Danger: The High Protein Diet

You've probably heard about the sudden deaths of those who have gone on a high-protein, low-carbohydrate liquid diet to lose weight. These deaths are caused by irregular heart rhythms resulting from severe nutritional imbalances. But while these deaths are dramatic, there are many other chronic, disabling disorders that come from a high-protein diet. In fact, a high-protein diet is toxic to the body! This diet taxes your liver, breaks down your body's own protein tissues, triggers a loss of calcium from your bones, and leaves behind toxic residues. Before your body manages to eliminate these residues, it is often damaged, becoming more susceptible to a variety of diseases including cancer and arthritis.

A high-protein diet also causes excessive calcium loss through the urine. People on a high-protein diet need large amounts of calcium to make up for the losses. With an extremely high-protein diet (140 grams a day), researchers found it was impossible to maintain calcium balance-regardless of how much extra calcium one
ingested!

Too much protein causes harmful amounts of ammonia to accumulate in the body, and ammonia has been shown to slow the growth of cells in a cell culture. It seems clear that ammonia will slow the growth of normal cells, but hardly affects the growth of cancer cells - apparently giving the cancer cells an advantage!

For the elderly, a high-protein diet is particularly detrimental since they may easily lose bone matrix, resulting in osteoporosis, or thinning of the bones. Then, too, there's the loss of calcium, iron, zinc, and phosphorus through the urine during a high protein diet and we know that zinc is needed to balance other minerals in the
blood.

 In a completely primitive society, an individual receives about 1 0 percent of their calories from protein, about 10 percent from fat, and about 80 percent from complex (unrefined) carbohydrates. Studies indicate this kind of diet is the easiest for the human body to handle, since both fats and proteins are far more difficult to metabolize than carbohydrates.

Almost 1 00 percent of carbohydrates can be converted to energy during digestion, so they represent the least "expensive" form of body fuel, leaving the smallest amount of waste product. Protein, on the other hand, is an "expensive" fuel, since only 58 percent is avail- able for "burning:' leaving much waste material for your body to dispose. Fats are even more difficult, since only 10 percent can be converted into fuel. So, since the production of heat, the performance of work, and the forerunners for many other nutrients are obtained from carbohydrates, it is plain that they should represent the major portion of food eaten.

Many people have a fear of eating carbohydrates, thinking they will cause weight gain. This is a misconception. It's fats and proteins that stimulate one to become overweight, rather than unrefined carbohydrates. Eating high-carbohydrate foods will not cause you to become overweight unless you eat high-fat and high-protein sauces, gravies, and other foods with them. In fact, if you use a high-carbohydrate diet from natural sources, it is highly unlikely that you will become overweight.

Refined carbohydrates are absorbed rapidly into the blood stream and put a strain on the pancreas, liver, stomach, and other digestive organs, often resulting in imbalanced blood biochemistry. Generally speaking, all refined or concentrated foods should be taken quite sparingly.

The best diet is a very simple one consisting of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Apart from these three food groups, all other foods should be used sparingly. Some nutrients, like salt, should also be used sparingly, and oils should be severely restricted, as they may cause an increased susceptibility to cancer and heart disease. No added protein should be used, and very high protein foods-such as animal products-should be used very sparingly.

Enjoy the foods God gives us - in their natural form. Your body will thank you!!!

Taken from Dr. Agatha Thrash - Dr. Agatha Thrash confounded Uchee Pines Institute with her husband Dr. Calvin Thrash. Together they wrote a book entitled Diabetes and the Hypoglycemic Syndrome, which can be ordered online at ucheepines.org