More Millennials Are Having Strokes • Hacker News Board

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#51

Post by scythe » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:18 PM UTC

screye wrote: post #30

simonsarris wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Various deficiencies are definitely a problem in my friend population, where many of them are vegans. The vegan diet is a diet of deficiencies, and since none of them are particularly careful about what they eat, I worry that it is making them all worse off. Iron and B12 may be the most obvious, but also D3, calcium, zing, animal based nutrients like creatine, and I'm sure others. Unfortunately, this becomes a touchy…

This is surprising to me, as in India a large part of the population is vegetarian. We don't seem to be susceptible to the same problems. The move away from Milk products & Eggs seems to open a huge nutrient gap that the vegan population hasn't adequately identified how to fill.

India also has an established traditional eating pattern which is supportive of health and good nutrition. For example, cumin seeds are extremely high in iron, and make their way into lots of Indian cuisine. The mineral content of seeds generally isn't very bioavailable, but the extensive wet grinding and precooking of spices followed by cooking with starch and acid is a nearly ideal (and quite impressive) technique to convert locked-up metal phytates to bioavailable citrates and lactates. That prehistoric Indians were able to figure this out suggests that it brought significant benefits.

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#52

Post by logicfiction » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:21 PM UTC

ams6110 wrote: post #41

Pulcinella wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we allowed for bad opinions as a reason to deny health coverage, then health insurance would be affordable. And since it costs nothing to post better, it seems fair.

No need to go full denial. Insurance is priced according to risk. If I've got a record of accidents and traffic violations then my car insurance costs more. If I'm 100 lbs overweight and hypertensive then life insurance costs more. Medical insurance can be priced the same way, creating incentives to maintain a healthy weight and diet.

I don't necessarily disagree, but I think you start getting into challenging grey area with pre-existing conditions. Is being overweight a consumer responsibility but an auto-immune disease isn't? How do you effectively draw a line between disease or health risks someone should be responsible for versus not.

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#53

Post by scythe » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:25 PM UTC

danenania wrote: post #16

simonsarris wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Various deficiencies are definitely a problem in my friend population, where many of them are vegans. The vegan diet is a diet of deficiencies, and since none of them are particularly careful about what they eat, I worry that it is making them all worse off. Iron and B12 may be the most obvious, but also D3, calcium, zing, animal based nutrients like creatine, and I'm sure others. Unfortunately, this becomes a touchy…

I'm not vegan, but the counterargument I've heard is that an unbalanced omnivore diet can also lead to deficiencies/nutrition problems, and that actually the average vegan diet is more balanced overall than the average omnivore diet, so it's unfair to single out vegans when eating a healthy and varied diet is a challenge for everyone. In other words, you should probably be just as worried about your non-vegan friends…

It's actually pretty rare to eat too much meat. Meat is expensive, despite subsidies. Unless you deliberately go out of your way to eat lots of meat, you won't be eating that much.

Furthermore, the combination of meats, vitamin D-added milk, and enriched cereals, the latter two courtesy of the FDA who have centuries of history fighting malnutrition, and who for example introduced hominy grits to the South to combat pellagra, tends to hit everybody's basic nutrition requirements with the exceptions of dietary fiber, vitamin C, and potassium. While good health is still dependent on eating a variety of vegetables, it's important to give the US food system its due -- it produced pretty good results before the modern Age of Excessive Sweeteners.

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#54

Post by axlprose » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:27 PM UTC

mazamats wrote: post #42

acalderaro wrote: post #15

Possible reasons: Diet (any non-red meat eating diet for nutrient deficiencies, or too much meat due to reliance on fast food), drug/stimulant use (YOLO culture?), More sedentary lifestyle (Desk jobs, social media for 'entertainment'), Lack of resources to take time off from work (too many hours + high rents = no time/money to do have non-home hobbies) The interesting statistic was the urban regions were less pronoun…

What does not consuming red-meat have to do with anything? Consumption of red meat is at an all time high and is growing every year.

> Consumption of red meat is at an all time high and is growing every year.

I was curious to see if this was actually the case, but the data doesn't really seem to support this claim. Meat consumption overall appears to have remained relatively stable over the past few years, but it's mostly been an increase in poultry intake that's made up for a simultaneous decline in red meat consumption.

http://www.nationalchickencouncil.org/about-the-industry/sta...

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3045642/

http://fortune.com/2015/10/27/red-meat-consumption-decline/

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families...

