This content challenges the common low-carb narrative by comparing two ancestral tribes: the high-fat, low-carb Maasai and the high-carb, low-fat Chimane, revealing that the high-carb consuming Chimane exhibit significantly better cardiovascular health.
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And the Messiah.
>> The Messiah.
>> The Messiah.
>> The Messiah.
>> The Messiah.
>> The Messiah.
>> The Messiah.
[Music]
>> Low carb influencers love pointing to
the Messiah, an ancestral tribe that ate
a high-fat diet of milk, meat, and blood
as proof that our ancestors thrived on
low carb diets. Messiah eating mostly
meat, mostly dairy, mostly blood from
their cattle, if not exclusively. and
and they found that the the Messiah were
much much healthier.
>> The thing is they never show you the
other ancestral tribes like the Chimane.
When you compare the Messiah to the
Chaman who eat almost the exact opposite
diet of fruits, roots, and vegetable as
well as wild game, the whole low carb
ancestral narrative starts to look very
different. And when you take things even
one step further and you look at the
different metabolic markers between the
two groups based on published data that
we have activity levels and their
cardiovascular data, you start to see a
pattern that very few people in the low
carb nutrition world talk about.
In today's video, I'm going to show you
the dietary differences between the
Messiah and the Chaman. One, extremely
high in fat and the other extremely high
in carbs. two, how each tribe's health
outcomes compare, especially when it
comes to blood pressure, cholesterol,
and cardiovascular health. And three,
the practical lessons that you can use
to build a diet that's specific to your
metabolic needs. Now, before we get
started, much of the work that I do
helping people to cut through the
conflicting nutrition advice starts with
understanding which foods support your
individual physiology. To make that
easier, I created a free protetabolic
diet calculator and food guide that
helps you to build a diet tailored to
your unique needs. You can grab it using
the link in the description. All right,
to start off here with this comparison,
I want to look at the Messiah first. So,
we're going to take a look at the
Messiah, the population that was
studied, their diet, their physical
characteristics, and then we're going to
see their cardiovascular results. And
then we're going to do the same thing
for the Chamani. And then we're going to
compare the two different outcomes and
see how they actually look. this really
highfat versus this really high carb
dietary setup. So the Messiah data we
have is older data from a researcher his
name is George man and George man's
papers come from 1972. Now the thing to
keep in mind with this comparison and to
be fair is that George man's data is
autopsy studies. So they looking at
people who had died and then they
autopsied their cardiovascular system.
Whereas when we look at the chimanete,
these are going to be living people. So
it's not an applesto apples comparison
per se, but it can give us a rough idea
of what's going on or this is the best
information essentially that we have in
terms of what's going on with these two
different populations in terms of their
overall health, particularly their
cardiovascular health because that's
what the researchers were focused on in
these two papers. So in George man's
studies the population he looked at was
a total of 50 people 50 men actually who
had died. The age was from 10 years old
to 60 years old. Now interestingly most
of the population that had died was less
than 60 years old. And we can see that
we can see where their deaths had come
from. So 15 of these men had died from
combat, 13 from infection, eight of them
from cardiovascular and renal diseases,
six of them from accidents, three of
them from cancers, two of them from an
intestinal instru obstruction, two from
suicide, and one from a diabetic coma.
Now, one thing to keep in mind here,
some of the cardiovascular and renal
deaths that we see here aren't
necessarily from the typical
cardiovascular diseases that we would
see in western populations like coronary
heart disease. These are more infective
diseases like sypholytic heart disease
and things like this. So that's one
thing to keep in mind that makes the you
know just to be fair around the data.
These aren't like your oh they had a
heart attack. They actually didn't find
high amounts of heart attacks in in this
population. We'll talk about their athoscerosis.
athoscerosis.
