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The True Cost Of Meat

NewScientist.com

8-13-4

 

 

Americans each chomp their way through an astounding 100 kilos of meat

every year - that's a medium steak per person per day. This worries Robert

Lawrence, because a meaty diet with so many calories in saturated fats

squeezes out healthier fruits, vegetables and grains. But, as he told Liz

Else, he's busy providing the academic ballast for a national campaign to

save the country from itself. And fortunately for him, he's an optimist

 

*What is the campaign called? Can you really change the way Americans eat?

 

It's called Meatless Monday - the name goes back to the first world war

when it was used as a catchy phrase to help people live with rationing. In

a way we're doing the same thing but it's a voluntary rationing at a time

when the average citizen is " eating " 800 kilos of grain per year compared

with 250 kilos in China. Our grain feeds animals, mainly beef, where 1

kilo of beef takes around 7 kilos of grain to produce. And yes, the food

industry is enormous but I'm a great believer that the truth will

ultimately out, and the more good data that we have the more likely it is

that we will be able to persuade people either to change their behaviour

or, even more importantly, to use their behaviour to change policy.

 

*Why Mondays?

 

We liked the way it sounded! But also people often overdo things at the

weekend so it makes a different start to the week.

 

*How meatless is Meatless?

 

Basically, no red meat, pork or poultry. Fish - which is high in

nutritional value - and " good fats " are fine.

 

*What was the motivation?

 

Maybe it was because I had my first grandchild and started worrying about

the future. I began to think a great deal more about what policy

interventions we could develop that would integrate human health with the

health of the ecosystem. After all, we've known for years about the

important environmental effects, starting back with the London chimney

sweeps in the 18th century who got scrotal cancer because they were being

exposed to all the tars of the soot. But the environment as something that

is intimately related to the health of the entire population hasn't been

explored in this much depth. It particularly relates to ideas of food

security, how we are using arable land and water, and how food production

contributes to inequities in food security around the world as well as

within our own society.

 

*This is all highly political.

 

Oh, highly political. The agricultural industry and the food industry have

a lot of political power.

 

*Could it be as tough as taking on the tobacco industry?

 

Well, it's interesting that there is a group called the Center for

Consumer Freedom in the US which is a front for the tobacco industry, the

Cattlemen's Association, the Pork Producers' Association, the Dairy

Producers' Association, the Egg Board and so on. They have declared

several of us here at the School of Public Health " environmental

extremists " because we are talking about the safety of the human food

supply, going right back to the safety of the animal feed supply.

 

*Are there environmental health problems associated with meat production?

 

Absolutely. One striking example is in our own back yard. We are looking

at changes in the microbiologic flora and fauna of the surface water on

the eastern shore of Maryland, where a billion chickens a year are raised.

The chicken feed contains antibiotics and arsenic, which is used as a

biocide. And the arsenic ends up in what we euphemistically call " chicken

litter " , chicken excrement. That is put back on the fields to grow

soybeans and the corn to feed the chickens, but in such quantities that

the arsenic is now leaching into the surface water.

 

A colleague was trying to see whether this enormous industrial

agricultural production could explain the arsenic in drinking water on the

eastern shore, and the appearance of antibiotic-resistant bacteria because

of chronic exposure to low levels of antibiotics.

 

*What are the risks of doing this kind of research?

 

There is a risk, particularly in the US, of science being used for

political purposes. A few months ago, the Union of Concerned Scientists

issued a statement that was signed by about 60 Nobel prizewinners,

criticising the political manipulation of scientific data. And when you

get into the environment in the US, of course, it brings out all the worst

aspects of that.

 

*What can you do?

 

The Center for a Livable Future, which is where we provide the academic

background for Meatless Monday, focuses on the way diet, food production,

environment and health are interrelated, with particular emphasis on the

environmental and health impacts of industrial animal production. Animal

rearing on an industrial scale adds to the air quality problem, for

example, by releasing ammonia and other chemicals related to intensive

agriculture. The centre is all about promoting policies to protect our

health, our planet, and our ability to sustain life in the future.

 

*Why did you pick meat? Why not fizzy drinks, dairy products, cakes or

cookies?

 

One reason was that we could map onto the Healthy People 2010 initiative

from our Department of Health and Human Services. Every 10 years, it comes

up with a set of objectives - this time cutting saturated fat intake by 15

per cent. Now if you do the math, one day a week without saturated fat

from animal sources is about 15 per cent.

 

And the other reason is that because of subsidies and other factors, we

don't capture the externalities in the true cost of things. Meat is a

particularly good example of where we don't capture the true costs -

environmental degradation - and price that in.

 

*But you're up against huge sums of money?

 

Yes, and it's not just the subsidies. Around $34 billion a year is spent

by the food and beverage industry on marketing to the American population.

