3 Comments

That was really great thanks!!

Regarding Atherosclerosis one question I've had for a quite a while is why did the Masaii have extensive atherosclerosis as found in https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.aje.a121365 ?

I know that they did not suffer from heart disease despite that, still I want to know what caused the atherosclerosis in this case, was it their diet or not?

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Oct 24, 2023·edited Oct 24, 2023Author

Thank you!

We have to assume it was their diet playing some substantial role.

From the paper: "The Masai vessels enlarge with age to more than compensate for this disease. It is speculated that the Masai are protected from their atherosclerosis by physical fitness which causes their coronary vessels to be capacious."

I like to call this 'non-pathological atherosclerosis'. If it doesn't lead to a heart attack, why is it a problem?

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Oct 25, 2023·edited Oct 25, 2023Liked by Tucker Goodrich

Appreciate the answer. For me the concern remains that something about a milk, meat, blood diet may be atherogenic.

The compansatory mechanism may just come from high amounts of nitric oxide they get from constant sun exposure, or their active lifestyle.

Anyway the Masaii case still is super strange to me also because they also did not have elevated cholesterol.

If you ever do a round two with Dave, would be really interesting to bring their case up.

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