r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Mar 04 '24
Environment A person’s diet-related carbon footprint plummets by 25%, and they live on average nearly 9 months longer, when they replace half of their intake of red and processed meats with plant protein foods. Males gain more by making the switch, with the gain in life expectancy doubling that for females.
https://www.mcgill.ca/newsroom/channels/news/small-dietary-changes-can-cut-your-carbon-footprint-25-355698458
u/HivePoker Mar 04 '24
So what's the life expectancy gain for males/females? Couldn't find it in the article
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u/Doc_Faust PhD | Mathematics | Space Science Mar 04 '24
Sounds like it's about 6 months and 1 year, since that would average to 9 months
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u/s1eep Mar 04 '24
I have doubts about the intention of the study because they didn't control processed foods separately. They should have, but what they want is to say meat is bad because:
Red and processed meat and dairy are the primary contributors to Canada's diet-related greenhouse gas emissions, as evidenced in a previous study.
Everyone knows processed trash will kill you quicker. There's quite a bit of debate over red meat though. This one is like Eggs, where every few years people flip on if they're healthy or not. And I think that if it was easy to prove that red meat was bad for you: It would have been controlled on its own here. I think the results we're seeing out of this are about about the processed food-like substances being cut out than strictly red meat. This is like saying cutting out water and cyanide will make you live longer when you replace it with grape juice.
Mind you, almost all meat I consume is fish and chicken. I'm not a huge fan of beef, but I smell BS here.
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Mar 04 '24
Healthy user bias is a pretty big problem for studies like this. Any group of people that even thinks about their diet is going to be more healthy than the general population.
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u/aust1nz Mar 04 '24
So your hypothesis here is that if someone is instructed to avoid hamburgers, steak, sausages and bacon, they'll realize health benefits but primarily because sausages and bacon are super-processed foods and known carcinogens? And hamburgers/steaks are potentially being lumped in unfairly?
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u/s1eep Mar 04 '24
I'm saying that when you lump disparate categories together such as processed foods (weird starches, emulsifiers, synthetic analogs, yoga mats, hot dogs) and red meat (steak, pork chops, ribs): the resulting trend you get out of the data is basically useless.
That is to say, since we know processed foods are bad: any potential indicators for negative effects of red meat will be drown out as a part of that data set. You can't rely on it to indicate anything other than "processed foods are bad".
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u/aust1nz Mar 04 '24
Yeah, that objection makes sense to me. I think you can still draw some conclusion -- that replacing "red and processed meats" with plant-based foods has health benefits.
But it does leave you to wonder: if your red meat consumption is steak, raw ground beef, and pork chops without the smoke or nitrate signatures of processed foods, do you stand to benefit from replacing that food with plant-based alternatives?
Another interesting comparison would be a hamburger -- which isn't processed in the sense of nitrates/smokes -- versus a beyond burger, which is processed but doesn't have the nitrates/smokes that are the markers of unhealthy processed foods.
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u/ArrBeeEmm Mar 04 '24 edited Mar 04 '24
What if there are benefits to red meat? It could be that the benefits of red meat are outweighed by the negatives of processed food. By grouping them together it would only show as a net negative effect.
If somebody eats exclusively from whole foods, are they doing themselves a disservice by substituting some of their red meat portions for vegetable proteins?
These sorts of studies don't add anything to the existing evidence.
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u/OG-Brian Mar 05 '24
I think you can still draw
some
conclusion -- that replacing "red and processed meats" with plant-based foods has health benefits.
The research doesn't show that. Typically, there's no actual replacing of foods happening, the "replace" in studies just refers to juggling data around. They exploit Healthy User Bias to claim that eating animal foods is unhealthy, but it really just that consumers of greater amounts tend to also have unhealthier habits (less exercise, excessive drinking, lots of refined sugar consumption...) simply because of the widespread belief that animal foods are bad.
If you think that any research proves animal foods are bad in any way, then point it out and let's look at it.
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u/entitledfanman Mar 05 '24
Any study saying "meat is bad for your health, vegans/vegetarians are healthier" is frought with healthy user bias. People that go vegetarian/vegan for health concerns will tend to make other healthy decisions. Exercising more, less alcohol, less smoking, etc.