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#55

Post by Mikeb85 » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:30 PM UTC

ThomPete wrote: post #21

danenania wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not vegan, but the counterargument I've heard is that an unbalanced omnivore diet can also lead to deficiencies/nutrition problems, and that actually the average vegan diet is more balanced overall than the average omnivore diet, so it's unfair to single out vegans when eating a healthy and varied diet is a challenge for everyone. In other words, you should probably be just as worried about your non-vegan friends…

How can a vegan diet be more balanced? It lacks diversity which as far as I understand is the primary foundation for good healthy diet. Many different things in not too much quantity.

> How can a vegan diet be more balanced? It lacks diversity which as far as I understand is the primary foundation for good healthy diet.

How does it lack diversity? There's far, far more non-animal foodstuffs in the world than types of meat/fish... Also, most traditional and 'varied' diets contain far more vegetable matter than meat anyway.

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#56

Post by Moto7451 » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:34 PM UTC

pmichaud wrote: post #29

ThomPete wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can a vegan diet be more balanced? It lacks diversity which as far as I understand is the primary foundation for good healthy diet. Many different things in not too much quantity.

Strictly speaking vegan is obviously a more limited subset of omnivore. But in a practical sense, it would surprise me if vegans didn't have more variety in their diet. I was vegetarian for almost a decade, basically my 20s, and what became clear immediately was that I had to figure out different stuff to eat. Default food wouldn't work anymore, so I have to branch out a lot and find foods that I would've never thoug…

I think you mean to say that veganism is a subset of vegetarianism? Omnivores by definition eat animal products.

I'm typically vegetarian to suit my own wacky body chemistry and slow metabolism (tldr; lowered/normalized my blood pressure, cholesterol, lost weight etc by diet changes and exercise) and would like to underline the point you're making about finding dietary substitutes. Protein consumption was the hardest thing for me to adjust back into nominal ranges. It's pretty easy to overconsume carbs (carbitarianism) on the way to getting the 50-100g of protein needed for a typical semi-active to active day.

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#57

Post by legulere » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:41 PM UTC

zosophorous wrote: post #18

simonsarris wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Various deficiencies are definitely a problem in my friend population, where many of them are vegans. The vegan diet is a diet of deficiencies, and since none of them are particularly careful about what they eat, I worry that it is making them all worse off. Iron and B12 may be the most obvious, but also D3, calcium, zing, animal based nutrients like creatine, and I'm sure others. Unfortunately, this becomes a touchy…

Perhaps that is true for a vegan diet where you only eat standard American food, but a whole foods plant-based diet has been shown time after time to lower risks for all sorts of diseases, from heart disease to cancer to parkingsons and MS. Iron and calcium are in plants, D is in fact added to milk, and can be added to a plant based diet via a pill as well if you don't synthesize enough. You are an animal; your body…

Eating a diet largely based on plants but with meat every now and then has all the benefits of a purely plant based diet but without the problems

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#58

Post by sjg007 » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:42 PM UTC

galois198 wrote: post #35

From what I understand, strokes are caused by the same thing heart attacks are - atherosclerotic plaques, and APs are caused by high blood cholesterol - APs are literally constituted of cholesterol/foam cells. Has the consensus changed?

There are two major kinds of stroke, ischemic and hemorrhagic.

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#59

Post by copperx » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:43 PM UTC

pcl wrote: post #47

mazamats wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does not consuming red-meat have to do with anything? Consumption of red meat is at an all time high and is growing every year.

According to another comment here, iron deficiency is a common cause of strokes in younger people. Diets low in red meat often lead to iron deficiency. (Of course, this can be addressed with a supplement, but not everyone who avoids red meat also takes iron supplements.) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14683737

Excess iron in men also elevates cancer incidence, so I don't think one should take an iron supplement if there's no need. A blood test is necessary. If you look closely at the men and women's multivitamins that are sold in stores, you'll see that there is no iron on the men's multivits.

Excess iron can be reduced by donating blood.

Also important: cast iron cookware introduces a non-insignificant amount of iron into cooked food, which can be detrimental (or beneficial) depending on the subject.

Re: More Millennials Are Having Strokes

#60

Post by legulere » Sun, Jul 02, 2017, 8:45 PM UTC

sotojuan wrote: post #5

shams93 wrote: post #4

Sleep deprivation is known to cause strokes, take a look at how many millennials are expected to put in 80-100 hours for a 40 hour check , extreme high competition overtime just to hold onto their seat.

OK, ready to get out of my bubble. How true is this? The only people I know that work more than 40 hours a week still work less than 60. This is in "office", food, and service jobs.

It's not that uncommon to work 12 hours per day 7 days a week in touristic places.