Top 7 Health Reasons to Bypass Animal Products

Nicci and Sadie chop onions for a vegan stew. Photo: Kneidel

Previous post: Top Five Ways Livestock Wreck the Planet

1. Protect your heart. Multiple studies report that the consumption of beef, pork, and lamb increase the risk of heart disease. Cardiologist Caldwell Esselstyn, in a 20-year-study, found that patients who adhered to his plant-derived diet reduced their cholesterol from an average of 240 mg/dL (high risk) to below 150 mg/dL - the total cholesterol level seen in cultures where heart disease is essentially nonexistent. In addition, Esselstyn's patients who had already experienced heart attacks or bypass surgery, etc., had virtually no further cardiac events after adopting his diet. His work is featured in the new documentary PLANEAT.

2. Vegetarians are 40% less likely to get cancer compared to meat-eaters, according to the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. Colon cancer is one of several cancers linked to meat consumption. Total fat and saturated fat, which tend to be higher in animal products than in plant-derived foods, increase colon-cancer risks. The same is true for breast cancer. Countries with a higher fat intake, especially fat from meat and dairy products, have a higher incidence of breast cancer. In Japan, for example, the traditional diet is much lower in fat, especially animal fat, than the usual western diet, and breast cancer rates are low. In the 1940s, when breast cancer was very rare in Japan, less than 10% of the calories in the Japanese diet came from fat.

3. Milk is a "stew of hormones"
Recent studies in adults have linked cow's milk with an excess cancer risk in the prostate, and to a lesser extent in the breast and ovaries, notes oncologist Michael Pollak of McGill University. Researchers suspect milk's "natural stew of hormones, growth factors and other biologically active chemicals" to be causative agents, reports Janet Raloff in Science News. Scientists at the National Cancer Institute analyzed grocery-store milk and found that whole milk contains the smallest quantity of estrogens; skim and buttermilk contain the most. Here's a quandary: although whole milk may contain the least estrogens, it contains the most saturated fat. And saturated fat has been associated with colon cancer for some time. What to do? Jettison the milk. See my previous post about milk and cancer.

4. Diabetes and obesity associated with meat-eating
An August 2011 study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition suggests that eating as little as 1 daily serving of red meat (beef, pork, lamb) increases your risk of type 2 diabetes. In the study, one daily serving of unprocessed red meat raised the diabetes risk about 20%. Worse, "one serving per day of processed meat like a hot dog or sausage was associated with a 50 percent increased risk of diabetes” said study co-author Dr. Frank Hu of the Harvard School of Public Health. “That’s pretty high.” In addition, those who ate the most red meat were less likely to eat fruits and vegetables and more likely to be obese and to smoke. “I think we should change our mindset in terms of protein sources in our diet,” said Dr. Hu. For the summary article, click here. For my previous post about fast foods and health, click here.

5. Fish infused with mercury
U.S. coal-fired power plants release over 48 tons of mercury into the air annually; Asia releases even more. All this airborne mercury winds up in freshwater and oceans - and in fish. The EPA says a mercury blood level below 5.8 mcg/L is safe for pregnant women; the agency estimates that at least 8% of U.S. women of childbearing age have blood mercury levels higher than that. In the Northeast, 20% of such women do. In NYC, 25%. One San Francisco physician found that 89% of patients who said they often eat fish had elevated levels. Symptoms are neurological, ranging from loss of balance to cognitive problems. Says Dr. Nicholas Fisher of Stonybrook, "95 to 100% of the methylmercury in our bodies comes from eating seafood." When the EPA tested predatory and bottom-dwelling fish from 500 lakes, they found mercury in every single one; half were unsafe to eat. Another study by the USGS found mercury-contaminated fish in all 291 streams and rivers they tested. Are any fish safe to eat? If you want to check it out, go to gotmercury.org or epa.gov/ost/fish. For more info, see Sierra Magazine's Nov/Dec 2011 article "This much mercury...how the coal industry poisoned your tuna sandwich."

6. One egg has twice the cholesterol of a Quarter Pounder with Cheese
Aside from the periodic salmonella outbreaks, even uninfected eggs can be a hazard to your health. According to Susan Levin, writing for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, 70% of the calories in an egg are fat calories. Eggs also have "a surprising load of saturated fat, which causes the liver to produce more cholesterol, which in turn increases the risk for cardiovascular disease." A typical egg contains 212 milligrams of cholesterol, more than the 2010 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee recommends for an entire day. An egg contains more cholesterol than a McDonald’s Quarter Pounder with Cheese, which sports a hefty 94 milligrams of cholesterol. There is no recommended minimum intake of cholesterol, but 200-300 mg is the recommended daily max.