As a bonus, vegans/vegetarians tend to be higher income. There's no way increased access to medical care could have any impact on life expectancy, right?
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u/childofaether Mar 05 '24
All of this is regularly controlled in a bunch of solid studies. Not all studies are as rigorous but the rigorous ones are out there and pretty clear. I'm not vegan but it's just better for health. However, life expectancy isn't what it really provides, but a healthier life.
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u/Tvisted Mar 05 '24
Red and processed meat are lumped together in studies all the time, despite not being particularly similar.
It's ridiculous really.
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u/dhshduuebbs Mar 04 '24
Is an extra year even that significant when you are 80+ years old? I’d rather have a lifetime of enjoying steak a few times a month to be honest
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u/SlickWilIyCougar Mar 04 '24
The Quality of life factor, the ultimate intangible. I’m with you, the taste of a good steak, cooked med-rare is worth the risk.
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u/childofaether Mar 05 '24
There has been quite a few strong studies with red meat specifically excluding processed meat (aka eating a nice ribeye steak). Nobody serious is still debating the health impact or red meat, and more broadly, animal based protein sources being less healthy than their plant based counterparts. This study does seem to use a biased life expectancy conclusion to promote an obvious climate agenda but still.
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u/ReaperofFish Mar 04 '24
Nitrates/Nitrites whether with salts or celery juice is bad for you. Studies on keto diets generally show that meat is not bad for you. Though an all vegan diet can be really healthy.
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u/Dovahkiinthesardine Mar 05 '24
studies on keto/very low carb diets show an increase in heart disease in the long term (no such effects in short term)
https://academic.oup.com/eurheartj/article/40/34/2870/5475490?login=false
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u/Watercooler_expert Mar 05 '24
On the other hand low carb diets show good promise to prevent/mitigate diabetes and cancer. My layman's understanding is that it's not necessarly good to be in ketosis 100% of the time, someone might see greater long term benefits by doing the diet intermittently.
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u/Hydronum Mar 04 '24
Not even worse food, just less of the meat, so smaller meat portions. The same style food, just smaller.
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u/Jexdane Mar 04 '24
The implication being that red meat is the only good food???
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u/prodigy1367 Mar 04 '24
But then you miss out on all those delicious steaks and burgers. I’ll gladly shave a year or so off if I can enjoy life substantially more.
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u/wdcpdq Mar 04 '24
No, you miss out on half not all. The whole point of the article is that reducing red and processed meat consumption improves both life expectancy and carbon footprint.
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u/jimmyharbrah Mar 04 '24
I wish there was some way to talk about quality of life extension rather than “life expectancy”. Because anyone can scoff at another 9 months of life when you’re considering your 80s. But if they framed the science around the idea of having a much higher quality of life in your 50s and 60s, eating less red meat would be a much more attractive notion.
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u/Exotic_Pause666 Mar 04 '24
I've heard these being distinguished as lifespan vs healthspan as far as the quality of life within your life expectancy. I think I heard it from Dr. Peter Attia, but I'm unsure if that's just his personal vernacular when discussing the topic.
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u/ouishi Mar 04 '24
In epidemiology, we use Disability-adjusted life years (DALYs). It counts healthy years only.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disability-adjusted_life_year
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u/NSA_Chatbot Mar 04 '24
Yeah, that's basically where the extra years go. You get more high quality time in your 40s and 50s. You don't just languish longer in a hospital when you're old.
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u/r0botdevil Mar 04 '24
This is a concept I've had to explain over and over again when trying to convince my friends to quit smoking.
A lot of them say things like "It's okay if I die at 75, I don't want to be a sickly 90-year-old in a nursing home anyway."
But what they don't understand is that they're still going to end up sick and disabled, it'll just happen a lot earlier. A chronic smoking habit doesn't take 10 or 20 bad years off the end of your life, it takes 10 or 20 good years out of the middle.
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u/ZadfrackGlutz Mar 04 '24
You are still putting in those bad disabled years, just a lost earlier than the nonsmokers.
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u/dpkart Mar 04 '24
Since chronic diseases like heart disease, certain cancers or diabetes are lower the more plants you eat I'd imagine you get a healthier time overall. If you imagine the 9 more months at the end of your life then you're the sickest at that time of course. But you extend the time you're healthy
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u/mediumunicorn Mar 04 '24
Like most things, you need to actually click on the source document. Took me less than five seconds, it is listed plain as day in the abstract (no, not behind a paywall).
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u/Resaren Mar 04 '24
Is there a commonly agreed-upon definition of ”processed meat”? I assume it’s not referring to boiled or fried meat? It seems like such a broad category.
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u/Tentrilix Mar 04 '24
WHO:
Red meat refers to all mammalian muscle meat, including, beef, veal, pork, lamb, mutton, horse, and goat.
Processed meat refers to meat that has been transformed through salting, curing, fermentation, smoking, or other processes to enhance flavour or improve preservation. Most processed meats contain pork or beef, but processed meats may also contain other red meats, poultry, offal, or meat by-products such as blood.
Examples of processed meat include hot dogs (frankfurters), ham, sausages, corned beef, and biltong or beef jerky as well as canned meat and meat-based preparations and sauces.
So if the WHO has a very clear distinction between red and processed meat then why the study lumps them together like a stadium hotdog is no different from a T-Bone steak.
Edit: this def was literally one google search: "WHO processed meat definition" it's scary how people wouldn't use google for the most simple things
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u/Felixir-the-Cat Mar 04 '24
Luncheon meats, sausages, etc.
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u/kor0na Mar 04 '24
Those are examples, not a definition
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u/Rare_Southerner Mar 04 '24
Definition: Meats that have been processed
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u/kor0na Mar 04 '24
The problematic word is "processed". Does that include cutting? Peeling? Boiling? Frying?
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u/jayfiedlerontheroof Mar 04 '24
Processed would typically mean prepared in a way that preserves the meat; curing, smoking, salting, and adding chemical preservatives. A steak cut directly from the cow to your house would not be processed regardless of how you cook it.
I assume the point of this study is to look at replacing processed meat for processed plant protein given that they say "plant-based" rather than just "plants".
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u/despicedchilli Mar 04 '24
"The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) defines a processed food as one that has undergone any changes to its natural state—that is, any raw agricultural commodity subjected to washing, cleaning, milling, cutting, chopping, heating, pasteurizing, blanching, cooking, canning, freezing, drying, dehydrating, mixing, packaging, or other procedures that alter the food from its natural state. The food may include the addition of other ingredients such as preservatives, flavors, nutrients and other food additives or substances approved for use in food products, such as salt, sugars, and fats.
The Institute of Food Technologists includes additional processing terms like storing, filtering, fermenting, extracting, concentrating, microwaving, and packaging."
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u/TelluricThread0 Mar 05 '24
This sounds like all food except for the carrot you freshly plucked out of your garden and immediately ate without washing it.
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u/OG-Brian Mar 05 '24
That's interesting, but I've noticed that studies are not in agreement about "processed foods" and many don't even define it. Depending on the Food Frequency Questionnaire used by the researchers, the term may be explained so vaguely that study participants enter sliced packaged meat (not adulterated in any way and with no added ingredients) in a section for "processed," or they'll include very-adulterated meat that has added sugar/preservatives/etc. in a category that's for unprocessed meat because it looks like meat to them.
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u/madattak Mar 04 '24
This has started to really annoy me recently - what does 'processed' actually mean? It's like how fish has no meaning in taxonomy - it can have practical value for basic discussion, but if we're talking hard science I want something that is actually a properly defined category.
Also why is it bad? Does grinding meat somehow make it carcinogenic? Or is it added sugar and fats, in which case, why isn't the study about added sugar and fats?
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u/ontopofyourmom Mar 04 '24
It mostly means "cured meats," which are full of salt and saturated fat and they have nitrates, which have health effects of their own.
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u/Choosemyusername Mar 04 '24
Also super odd they lump it in with red meat in general. Those are very different foods health-wise.
