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There's no reason to eat meat

There's no reason to eat meat

Date published: 4/22/2007

Why eat meat at all?

YOU CAN MAKE a good case for avoiding meat altogether. Studies show that the folks who eat the most red meat are the most likely to develop dreaded diseases such as diabetes, heart attacks and strokes, as well as cancers of the stomach, colon, breast and prostate.

They can't prove whether meat was the cause or just a marker for an unhealthy lifestyle. But studies show that when people immigrate to America from countries where less meat is eaten, their risk for disease goes up.

Fatty meat seems particularly risky, as do processed meats like sausages. Even a lean cut of meat, like a 3-ounce piece of sirloin steak, has more calories and fat than the same size piece of roasted turkey (240 calories in the steak compared with 130 in the turkey).

Another drawback: Meats cooked at high temperatures can form cancer-causing chemicals, although marinating meat for 30 minutes before cooking can prevent the formation of these chemicals.

Food poisoning is more often related to meats than to vegetables and fruits. And interestingly, the recent cases of food poisoning in spinach were traced to contamination by animals.

And you never have to worry about getting mad cow disease from beans.

Another strike against red meat: It may make you smell bad, according to one small and strange study by Czech scientists. The Czechs assigned two groups of men to meat-filled or meat-free diets for two weeks. The men wore pads in their armpits during the last day of the diet. At the end, women sniffed the men's armpit pads.

The ladies judged the meat-free men as smelling more attractive and less intense. (No word on whether the men actually got more attention by avoiding meat.)

From a more serious, environmental standpoint, it takes more resources to produce beef versus beans. To produce 1 pound of beef, farmers use 16 pounds of grains and soy and 2,500 gallons of water, according to the classic book "Diet for a Small Planet" by Frances Moore Lappe.

And some of today's factory feedlots crowd the cattle into dirty pens, according to reports in The New York Times and other media. You have to search to find a small family farm with green pastures such as the ones my ancestors had.

Finally, you can get all the nutrients in beef and pork--protein, iron, zinc, niacin, vitamin B12 and the like--from other foods, such as chicken, fish, eggs, milk, beans and nuts.

Olympic track athlete Carl Lewis proved people could be incredibly fit on a vegetarian diet.

So unless you like meat, there's no reason to eat it.

Jennifer Motl welcomes reader questions via her Web site, bright eating.com, or mailed to Nutrition, The Free Lance-Star, 616 Amelia St., Fredericksburg, Va. 22401.

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Date published: 4/22/2007