 eggs and a pile of veggies for breakfast.
LUNCH:Turkey sandwich and carrot sticks or a bell pepper stuffed with sauteed grassfed beef, onions, tomatoes, carrots for lunch.
SNACK: KASHI bar or bowl of organic berries and greek yogurt
DINNER: Whole wheat Pasta with jarred red sauce, ceasar salad bread, italian sausage or grassfed NY steak, salad with a huge amount of colorful veggies, and homemade sweet potato and coconut slices.

HOW IS THAT DEFICIENT IN NUTRIENTS!!! Makes me SO angry!

[Owly]

I'm not sure how the dietitian makes out 22% to 40% carbohydrate[*] (Cordain's recommendations in The Paleo Diet) to be very low carb, but never mind. Unfortunately, she doesn't say which "nutrients, vitamins and minerals" it's low in and how she's determined that.

It seems a little sad to me that we live in a public culture where it's possible to make potentially damaging statements about something, and thereby perhaps affect public perceptions and discourse, in an offhand manner without feeling one needs to establish what the truth is or substantiate what one claims.

________________
[*] Of course Cordain is hedging his bets (and perhaps trying to keep clear blue water between himself and the low-carb movement) and seemed to me to more-or-less to admit in the interview with Eenfeldt that if you follow his recommendations so far as food selection goes it's actually hard to get above 25% of calories of carbohydrate.

Although if you do the math on that 25% carbohydrate, that still works out to 125g of carbs for a 2000 kcal/day diet. Not what most low-carb advocates would call VLC. Our idea of low carb and a CW dietitian's idea of low carb are very different considering that at Cordain's top end figure of 40% carb, on a 2000 calorie diet, that's 200g/day, still 100g shy of the CW RDI for carbohydrate.

We tend to forget just how much carbohydrate the mainstream dietary world eats, which is why it cracks me up when those of us who eat in the 100-150g range are referred to as eating "high carb". The ranges most primal folks think in are totally different from what you get in official dietary guidelines. To that dietitian, we are *all* shockingly low carb.

[magnolia1973]

Mark Hyman, MD: The Last Diet You Will Ever Need

Good article....

[namelesswonder]

I like the "Last Diet" article because it at least has a focus on whole foods, which I think will be the first major stepping stone in teaching people to learn how what they ingest treats their body. On the one hand, I like seeing a bit more publicity for ancestral-styled eating, but on the other, I just REALLY want to know that people are staying away from "fake foods" and start seeing that disappear from the stores.

[lotusberries]

Commenters Bite Back On The Paleo Diet : Shots - Health Blog : NPR

Some of the comments on this article I don't understand, but hear a lot. It's the, "well this might work for SOME people, but we're all different and this wouldn't work for most of us." So whole foods aren't good, and people actually should be eating processed food? I don't get it.

[Catherine]

isn't NPR govt funded? The same govt that gives us subsidized wheat, soy, corn, and the food pyramid encouraging us to make the base of our diet of such subsidized items?