By contrast, the social marketing budget of the National Cancer Institute

for its big Five-a-Day campaign, promoting five servings of fruit and

vegetables a day, was $2 million.

 

*In such an unequal fight, leverage must be important...

 

That's right. So the idea of Meatless Monday is to get something that is

catchy, that people will remember. What we've really learned from

promoting health education is that frequent simple messages work much

better than complicated ones. Or, sadly, than talking about the plight of

the developing world.

 

*But you're not going to get anywhere unless you join up with activists,

are you?

 

Right. And we have joined up with a group in New York that is actually

where the Meatless Monday campaign is based. We're providing the kind of

scientific validation, and we have staff at the centre who vet the recipes

on the Meatless website. And the site (www.meatlessmonday.com) has been

specially designed to make it very accessible for everyone - bright and

jazzy. We also work closely with the Global Resource Action Center for the

Environment in New York, and they've been involved with doing a cartoon

called The Meatrix.

 

*Like The Matrix?

 

Yes, but it's making the point about industrial animal production in the

US through a spoof of the film. It's won lots of awards - and does a great

job of raising the issues in a way people can relate to.

 

*This hints at the dark side of animal production...

 

Yes, it can get quite dark. We've got a couple of studies going on with

the chicken industry following hurricane Floyd. In all of the big hog

farms in North Carolina, their open septic pools were flooded out by the

hurricane. Twenty-three of the 26 river systems in North Carolina were

polluted with animal waste run-off from the hog industry. There are 11

million hogs in North Carolina and there are 7.5 million people, and each

hog produces about five times the waste of one human.

 

*Are things improving at all? How many animals are killed in the US?

 

We now have a population of 286 million, and we kill and consume 9 billion

animals a year, 35 million head of cattle, 100 million hogs and 8 billion

chickens and turkeys. In terms of total meat consumption, the average

American male consumes twice what the US Department of Agriculture

recommends, and the average American woman consumes about 1.6 times. Way

above even the high meat-eating countries of Europe.

 

*So what does meat do to you?

 

No matter how lean the cut of meat you still take in saturated fat, and

the saturated fat content of the American diet is much, much higher than

it should be. The cholesterol story and the saturated fat story have been

around a long time, and the meat industry says that for 30 or 40 years

they have been breeding leaner cattle. But when they talk about lean cuts

of meat, they don't acknowledge the vast quantities of beef consumed that

is in the form of hamburger, and that typically has about 50 per cent fat.

In fact, they take the meat that is not used for steaks and chucks and

things like that, the part that raises concerns about BSE. Some of that

meat is actually quite lean, but then they take some of the trimmed fat,

grind it up and add it back to the meat so that the beef patty in

McDonalds or Wendy's or Burger King will retain some moisture and juices

because a very lean patty ends up being pretty dry.

 

*That sounds rather contradictory!

 

You have them talking out of both sides of their mouth. On the one hand

the industry says: " But you can have a 3-ounce portion of lean beef and it

has fewer calories, fewer fat calories than lots of other things. " But if

you go to an American restaurant, and they came out with the 3-oz serving,

it would be about the size of a deck of playing cards. The customer would

say: " Is that all I'm getting? " A typical serving is 12, 14 or 16 oz.

Enormous.

 

*But that can't be good?

 

Our agriculture system produces 3900 calories for every man, woman and

child in the US every day, and since we only need about 2400 calories on

average, what are you going to do with that excess? Well, you're going to

super-size everything, and people either throw it away so there's

tremendous waste or they consume it and gain waist!

 

*Where do you shop?

 

My wife and I go to Whole Food and Trader Joe's in the north of Baltimore,

which are good but they are more expensive. And one of the things that is

a real equality issue in the US is that poor neighbourhoods like the one

our school is in don't have any supermarkets at all. They rely on these

little corner stores that don't have any perishables, just canned and

packaged food. To get decent produce, a poor person living in east

Baltimore would have to take the bus and change twice to get to another

part of the city.

 

*They'd have to be very motivated. Maybe if they knew about the other

health effects of eating meat?

 

Well, maybe. Another big problem with eating a lot of animal fats is the

organic pollutants that travel in the fatty layer of tissues. So dioxins,

PCBs and pesticides end up in the food supply. About 30 per cent of animal

feed for hogs and beef is recycled animal fat. And then there are

endocrine disrupters, hormones and growth promoters used in the beef

industry and increasingly in some of the other animal products. We need a

lot more data, but what is emerging suggests that these endocrine

disrupters play a role in everything from lowering the age of menarche to

explaining the continued increase in breast cancer compared with other

cancers.

 

*What about food poisoning?

 

We have about 75 million cases of food-borne diarrhoeal disease in the US

each year. And 75 million cases out of 286 million Americans is quite a

lot.

