We all know what lifestyle diseases are like lung cancer which are caused by our own choices like deciding to smoke 40 a day and typically people have no sympathy when they become ill since it's "their fault". There are other things though that can make you not just sick but will shorten your lifespan and eventually kill you...only thing is you've been encouraged to do these things.
What does:
Heart Disease,
Cancer,
Mercury Poisoning,
Salmonella,
Diabetes and
Obesity have in common?
Animal products
It's been proven time and time again that consumption of animal products
increase the risk of so many 'lifestyle' diseases which can have horrific long term effects. Think back to Japan and both their mercury poisoning cases: Thousands died from it and what food substance contains mercury?
Fish All fish contain small amounts of it and the further up the chain you go the higher the amounts of mercury so eating
dolphin, shark or even tuna can mean you're being exposed to high concentrations of it. It didn't just kill those who were directly exposed to it but affected and mutated fetuses causing problems for generations to come.
The image is so large so you can see how it works in the fish food chain. Low in mercury puts them near the bottom of the food chain and high in mercuary puts them at the top hence why sharks are in that category- only thing missing is Dolphin and any species that eats a high amount of fish.
But what about
protein right? And
calcium? You need to eat animals and their products to get these!
Not quite; you can find protein in everything you eat. Have you ever heard of someone being protein deficient really? Yes there are foods in high concentration of it such as nuts, beans and lentils but it's not like you need to eat alot of them (but if you do then great news as they have less fat than animal products per gram so go wild!!) With
calcium it's in alot of other foods such as broccoli spinach and other leafy greens as well as tofu (doubles with protein as well) and dried herbs.
FACT: Countries that eat less animal products have a higher life expectancy rate and lower rates in diseases including heart disease and cancer.
Dairy Products
I'll start with these as people tend to forget how bad they really are for you thanks as you're 'educated' to believe you need to eat them but this is a LIE.
Dairy products are fattening and sure you can get the low fat if you like and if you're lactose intolerant you can get special stuff with the lactose taken out. 75% of all humans are lactose intolerant and most don't even realise it; it was only when I cut out dairy that I realised I was no longer getting sick, I used to be constantly ill with colds and flus which would affect my asthma horribly but now I'm rarely ever sick! All I did was cut dairy, nothing else (this was after I became vegetarian).
The consumption of Dairy has been linked to so many different disease it's almost unreal; Cancer, autisism, schizophrenia, diabetes and even the dreaded acne is linked to it. But still we continue to consume what is literally poisoning and slowly killing us. How could it's consumption be doing this? Well consider that cow's milk is made to grow baby cows into adults by getting them to gain 300 pounds a year and many hormones to help do this; not so great sounding for humans then is it? Antibiotics are in some places the only way to keep dairy cows alive due to the conditions they are forced to live in and also give birth in; these antibiotics build up in the cows so when they are eventually processed for hamburgers the antibiotics end up in those that eat them and also in those who consume the dairy. Human activity caused the birth of Mad Cow Disease by feeding natural grass eaters grain and dead animals; we still continue to do this.
That was big chunk wasn't it? And hopefully you can see how dairy isn't good for humans to consume. There's even been claims that girls who eat high amounts of dairy start their periods well before they should do; this could be due to the growth hormones the cows are being given.
Meat
Up until this point I haven't mentioned cholesterol which is also relevant to dairy so I'll do that now. Not all cholesterol is bad, in fact your body needs some, but the stuff in animal products have some serious negative impacts on your body which can lead to heart disease and blocked arteries however cholesterol found in plant-based food has positive effects including removal of the bad cholesterol. That's the simplest I can put it really; even low fat diets including animal products raise your bad cholesterol levels causing problems.
It's been seen time and time again that meat eaters have a higher cancer rate compared to non-meat eaters; of course there are other factors to take into account such as drinking or smoking rates but that doesn't mean you can ignore the fact that diet seems to play a role in some types of cancer. In some cases plant-based diets have seen cancer sufferers get a full recovery or the cancer cells begin to stop growing. This does make us ask a scary question: Are the hormones exposed to meat animals causing cancer in humans? Is that what's suddenly causing this epidemic of cancer in countries that eat more meat? Full studies need to be done into this and not by researchers being paid for by the food industry as the truth will be hidden then.
Like I mentioned about with Mad Cow Disease we have created serious illnesses that kill thousands in the end be it human or not. The more recent examples are Bird flu and Swine Flu both created in factory farm conditions and our response to fix this is to just load them with more antibiotics 70% of the world supply goes to factory farms. There are more antibiotic resistant diseases today than ever before, why? Because after we end up consuming the antibiotics through meat animals it builds up so that when some disease comes along making you ill there is the chance that disease could become resistant as it's exposed to low levels of the antibiotics.
We are the ones at fault here; we've been creating these illnesses then killing all the infected even though we are the ones who made this problem and continue to make it so much worse.
I don't want to go on forever so I'll leave everything here but there'll be a few links for you to check out if you like.
Comments, thoughts and suggestions on what you want covered to go in the comments as always guys :)
Clare x
This is a little list of things with a few facts
Cholesterol focus but a blog with loads of info for you
Getting dirty with the dairy
A bit more meaty goodness for you
Covers different diseases and the causes with what's been shown to reduce the effects of the disease
Brings up a few points of diseases linked with animal products (just because you don't like peta doesn't mean the facts are false)
