More information: www.ProVegan.info
Our diet influences our health tremendously: “You are what you eat.” A well-planned diet means that we have a wonderful chance to live a long, fit and healthy life. So if our diet is so important, shouldn’t we learn more about how to eat right from the standpoint of nutrition, working with reputable studies from all around the world?
We are all familiar with articles that urge us to eat more fruit and vegetables and less meat. Even so, meat is still considered a completely normal part of an allegedly healthy, balanced diet, despite the fact that numerous scientific studies have proved that consuming meat damages our health. The disastrous impact that milk, cheese and other dairy products have on our health is less well known or not widely known at all. The public is shocked whenever natural disasters or terrorist attacks kill hundreds or thousands of people. But will people react in the same way when millions of people suffer from and die of cancer, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, obesity and other diseases that are related to diet and malnutrition? While the public is being misinformed and misled about a healthy diet, certain industries will profit from this situation.
The animal industry’s fairy tales about the alleged health benefits of meat, eggs and dairy products often go unquestioned by uninformed consumers and uninterested politicians. But that’s not all: in the EU and in many countries elsewhere, unhealthy and cruel products are subsidized with tax money. It is scandalous that sales of plant drinks in Germany are impeded by a value-added tax of 19 % while cow’s milk is massively supported by a value-added tax of only 7 % in addition to subsidies. This political activity is absolutely unacceptable since it obviously places the interests of the animal industry above the health of the people whom governments should be representing.
Even the media attacks healthy diets from time to time. In most cases, it never comes to light whether a journalist was simply uninformed or might have had close connections to the animal industry and therefore an economic interest. One example: in 2004, a toddler whose parents had reportedly fed him a vegan diet died. However, the child had not actually eaten any vegan food. In fact, he hadn’t eaten any food at all! He had lost his appetite because he’d contracted pneumonia and hadn’t received medical treatment for the condition. What’s shocking is that the child had not been fed at all and that his parents believed in a special diet called “Urkost” (primordial food), which has nothing to do with a healthy vegan diet. As is too often the case, the media did not think it was necessary to do proper research about the story or the nutritional basics of a vegan diet. Instead, the media condemned vegan diets in the interests and favour of the animal industry with the usual prejudices, even though this very case had nothing to do with veganism. What remains in the public mind, though, is a faulty impression about veganism which is completely in the animal industry’s interests.
Millions of people suffer and die because of extreme malnutrition caused by meat, milk, dairy products, eggs, and animal fats and proteins – from obesity, hypertension, heart attacks, angina pectoris, strokes, atherosclerosis, osteoporosis, cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s and other chronic diseases. In recent years, numerous studies have demonstrated a connection between the consumption of animal products and these diseases. Studies have also shown that many fish are contaminated with shockingly high levels of environmental toxins, such as dioxin and heavy metals. The universities of Barcelona and Granada in 2009 conducted separate studies on the mercury levels of children and pregnant women and found a clear connection between fish consumption and mercury contamination. Elevated mercury levels obviously affected the children’s mental effectiveness (memory, language) and were connected with delayed development. Several studies, including a French one from 2007, indicated that fish and milk, in particular, are the most common sources for the intake of toxins (including dioxin, furans and dioxin-like PCBs).
Numerous studies have demonstrated a connection between milk consumption and a number of serious diseases, such as breast cancer, ovarian cancer, prostate cancer, Alzheimer’s, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s, types 1 and 2 diabetes and osteoporosis. Statistics published by the World Health Organization about the worldwide incidences of breast cancer correlate with the levels of milk consumption in the respective countries. The “EU-BST-Human-Report”, commissioned by the EU to show the effects of milk consumption on human health, concluded that hormones in milk can increase the growth of malignant tumors, especially in cases of breast and prostate cancer.
The fact that millions of people are victims of animal products is simply accepted as “normal” – it generates no outcry from the media. However, if one person dies because his irresponsible parents fed him a diet that people could only wrongly allege was vegan, the incident sparks a huge public outcry and outrages uninformed consumers and meat-industry representatives. The findings of scientists and the statements of renowned nutritionists and physicians strongly contravene the lyrical rhapsodies of journalists and animal-industry lobbyists. For example, in 2003, in a joint position paper, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, or A.N.D. (formerly the American Dietetic Association), and Dietitians of Canada commented on the health advantages of vegan diets. Some of the most renowned dieticians in the US and Canada belong to these organisations. The A.N.D. alone has approximately 70,000 members. The position paper states, in part:
“Well-planned vegan diets and other forms of vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence.”
