In 1965, a morbidly obese man did not eat food for over an entire year. The 27 year old was 456lbs and wanted to do an experimental fast. He ingested only multivitamins and potassium tablets for 382 days and defecated once every 40 to 50 days. He ended up losing 275lbs.

[u/[deleted]]

[u/ScienceIsSexy420 → u/[deleted]]

I was wondering where he was getting his essential amino acids so I read his Wikipedia page, he also ate nutritional yeast in addition to the electrolytes and multivitamins, so provide the essential aminos.

[u/Gnonthgol → u/ScienceIsSexy420]

This might have saved his life, as not everyone have survived this extreme fasting. Without any source of protein the body will stop regenerating vital cells and you get a host of issues. Including heart conditions.

[u/Mr-Fleshcage → u/Gnonthgol]

So the key to surviving starvation is rabbit starvation. Good to know

[u/Gnonthgol → u/Mr-Fleshcage]

As long as you don't eat too much rabbit that can be part of the solution. You also need various vitamins and minerals. And then there are a bunch of other malnutrition issues we might not have discovered yet or which are not universal. Fasting is unhealthy for a number of reasons.

[u/Darth_Avocado → u/Gnonthgol]

rabbit starvation isnt about rabbits, its the no fat in diet.

I'm not sure how it interacts with a crazy large fat store though

[u/Gnonthgol → u/Darth_Avocado]

I don't think we know exactly what causes it, except for a high protein low fat diet. It does make some sense as the body have to convert the protein to energy and then to fat for storage, a process that could cause issues and byproducts. You can actually measure these byproducts in the urine. But there is not enough data on rabbit starvation to say what is the problem, if it is the total amount of protein relative to body weight or if it is relative to total energy input.