Earlier quoted context omitted.
The next line of the article after that 40% quote: > Carla Prado, a nutrition researcher in the Faculty of Agricultural, Life & Environmental Sciences and lead author on the commentary, explains this rate of muscle decline is significantly higher than what is typically observed with calorie-reduced diets or normal aging and could lead to a host of long-term health issues — including decreased immunity, increased risk…
> Losing weight without losing muscle mass is very hard. Yes it is. > It requires extreme diets like a protein sparring modified fast where 80%+ of your calories are from lean protein while running a 50% caloric deficit. I’m not any sort of expert but that sounds frankly, dangerous. I don’t see how you do something like that without damaging your liver. It’s very possible to lose weight and gain muscle, but you have…
I haven’t seen any credible research that a healthy person can damage their liver from excessive protein intake. Someone suffering from liver disease needs to be careful, sure, but evidence that it would harm a healthy liver is practically nonexistent.
That said, PSMF is explicitly not a sustainable diet and proponents generally don’t claim it to be. It’s a short term diet meant to preserve muscle mass under extreme caloric restriction (under 1.2k calories).
> Eat a balanced diet without junk, work out regularly, and keep the calories to only what is necessary.
If it were as simple as that, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.