In addition, Dr Claus Leitzmann, one of the most renowned dieticians in Germany, has said:
“Studies on vegans, which have been done worldwide, and also by us, show clearly that vegans on the average are healthier than the general population. Bodyweight, blood pressure, blood fats and cholesterol, kidney function and general health status are more often normal.”
In 2009, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, or A.N.D. (formerly the American Dietetic Association) published an updated position paper on vegetarian and vegan diets and confirmed its support of them. This is outstanding, especially since the connections between the A.N.D. and the animal industry are well known – however, it is simply impossible to ignore the scientific data supporting a vegan diet. The A.N.D. concludes that well-planned vegetarian diets – including vegan diets – are healthful and nutritious for adults, infants, children and adolescents and can even help prevent and treat chronic health conditions such as heart disease, cancer, obesity and diabetes. Published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association in July 2009, the paper outlines A.N.D.’s official position on vegetarian diets, including a vegan diet:
“It is the position of the American Dietetic Association (currently, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics) that appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and for athletes.”
The medical organisation PCRM (Physicians‘ Committee for Responsible Medicine) is a nonprofit organisation that supports preventive medicine, conducts clinical research and supports higher standards in research concerning ethics and efficiency. PCRM recommends a vegan diet as the healthiest diet and presents logical reasons for this:
“Vegan diets, which contain no animal products are even healthier than vegetarian diets. Vegan diets contain no cholesterol and even less fat, saturated fat, and calories than vegetarian diets do because they exclude dairy products and eggs. Scientific research shows that health benefits increase as the amount of food from animal sources in the diet decreases, making vegan diets the healthiest overall.”
Dr T Colin Campbell, author of The China Study, defends the benefits of a plant-based diet:
“In fact, these findings indicate that the vast majority perhaps 80 to 90 % of all cancers, cardiovascular diseases, and other forms of degenerative illness can be prevented, at least until very old age, simply by adopting a plant-based diet.”
“Additionally, impressive evidence now exists to show that advanced heart disease, relatively advanced cancers of certain types, diabetes and few other degenerative diseases can be reversed by diet.”
Campbell, professor emeritus at Cornell University, has been one of the leading and most renowned scientists of nutrition research worldwide for more than 40 years. He has published more than 300 research papers, and his outstanding survey, The China Study, is the most comprehensive study of health and nutrition ever published. It was financed by governmental research funds from the US and China and therefore closely monitored by the authorities.
Despite the clear and weighty evidence based on reputable scientific facts, large parts of the media, unwitting doctors and alleged “nutritionists” keep spreading incorrect and misleading facts about the animal food industry and archaic and faulty doctrines. Altogether, this is a major health scandal. The prevention of diseases should be considered at least as important as their treatment. But our health systems earn millions with the treatment of chronic diseases caused by unhealthy diets. A massive new health policy aimed at prevention might take away large parts of the health industry’s profits. So it comes as no surprise that the conflicting interests of the health and animal industries, combined with widespread misinformation, have led to a situation in which the prevention of diseases through good nutrition falls by the wayside. And so it completes a circle in which humans, animals and the environment suffer tremendously. It is therefore in the interest of all citizens to look after their own diet.
A vegan diet that is varied and carried out appropriately is the healthiest diet of all – and the only truly healthy diet for human beings. However, just leaving out meat, milk, cheese, eggs and fish won’t make it a healthy diet. A poorly devised vegan diet that is not varied and includes too much refined sugar and too much additional oils and fats is unhealthy, too! And this is despite the numerous scientific nutrition studies that found that the majority of vegans are healthier than meat-eaters and vegetarians.
It must be emphasized once again that a vegetarian diet offers no health advantages and, least of all, any ethical benefit. Although studies have shown a better health status for many vegetarians, this is primarily related to vegetarians generally leading a healthier lifestyle and developing increased health awareness. According to scientific studies, milk and dairy products are the unhealthiest of all foodstuffs (due to high levels of hormones, carcinogenic animal proteins, carcinogenic environmental toxins).
Anybody wishing to eat a vegan diet should be particularly aware of his or her vitamin B12 intake – a vitamin built only by micro-organisms (bacteria). It is therefore mostly found in easily perishable animal foods like meat and milk. It has been suggested that plant-based foods can contain vitamin B12 under certain circumstances, but as this source is too uncertain, I will not discuss this option further. Alleged “experts” tend to name a possible lack of vitamin B12 as the biggest argument against a vegan diet. And this is despite the fact that many omnivores are deficient in vitamin B12, too. In order to make veganism the healthiest diet, one has to make sure his or her diet is varied and obtain an appropriate source of vitamin B12.
For a vegan diet to be the healthiest of all diets, a few simple rules need to be followed. In my view, unfortunately, these principles are considered too seldom.
I highly recommend the following publications for further information:
