The scientific evidence is over whelming. What we eat profoundly affects our well-being and longevity. The Surgeon General has found that nearly 70 percent of all disease in the US is diet-related. The Journal of the American Medical Association reports that half of all adults in the US suffer from one or more chronic conditions, many closely linked to the meat-centered Standard American Diet (appropriately known as SAD). Despite such grave findings, millions continue ot eat in ways that severely compromise their health.
There is a solution, and it's as close as your plate. For optimal health, the medical community agrees, eat a diet rich in foods from the plant kingdom--whole grains, fruits, vegetables, legumes, seeds and nuts--and choose few or no animal products.
There is a large and growing body of medical studies showing that people who eat plant-centered diets are at significantly reduced risk for developing this nation's leading killers: heart disease, many types of cancer, diabetes, hypertension, stroke and obesity, to name a few. The landmark China Health Project (one of the most comprehensive studies of the relationship between diet and health ever undertaken) found that a low-fat, plant-based diet commonly prevents, consistently improves and often cures many of the top diseases of our time. Case in point: numerous doctors in the US now use a low-fat vegetarian diet to reverse even severe heart disease in their patients.
There's no question that largely vegetarian diets are as healthy as you can get. The evidence is so strong and overwhelming and produced over such a long period of time that it's no longer debatable. My number-one reason for eating a plant-rich diet is that it tastes good.---Marion Nestle, PhD, Chair of the Nutrition Department at New York University
Grains, legumes, fruits and vegetables are abundant sources of many substances that promote good health and protect against disease. These compounds include antioxidants (such as beta carotene and vitamins C and E), phytochemicals (like the compound genistein in soyfoods) and disease-fighting fiber, not present in any amount in any animal product.
According to the American Dietetic Association (ADA), a vegetarian eating style can provide all of the nutrients you need, including sufficient protein and calcium. People can meet or exceed the Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) for protein simply by choosing a varied plant-centered diet and eating ample calories, says the ADA. (Ironically, most Americans get roughly twice the protein they need, and this can contribute to osteoporosis, kidney disease and other medical problems.) As for calcium, deficiencies among people eating a plant-based diet are rare, and there is little evidence that calcium intakes below the RDA cause these individuals any health problems. On the contrar, studies show that people who avoid animal products absorb and retain more calcium from foods than people who eat them.
What's missing from a diet free of animal foods? Certainly not flavor or variety. The plant world offers a choice of dozens of grains, cereals and pastas, 40-50 commonly eaten vegetables, 20 fruits, 24 types of peas, beans, and lentils, 12 kinds of nuts and a galaxy of culinary herbs and spices.
What will be lacking from your plant-based diet is the deadly blend of cholesterol, total fat and saturated fat that routinely accompanies animal foods. You'll also be missing out on pesticide and drug residues and industrial poisons like dioxin, which tend to concentrate in the fat cells of animals. Finally, you'll be facing a significantly reduced risk of exposure to deadly microbes like E. coli, Salmonella and the agent responsible for Mad Cow Disease.
In recent decades, Americans have taken part in a nutritional experiment that has failed miserably. The good news is that a plant-based diet can help us reverse the epidemic of diet-related diseases, the crippling level of health care costs and the immeasurable human suffering that is the legacy of the Standard American Diet.
Besides being easy, delicious, environmentally-friendly and economical, a plant-based diet can dramatically improve your chances of living a long and healthy life.
The data have been in for decades now and they demonstrate one thing: vegetarian diets offer incontrovertible health benefits. The studies are there-hundreds of them-in peer-reviewed journals. I know because I've got reprints in my office-cartons full, in fact.---Gary Null, PhD, author of more than 50 books on health and nutrition
In my view, no chemical carcinogen is nearly so important in causing human cancer as animal protein.---T. Colin Campbell, PhD, epidemiologist and Director of the Cornell-Oxford-China Diet and Health Project
More than 2,500 Americans die each day from heart disease, the leading killer of both women and men.
Each year, US doctors perform 284,000 coronary bypass surgeries. The average cost is $30,000 per procedure. People eating no meat have 24% less heart disease than people who eat meat. People eating no meat and dairy have 57% less heart disease. Physicians may be able to reverse existing heart disease in more than 70% of patients who followed a prescribed low-fat vegetarian diet. The journal Preventive Medicine estimates the health care costs attributable to meat consumption in the US between $28 and $61 billion each year. If combined with the money spent treating smoking-related illnesses, this would be enough to provide coverage for the roughly 40 million currently uninsured US citizens. More than 1.2 million Americans are diagnosed with cancer each year, and more than 500,000 die from the disease. A study of more than 11,000 people found that those eating a vegetarian diet have 40% less chance of contracting cancer than people who eat meat. As many as 80 million cases of food-borne illness occur in the US each year, accounting for at least 9,000 deaths. 60-70% of these cases are directly linked to consumption of animal products. Roughly half of all antibiotics used in the US are fed to livestock. Only about one in every 18,500 slaughtered animals is tested for antibiotic residues.