7. Chicken is "one of the most dangerous...."
Time magazine has called chicken one of the most dangerous items in the American home. Recent studies report that more than 30% of U.S. chicken is contaminated with Salmonella, and 62% is contaminated with Campylobacter. According to the USDA, these two pathogens cause 80% of the illnesses and 75% of the acute deaths associated with meat consumption. Regarding the saturated fat issue: many consumers have replaced red meat with chicken, believing chicken to have less fat. But chicken is not low-fat. According to The George Washington University Health Plan, "Three ounces of lean top round has 5 grams of fat, while three ounces of roasted chicken thigh has 13 grams of fat. Even without the skin, the roasted thigh has 9 grams of fat." For more info and sources about human health and poultry, click here.

What to do?
Avoiding animal products is no longer difficult, given the profusion of substitutes in today's grocery stores and farmers markets. For ideas on family meals, check out some of the menus and cookbooks reviewed on this site.

 Sadie peruses local produce at a farmers market. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Coming soon: Top 5 Humane Reasons to Choose a Plant-based Diet and Skip the Animal Flesh

Keywords: vegan health animal products vegetarian health health hazards of meat health hazards of eggs health hazards of milk health hazards of animal products healthiest diet healthy diet

1% of deaths worldwide due to secondhand smoke - including my dad

My kind and beloved mom. I miss her every day. Photo: Sally Kneidel

My mother was a chain smoker; she died of pancreatic cancer, which is linked to smoking.

My dad didn't smoke at all, but he died of lung cancer.

Secondhand smokes kills 603,000 per year

So I wasn't too surprised to see in today's paper that secondhand smoke kills 603,000 people per year. That's in addition to the 5.1 million killed annually from smoking itself.

165,000 children die yearly of smoke-related illnesses

The study I saw in the newspaper was conducted by the World Health Organization. Armando Peruga of WHO said the organization was particularly concerned about the 165,000 children who die of smoke-related respiratory infections, mostly in Southeast Asia and Africa. I found that interesting, having recently returned from a stay in Southeast Asia.

In Southeast Asia it's customary for men to smoke, part of the masculine subculture

I noticed in Malaysia and Indonesia that most men smoke, while no women do. When I asked about it in Indonesia, a local told me that it's taboo for women to smoke, but it's a "custom" for men and especially all nature guides to smoke, particularly while leading treks. I found that odd. I also found it annoying to be engulfed in cigarette smoke while trying to stand absolutely still to photograph skittish wildlife. I noticed that Southeast Asian men seem to have no awareness that their smoke may be bothersome to others nearby. Smoking takes place anywhere and everywhere, and I never saw anyone react negatively to it except myself.

Most of these cigarette brands originated in the United States.  Here, they're for sale behind the counter in Gentingmas, a small food shop in Sandakan, Malaysia, on the island of Borneo. Photo: Sally Kneidel

North Carolina is the home of corporate tobacco

Of course, almost all of the cigarettes the Asian men smoked were brands that originated in America, which was embarrassing. Local stores sold Marlboros, Pall Malls, Kents, Winstons, Salems. I live less than 100 miles from the town of Winston-Salem, NC, home of R.J. Reynolds, one of the world's largest cigarette corporations.

Children of smoking parents have not only an increased risk of death, but many related illnesses

Peruga of WHO went on to say that children whose parents smoke have a higher risk of sudden infant death syndrome, ear infections, pneumonia, bronchitis and asthma. Their lungs may also grow more slowly than kids whose parents don't smoke.

Women impacted most by secondhand smoke

The WHO study, published last Friday in the medical journal Lancet, reported that secondhand smoke has its biggest impact on women, killing about 281,000 yearly. In many parts of the world, women are at least 50 percent more likely to be exposed to secondhand smoke than men. That makes sense given what I observed in Indonesia and Malaysia. The men are doing the smoking, while the women and children are breathing it. And the social custom seems to be to pretend that the smoke is not a problem.

