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posted by janrinok on Saturday November 19 2022, @05:35PM   Printer-friendly
from the take-your-protein-pills-and-put-your-helmet-on dept.

'Protein hunger' drives overeating, large-scale population study shows:

A year-long study of the dietary habits of 9,341 Australians has backed growing evidence that highly processed and refined foods are the leading contributor of rising obesity rates in the Western world.

The new study, in the latest issue of the journal Obesity conducted by the University of Sydney's Charles Perkins Centre (CPC), was based on a national nutrition and physical activity survey undertaken by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), and further backs the 'Protein Leverage Hypothesis'.

First put forward in 2005 by professors Raubenheimer and Stephen Simpson, the Protein Leverage Hypothesis argues that people overeat fats and carbohydrates because of the body's strong appetite for protein, which the body actively favours over everything else. Because so much of modern diets consist of highly processed and refined foods – which are low in protein – people are driven to consume more energy-dense foods until they satisfy their protein demand.

[...] "It's increasingly clear that our bodies eat to satisfy a protein target," added Professor David Raubenheimer, the Leonard Ullmann Chair in Nutritional Ecology at the School of Life and Environmental Sciences.

"But the problem is that the food in Western diets contains increasingly less protein. So, you have to consume more of it to reach your protein target, which effectively elevates your daily energy intake.

[...] Participants with a lower proportion of protein than recommended at the first meal consumed more discretionary foods – energy-dense foods high in saturated fats, sugars, salt, or alcohol – throughout the day, and less of the recommended five food groups (grains; vegetables/legumes; fruit; dairy and meats). Consequently, they had an overall poorer diet at each mealtime, with their percentage of protein energy decreasing even as their discretionary food intake rose – an effect the scientists call 'protein dilution'.

Journal Reference:
Amanda Grech, Zhixian Sui, Anna Rangan, et al., Macronutrient (im)balance drives energy intake in anobesogenic food environment: An ecological analysis [open], Obesity, 30, 11, 2022. DOI: 10.1002/oby.23578


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 3, Funny) by RamiK on Saturday November 19 2022, @05:47PM (14 children)

    by RamiK (1813) on Saturday November 19 2022, @05:47PM (#1280514)

    Problem solved.

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  • (Score: 4, Funny) by Runaway1956 on Saturday November 19 2022, @06:22PM (7 children)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Saturday November 19 2022, @06:22PM (#1280517) Journal

    But - - - what happens when you add all that protein to an environment of preservatives, additives, food colorings, flavorings (artificial and natural) and it all reaches it's expiration date?

    Sounds like a potential Frankenstein's monster!

    • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 19 2022, @06:40PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 19 2022, @06:40PM (#1280519)

      But - - - what happens when you add all that protein to an environment of preservatives, additives, food colorings, flavorings (artificial and natural)

      Same as mixing vinegar and baking soda.

    • (Score: 4, Interesting) by RamiK on Saturday November 19 2022, @07:12PM (5 children)

      by RamiK (1813) on Saturday November 19 2022, @07:12PM (#1280526)

      Actually you sorta stumbled on one of the issues:

      A particularly insidious proposed mechanism is the “protein decoy effect,” in which homeostatic protein seeking responses are diverted by cheap, abundant, fat- and carbohydrate-rich, umami-flavored, savory snack foods, which exacerbate rather than ameliorate the protein deficiency they are selected to redress [(28)].

      ( https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/oby.23578 [wiley.com] )

      Still, fundamentally, the core problem is the (lack of) protein content: Force the industry to meet a minimal macronutrients targets and the additives will no longer be required so they'll be removed.

      But yeah, the problems isn't processed food but certain practices in the food industry and they can all be resolved by simply reverting the recipes to using protein powder instead of pectin(=starch=carbs) and MSG(=sodium+carbs).

      If the field wants to stop being treated like a pseudoscience, it should focus on the actual problems at hand.

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      • (Score: 2) by RamiK on Saturday November 19 2022, @09:22PM

        by RamiK (1813) on Saturday November 19 2022, @09:22PM (#1280547)

        Typo correction: Glutamate is a non-essential amino acid, not a carbohydrate... Proofing is hard.

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      • (Score: 2) by Reziac on Sunday November 20 2022, @02:55AM (3 children)

        by Reziac (2489) on Sunday November 20 2022, @02:55AM (#1280586) Homepage

        Meanwhile, TPTB tell us we need to reduce our meat intake.

