Yesterday the talk was about vegetarians/vegans. Let’s reverse the question!
And please, PLEASE provide data to support your claims…
I’ll start with this report (Summary here, both in French), which states that for adults in Quebec (traduction libre):
Data is from food frequency questionnaires given in 2004. Hopefully you guys will be able to provide better data but that’s what I found for my area
In my experience, the deficiencies happen when we eat foods that are not nutrient dense. There are tons of high calorie, low nutrient foods that all kinds of people eat. Many processed foods are full of ingredients that add calories without adding a proportional amount of nutrition (most seed oils, flours, etc.). I think this is the root cause of why we tend to over consume calories, while under consuming nutrients.
Its really difficult to come up with an all-inclusive answer.
It really depends on the country, population group, socioeconomic status, etc as well as the testing method (food frequency questionnaire versus other measuring methods).There are some common trends like women in childbearing age having too low iron intake. Children and young adults lacking vitamin D due to school/work preventing them from spending time outside. Elders living in care homes being a lot more deficient across the board compared to those still living at home. There are tonnes of examples like these. I cant think of a single example that is solely due to their choice of having an omnivorous diet.
Another thing to consider is the choice of using food frequency questionnaire. If I was asked in December about my consumption of citrus fruits (loove satsumas) it would be a lot higher than in summer (can’t stand peeling oranges). Measuring micronutrients using FFQs is very flawed as micronutrients are measured in such small units. The method also relies on people’s memories which can be flawed at times. FFQs also typically uses a pre-worked out list of food items adjusted according to the population of interest and as a foreigner I would probably not eat most of the things on the list and according to my results I would be deficient in most everything even though I might get my nutrients from other sources.
All this said, its still a very interesting topic and something that could definitely benefit people if they knew which nutrients to be extra aware of for someone in their position.
this is a non-discriminatory population survey it generalizes within a small sample size of individuals.
In general, the populations of the richest countries such as the USA, Canada and those of Western Europe present all the above characteristics due to high intake of processed products, pickles, preserved foods, low exposure to the sun (vitamin D), low consumption of fresh vegetables and sedentary
the opposite happens in poorer countries where there is high fiber intake, generalized mineral and vitamin deficiency due to artificial or real scarcity of food and resources, environmental problems and a high calorie expenditure compared to the intake for example in certain parts of Africa the diet consists of cassava, garri (manioc flour), beans and wild herbs with high rates of beriberi, anemia and other nutritional deficiencies meanwhile in rich countries people get intoxicated with multivitamins suffering from hypervitaminosis to reach a social standard
This is a terrible study on which to base broad assumptions about omnivores’ diets. It’s old, vague, relies on recall rather than science, pertains only to people from Quebec, and is inaccessible to everyone who doesn’t speak French. I cant fathom why you’d use it as a source of information here.
You want us to back up our claims with science? Ok, you go first.
Definitely fiber, “How Not to Die” Book by Gene Stone and Michael Greger, Dr. Greger posts lots of videos on LinkedIn and various peer reviewed articles, but its something like 1-3% of U.S. adults hit their daily fiber goal. I’m vegetarian and there are a slew of things I need to watch (B12/Vitamin D) protein gets talked about but lack of fiber is something we can all address. Blueberries, bananas, avocados, quinoa all have relatively high fiber contents.
I am very surprised that iron isn’t on the list—except for too much of it on days when a person with a “standard” diet eats red meat, so not evenly spread out but still not enough of it from lots of plant sources spread evenly?