Paleo diet Eating as in the Stone Age is healthy?

The Paleo Diet: How Healthy Is The Stone Age Diet Really?

07/10/2011

Among fitness practitioners and active athletes, the paleo diet is now very popular. The supporters of this new diet mainly eat a lot of meat, fish, eggs, fresh fruits, vegetables and nuts. Mainly eat the supporters of this diet meat and fish in excess.

In the US and also in Germany, the Paläo Kost finds more and more supporters. The menu includes fruits, vegetables, eggs and lots of meat. The basic idea is to eat, above all, what prehistoric man consumed more than 20,000 years ago in the Stone Age. Therefore, the diet is also „Stone Age Diet“ or „Stone Age diet“ called. Unlike the carbohydrate-reduced diet, carbohydrate rich, high glycemic fruits such as dried figs or dates are allowed in the Stone Age diet. Accordingly, only foods are eaten, which were also prepared and consumed by people in stone age.

Sugar and cereal products are frowned upon
Food made from grain, sugar, chocolate, alcohol and milk, as well as dairy products, are strictly prohibited during Stone Age nutrition. Advocates in many advocates propose effective protection against many widespread diseases of the United States that arose only through the emergence of progressive civilizations. According to the meat diet to protect against heart attack, obesity and diabetes. Critics accuse the dietarians that the statements regarding the Stone Age way of life consist of pure hypotheses for which there is no scientific evidence. For from a scientific point of view, the reconstruction of nutrition during the Stone Age is only partially possible. The food habits of the hunters and gatherers can not be transferred to the lives of people in modern times. In addition, the Stone Age covers a period of two million years. During this time the Stone Age people lived in different habitats. So there were none „Uniformly determined diet“, Meat consumption varied significantly due to the different living conditions. Many Stone Age people fed on fruits, seeds, mushrooms, roots, leaves, eggs and small animals. A representative of this diet was Australopithecus. The shape of the following homo habilis was similarly stored. These supplemented the killed prey with plant food. Did the Stone Age people really eat superficial meat??

Has humans hardly changed genetically since the Stone Age??
Despite persistent criticism, the Paleo diet is supported by numerous fitness supporters and some scientists. For example, Professor Loren Cordain of Colorado State University argued. „Ten years ago that was an absurd idea, but over the past two to three years it has become known worldwide“. The professor says the primeval diet has strengthened the health of the Stone Age people and activated brain functions, so that homo sapiens could develop into the modern man of today. The human genome has remained largely unchanged since the Stone Age, says the scientist. Man would still be deeply rooted in the genes and primarily a meat eater. A few million people would already feed on the guidelines of the Stone Age people, says Cordain. Some books on this topic have made it in the past again and again in the bestseller lists.

The statement that genes have hardly changed since the Stone Age is vehemently rejected by critics. Researchers have found in the last few years about 700 genetic changes that have occurred in the last 10,000 years. For example, one of the genetic changes is the ability to develop a lactose tolerance and thus to digest milk and dairy products from livestock. According to this - in contrast to the Stone Age Diet thesis - an adaptation of new food in a short period of time has long since taken place.

Effective against common diseases such as diabetes or obesity?
Loren Cordain claims that scientific research has acknowledged and even acknowledged the benefits of the paleo diet. So have the trade paper „Journal of Diabetes Science and Technology“ recently published the results of a study that showed subjects after a meat diet improved blood sugar levels and the risk of cardiovascular disease was reduced. During a study, Swedish researchers came to the conclusion that the Stone Age diet was more satiating than the frequently recommended Mediterranean diet. According to this, the prehistoric tasting, despite the high consumption of meat to protect against obesity and obesity.

Counter model to diets of industrialized countries
Not to be dismissed is the criticism of industrially produced foods, which in particular have contributed to the fact that more and more people in the western industrial nations are suffering from obesity and metabolic diseases. Flavors and simple fats are often included in ready meals. Although the food industry has one „Organic trend“ recognized, yet the diet often depends on the consumer's wallet. If you have a good income, you can also eat healthier. Accordingly, the preference for fresh vegetables, fruits and nuts in the Stone Age diet is very healthy. Controversial remains the high meat consumption and the renunciation of dairy products and cereals.

Paleo diet is not based on modern humans
The paleo-diet is criticized above all in circles of nutritionists. The US magazine „U.S. News & World Report“ During a survey, urine dieters recorded only about 23 percent of the calories of their daily diet in the form of carbohydrates. However, US health authorities recommend a daily intake of at least 45 percent. By contrast, levels of fats and proteins exceed health recommendations many times over.

Nutritionist Marion Nestle of the New York University of Nutrition Science finds that the Stone Age diet is not adapted to modern humans, who are less physically active today than they were in primitive times. She also doubts that in the Stone Age, over half of the diet actually came from meat. „That can not be confirmed scientifically“. At those times the general life expectancy was only 25 years. „At that time, nutrition was anything but ideal in addition to the circumstances of life“, the scientist argues. In contrast, Cordain argues that still exist today native people under similar living conditions and diets. On the one hand, people would have longer life expectancy and, on the other hand, they would not suffer from the diseases of the western world such as diabetes, hypertension or rising blood lipid levels. Would these people accept the nutritional forms of so-called civilization?, „The health of those would severely worsen“. (Sb)

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Picture: Günther Gumhold