Dental hygiene-
very important things to consider:
1. What type of carbohydrates are in Paleo foods? - eg fructose from fruit,
but what are the other carbohydrates (I don't know). Are there starches in
non-grain foods. Starches are broken down by amylase enzyme in saliva to
release simple sugars. Are there any enzymes in saliva to break
disaccharides (double sugars)(eg sucrose, fructose) into monosaccharides
(single sugars) eg glucose, galactose. If not then sucrose might be better
for the mouth than starches!!
2. Enzymes in saliva probably protect our teeth. Grain foods are full of
enzyme inhibitors (eg protease inhibitors)and lectins etc. These probably
knock out some of our salivary defences.
3. Dogs now exhibit dental disease as badly as we do, since being fed
grain-based canned foods.
4. Dental implications have implications for local oral immunity. If our
mouth is now friendly to germs, it helps us breed throat infections,
influenza etc. This provides another vital clue to understanding why these
diseases are so common in Neolithic communities (in addition to simple
over-crowding).

Natural bugs- well an unhealthy mouth is going to be more susceptible in the
first place. I'm sure the same would go for the rest of the alimentary
canal. Unlike dogs, we can't cope with other animal's faecal germs, and
these are harmful to us. The question is complicated by the obvious local
immunodeficiency caused by Neolithic diets. Plenty of kids eat diet and live
through it- some have stools like potting mix!
(BTW These kids are at very high risk of lead poisoning as so may soils have
high levels from old residues)
Ben Balzer
>
> First, what is the implication of Paleo on dental
> hygiene? I'm sure that your average HG a few hundred
> thousand years ago didn't take a whole bunch of time
> to brush his teeth. But, the diet was not necessarily
> sugar or starch free. So, what d'ya think?
>
> Second, the recent discussion about germs, bacteria
> and parasites got me to thinking. What about the same
> in regards to fruits/veggies? Of course, we need to be
> careful about man-made "additives", but what about the
> occasional fruit you see lying on the ground? Or the
> cucumbers we ate last night freshly picked from our
> garden? Any danger from natural "bugs"?