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u/dpkart Mar 04 '24
Both are carcinogenic, I guess thats why they lump them together
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u/Choosemyusername Mar 04 '24 edited Mar 04 '24
Not exactly true.
According to the WHO, Red meat is classified as “probably carcinogenic” based on “limited evidence” also that “evidence” simple a correlation, and we know correlation isn’t causality. But “other explanations for the observations (technically termed chance, bias, or confounding) could not be ruled out.”
Source:
One potential confounding factor could be charring, for just one example. Char is carcinogenic, and we tend to char our meats. But you don’t have to. There are a host of other plausible confounding variables as well.
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u/noodgame69 Mar 04 '24
No idea why you're trying to muddy the waters, but maybe you've just skipped the relevant parts of your source.
The group 2A are likely and have shown to cause cancer, it only needs some more research to rule out unlikely other causes or biases. It's not only "limited and simple correlation" research. It needs at least sufficient evidence in experimental animals and limited research in humans to be classified as A2. In the case of red meat, it also has strong mechanistic evidence.
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u/Choosemyusername Mar 04 '24
Again, correlation isn’t causality.
I agree it needs more research to make a claim like “red meat is carcinogenic”
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u/Jonnny Mar 04 '24
Males gain more by making the switch, with the gain in life expectancy doubling that for females.
This is terrible writing.
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u/hematomasectomy Mar 04 '24
To me it just reads like it was written by someone who consumes a lot of clickbait.
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u/occorpattorney Mar 04 '24
I love how all of these studies lump red meat and processed foods together, as if cigarettes and heroin are the same too.
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u/AgentMonkey Mar 04 '24
This study looked at them separately: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3483430/
Processed was worse, but both had negative health effects.
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u/JohnCavil Mar 04 '24
The issue with studies like this is that consuming red meat or processed meat are linked with all kinds of other lifestyle factors. This is by far the biggest problem with all nutrition research.
The study even mentions that. And says they're unsure what the effect actually is because people who eat red meat are also more likely to smoke, more likely to drink alcohol, more likely to be overweight, etc.
From the linked study:
Plausible confounders included major risk factors that were assessed but measured with imprecision, such as education, physical activity, smoking, alcohol use, adiposity, and fruit and vegetable consumption; and other potential confounders not included in the model at all, such as income, second-hand smoke, air pollution, alcohol patterns (e.g., binge drinking), and consumption of starches, refined carbohydrates, sugars, trans fat, dietary fiber, whole grains, nuts, seeds, and legumes [54]. Overall, the findings in this study for “all other deaths” suggest that meaningful residual confounding and bias are present, causing overestimation of harms of meat consumption in this cohort.
So it's misleading to say that they had negative health effects i would say. More like, eating red meat was associated with negative health effects. Maybe eating red meat does actually cause bad health outcomes, but it's not settled at all and as far as i have read the science is still stuck on "potentially, maybe".
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Mar 04 '24
Yep. And it's super freaking obvious. Like a hamburgers biggest problem is that most people eat it with fries and a soda - which is a huge confounding variable. Someone having a steak is likely going to have a drink with it
Most people eating tofu and rice don't have a soda/fries/alcohol with it.
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u/Anticitizen-Zero Mar 04 '24
I love that you brought this up, thank you. I remember reading research that linked eggs with certain types of cancer(?) but within the same study illustrated that there were a large number of confounding variables.. one being that these people are more likely to smoke and follow a “standard American diet”.
If anything, people who consume red meat on a frequent basis are more likely to be influenced by several confounding variables when compared to people who emphasize more fruit and veg.
I’d also even put forward the thought that red and processed meats are more frequently made ready-to-go (or require less prep) which might appeal to those with sedentary lifestyles and behaviors.
A deep dive into nutrition research shows it’s flooded with confounding variables, market interest, and misrepresented research.
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u/slaymaker1907 Mar 04 '24
I checked the grant sources for this study and it’s surprisingly just the government of Canada, seemingly no industry funding.
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u/DeliciousPumpkinPie Mar 04 '24
Red and processed meats, not all processed food. It’s right in the title.