Now in terms of the Messiah diet,
there's multiple papers that get pulled
together to try to understand it. But I
pull in pulling those papers together um
I have a couple quotes here that we'll
look at. So we have a quote here and
this paper come the paper that pulled
some of these together is the
traditional Messiah dietary practices
and inapplicability to modern carnivore
diets a narrative review. Now the they
first talk about a paper from Bis at all
which I've also read bis's paper but
they summarize it nicely here. They say
Bis at all reported that milk was the
primary dietary staple with men drinking
3 to five lers per day. When milk
supplies dwindled for four to five
months per year during dry seasons, the
Messiah supplemented their diet with
fresh blood mixed into milk. They also
consume large quantities of roasted or
boiled meat from cattle, sheep, or goats
during these times with meals estimated
to include 1.8 to 2.3 kilograms of meat
in a single sitting and 2 to 5 kilograms
of meat on days when cattle are brought
to market as well as celebration days.
So most of the year or at least half the
year the Messiah were subsisting mainly
on milk. When you go through these
studies their milk composition is
actually very different than the milk
composition of the of western cows. They
have a higher fat percentage a higher
cholesterol content and typically a
lower carbohydrate content in their
milk. And then for a portion of the
these years they actually went to a
higher meat intake because of a lack of
supply of milk from the cattle. and they
usually would have the meat from sheep
or goats and they tended to avoid
killing the cattle as much as possible.
So that it's only a portion of the year
that they would have this very high meat
intake which actually counter to the
some of the carnivore narrative where
the diet is actually mainly meat and
some of the concerns talked about in
carnivore diet is like hey don't have
too much dairy. So their diet was mainly
focused on dairy and meat was like the
subsistence food when there wasn't
enough dairy left over. Now, and this
and the other thing to keep in mind,
this was mainly for men. And this was
also mainly for men that were in the mir
cohort. So, the mirin cohort or the
mirin time frame is a time frame with
the Messiah things from like 15 to age
30 somewhere around there where they are
considered the warriors and they only go
on a diet of meat, milk, and blood.
However, when they're younger and then
after that time frame, the diet can be
different than that. It doesn't only
have to be meat, milk, and blood. So,
that's something that's important to
consider. And so I have a next quote
here and we're going to look at what did
the women and children do. So they say
Nestle reported that meat was less
frequently consumed by women and
children typically two to five times per
month depending on the season and
livestock availability. Non-pregant and
lactating women obtained 52% of their
daily daily energy intake from dairy and
maize became an alternative staple and
milk was scarce. However, fruits,
vegetables, and pulses were rarely
eaten. So they would have corn and they
would have they would have milk um for
women and children mainly and there
wasn't as much meat consumption as we
saw with the men. So this is not a
typical carnivore diet. This is actually
kind of more like a somebody doing like
a full pete diet with no carbs, right?
They're they're just doing only having
milk where they're really focusing on
milk. And then in times where there's
not enough milk then they would here
they would the women and children add
corn but the men would typically add um
or would add large quantities of meat.
Now in terms of what the breakdown of
the diet was macro wise we have another
quote here. They say nutrition intake
among the Messiah indicates that the
traditional diet is high in fat and
protein and low in carbohydrates. Early
reports indicated that the adult Messiah
men and women consume between 2,500 and
3,000 calories per day with 33 to 47% of
the energy derived from fat, 27 to 40%
from protein, and 13 to 40% from
carbohydrates. Subsequent investigations
indicated higher fat intakes, closer to
60 to 67% of total calories, and mean
cholesterol intakes of 500 to 2,000
milligrams per day. The mean fatty acid
composition of the diets of adults have
been reported to be approximately 68%
28% and 4% saturated monounsaturated
polyunsaturated fats respectively. So
68% of the diet was saturated fat, 28%
was monounsaturated fat and 4% was
polyunsaturated fat. Um the other things
they say here and this is something
interesting to note about the Messiah is
that even though they were on their
carnivorous diet they um and they had
meat consumption at different periods of
time there was rank nutrient
deficiencies in the population. Now they
also had infections so that's something
to keep in mind but the diet wasn't
sufficient in certain vitamins and
minerals and so they further say the
traditional Messiah diet has also been
reported to be devoid of added salt
meeting requirements to the consumption
of animal blood. Micronutrient analysis
indicated that iron and vitamin C
intakes were low reflected by anemia
prevalence in about 40% of children
under five years of age and 22% in adult
women. So a large percentage of children
and women are actually anemic in this
population. Um and then the the diet
isn't appropriate for certain uh
vitamins and minerals. Now when we look
at this all together, the breakdown of
the Messiah diet, it's about 2,500
calories per day, roughly 2,500 to
3,000. I took the 2,500 here. Men were
probably higher because at the Chamani
cohort that I looked at or the studies
on the Chamani talked about a 2400
calorie intake per day. So we're getting
relatively close comparison in terms of
their calories. Now their macros are
very different. So the Messiah here have
about 13% carbohydrate. So that's going
to be about 80 grams per day. That's
pretty close especially with their
activity levels or their it's at ketoic
levels almost. um you know 50 grams per
day, but their activity level is
massive. We'll see that in a second.