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        And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
        • (Score: 4, Informative) by RamiK on Sunday November 20 2022, @01:22PM (2 children)

          by RamiK (1813) on Sunday November 20 2022, @01:22PM (#1280665)

          Which powers-at-be? The USDA places meat in their "food pyramid" at excessive levels due to pressures from the beef industry: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_pyramid_(nutrition)#Controversy [wikipedia.org]

          The people telling you to eat less meat are some environmental and animal rights groups who oppose poultry and even fish on various grounds, some being more legitimate than others, and the American Heart Association that focuses on red meat and is telling you to get your proteins from plants, fish, poultry and dairy instead: https://pharm.org/red-meat/american-heart-association-study-cut-out-red-meat/ [pharm.org]

          Regardless, the people in power are definitely not telling you eat less meat.

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          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 20 2022, @06:31PM (1 child)

            by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 20 2022, @06:31PM (#1280703)

            Bb,but I saw an advert on TV telling me the looney libtards want to make hamburgers illegal that's why I voted for a sensible moderate who loves Freedom.

            • (Score: 2) by RamiK on Sunday November 20 2022, @09:22PM

              by RamiK (1813) on Sunday November 20 2022, @09:22PM (#1280715)

              Actually, the consumer advocacy concerns regarding pink slime [wikipedia.org] and plumping [wikipedia.org] can be alleviated by requiring manufacturers to meat protein content standards so no matter how much fat and water they inject poultry, ham and beef, it will still not cause the protein dilution affects on appetite as dissuaded in the article.

              In fact, I've seen a paper examining adding pea protein powder to hamburgers as filler and the results are pretty good: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0023643821019277 [sciencedirect.com]

              So, profit?

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 19 2022, @07:14PM (5 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 19 2022, @07:14PM (#1280527)

    Add protein powder to everything

    You know they'll end up loading it up with fructose corn syrup, Purple(tm) and 5 types of electrolytes... Back to square one.

    • (Score: 4, Interesting) by RamiK on Saturday November 19 2022, @08:13PM (4 children)

      by RamiK (1813) on Saturday November 19 2022, @08:13PM (#1280540)

      A more realistic concern is that they'll use incomplete proteins (those lacking in essential branched amino acids) since the regulator will "mistakenly" forget to require them to balance them out.
      It's a common problem with plant based protein powders marketed to vegetarians.

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      • (Score: 1) by anubi on Sunday November 20 2022, @10:50AM (3 children)

        by anubi (2828) on Sunday November 20 2022, @10:50AM (#1280651) Journal

        We had a problem around 2007, when China used Melamine, an industrial chemical which contains Nitrogen, to economically fortify cat food so as to increase the protein assay to be reported on the label.

        I am aware as I lost a momma cat and a litter of kittens to it.

        Infant formula was also involved. Thousands of Chinese infants also lost kidney function and have to dialysis.

        Messing around with synthetic foods is risky!

          https://pictures-of-cats.org/melamine-in-cat-food.html [pictures-of-cats.org]

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        "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
        • (Score: 1) by anubi on Sunday November 20 2022, @11:14AM

          by anubi (2828) on Sunday November 20 2022, @11:14AM (#1280652) Journal

          A link to the recall list:

          https://pictures-of-cats.org/cat-food-recall-list.html [pictures-of-cats.org]

          Both me and my neighbor lost cats. All of them had an unmistakeable odor prior to their passing.

          We both fed our cats the same stuff...which was on that list

          By the time the renal failure was diagnosed, the cats were goners.

          Again, I post this as a reminder to manufacturers to be extremely cautious about screwing around with edibles, as even the melamine at the time appeared just an economical way to make numbers look better for the protein assay.

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          "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
        • (Score: 2) by RamiK on Sunday November 20 2022, @01:08PM (1 child)

          by RamiK (1813) on Sunday November 20 2022, @01:08PM (#1280663)

          As I've already mentioned here [soylentnews.org] and here [soylentnews.org], the flour and rice on the shelf that you eat every day are already extensively engineered products that are fortified with multiple chemicals in the same manner. Besides, baby formulas and pet food are fundamentally engineered product since different animals and especially infants have different macro and micro nutrients needs than adult humans so formula and pet food factories are in the business of taking various products and powders and mixing them to get the right numbers.

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          • (Score: 1) by anubi on Monday November 21 2022, @01:50AM

            by anubi (2828) on Monday November 21 2022, @01:50AM (#1280744) Journal

            Yup. Those of us who are aware of this stuff need to bring it into view every chance we get!

            Thanks! From all of us!

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            "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]