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Topics: Health, Fitness, Social Media, Joe Rogan, Jordan Peterson, Podcast, YouTube, Science
Liv Bridge
Topics: Health, Fitness, Social Media, Joe Rogan, Jordan Peterson, Podcast, YouTube, Science
Experts are warning an enormously popular diet championed by influencers could cause serious health problems.
We're all guilty of turning to the internet when it comes to researching weight loss tips.
Yet while on the quest to find the perfect diet, social media has become loaded with misinformation and misguided nutritional advice, aggravated further by the rise of fitness influencers posing as models of health and wellness.
You might have come across Keto, Atkins or low-carb diet plans, but there are countless others thrown into the mix - from fasting to juice cleanses and from plant-based to full carnivore.
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Now, medics in the US have issued a stark warning against one of these so-called fads in particular - the carnivore diet, as championed by the likes of UFC commentator and podcast veteran, Joe Rogan, and Canadian psychologist, Jordan Peterson.
The diet is easy enough to grasp, consisting entirely of meat, fish and animal products like eggs and dairy, while excluding fruit, vegetables, legumes, grains, nuts and seeds.
Dr Shaw Baker MD who wrote the book, The Carnivore Diet, says consuming nothing but meat 'saved his life' while advocates of the diet claim it helps with weight-loss and even alleviates chronic health conditions.
Peterson reportedly once said on a podcast with Rogan that the diet helped him with depression, gastric reflux and mood swings, while the podcaster said it helped him to lose 12 pounds and tackle 'lots of aches and pains'.
But doctors from the Indiana University School of Medicine are now warning it could lead to an increased risk of kidney stones, reports The Daily Mail.
Kidney stones are hard deposits formed in the organ that can block the flow of urine from the body and in severe cases, lead to life-threatening infections like sepsis.
Writing in the The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the researchers found one patient adopted the meat-based diet after learning about it on YouTube but ended up suffering complications.
While the man in his 60s lost two stone, tests revealed he was beginning to develop the painful condition with signs of three types of kidney stones, formed of calcium oxalate, calcium phosphate and uric acid.
He was treated for gout as well as a type of arthritis and was advised to ditch the diet.
A year later, he was reportedly in much better health with no signs of kidney stones.
The researchers wrote: "Due to increased animal protein, the exclusion of dairy products, and the removal of fruits and vegetables, the diet creates an optimal environment for the development of all stone types."
The study claimed the patient's results demonstrated the 'potential hazards of the carnivore diet,' adding: "The lack of literature on this and other fad diets’ safety and efficacy should be a cause for alarm among physicians.
"The advent of social media and the use of such communication for health information will make fad diets a continually growing issue."
The doctors recommended a fibre and carbohydrate-rich diet to help feed the gut bacteria to ward off the formation of kidney stones.
Other research from Harvard University and Oxford University revealed people who ate red meat have a 62 percent higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes and 18 percent higher risk of heart disease per each additional 50 grams eaten a day.