Their fat intake was about 66% fat,
which would be about 183 grams per day
of fat, and it was about 124 grams of
saturated fat, 51 grams of
monounsaturated, and 7 grams of
polyunsaturated. I calculated those off
the total fat intake, the 66% giving me
the 183. And then I took the percentages
that I got from the study, the 68%
saturated, 28% mono, and 4% poly. The
protein intake was about 130 grams per
day. Um, and again, this is from dairy
products and from milk product uh from
the from the meat products. So, this is
what the diet looks like here for the
Messiah. Now, in terms of the Messiah's
physical characteristics, the Messiah
tended to be on the leaner side overall.
Quite a bit on the leaner side. uh from
the man's study they actually showed the
Messiah BMI at least with I'm using from
man's study because I'm going to go
through man's data but the BMI was about
19.4 four kilograms per meter squared.
So they were towards the underweight
category overall. The Messiah actually
had a low blood pressure. So this was
also from the from man's studies say man
at all conducted a cross-sectional study
involving 400 Messiah adolescent boys
and men aed 14 to 55 years who were
recruited from several communities in
the region. Um they basically said the
study used standardized clinical
protocols. Participants were examined
after a resting period and blood
pressure is measured. um and they took
duplicate readings to get to ensure that
they were accurate. Hypertension was
defined using thresholds of systolic
blood pressure greater than 160
millimeters of mercury and diastolic
blood pressure greater than 100. What
they found was that only six men
exhibited blood pressure greater than
160 millimeters of mercury and five had
diastolic readings at or above 100
millimeters of mercury. So most of the
men so out of the 400 Messiah men only
six of them were actually considered
hypertensive hypertensive here. Now 160
on systolic and 100 on diastolic is
pretty um like a there's a a pretty high
bar set there. It could be lower like
the current standards would be if you
were greater than 130 or well you'd be
in pre-hypertensive area but greater
than 140. So this is still this level is
a bit higher but overall we're not
seeing a high amount of hypertension in
this population.
Also something interesting about the
Messiah and why they've been studied so
much is that their cholesterol levels
are typically quite low. So this is a
graphic showing the cholesterol change
in the Messiah um from about 15 years of
age to 65 years of age and the average
cholesterol level was about 135
milligrams per deciliter. So that was
their total which is significantly lower
than the cholesterol levels that you
would typically see in westerners which
they compared here with US males
averaging around 220 somewhere between
220 240 and in US females as they age
going over the 240 mark. So much lower
than western counterparts. Now one thing
that's interesting here and this is a
bit of a tangent. The Messiah actually
have some degree of genetic adaptation
to their diet and they tested this in
different studies. So bis at all tested
this and then man at all had tested
this. Um and basically what they had
found was that the Messiah lower their
production of cholesterol from their
liver in the face of a high dietary
cholesterol intake more so than western
counterparts do. So when the Messiah get
a high amount of cholesterol in the
diet, they drastically decrease their
cholesterol production, which allows
them to keep overall lower lipid levels.