She told me cigarettes were her best friend

I remember going out to eat with my parents one Sunday when I was a kid; my brothers weren't there. I complained in the car about the cigarette smoke and I complained again at the table. My dad told me to nip it, he said my biting my fingernails was more annoying than the smoke so I had no room to talk. I know he was just trying to protect my mom, to let her enjoy her cigarettes in peace. She always did say that cigarettes were her best friend. After an aneurysm ruptured in her head and left her severely brain damaged (2 years before the pancreatic cancer killed her), she still kept trying to smoke. She'd sit upright in her bed and go through all the motions of smoking, putting her empty fingers to her lips, drawing in deeply and blowing out the imaginary smoke. She didn't realize the cigarette was missing. Poor mama, she did that right up to the end. A true North Carolinian - born, bred, and dead in the land of tobacco.  She may have loved her cigs, but I can't say they loved her back.

Me and two dear Malaysian friends, Ria and Nola. They work in the Gentingmas shop on Borneo, where I did a lot of food shopping. The shop sells Marlboros and Winstons like most Asian shops. But Ria and Nola don't smoke and neither do I.  Photo: Ken Kneidel

Cited:
"Secondhand smoke kills more than 600,000 a year. New study shows global impact of secondhand smoke; children account for more than one-quarter of deaths each year." CBS News. London, November 25, 2010.

Maria Cheng. "600,000 deaths a year blamed on secondhand smoke" Associated Press. Reprinted in Charlotte Observer, November 26, 2010.

One of my recent posts about the tobacco industry's marketing to minors:
New studies show fast foods "kids meals" loaded with calories and fat

Key words: 600,000 deaths secondhand smoke cigarettes WHO cancer lung cancer respiratory disease

New studies: cancer linked to milk consumption

My mom was a meat, eggs, and milk gal. To her way of thinking, animal protein was the key to good health. Breakfast was bacon, eggs, and milk, period. If my brothers and I were running late for school, she made us gulp down a blend of raw eggs and milk. I loathed that "yellow milk."

Things have changed since then. My parents both died of cancer and my own children are in their twenties. When my two kids were teenagers, we gave up meat as a family and later gave up eggs and cartons of dairy milk - for environmental, humane, and health considerations.

Cheese was harder

For a while I continued to rationalize eating cheese and ice cream. I told myself it was okay because the cows weren't killed, they were just milked. But while researching and writing our book Veggie Revolution, my daughter Sadie and I learned the truth about dairy cows. It's not a pretty picture - in terms of the planet, the cows, or our health.

A dairy cow at a milking machine. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Humane considerations: "A cow is just a milk factory" he said with a smirk

A dairy scientist we interviewed at N.C. State University told us, "A dairy cow is just a milk factory.  There's not much quality of life." He's right. Modern dairy cows are among the most exploited of all factory-farmed livestock. In order to offer milk at competitive prices in supermarkets, dairymen today push the cows to their physiological limits to produce as much milk as their bovine bodies possibly can. Whereas cows 100 years ago could produce milk for a farmer's family for 10 to 12 years, the typical dairy cow nowadays burns out after only 3 years of milking. She wears out for four reasons: 1) she's pregnant for nine months every year, 2) she's milked for 10 months every year, in spite of being pregnant, 3) most dairy cows are given injections of the hormone BST (also called BGH) to maximize milk production, and 4) her leg joints give out from standing on concrete while she's heavy with pregnancy and a full udder.

So when she loses her ability to walk, or fails to become pregnant, or her milk production drops too low, she's "culled from the herd" and slaughtered. Her meat is sold for low-quality packaged beef products such as potted meat or beef hot-dogs.About 30% of the herd at a conventional dairy is "culled" every year.

Veal is the male calves of dairy cows

Eating dairy products is not more humane than eating beef. Beef cattle spend 5 or 6 comfortable months with their mothers at pasture before heading to the factory-like feedlot to be fattened for slaughter.  Whereas, male calves of dairy cows are often kept tethered and immobile beginning 24 hours from birth, to be sold in a few months as veal. (Veal is muscles that have had no exercise whatsoever; the meat is pale and tender as a result.) The female calves of dairy cows become impregnated at about 1.5 years of age and go "on the milk string" by their 2nd birthday. Calves of both genders are separated from their mothers after 24 hours so the mother's milk can be sold to humans.