 

*Do these problems with meat-eating show up anywhere else?

 

Leaving aside the epidemic of obesity, Americans were once the tallest and

leanest people in the world and now we are collectively getting shorter

too.

 

*Shorter?

 

There's a lot of speculation but part of it must be lower nutritional

values. This is not unlike what happened in the past. Take my uncle, who

grew up in the Rhondda Valley in south Wales and was barely 5 feet tall.

He was a conscientious objector in the first world war and served in the

ambulance corps. The average enlisted man in the British army was four

inches shorter than the average officer. My father was the tallest in his

family at 5 foot 3 inches, and my older brother is the same height as me -

6 foot - so in high school we had to endure all these jokes about the tall

milkman because they would see my brother and me with our parents!

 

*But now Americans are getting shorter?

 

We may be in the midst of stepping back, of seeing collectively some of

the real manifestations of a degraded American diet.

 

*What's it like trying to get the message across to government officials?

 

I recently chaired a panel at the Institute of Medicine on dioxin in the

food supply. It was sponsored, as most of the National Academy of Science'

s Institute of Medicine things are, by the US Department of Agriculture;

the Food and Drug Administration; the Environmental Protection Agency, and

the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry of the Centers for

Disease Control. And when we met seven or eight of the people from these

agencies and told them what we were going to say in advance of the press

conference, the EPA and the ATSDR people were fine, the FDA was a bit more

concerned but USDA was really unhappy.

 

*Why?

 

They have this totally untenable situation where part of their job is to

make recommendations to the American people about diet and the other is to

promote the US agricultural sector. They were very, very concerned that we

were going to make some recommendations that would create huge political

problems for them.

 

*Did you?

 

One of the things we said was that school lunches needed to be

dramatically altered to reduce the animal fat served to school-aged

children because that is where the dioxins and other chemicals are

accumulating - and nothing has happened yet.

 

*How much meat do you eat?

 

I would say on average in a typical week we would end up having fish once

and then chicken about once in two weeks and I can't even remember the

last time that beef or pork was prepared.

 

© Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

http://www.newscientist.com/opinion/opinterview.jsp?id=ns24601

 

 

 

Martha Gellhorn set off with a knapsack and $50

to cover the Spanish Civil War in 1937. She was

29 and would spend the next 53 years of her life

covering wars. " War is a malignant disease, " she

once wrote, " an idiocy, a prison, and the pain it

causes is beyond our telling or imagining. "

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I keep hearing so much conflicting information, aaargghhh--makes me

feel like pulling my hair out, lol! I agree that it's not good to

eat those antibiotics and hormones, etc. in meat, which is why I try

to buy the organic, grain fed products as much as possible.

Sometimes they are hard to get and expensive, but it's worth it.

However, the lower carb plan I'm on says that saturated fat is okay,

and part of a healthy diet. Combining it with sugar and refined

carbs is the culprit. There was a study in Framingham, Massachusetts

in which Dr. William Castelli said that " the more saturated fats one

ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the

lower people's serum cholesterol...We found that the people who ate

the most cholesterol, the most saturated fat, ate the most calories,

weighed the least and were the most physically active. "

 

I've also read that beef has steric acid in it, which helps lower

cholesterol. And Dr. Christiane Northrup, author of the best-

seller, " The Wisdom of Menopause " , says that saturated fat " is an

overrated threat " . She supports Atkins and Somersize (the plan I'm

on), and agrees that it is only a problem when you combine it with

refined carbs. All I know is that I eat meat, and fish--not alot,

but a normal amount--and mostly vegetables, and the pounds dropped

off me, because I cut out sugar. I really think this person should

focus more on eliminating refined carbs, and then promote more

vegetables!

 

, The Stewarts

<stews9@c...> wrote:

> The True Cost Of Meat

> NewScientist.com

> 8-13-4

>

>

> Americans each chomp their way through an astounding 100 kilos of

meat

> every year - that's a medium steak per person per day. This

worries Robert

> Lawrence, because a meaty diet with so many calories in saturated

fats

> squeezes out healthier fruits, vegetables and grains. But, as he

told Liz

> Else, he's busy providing the academic ballast for a national

campaign to

> save the country from itself. And fortunately for him, he's an

optimist

>

> *What is the campaign called? Can you really change the way

Americans eat?

>

> It's called Meatless Monday - the name goes back to the first

world war

> when it was used as a catchy phrase to help people live with

rationing. In

> a way we're doing the same thing but it's a voluntary rationing at

a time

> when the average citizen is " eating " 800 kilos of grain per year

compared

> with 250 kilos in China. Our grain feeds animals, mainly beef,

where 1

> kilo of beef takes around 7 kilos of grain to produce. And yes,

the food

> industry is enormous but I'm a great believer that the truth will

> ultimately out, and the more good data that we have the more

likely it is

> that we will be able to persuade people either to change their

behaviour

> or, even more importantly, to use their behaviour to change policy.

