Keto Is Not a Fad by Roxana Soetebeer, MPHC, NNP, MHP, PFC
Keto Is Not a Fad
It's not new. It's not extreme. It's how humans have eaten for most of our existence: low-carb, animal-based, and nutrient-dense.
Before cities, before so-called modern nutrition advice, we were hunters. Meat wasn't optional. It was survival. Our bodies, our brains, and our entire species evolved with animal foods at the centre of the diet.
It wasn't all hunting. Farming existed in some regions for thousands of years. But the evidence is clear. The first farmers were smaller, weaker, and in poorer health than their hunter-gatherer neighbours. They had more tooth decay, their bones showed signs of nutrient deficiencies, and more signs of chronic illness. Farming kept people alive, but it didn't make them thrive.
Early humans like Homo habilis and Homo erectus didn't make it across harsh environments on berries and leaves. They thrived on meat and fat. Carbs were occasional. Seasonal. Honey if you were lucky. Fruit if it was ripe. Roots if you could stomach them raw. But meat high in fat was the constant.
Our physiology proves the point. We have highly acidic stomachs designed to digest animal protein and protect against pathogens. We cannot digest cellulose. Our ability to extract key nutrients like iron and zinc from plants is poor. Fun fact: there is no vitamin A in plants. Only precursors, and humans convert those poorly.
Our bodies run efficiently on ketones, the energy produced from fat. The brain still needs some glucose, but it doesn't have to come from eating carbs. Even without any dietary carbohydrates, the body makes all the glucose it needs from protein and fat. In deep ketosis, up to 70 percent of the brain's energy can come from ketones. The rest comes from glucose produced by the liver.
And our gut microbiome? It adjusts to match the food supply. Remove plants, and the microbiome adapts.
In nature, almost everything that moves is food for humans. If it crawls, swims, flies, or walks, we can eat it. Animals provide protein, fat, and all essential nutrients in a form our bodies can easily use. It's no coincidence we evolved to hunt.
Plants are a different story. About 95 percent of plants are toxic or harmful to humans. The small fraction that isn't still has to be prepared to lower the effect of anti-nutrients. Cooking, soaking, and fermenting, all just to survive the plant's natural defences. In other words, if you had the skill to hunt and the knowledge to identify edible plants, you'd still be hunting. Foraging for seasonal scraps was what you did to avoid starving, not to thrive.
Koalas are one of the few species that survive entirely on a toxic plant. They eat nothing but eucalyptus, a plant so toxic almost no other animal can touch it. No competition sounds like a good thing, but it comes at a price. Koalas are slow, sleep most of the day, and depend completely on that one food source. If the eucalyptus disappears, they disappear.
Humans never went down that evolutionary dead end. We didn't adapt to detoxifying plants. We adapted to hunt, eat animals, and thrive.
Long before keto had a name, people understood the value of cutting carbs. In 1863, an Englishman named William Banting published one of the first popular low-carb diet books. His method became so well known that in parts of Europe, banting became a common word for dieting.
For over a century, the ketogenic diet has been part of medical treatment. In the 1920s, doctors used it successfully to treat epilepsy, especially in children who didn't respond to medication. It worked then, and it still works today. It works so well that suddenly stopping the ketogenic diet can trigger seizures, just like stopping seizure medication.
But as pharmaceutical companies pushed anti-seizure drugs, the diet was quietly sidelined. Food doesn't generate patents. Pills do.
In the 1970s, Dr. Robert Atkins reintroduced low-carb eating to the public. He took the heat from the medical establishment, but his patients saw results. They lost weight, improved blood sugar control, and reversed metabolic disease.
Today, science is catching up. Keto isn't just for epilepsy or weight loss. It's being used for:
- Type 2 diabetes and insulin resistance
- Obesity and metabolic syndrome
- PCOS and hormonal disorders
- Alzheimer's and neurodegenerative disease
- Mental health conditions, including bipolar disorder and schizophrenia
Psychiatrists like Dr. Chris Palmer are showing how ketogenic therapy can improve even severe mental illness. His book, Brain Energy: A Revolutionary Breakthrough in Understanding Mental Health--and Improving Treatment for Anxiety, Depression, OCD, PTSD, and More, explains the science behind it.
Dr. Georgia Ede explains the connection between diet, brain health, and mood disorders. Her book, Change Your Diet, Change Your Mind: A Powerful Plan to Improve Mood, Overcome Anxiety, and Protect Memory for a Lifetime of Optimal Mental Health, lays out the details.
Dr. Casey Means and Dr. Calley Means describe how constant blood sugar spikes, even in healthy people, drive modern chronic disease. Their book, Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health, explains how to break that cycle.
A fad is a practice, interest, or fashion that becomes popular for a short time but quickly fades away. The ketogenic diet has been used in medicine for over a century, and has been part of human evolution for much longer. That is not a fad.
The ketogenic diet works with human physiology. Done right, it strips away modern, damaging foods and gives the body the fuel it was designed for.
Eat like it matters.
—Coach Roxana
Written by Roxana Soetebeer, MPHC, NNP, MHP, PFC
Published July 5th, 2025
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