Archive for the ‘disease’ tag
Dangers of a High Protein Diet
Our protein requirements are minimal and a high protein diet, as most Americans consume, can lead to higher risks of disease and other health issues. Studies have shown that as consumption climbs over 5% protein from calories, so do the risks of disease.
Here are a just a few diseases that are associated with high protein, specifically animal protein diets:
- Osteoporosis – high animal protein diets have been shown to encourage calcium loss and make bones more brittle and fragile. Plant based diets have show to increase bone strength and avoid osteoporosis.
- Cancer – Hundreds of thousands of studies have linked animal food diets to most every cancer known to man. Fat is linked in part since animal based diets are normally also higher in fat as well. Often mentioned is also highly heated foods which not only combine or ‘bond’ the proteins and amino acids and become less usable by the body to synthesize, they are also carcinogenic. The FDA admits that all cooked foods contain carcinogens.
- Kidney Problems – Long term consumption of animal foods has shown risks of complete loss of kidney function. The longer term and more consumption of animal foods shows decline in normal kidney function. Kidney stones are one symptom of high animal protein diets.
Studies have shown increased calcium excretion in higher animal food diets. In addition to increasing the risks of osteoporosis, this also increases risk for kidney stones. Researchers in England found that when people added only about 5 ounces of fish (that’s about 34 grams of protein) to a normal diet, the risk of urinary tract stones increased by as much as 250 %.
In addition, so called ‘normal’ amounts of protein (according to accepted societal levels) have shown an amazingly high level of cancer.
What are the other risks of a high protein, animal based diet? How about obesity, high cholesterol and breast cancer?
How Much Protein Is Needed?
How much protein is necessary?
This is a widely debated subject and often heated discussion in the health and wellness community.
In the example of mother’s milk, which consists of 7% protein, our requirements are moderate compared to the publicly accepted rates of a high protein diet. Eating a diet filled with a variety of fruits and vegetables will be more than adequate to meet your requirements. Many fruits contain 4-8% protein, and most vegetables range from 10-30% protein.
Although this number varies depending on many factors, on average, an adult male may need around 0.3 to 0.4 gm per kg of weight or 0.01 ounces per pound of weight. So a 150 pound person would require about 2.11 ounces of protein per day. This is extremely low and as you can see you can easily meet this requirement with any variety of plant based foods. Part of the reason the requirement is so low is that we efficiently recycle between 100 to 300 grams of our own protein every day. This helps build new protein by breaking down the amino acids we eat and synthesize every day.
Most American’s already eat between 10 – 30% of their daily intake as protein, which is high. This is largely an animal based diet that leads to many diseases and increased health risk factors as research has proven.
How The China Study Was Conducted
Learn how the most comprehensive study on nutrition, the China Study, was conducted and what parameters were used.