And this is actually something that's
very interesting to consider because it
would indicate that they have some
degree of adaptation to their diet,
which may make this type of eating
pattern not necessarily reproducible in
another population that doesn't have
this adaptation. So that's one thing to
keep in mind here. Now the other thing
is the Messiah were extremely active. So
they had about they had an energy
expenditure here they say of 2500
calories above basil requirements. Um so
this they say here this is approximately
the energy expenditure of running a
marathon. So they had dur and I think
this energy expenditure was largely for
some of the the murin cohort. So the
young men who were a part of the warrior
groups but either way the they looked at
their energy expenditure and it was
quite high overall. And then the Messiah
as I mentioned were also riddled with
infections. They say the Messiah
experienced a high prevalence of
infectious disease and parasitic
infections which significantly
influenced their lipid profiles and
cardiovascular risk. Common diseases
include malaria, tuberculosis, brucyosis
and gastrointestinal parasitic
infections which have been linked to the
consumption of raw meat, milk and blood
as well as poor sanitation and
contaminated water. These infections
contribute to significant morbidity with
malaria affecting up to 35% of African
pastoralis and high reported prevalence
of conditions including diarrhea and
pneumonia among children. So they have
their ancestral diet but they also have
quite a bit of infections. So I'm this
that's the whole profile that's the
whole picture of the Messiah that
they're highly active people. They have
a very highfat very low carbohydrate
diet. They their body weights typically
fall in a lower BMI category. So they
are either underweight or normal weight
and then they also have typically low
cholesterol levels and low blood
pressure. So they don't have high
cardiovascular risk factors from weight,
blood pressure or cholesterol. So the
question is what is their cardiovascular
profile look like? Did they have
aoscerosis? Did they not have
aoscerosis? What are we looking at? So
this is where the man data comes in on
the 50 men that that we looked at. And
so this is from man. Man says the
present data do not confirm either of
bis statements. So bis at all had done a
study on the messiah and said that they
didn't have aoscerosis but that was only
on a population of 10 men an autopsy of
10 men. So man further says we find that
the messiah vessels do not do or we find
that the messiah vessels do show
extensive atheroscerosis. They show
coronary intimal thickening which is
equal to that seen in elderly Americans.
The unique anatomical feature of the
Messiah material is that the coronary
vessels enlarge with age so that the
luminina are not compromised by intimal
thinking. So the in the same paper man
at all says the Messiah don't see very
many heart attacks. They didn't see very
very many heart attacks at least based
on EKGs. However, on the autopsy
information when they're looking at the
hearts of these men uh and the blood
vessels of these men, they actually find
quite a bit of aoscerosis and it's on
par with elderly Americans, elderly
westerners. What they say is that the
vest the interior portion the lumen of
the vessels actually just expands as
they get older so that it's not
compromised by the athoscerosis that
they have. So going on here I pulled
some of the graphics from the paper so
we can actually look and see um what's
going on in terms of their athoscerosis.
So this first graphic here looks so
sudanophilia is a staining technique to
see how much lipids are in the vessels
and we can see the arch thoracic region
abdominal region all regions and this is
of the of the aorta and we can see that
around 30 years of age the mass start to
increase their um start to increase the
amount of lipids present inside their
aortas. So you see a a significant
increase and then that tends to go
upwards as they get older. So there's a
they have a little bit when they're
younger, it decreases till they're 30
and they start to see an increase of
atherosclerosis until they're 60.
Then the next thing we start to see here
is we see the frequency of fibrosis like
high-grade severe fibrosis in the
arteries which would be indicative of
high amounts of atherosclerosis and you
see by for age 40 50 and 60 you're
seeing high amounts at least in these
autopsies of severe fibrosis amongst
these amongst the Messiah which rules
out the idea that they don't get
atheroscerosis because of their
ancestral diet. um they're actually
getting uh significant atherosclerosis.
Now the next graphic that we see here is
they plotted the MSI in terms of the
intimal thickness of their arteries
across their age groups and then they
compared them to a study by young at all
of men aged 60 to 69. So the Messiah in
the at the 50-year age group have almost
similar atheroscerosis or intimal
thickness of their arteries which is a
measure of aththeroscerosis as men in
their 60s to 69 years old in the US. So
their outcomes look arguably a little
bit worse in terms of atheroscerosis
compared to American men at least in
this this uh this manowl study. And then
the last one that we see here is a
comparison of the different vessels. The
left main uh the left anterior
descending the left anterior left
circumflex and then the right circumflex
arteries. Um the amount of intimal
thickness that they see. So we see this
line right here where we see that this
is the from the young at all study for
men aed 60 to 69 for all their vessels.
the Messiah men at age 60 have higher
amounts of atherosclerosis
than the 60 to 69 year old men um from
the US at all at every single point of
their of their coronary arteries. So
they have much higher coronary artery athoscerosis
