By Andreas Moritz
Meat and meat products have five to ten times the concentration of protein than found in plant protein foods. It is, therefore, easily possible to overeat animal protein, but it is hardly possible to overeat vegetable protein because a normal digestive system does not have the ability to process 5-10 times more food than is normal for the body. It is common knowledge that the body is able to store unused sugar and other carbohydrates in the form of fat, but it lesser known that it also has a large storage capacity for protein.
The body’s protein stores are the connective tissues (the fluids between the capillaries and the cells) and the basal or basement membranes, which hold together and support the cells of the blood capillaries and arteries. When these protein stores are filled to their full storage capacity, the organs and arteries that are supplied by these protein-congested capillaries begin to starve of oxygen and nutrients, and suffocate in their own metabolic waste products. The resulting toxicity crisis prompts an inflammatory process by the body, which is necessary to increase blood flow and make nutrients available for growth of new cells and repair of damaged connective tissue.
Repeated bouts of inflammation in the artery walls can involve bleeding and subsequent formation of blood clots. Blood clots are the number one cause of heart attacks and strokes. As a measure of first aid and to avert constantly occurring potential heart attacks or strokes, the body attempts to contain the bleeding wounds. It does this by dispatching the glue-like lipoprotein, LP5, into the blood. LP5 attaches itself to the open wounds, thereby sealing them. To promote wounds healing and prevent them from repeated bleeding, the sticky LP5 catches the relatively large lipoprotein molecules, such as LDL and VLDL cholesterol molecules, and builds them into the artery walls. The resulting protective “bandage” saves the person’s life, at least for a while. If this survival mechanism occurs in the coronary arteries, it is called hardening of arteries or coronary heart disease.
A person who eats too many simple carbohydrate foods such as sugar, bread and pasta, or fats in a particular meal may have elevated concentrations of sugar, fats, and the cholesterol-containing lipoproteins in his blood. However, blood tests also show that if he overeats protein foods, his blood will contain higher concentrations of protein. Although there is no scientific to support this, nutritional science assumes that protein is completely burned during the digestive process. Whatever protein the body cells don’t use or need, so goes the argument, continues to circulate in the blood until it is broken down by liver enzymes and excreted as urea.
A major problem arises when a person does not have enough of these enzymes to remove the excessive protein from the blood stream. The liver of Kapha and Pitta types, for example, who naturally require only very few proteins to sustain themselves, has a limited capacity to break down food proteins. If liver bile ducts are congested with stones, this also greatly diminishes this important liver function. The same applies to people who regularly eat too many proteins. In any case, the extra proteins that are not broken down and eliminated through the liver route, are absorbed by the connective tissue under the skin (which is the least harmful), and the intercellular connective tissue of the organs (which can be very harmful). If there is a continuous, regular supply of large amounts of food protein, the intercellular connective tissue and basal membranes of the capillaries start filling up with the protein and begin to thicken. Unless protein intake is discontinued, the capillary cells become damaged. The body responds with inflammation to help destruct and remove damaged or dead cells. This inflammatory process, though, has side-effects. It forms the beginning stage of diet-caused atherosclerosis.
By contrast, as it was first discovered in 1955, people who live on a protein-free diet for a certain length of time do not produce urea after their first protein meals. This means that their connective tissues contain no abnormal amounts of protein. This applies to all vegetarians whose only source of protein is of purely vegetarian origin, such as in grains, legumes, nuts, seeds, etc. Vegetarians hardly ever develop a surplus of protein in the connective tissues and blood vessel walls, and are, therefore, not at risk of developing atherosclerotic deposits. This has been confirmed by the American Medical Association.
It is a commonly accepted medical theory that all unused calories, whether they occur in the form of carbohydrates, fat, or protein, are converted into fat and deposited in the body’s fat cells. This would make fat to be the only storage molecule responsible for obesity and related illnesses, including coronary heart disease and Type 2 diabetes. Yet there is overwhelming evidence to show that stored fat alone cannot be held responsible for causing coronary heart disease. The only other substance that the body can store in large amounts is protein; much of it ends up in the blood vessel walls.
In addition to breaking down proteins in the liver and storing proteins in the blood vessel walls, the body employs another tactic to get rid of this dangerous culprit. A well-trained athlete can utilize no more than 40 grams of protein per day. The average American eats up 200 grams per day. Whatever proteins cannot be stored, which easily happens by regularly eating more than 30-40 grams of protein each day, the body converts into nitric, sulfuric and phosphoric acids. The kidneys try to eliminate some of the strong acids (similar to the ones found in your car battery). To do so, they have to attach a basic mineral to every acid molecule,
As a result, sodium, potassium, magnesium (the main basic minerals) and all the rest become depleted as well. All this sets your body up for an incidence of acidosis, which is another name for toxicity crisis. Heart disease is a typical symptom of chronic acidosis.
This is an excerpt from my book HEART DISEASE NO MORE!
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