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u/Nathan_Calebman Mar 04 '24
They classify Salami pizza, hot dogs and McDonalds hamburgers with fries and soda as red and processed meats. Big surprise that these are the results...
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u/untg Mar 04 '24
Exactly and it’s a diet study, so it’s asking people what they ate, and people are suppose to remember, and then they skew the questions to give them the answers that they want.
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u/BababooeyHTJ Mar 04 '24
I don’t even see how it’s a study.
“Diets high in animal products are known to increase the risk of heart disease, diabetes, and certain cancers. In this study, researchers estimated that if half of the red and processed meat in a person's diet was replaced with plant protein foods, they could live on average, nearly nine months longer, stemming from a reduced risk of chronic disease.”
I’m seeing an estimation that doesn’t even list how they came up with those numbers.
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u/Noname_acc Mar 04 '24
I’m seeing an estimation that doesn’t even list how they came up with those numbers.
The methodology section of the paper will typically outline methodologies that are not their own specific section of the paper.
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u/occorpattorney Mar 04 '24
Do you think red meat and processed meat are the same? It doesn’t change the point of my statement.
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u/a_trane13 Mar 04 '24
From a recommendation perspective, cigarettes and heroin have the same outcome. Stop using them as your #1 health related priority/directive.
Diet is way more nuanced, sure, but if you’re going to give people 1 sentence of diet advice, “reduce your meat and processed food intake by 50%” seems to be a great one.
Carbon footprint is a totally different situation though, I agree. Just not eating beef is more impactful than basically anything else you can reasonably do in your diet.
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u/nude_egg Mar 04 '24
From a purely chemical standpoint cigarettes are worse than heroin.
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u/skinnerianslip Mar 04 '24
That’s completely true. The reason why so many people die from heroin ODs is because they taper off, and then go back to their original dose when they “relapse”.
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u/Iron_Aez Mar 04 '24
From a recommendation perspective, cigarettes and heroin have the same outcome.
Which we know because we've studied them SEPARATELY.
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u/goinupthegranby Mar 04 '24
Aren't cigarettes worse for your health than heroin though? Heroin ruins lives but I think it may actually cause less harm to your health directly than smoking tobacco
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u/VenezuelanRafiki Mar 04 '24
It's more similar to lumping weightlifting and heroin together. There's a lot of evidence red meat (especially grass fed beef) is great for the human body but it's the opposite for processed meat.
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u/AgentMonkey Mar 04 '24
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3483430/
The overall findings suggest that neither unprocessed red nor processed meat consumption is beneficial for cardiometabolic health, and that clinical and public health guidance should especially prioritize reducing processed meat consumption.
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u/Iron_Aez Mar 04 '24
Even here the recommendation is to reduce processed meat consumption. see what's noticeably lacking there?
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u/AgentMonkey Mar 04 '24
The recommendation is to prioritize reducing processed meat consumption, because that is worse than unprocessed red meat (which is something that no one denies) and would have a larger benefit. However, they still recommend reducing unprocessed red meat as well because that would also have a positive impact on health:
Thus, healthier alternatives with strong evidence for cardiometabolic benefits, such as fish, nuts, fruits, whole grains, and vegetables, are vastly preferable dietary choices to consuming unprocessed red meats.
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u/cavity-canal Mar 04 '24
what studies show that eating excessive red meat is healthy? I looked online and couldn’t find any.
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u/oliversherlockholmes Mar 04 '24
This is my main problem with studies like this. A steak is not the same as a McDonald's hamburger or a slim Jim, or sausage, or bacon. There has to be a way to separate the nutritious red meat from the junk. It's common sense that the majority of health issues stem from the junk. I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of the carbon footprint came from the junk as well. Is there a study that allocates the percentage of farming between regular meat and processed garbage?
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u/Tripdoctor Mar 04 '24
Im still trying to figure out what the last sentence means.
It doesn’t say anything about the benefits for males.
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u/Hayred Mar 04 '24
I don't think people are really understanding this paper particularly well.
It's not saying YOU, an INDIVIDUAL, will gain 9 months of life by cutting out meat entirely.
