In this study, which examined diets and death rates in 22,944 Greek people, diets low in carbohydrates and high in protein were associated with an increase in total mortality.

In this study, one extreme (the bad end of the range) of the distribution was about 20% of energy intake was derived from proteins and 25% was derived from carbohydrates. The other extreme, the good end of the range, was around 10% of energy intake was derived from protein with 50% or more from carbohydrates. The authors adjusted for energy intakes in some of their models and found the stronger determinant was protective associations with higher carbohdrate intake (the adverse effect, from higher protein intake, wasn't as statistically strong).

Most of you already think so, but it's nice to have some confirmation on such a large scale.
[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov]

The authors felt that the higher protein intakes were indicative of reduced consumption of the most protective foods (f+v).

I wish that we had similar studies for monounsaturated fat intakes compared to nonfattyfruit/vegetable intakes because I suspect we would see a similar trend, for kcals from fattier foods crowding out kcals from the more protective foods (f+v).

For these diets examined in this paper, which were not weight loss diets, but habitual diets, the fat intake mortality associations tended to be inverse with intake of unsaturated lipids (monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats) and positive, although not always significantly, with saturated fats.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/18/2007 03:12AM by arugula.

Interesting stuff.

When it says 50% energy from carbohydrates and 10% from protein, can I assume that the remaining 40% is from fat?

I ask because I started using the Pantry feature on nutritiondata.com and according to it I'm getting my energy 50% from carbohyrates, 40% fat and 10% protein. This is just what I've natural gravitated towards.

Cheers,
Ian.

They wrote 50% or more from carbohydrate, which would mean 40% or less from fat. I think 40% fat is ok if your EFA needs are met and in the right proportion and your excess fats are mostly monounsaturated and raw and the rest of your diet is nutrient-rich.

But it might be that lower is better.

Thanks for your post about the study Arugula.