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Comment by glastra | Hacker News Reader

I guess he was extrapolating and referring to the idea that carbohydrate consumption is the root cause of most, if not all, modern diseases. An idea held by many, including me.

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In Mongolia in rural areas people eat just meat. Dearth from heart decease and liver cancers are leading causes of dearth there. On the other hand, life expectancy in Mongolia is 70 years, while in mostly vegetarian India it is 69.5. Just from that one can easily see that blaming one particular food group is not productive.

Yes, they eat just meat, but smoking prevalence is over 50% [0], and alcoholism is rampant [1].

Bad example, to be honest. In fact, liver cancer can be directly attributed to drinking.

A life expectancy of 70 years under such conditions is actually astonishing.

[0]: https://www.who.int/tobacco/media/en/Mongolia.pdf

[1]: https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112485...

To say even most modern disease has to do with carb intake ignores all the diseases that clearly aren't even diet related. You could probably get away with saying most diet related diseases are related to carb intake. I'd say that's a stretch, too, though I do suspect, as you do, that the type and quantity of carbs people eat is underappreciated as a factor in many illnesses.

Yes, absolutely. Some diseases are due to pathogens and such. But those should not be "modern", in the sense that said pathogens might not be exactly new. Maybe you could say anthropogenic diseases such as lung cancer from smoking or esophagus cancer from drinking are modern, though.

What I meant by "modern diseases" in my comment is a group of non-communicable diseases or so-called "diseases of civilization".

"Diet-related" is rather ambiguous, so different lines might be drawn there. As an example, would you say Alzheimer's is a diet-related disease? What about melanoma and/or sunburn?

Ah I either missed or misunderstood the use of "modern" there. I can't speak to the relationship between diet and melanoma or Alzheimer's, but I understand your point.

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