The Eskimo Myth?

#1

Apparently it isn’t true that Inuit have a healthy diet, at all. Same with the Masai.

Now those aren’t quite the keto diet, but they are cited as evidence that a carb free/fat rich diet is healthy.

Is this article wrong?

#2

Bring all of your consumable fat to me.

(bulkbiker) #3

Check out who wrote it to see their agenda…

(TJ Borden) #4

The article completely misses the point of the example their diet sets. It’s not about the benefit of fish oil, it’s about the absence of carbohydrates, and the article misses that completely. Even at that, their “studies” are based on the addition of fish oils on a SAD, which likely wouldn’t make anyone healthier.

That’s like saying: Seatbelts don’t save lives. We conducted a study of people driving their cars off of 100 foot cliffs, and no one survived by wearing a seatbelt, so seatbelts clearly don’t save lives, and in fact might cause more harm because the victim was strapped to the wreckage and unable to flee an otherwise survivable accident.

Yes, the last part sounds crazy, but no crazier than the conclusions they come to with no real science.

(CharleyD) #5

My personal rule is to not give that site any clicks.

The way I see it, if someone truly found that the traditional diet really is toxic, it wouldn’t be broken on HuffPost.

I’ll trust Weston Price and Cate Shanahan’s work on this subject.

#6

The article cites numerous sources.

#7

NO one has said it was broken on huffpo, just that the site is reporting it as many others did I’m sure. Why should that be a problem?

Why are the sources you cite credible?

#8

This is actually quite concerning.

A cursory look into weston price reveals support for a whole raft of lunacy: anti vaccine thinking (as supported by other keto advocates including Dr Mercola and Dr Eric Berg), eating raw milk, crank ideas about dentistry.

Now they may be right about some things. Nothing’s as simple as black and white, but I expect far better sources than they.

To hear people recommending them over what certainly appear more credible sources is deeply concerning. Espcially from a forum that credits itself with being scientific.

(CharleyD) #9

Weston Price’s nutshell story is that travelled the world trying to figure out how isolated populations eat and stay healthy and how their teeth and bones grew. The populations had very little access to sugar, had never seen vegetable oils and noticed their traditional diets were meat on the bone, high in salt, etc.

Cate Shanahan picks up from there and links LCHF to what we know now about epigenetics. In that, you will be the healthiest if you eat as your ancestors did, since they gave you a genetic legacy that you throw away by eating as your nutritionist tells you.

#10

The article links to the Canadian Jounal of Cardiology that claims the Inuit have as much coronary heart disease as non-eskimo populations.

#11

I’m sorry but i do not consider weston price to be remotely credible

#12

I don’t think you need to agree with everyone who follows WPrice to agree with the basic principles: we evolved eating a certain way, and departure from that has often been detrimental to our health. Put even more simply: it’s the new eating patterns that we should look at critically and cautiously.

Personally, I find his observations about health and specifically about dentistry/jaw construction very interesting and I’m not concerned that I might not agree 100% with everyone who cites his work. I work with young children and even in the last generation I see a difference in the narrowing of the jaw and palate among my students. Very few children that I see have wide, full palates and jaws with enough room for all the teeth, and I swear the current generation - at least in the US - is noticeably worse than the last. (This is casual, unscientific observation, but it makes a lot of sense to me.)

(CharleyD) #13

okay :hugs:

I don’t see anything particularly objectionable to his nutritional observations:
https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/abcs-of-nutrition/principles-of-healthy-diets-2/#characteristics

I don’t know or particularly care about the vaccine policy of his foundation these days but I’m sure the isolated populations he ran into in the 30s and 40s lived fine without vaccines and that may be where that comes from.

(CharleyD) #14

That was exactly Price’s motivation to explore.

#15

I actually owe him a debt of gratitude. My father came across his work when I was in my late teens, early 20s, and even though I didn’t go too deep at that point, hearing some of the research through my dad - and finding that it all made so much sense to me - eased my mind quite a bit about fat and made me question dietary dogma. That probably lay the groundwork for my later forays into Paleo, keto and ancestral eating.

(Todd Allen) #16

The Inuit now eat refined flours, sugars and vegetable oils. I interpret this as a diet high in seafood/fish oil is not protective against processed foods. Most non-European peoples develop high rates of diabetes, heart disease, cancer, etc. as they increasingly turn to cheap processed western food.

(CharleyD) #17

Pima and Bantu come to mind as becoming metabolically deranged when forced to change their traditional diet.

Now knowing what happens I’m against lab coats in an ivory tower telling ANY population what’s best for them to eat.

(Adam Kirby) #18

lol you’re posting an article by Neal Barnard, hardcore vegan advocate. Reckon he factored in all the refined grains and sugar they’ve been eating for decades? lol, weak AF article.

(Banting & Yudkin & Atkins & Eadeses & Cordain & Taubes & Volek & Naiman & Bikman ) #19

The CJC report requires at $35 purchase or a membership to read more than the abstract.
I’d be curious to read more about the methodology. I’m unclear on how many Inuit people live as hunter gathers in the modern day, or what period they covered.

That said, I do not often reference either the Masai or the Inuit in support of my diet.

#20

He’s a quack