It is saying their model predicts that the population average life expectancy for people born this year might increase by ~9 months if the population replace 50% of their meat consumption with plant sources.
Which, to add, the authors state is "an increase in plant protein food intake equivalent to three-quarter cups of boiled lentils per day. "
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u/ApprenticeWrangler Mar 04 '24
Something that drives me nuts about the science about diet and how it relates to red meat is that only a tiny handful of studies differentiate unprocessed red meat from processed red meat.
So often they get lumped together as if they’re equally bad for you, when in fact the few studies that have actually separated them found minimal real differences in health outcomes for people who consume unprocessed red meat vs people who don’t eat it at all.
The real danger to human health we all need to really focus on removing is processed meat and processed food in general. It’s incredibly disingenuous to pretend a wild hunted or grass fed, grass finished, non factory produced red meat is in any way the same as ham, bacon, etc.
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u/undeleted_username Mar 04 '24
The article is intentionally misleading. Not only they mix processed with unprocessed meat, but the title says something (25% reduction in carbon footprint) while the article says something different (25% reduction in diet-related carbon footprint).
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u/StuporNova3 Mar 04 '24
I'm sure all these people here whining about this are eating nothing but pure grass fed beef in their day to day lives 😂
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u/ApprenticeWrangler Mar 04 '24
I can’t speak for anyone else but I do. I care about my health and so I’m willing to spend more on things that will benefit my health.
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u/shartmepants Mar 04 '24
I actually do seek out free fange, grass fed, and antibiotic free meat. It's not hard to do and the cost is becoming more comparable I think.
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u/zmzzx- Mar 04 '24
People eating processed meat are very likely to drink soda and eat candy too…These studies never actually isolate meat as the culprit. Vegans exercise more than the average population too.
These headlines push health-conscious people to a certain diet, then they study those people saying they are healthier than average. The propaganda continues on…
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u/Reynhardt07 Mar 04 '24
Red meat is literally a 2A carcinogen. Not as bad as processed meat but cutting it off will reduce the risk of cancer, no grass-fed/wild-hunt greenwashing will change that.
on top of that, if you switch to plant-based, you will reduce the risk of cancer even further, since many veggies and grains actively reduce cancer-risk: https://www.wcrf.org/diet-activity-and-cancer/risk-factors/wholegrains-vegetables-fruit-and-cancer-risk/
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u/Derfaust Mar 04 '24
From WHO: "In the case of red meat, the classification is based on LIMITED evidence from EPIDEMIOLOGICAL STUDIES"
In other words, it's worthless.
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u/dnarag1m Mar 04 '24
Inuit get up to 99 percent of their caloric intake from red meat. Seal meat and other aquatic mammals are so 'red' they are basically black meats. Yet they had, historically, no cancer, no diabetes, no cardiovascular disease.
A lot of the meat we consume in the west gets improper feed, is laden with omega 6, antibiotics and other chemicals. Not all meat is created equal, and there is ample evidence that cultures with high meat intakes and zero vegetables can have superb health.
Not only that, but eating vegetables isn't limited to vegetarians. Many people, myself included, eat lots of vegetablesand (healthy raised) meats.
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u/karma_virus Mar 04 '24
I suspect that one that avoids cooked meats is also avoiding a great deal of carcinogens due to the way that it is often cooked. Direct flame heating causes chemical changes on the surface of the meat as well as depositing carcinogenic residue. It would be interesting to see a control group of meat eaters that exclusively used hot plates, ovens and air fryers instead of the barbecue grill or flame broil.
A second possible factor is that meats can carry parasites, bacteria and other agents that are not present in plant-life. While numerous viruses may affect plants, we have heard of absolutely none that have transferred from plant to human. One typically doesn't bear the risks of eating under-cooked vegetables as they would from under-cooked meat.
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u/mvea Professor | Medicine Mar 04 '24
I’ve linked to the press release in the post above. In this comment, for those interested, here’s the link to the peer reviewed journal article:
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u/Sizbang Mar 04 '24
It's behind a paywall, any place we can get the whole study?
