alexs wrote:
>>I wrote:
>>    For a reference you can read in any vitamin book that
>>    thiamin was "important for carbohydrate metabolism".
alexs:
>In these days of vaccines & glamor drugs, thiamin is not well
>appreciated. See
> http://www.seanet.com/×alexs/ascorbate/195x.htm#Klenner-1951
>for some insight into thiamin's role in resistance to viral
>infections, esp. poliomyelitis. Diet is not everything...
>it's the *only* thing.

Thanks for the interesting reference.
Yes, it seems as vitamins (also thiamin) aren't a very "modern" topic
today, are thought of to be "known" and "manageable" by supplements.
Still, thinking of a nutrition without any supplements
as paleolithic people -our anchestors- had for eons
makes them more interesting and important for me.
They can give us a hint, which food combinations had supplied them
historically, and which could be healthy today.

So, poliomelitis paralysis
 " appears to be  due to a B1 avitaminosis". ..
I've always thought how a wide-spread lack on essentials (vitamins)
over many years could affect a whole society.

I know from books that especially folate and thiamin are
candidates, notoriously low in supply in the normal western diet.
So i find it not astonishing, that whole civilisation diseases
are traced back to them or find a cure in supplying them
(folate and heart diseases, vitamin-e plus C and cancers ...).
Maybe thiamin shortage is even a major cause for
obesity and diabetes, viewing the given facts about
the body's fuel chemistry.

regards
Amadeus