Going vegetarian doesn’t mean ‘absence of meat’ or you’ll be malnourished.
Did you know that here in the UK, we’re now eating so badly, that malnourishment is a rising problem, which costs the NHS £7.3 billion per year?
Red meat, such as beef, lamb and pork gives us the essential protein we can’t do without, along with micronutrients such as iron (and I don’t mean iron filings!) for healthy red blood cells which carry the oxygen round our body; zinc for healthy hair and nails and repair of body tissues; B12 for the brain, blood and the nervous system; vitamin A for growth and development, for the immune system and good vision and contains essential fatty acids too. (Your brain is 60% fat. The myelin sheaths surrounding, protecting and insulating your brain cells depend on your eating enough, and the right sort of fat to maintain their integrity.)
It’s difficult to get all these essential nutrients without meat.
In fact, I have a friend who ‘went vegetarian’ and ended up with rickets!
However, there’s some good news for vegetable lovers.
Fibre i.e. fruits and vegetables help to protect against the damaging effects of a high meat diet.
A recent 12-year study by University College, London, examining the eating habits of 65,000 people in England between 2001 and 2013, concluded that you begin to get beneficial effects by eating more than 7 portions of fruit and vegetables each day (42% less likely to die from any cause), not the much-touted (by the World Health Organisation and backed by the Government and NHS) 5 a day, which only 30% of the population manage to achieve.
What’s more the study found that canned and frozen fruit increased the risk of dying by 17 per cent.
Fruit juice was found to have no significant benefit. In fact we know that the high levels of fructose, without the accompanying fibre, found in the whole fruit, but not in the juice, is positively harmful.
Vegetables are better than fruit
Each portion of vegetables lowered the risk of death by 16 per cent. However, each piece of fruit only lowered the chance of death by 4 per cent. That’s why the Australian Government advises “two plus five” a day – two helpings of fruit and five of vegetables.