On Wed, 13 Oct 1999, Ben Balzer wrote:

> Paleo lowers homocysteine effectively as it has the highest levels of
> B12/folic acid?Vitamin E of any diet.

This is not necessarily correct, since it depends on the details
of one's paleo implementation.  As far as I know, reduction of
homocysteine depends upon B6, B12, and folic acid.  I'm not aware
that vitamin E has an effect, but I'd be interested to learn if
you have read about such a connection.

On this list, we have tended to define "paleo" more or less as is
done in Neanderthin, as any diet that *excludes*
neolithic/agricultural foods.  The trouble with this is that a
diet that is "paleo" in this sense may nevertheless easily be
deficient various vitamins.  To take a somewhat silly example,
imagine a diet consisting solely of pemmican and apples.  At
normal intake levels such a diet, while conforming to the above
definition of "paleo", would certainly be very low in B6, folic
acid, and vitamin E, not to mention other nutrients.  B12 would
probably be okay.

So, while I don't necessarily disagree that paleo diet is good
for things such as controlling homocysteine (even if it turns out
to be only a secondary or tertiary marker for heart disease) I do
think that this presupposes a more careful definition of "paleo"
than what we typically use here.

Todd Moody
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