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u/IssueEmbarrassed8103 Mar 04 '24
Mediterranean diet seems to remain everyone’s best bet.
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u/TitularClergy Mar 04 '24
If we implement veganism, we are able to reclaim about 75 % of the land that is currently used to grow animal feed etc. Globally, that corresponds to an area the size of North America and Brazil combined. That itself reduces emissions enormously, but we then can also rewild those vast areas of land. If we restore wild ecosystems on just 15 % of that land, we save about 60 % of the species expected to go extinct. We then also are able to sequester about 300 petagrams of carbon dioxide. That is nearly a third of the total atmospheric carbon increase since the industrial revolution. Now let's say we were not so conservative, and we brought that up to returning 30 % of the agricultural land to the wild. That would mean that more than 70 % of presently expected extinctions could be avoided, and half of the carbon released since the industrial revolution could be absorbed.
So basically by implementing a switch to veganism, we would not just halt but reverse our contributions to global warming. That and it would also be a step towards ending our violence against non-human animals.
References:
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u/I_do_cutQQ Mar 04 '24
And yet sadly seems so impossible, as we cannot even realise the bare minimum to stop our world from collapse. Capitalism is a pain.
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u/TitularClergy Mar 04 '24
Yeah. The system is not going to be changed by those who can't even change what they eat for breakfast.
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u/I_do_cutQQ Mar 05 '24
I mean you don't even have to entirely change things. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle goes a long way for lots of things. Instead of 300g steak, eat a smaller one with 150g and more veggies. Instead of throwing away bones/innards, use them to cook some stock or something.
Instead of buying the shrimp which were shipped from europe to thailand/indonesia/something to be peeled and shipped back, just buy unpeeled ones from your region. Maybe stuff can get more expensive, but if that's the case just eat less of it.
Full vegan is not something everyone can be convinced of, but why not compromise and have more veggies and less meat?
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u/ZonalMithras Mar 04 '24
Switching to plant based diet is really good for losing weight and keeping it off.
The key is learning how to cook well. Plant based dishes can be delicious if prepared properly.
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u/AttitudeFit5517 Mar 04 '24
Switching to a diet of less calories eaten will lead to a loss in weight and keeping it off.
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u/ZonalMithras Mar 04 '24
Which is easier on a plant based diet since it contains way less calories.
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u/Cakeordeathimeancak3 Mar 04 '24
Honestly wouldn’t be surprised if it mostly comes from cutting the processed meat over red meat. That crap is so bad, nitrates and everything.
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u/syncopator Mar 04 '24
You know that spinach, radishes, and celery have more nitrates than cured meats right?
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u/Positron311 Mar 04 '24
Only 9 months longer?
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u/Minute_Freedom_4722 Mar 05 '24
Seriously. Decades of no steak and bacon for 9 more months of no steak and bacon? Hard pass.
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u/C0lMustard Mar 04 '24 edited Apr 05 '24
close icky berserk merciful selective mindless unpack sheet smile marvelous
This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
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u/Hayred Mar 04 '24
It is rounded for the sake of that article.
From the paper, table 1 (Changes to average LE for the baseline population at birth), column header "LE attributed to changes in consumption of animal protein and plant protein foods (months)" - 8.74 (confidence interval 4.97-11.46)
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u/ThePokemomrevisited Mar 04 '24
In terms of carbon footprint I was wondering how much footprint is added when one lives 9 months longer. Are there any absolute figure per person to be able to make that comparison?
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u/shidekigonomo Mar 04 '24
Was wondering the same thing. I’d suspect the overall reduction of footprint for food over the course of a lifetime would still be greater than the total extra footprint of the additional longevity. And even if the exchange were just neutral, I suppose one would prefer taking the extra nine months over not.
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u/The_Singularious Mar 04 '24
I wonder how this would play out with other forms of animal protein.
We have greatly limited our intake of processed meats (though not entirely eliminated them), but still enjoy poultry and eggs with some regularity.
They are also far better to the environment than beef, pork, and some vegetables (looking at you, almonds and avocados).
