However, because of the undeveloped medical standards of the time (vitamins were as yet unknown) the correlation between consuming barley rice and the improvement of beriberi had not been scientifically proven (in the field of German medical science), and Takagi considered the cause of beriberi to be a shortage of protein (from statistical analysis of patients and foods based on a British model).
但し当時の医学水準上（ビタミンの未発見）麦飯食と脚気改善の相関関係は(ドイツ医学的には)科学的に立証されておらず、高木側は脚気の原因を(イギリス医学の手法である、患者と食料の統計学的分析から)蛋白質不足であるとしていた。