 

Dairy cows waiting to be milked. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Environmental issues: Dairy cows win the poop contest

Dairy cows make a lot of waste. One beef steer makes 50-60 lbs of waste per day, but each dairy cow makes about 120 lbs per day, because they're older and bigger. (Beef cattle are slaughtered before or near their first birthday.) Some dairies these days have as many as 1000 dairy cows.Their waste is flushed into open-air lagoons, which can be 25 feet deep and as large as several football fields.These lagoons can spill over during storms, can crack and leak into groundwater. Nitrate contamination of ground and surface waters (and wells) near  livestock-waste lagoons is commonplace and is even legally allowed up to certain limits, although nitrates are toxic for human consumption.  Nitrates and phosphates also cause eutrophication of streams and lakes downhill from the lagoons, which means the nutrients fuel algal blooms that subsequently suck all the oxygen out of the water, suffocating fish and aquatic invertebrates.

51% of greenhouse gases are from livestock

In addition to the waste issue is the fact that the livestock sector worldwide generates 51% of all greenhouse gases - that includes methane from manure, CO2 from the burning of forests to raise livestock feed or to graze the animals, CO2 from the transport of feed or refrigerated animal products, etc. (That figure is from a recent analysis by World Bank scientists, "Livestock and Climate Change," published by Worldwatch institute.)

Milk consumption linked to cancer

The link between cancer and dietary hormones, especially estrogen, is a major source of concern among scientists. According to Harvard scientist Ganmaa Davaasambuu, a number of studies have correlated the consumption of milk and cheese with higher rates of hormone-dependent cancers (breast, testicular, prostate). Milk from a pregnant cow contains up to 33 times more estrogen and 10 times more progesterone than milk from a non-pregnant cow.  In nomadic societies like Mongolia, where cows are milked only 5-6 months per year, the hormone content of milk is relatively low. The Western practice of keeping cows confined in large numbers and milking them 10 months per year is relatively recent.

Science News article on milk, hormones, and cancer.

Photo: Sally Kneidel

Male hormones (androgens) in cows' milk are cause for concern too. In a recent report in Science News, physician F. W. Danby from Dartmouth Medical School said that certain androgens in cows' milk have the capacity for increasing the number of estrogen receptors in the human body. Extra receptors allow more estrogen - including any from milk - to affect cellular machinery that can turn tumor growth on.  Hormones in cows' milk "are being poured into a system that didn't anticipate them," said Danby, and can't eliminate them effectively.

The same Science News report goes on to say, "One of the most provocative aspects of the milk story is its impact on insulinlike growth factor 1. Many studies have linked elevated concentrations of IGF-1 with cancer risk. Not only is milk a rich source of the substance, but people who drink milk also end up with more IGF-1 in their blood."  Incidentally, I read in another article today that cows injected with BST have more IGF-1 in their milk. Since the year 2000, BST has been banned in Canada, the European Union, Australia, and New Zealand. But it's still legal and widely used here in the US.  National Dairy Council lobbyists can be thanked for that.

Do we need cows' milk for good health?

The Science News article concludes with a comment on milk from oncologist Michael Pollak of McGill University:  "Because the body of knowledge about this beverage’s human bioactivity is still in its infancy, people may just have to employ the precautionary principle. In the absence of definitive [safety] data—or the presence of an adverse effect which may be small—you have to decide: Is there anything good about milk? And other than developing children and malnourished adults, people probably don’t need milk."

No indeed. Calcium and protein are both easily available from plenty of plant-based sources.

Great-tasting nutritious alternatives to dairy products at our house. Photo: Sally Kneidel

Alternatives to dairy products

And, yes, we've given up dairy cheese. We found some good plant-based cheese we like at Trader Joe's. There's really no excuse anymore for me. Six years ago, a woman who works for PETA said to me, on the subject of going vegan: "It's not that hard."  What she said was so simple, but it stuck with me. No, it really isn't that hard. And as a person who loves animals, who frets endlessly about our planet, and who wants to stay alive as long as possible....it's one of those small things that I can do, that anyone can do, and if everyone did it, the impact would be huge.

Key words: dairy cancer factory farms livestock and climate change dairy cows dairy waste veal calves vegan

Sources:

Janet Raloff. "Scientists find a soup of suspects while probing milk's link to cancer".  Science News. 2009.

Robert Goodland and Jeff Anhang. " Livestock and Climate Change."  Worldwatch Magazine. Nov-Dec 2009.

Corydon Ireland. "Hormones in milk can be dangerous." Harvard University Gazette.