LEAN MEAT DIET UNSAFE

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Oct 22, 1896

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 22, No. 42.

LEAN MEAT DIET UNSAFE.

IN view of the fact that not a few physicians, some of whom claim to be "advanced," or truly "eclectic," advocate the lean meat diet, we believe our readers will be glad to know what the Medical Progress has to say of the matter from a scientific point of view:—

The truth seems to be that a person subsisting upon a lean-meat diet, while he may manifest a greater amount of strength than upon more natural dietary, and may be unconscious of any abnormal condition, is like a person in a powder magazine—he is in constant danger of vital catastrophe. The poison-destroying functions of his liver and the poisoning-eliminating capacity of his kidneys are taxed to their utmost to keep the proportion of ptomains and leucomains in the tissues down to a point which permits of the performance of the vital functions. The margin of safety, which nature has wisely made very large in order to provide for emergencies, is reduced to the narrowest possible limit, so that anything which temporarily interferes with the functions of the liver or the kidneys, or which imposes additional work upon them, may be sufficient to obliterate the safety margin, and produce an attack of grave or fatal disease. Invasion of the body by ptomain-producing microbes, such as the typhoid bacillus, the bacillus of diphtheria, the pneumococcus of Friedländer, the shocks resulting from accident, and even the depression of a severe cold, may be sufficient to consume the meager emergency capital, and the result is acute inflammation of the kidneys, or death under chloroform or from shock following an operation under anesthesia.