On Thu, 3 Sep 1998, Wade Reeser wrote:

> In the case of essential fatty acids (e.g. w-3), it is a question of how much
> is required for health.  When comparing wild animals to domesticated it is
> reported that the wild animals have 4 times the amount of w-3 fatty acids as
> do domesticated.  However, looking at the percentage of these fats to total
> fat, these numbers are small for both wild and domesticated animals.  What
> am I trying to say?  That the essential fats are a small percentage of any
> animal, wild or domestic, and I believe that our nutrition is adaquate with
> only
> domesticated meat.  How do you quantify the assertion that the domesticated
> animals are "n-3 deficient"?  I don't think that because they may have lower
> numbers that this would qualify as deficient.  Are there quantifiable disease
> states as a result?

The EPA content of domesticated animal fats is zero.  LNA content
is very low, compared to wild animals.  n-6 fats are high.  Is
there evidence that this conduces to disease states?  Yes.  Eaton
comments fairly extensively on this, and Simopoulos has written a
book on it, The Omega Plan, with numerous references to the
scientific literature.  Here is one comment from Eaton's
"Evolution, Diet, and Health."

        The w-6 : w-3 imbalance in current Western diets also
        affects coronary disease.  Excessive w-6 AA relative to
        w-3 DHA and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA, C20:5, w-3)
        adversely affects platelets and arterial walls so as to
        promote development of coronary atherosclerosis.
        (Riemersma, 1992)  The more balanced w-6 : w-3  dietary
        PUFA intake of Paleolithic humans would have negated this
        effect.

> >Similarly, if the food animal's diet is deficient in minerals for
> >any reason, the flesh of that animal will not be an adequate
> >source of minerals.
>
> Again, how do you quantify this deficiency?  Also, since animal flesh is so
> rich in nutrients, how "deficient" would they have to be before it would
> affect
> our nutrition?  As an example, take iron.  Anyone eating a small portion of
> meat will exceed their requirements for iron.  B12 is another good example.

I was merely making the point that *if* the meat is
mineral-deficient for some reason, the deficiency cannot be
compensated without finding some other source of the mineral.
Meats are relatively low in calcium.  You won't get enough unless
you also eat bones, or calcium-rich plant foods.

> Animal flesh has been shown to provide adaquate nutrition for generations of
> Inuit.  Though out domesticated meat does have some quantifiable differences
> with wild game, I don't think anyone really knows if these are significant.

I have to wonder whether the properties of the Inuit diet can be
generalized to "all-meat" diets in general.  With respect to n-3
fats, I'm pretty sure the answer is no.  Whether this extends to
other nutrients is an open question.

Todd Moody
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