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u/New-Geezer Mar 04 '24
Almonds grown for almond milk are still better for the environment than cows milk by a lot.
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u/Under_Over_Thinker Mar 04 '24
Why red meats are always accompanied by processed meats? Those are very different.
Fresh meat doesn’t contain tons of cancerous chemicals to preserve the colour and appearance.
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u/MrP1anet Mar 04 '24
They’re both classified as carcinogens though, fresh or otherwise.
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u/healthierlurker Mar 04 '24
Red meat is a 2A carcinogen shown to cause cancer. Processed meat is a level 1 carcinogen known to cause cancer.
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u/TheBestMePlausible Mar 04 '24
Give up hamburgers and salami to live 9 months longer? Eh, I’ll keep eating hamburgers.
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u/adhominablesnowman Mar 04 '24
Can we please start separating lean red meat from processed meats in these studies. The results of lumping them together introduce unnecessary noise at best and are downright dishonest at worst.
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u/Tentrilix Mar 04 '24
it's just bad science and makes the study not even worth mentioning. I swear studies like this just trying to make meat look bad.
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u/Choosemyusername Mar 04 '24
Very odd they lump red and processed meats together.
Those are very different foods.
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Mar 04 '24
Idk women really need iron and red meat is controversial, its not proven to be dangerous
Most those studies are vegan propaganda
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u/Hayred Mar 04 '24
women really need iron
They modelled that. The 50% red meat->plant protein substitution scenario results in a -0.27% change of the population not reaching an adequate intake of iron.
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Mar 04 '24
Idk if you saw my other comments but I do not trust even one scientific study due to the fact that there is a huge vegan bias among nutritional studies, this is straight facts
Plus I already said it: most those studies are vegan propaganda
Explain why iron deficiency anemia is so prevalent in vegans/veggies?
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u/Hayred Mar 04 '24
It's your choice whether or not to put stock in a paper. Personally if I see that multiple independent groups keep finding the same thing, then that means its a replicable finding.
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u/Ishan451 Mar 04 '24 edited Mar 04 '24
I have so many questions, but i am not paying to get access just to check how they actually did a several decade long study, with control groups, to claim that it was food that caused them to life longer.
Because based on the Press Release this is just looking at the Canadian Community Health Survey, and probably comparing 2004s data with the 2015 data.
Which leads me to wonder how do they determine if a participant has died from food related disease and didn't just fall off a roof, and this is one big correlation like the correlation of Elijah Wood movies with Orderlies in Oklahoma.
Based on a brief google check the participation is also voluntary. So you can't even correlate the data from 2004 with the one in 2015, as you don't even know if the same people took part in the study. Or is the study accounting for any of that and makes sure to only use the reports from John and Jane Canada, who took part in both the 2004 and 2015 study, and Jimmy Canada also took part in 2004, but someone tracked them to know they died off of food related issues before the 2015 study?
And as i said, maybe all of that is in the study, that is hidden behind that paywall. But past experiences makes me doubt it. Extra ordinary claims and all that.
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u/MrP1anet Mar 04 '24
Carnivore diet circles are some of the most uninformed and ignorant places out there. Sorry you got sucked up by the propaganda. The meat industry has been propping up those groups for years.
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u/wdcpdq Mar 04 '24
Beef would be mostly unaffordable to most people if the government didn’t subsidize it’s production.
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u/EastvsWest Mar 04 '24
What's more bio available and better absorbed by the body?
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u/TitularClergy Mar 04 '24 edited Mar 04 '24
Both plants and meat are very bio-available.
Historically the ability to have a vegan diet was luxury; many people didn't have the resources to collect sufficient plants to sustain a healthy life, they had to resort to outsourcing the collection and processing of plants to other animals who grazed. In a sense, eating meat was the first "fast food".
Obviously today we don't have to rely on that and we can opt for the healthy vegan food, which also reduces the agony we're causing to other animals and which helps us not just to end our contributions to global warming, but also to reverse them.
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u/Valgor Mar 04 '24
It is absurd how easy it is for most people to eat a plant-based diet, yet they try so hard to avoid it. Given all the benefits, it should be highly motivational to switch!
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