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Low-Carb Diets Could Shorten Life, Study Suggests (bbc.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: In the study, published in The Lancet Public Health, 15,400 people from the U.S. filled out questionnaires on the food and drink they consumed, along with portion sizes. From this, scientists estimated the proportion of calories they got from carbohydrates, fats, and protein. After following the group for an average of 25 years, researchers found that those who got 50-55% of their energy from carbohydrates (the moderate carb group) had a slightly lower risk of death compared with the low and high-carb groups. Researchers estimated that, from the age of 50, people in the moderate carb group were on average expected to live for another 33 years. This was: four years more than people who got 30% or less of their energy from carbs (extra-low-carb group); 2.3 years more than the 30%-40% (low-carb) group; and 1.1 years more than the 65% or more (high-carb) group.
The scientists then compared low-carb diets rich in animal proteins and fats with those that contained lots of plant-based protein and fat. They found that eating more beef, lamb, pork, chicken and cheese in place of carbs was linked with a slightly increased risk of death. But replacing carbohydrates with more plant-based proteins and fats, such as legumes and nuts, was actually found to slightly reduce the risk of mortality.
The scientists then compared low-carb diets rich in animal proteins and fats with those that contained lots of plant-based protein and fat. They found that eating more beef, lamb, pork, chicken and cheese in place of carbs was linked with a slightly increased risk of death. But replacing carbohydrates with more plant-based proteins and fats, such as legumes and nuts, was actually found to slightly reduce the risk of mortality.
Almost everyone I know who eats low carb does so for a reason. They are fat, prone to be fat, diabetic, celiacs, or some other health problem that made them switch to low carb in the first place. Otherwise healthy people generally don't choose low carb without a health problem first.
Butter is good. Low carb leaves a lot of parameter space for what are you replacing it with. At the end of the day you pick a caloric intake and you pick a method of filling it. Turning down the mid range doesn't say what you did with the treble, base and volume knobs.
Here's the thing. If you lower your carbs and 2 years later your whole body still feels great then whatever you did probably was the right thing. I'm not saying eat what makes you happy. Because if you do that, and happy is pancakes, then 2 years from now you won't feel healthy or happy about how you feel when you aren't eating pancakes.. Unless maybe you are a kid.
You body doesn't have sense on a meal by meal basis but it lets you know you are not eating well overall.
SO no frigging way are the people on low carb diets long term and likeing how they feel doing damage.
On the other hand low carb diets could be bad ideas if for example you stay on the atkins diet or something equivalently stupid. Atkins is better than being obese but once you shed that, get off it man!
The thig about low carbs is that for some people it's incredibly easy. Once you stop using sugar you just lose the desire for it. it's not punishment. And that's the magic of low carbs. It's one of the few "diets" that doesn't lead to yo-yo. At least not for a subset fo people. It's sustainable.
It isn't for every one. But for some folks it is an easy way to feel good over the long term. That can't be unhealthy.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Why do we keep covering these obvious causation vs correlation studies. Heck this one looks like it was crafted in reverse just to tarnish low carb diets. They get 2 minute blurbs on news stations and you never hear from them again. Ridiculous.
Eat 50% carbs and get your protein & fat from nuts & beans.
Hmm.. pretty much what I've been aiming for since a couple of years. Almost no sugar, and don't be afraid of fats! Just watch the kinds of fats & what other nutrients (protein, minerals, fibres etc) their sources come with. As the body adapts to pull calories from fats & high-fibre 'slow' carbs (vs. from sugar and low-fibre carbs found in many processed foods), blood sugar highs and lows tend to disappear. Making you loose those cravings for sugar rich, unhealthy in-between snacks.
One thing the article fails to mention: animal fat tends to be high in saturated fats, which are considered not-so-healthy. Whereas plant based fats tend to be high in mono- or polyunsaturated fats, which are considered healthier than the saturated variety. This could explain some of the differences.
Note that although plant based, for example coconut or palm oil (the latter put in almost any processed food these days) are also high in saturated fats. And thus may fall into the not-so-healthy camp. Not to mention ratio of omega-3 vs. omega-6 fats in a diet. Also FTA:
(..) greater consumption of animal proteins and fats, which have been linked to inflammation and ageing in the body.
Yeah, tends to be unhealthy and shorten life of the animals involved, too. One of many good reasons for having been a veggie most of my life.
Who to believe?
Learn critical thinking. What critical word appears in the very first sentence of the summary?
Answer: "Questionnaire"
This was a SURVEY, of people that selected their own diets, not a controlled study. People that give up meat and eat "plant based proteins" are the same people that will exercise, avoid smoking, drink a glass of red wine instead of a keg of beer, etc. Correlation is not causation, and the results of this survey really don't mean anything.
I've been diagnosed with diabetes a couple of years ago. I knew that lowering caloric intake can cure type 2 diabetes, but I am not fat, in fact, I am more on the skinny side, so I had few option of lowering my caloric intake much. However, I knew that carbs are associated with diabetes and started researching the issue more in depth. I decided to severely cut the amount of carbs I eat.
It was difficult at first, but as time went on, I gradually found it easier and easier. I replaced it with vegetables everywhere I could, which turns out to be a lot of places.
I am happy to announce that I have no symptoms or readings associated with diabetes anymore, and I do feel awesomely good. Whether this diet will shorten my life or not, I can't say (though I doubt it very much), but I really don't care. Quality of life matters more than length of life, and the quality of my life is so much higher than before the diet, I am glad to sacrifice a decade of shitty diabetic life for it.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
The fad with saturated fats has really hurt the average health, because people started eating more carbs to make up for the missing calories. And as a result, there was an explosion of diabetes cases.
As you say, when it comes to fats, the main thing you should look out for is whether they are trans-fats or not, and avoid trans-fats like the plague. But saturated fats have been proven to not be any worse for the cardiovascular system than non-saturated fats. Only this fact seems to have been suppressed in popular media.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
This study (really a survey) defines a low-carb diet as between 30-40% of calories. And the average is about 38% for the observed low-carbers.
That's lower carb, for sure, but it's not meaningfully low-carb. Ketosis (fat metabolism) doesn't begin until about 20% carbs (50-60g per day of carbs, as a rule of thumb).
A few months ago another study, 'proving' that low-carb diets had no advantages, also gave a firm conclusion recommending a 'plant based diet' while talking up low-carbing's supposed health issues. That study had low-carbing defined as 135g per a day, which is laughable.
It's as if the nutrition world is pushing a creationist diet (Adam and Eve were apparently vegetarians). Which is interesting, because Senator George McGovern, whose commission made it official US dogma that animal fat is bad for you, was a Christian. He pushed that agenda against the advice of his own scientists who advised him that the theory was unproven. The charts show the obesity epidemic starting at that point as diets went increasingly towards carbs. (Ironically, however, most of Christianity has never had a dogma of a literal translation of the bible; with Catholics even having the inventor of the Big Bang theory among their priests, Lemaitre; and Mendel, the father of modern genetics, was a monk).
Meanwhile, Stanford Uni did a study of a bunch of diets, including low-fat and Atkins, where the study lead, who was a longterm vegetarian, was surprised to find that Atkins beat all the other diets in improvements on every single cardio-vascular marker.
It's a fascinating youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eREuZEdMAVo
And meanwhile, in another study, vegetarian women hit the menopause several years earlier than normal people. And the fertility rate in men has dramatically dropped. hmmmm........
Well, i can tell you that I won't be getting a case of 'vegan face' any time soon.