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This paper estimates the food sources and macronutrient intakes of historical hunter-gatherers based on data from 229 different groups. Based on the available data, these groups did not suffer from the diseases of civilization. This is typical of hunter-gatherers.Initial data came from the massive Ethnographic Atlas by Dr. George P. Murdock, and was analyzed further by Cordain and his collaborators. Cordain is a professor at Colorado State University, and a longtime proponent of paleolithic diets for health. He has written extensively about the detrimental effects of grains and other modern foods. Here's his website.The researchers broke food down into three categories: hunted animal foods, fished animal foods and gathered foods. "Gathered foods" are primarily plants, but include some animal foods as well:Although in the present analysis we assumed that gathering would only include plant foods, Murdock indicated that gathering activities could also include the collection of small land fauna (insects, invertebrates, small mammals, amphibians, and reptiles); therefore, the compiled data may overestimate the relative contribution of gathered plant foods in the average hunter-gatherer diet.There are a number of striking things about the data once you sum them up. First of all, diet composition varied widely. Many groups were almost totally carnivorous, with 46 getting over 85% of their calories from hunted foods. However, not a single group out of 229 was vegetarian or vegan. No group got less than 15% of their calories from hunted foods, and only 2 of 229 groups ate 76-85% of their calories from gathered foods (don't forget, "gathered foods" also includes small animals). On average, the hunter-gatherer groups analyzed got about 70% of their calories from hunted foods. I think this makes a very strong case that meat-heavy omnivory is our preferred ecological niche. However, it also shows that we can thrive on a plant-rich diet containing modest amounts of quality animal foods.Paper here - http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/71/3/682?ijkey=KPJ8NPKvC6lVQ
...Mediterranean diet, and perhaps the reason why it has generated so much attention in the USA is that although 40-50% of the calories in the diet come from fat, the incidence of heart disease and cancer in the Mediterranean is lower than in the USA.
...Tehuelche (66 - 75%)...
The life of the Tehuelches was conditioned by a very hostile environment: terrible winds, extremely cold winters and lack of water, which prevented them from farming.
In the 1960s, a Vanderbilt University scientist named George Mann, M.D., found that Masai men consumed this very diet (supplemented with blood from the cattle they herded). Yet these nomads, who were also very lean, had some of the lowest levels of cholesterol ever measured and were virtually free of heart disease.
The Masai, for example, are remarkably healthy primarily on a diet of raw blood and raw milk which are unaffected by cooking or the toxins associated with modern cattle farming, although it should be pointed out that the average Masai lifespan is much shorter than that in the West, making comparisons more difficult.
No. For example, Inuit Greenlanders, who historically have had limited access to fruits and vegetables, have the worst longevity statistics in North America. Research from the past and present shows that they die on the average about 10 years younger and have a higher rate of cancer than the overall Canadian population.1Similar statistics are available for the high meat-consuming Maasai in Kenya. They eat a diet high in wild hunted meats and have the worst life expectancy in the modern world. Life expectancy is 45 years for women and 42 years for men. African researchers report that, historically, Maasai rarely lived beyond age 60. Adult mortality figures on the Kenyan Maasai show that they have a 50% chance of dying before the age of 59.2
Maasai women have a life expectancy of 45 years, and men only live 42 years. I know these red-meat loving nuts will claim that those statistics are of the modern Maasai, not those of years gone by, but the data is also damaging even if you bring up statistics from 20 or more years ago, when good data was collected. Real African researchers, not Weston Price who just briefly visited them, or the list of Groves' Weston Price Foundation compatriots, documented that a Maasai rarely lived past the age of 60 and when they did, they were considered a very old man.
If your going to pick on poor little Kenya's low life-span, realize that Finland, Denmark, and Belgium, countries that consume 1000+ calories or more of animal products daily than Japan have an average lifespan only 6 years lower, and lifespans higher than vegetarian countries India, Mexico, Venezuela, Chile, Panama, etc. Canada, Iceland, Sweden and France have a lifespan average less than 4 years lower than Japan.
For the Masai, there are other factors in their early deaths, namely development encroaching on their semi-arid grazing lands, poor supplies of clean water, lack of sanitation, non-existent medical care and high levels of waterborne disease. I don't know that more veggies would help in this case.
@ Warren: I am sure caloric restriction has something to do with it, but why would you want to live that hungry so many years? . I am gonna go back to Kitavans again, I remember reading they have plenty of food available through out the year and eat 2,700 kcals a day on average. This means they don't starve, although this surely means they don't overeat (I think that's one of the big problems of the West).
About the 40 years, that's why I am looking once you reach 40 years of age. Infant mortality is high in non-westernized cultures. In Kitava you can find many who are 60-80+ years of age. In the tribe Tarlach mentioned this does no occur (as far as I was able to find).
I've found myself disturbed by the number of vegetarian or mostly vegetarian groups that are always talked about as having extremely long and healthy lives. I just read a book called something like Staying healthy to 100 or something similar and all the groups were mostly vegetarian and they were in the Blue Zone book.I would like to think that it was mostly their eating to 80% full/ calorie restriction, that got them that health and longevity, but it does make me worry a bit too. I do know that I've been on that diet and felt horrible and I do feel better now, yet still don't feel like I'm bouncing around with energy either. I wish so badly to hear of people that also lived easily and vibrantly to 100 that ate a paleo style diet. Those numbers about the Inuit Greenlanders were a bit disheartening.