>

> *Why Mondays?

>

> We liked the way it sounded! But also people often overdo things

at the

> weekend so it makes a different start to the week.

>

> *How meatless is Meatless?

>

> Basically, no red meat, pork or poultry. Fish - which is high in

> nutritional value - and " good fats " are fine.

>

> *What was the motivation?

>

> Maybe it was because I had my first grandchild and started

worrying about

> the future. I began to think a great deal more about what policy

> interventions we could develop that would integrate human health

with the

> health of the ecosystem. After all, we've known for years about

the

> important environmental effects, starting back with the London

chimney

> sweeps in the 18th century who got scrotal cancer because they

were being

> exposed to all the tars of the soot. But the environment as

something that

> is intimately related to the health of the entire population

hasn't been

> explored in this much depth. It particularly relates to ideas of

food

> security, how we are using arable land and water, and how food

production

> contributes to inequities in food security around the world as

well as

> within our own society.

>

> *This is all highly political.

>

> Oh, highly political. The agricultural industry and the food

industry have

> a lot of political power.

>

> *Could it be as tough as taking on the tobacco industry?

>

> Well, it's interesting that there is a group called the Center for

> Consumer Freedom in the US which is a front for the tobacco

industry, the

> Cattlemen's Association, the Pork Producers' Association, the

Dairy

> Producers' Association, the Egg Board and so on. They have

declared

> several of us here at the School of Public Health " environmental

> extremists " because we are talking about the safety of the human

food

> supply, going right back to the safety of the animal feed supply.

>

> *Are there environmental health problems associated with meat

production?

>

> Absolutely. One striking example is in our own back yard. We are

looking

> at changes in the microbiologic flora and fauna of the surface

water on

> the eastern shore of Maryland, where a billion chickens a year are

raised.

> The chicken feed contains antibiotics and arsenic, which is used

as a

> biocide. And the arsenic ends up in what we euphemistically

call " chicken

> litter " , chicken excrement. That is put back on the fields to grow

> soybeans and the corn to feed the chickens, but in such quantities

that

> the arsenic is now leaching into the surface water.

>

> A colleague was trying to see whether this enormous industrial

> agricultural production could explain the arsenic in drinking

water on the

> eastern shore, and the appearance of antibiotic-resistant bacteria

because

> of chronic exposure to low levels of antibiotics.

>

> *What are the risks of doing this kind of research?

>

> There is a risk, particularly in the US, of science being used for

> political purposes. A few months ago, the Union of Concerned

Scientists

> issued a statement that was signed by about 60 Nobel prizewinners,

> criticising the political manipulation of scientific data. And

when you

> get into the environment in the US, of course, it brings out all

the worst

> aspects of that.

>

> *What can you do?

>

> The Center for a Livable Future, which is where we provide the

academic

> background for Meatless Monday, focuses on the way diet, food

production,

> environment and health are interrelated, with particular emphasis

on the

> environmental and health impacts of industrial animal production.

Animal

> rearing on an industrial scale adds to the air quality problem,

for

> example, by releasing ammonia and other chemicals related to

intensive

> agriculture. The centre is all about promoting policies to protect

our

> health, our planet, and our ability to sustain life in the future.

>

> *Why did you pick meat? Why not fizzy drinks, dairy products,

cakes or

> cookies?

>

> One reason was that we could map onto the Healthy People 2010

initiative

> from our Department of Health and Human Services. Every 10 years,

it comes

> up with a set of objectives - this time cutting saturated fat

intake by 15

> per cent. Now if you do the math, one day a week without saturated

fat

> from animal sources is about 15 per cent.

>

> And the other reason is that because of subsidies and other

factors, we

> don't capture the externalities in the true cost of things. Meat

is a

> particularly good example of where we don't capture the true

costs -

> environmental degradation - and price that in.

>

> *But you're up against huge sums of money?

>

> Yes, and it's not just the subsidies. Around $34 billion a year is

spent

> by the food and beverage industry on marketing to the American

population.

> By contrast, the social marketing budget of the National Cancer

Institute

> for its big Five-a-Day campaign, promoting five servings of fruit

and

> vegetables a day, was $2 million.

>

> *In such an unequal fight, leverage must be important...

>

> That's right. So the idea of Meatless Monday is to get something

that is

> catchy, that people will remember. What we've really learned from

> promoting health education is that frequent simple messages work

much

> better than complicated ones. Or, sadly, than talking about the

plight of

> the developing world.

>

> *But you're not going to get anywhere unless you join up with

activists,

> are you?

>

> Right. And we have joined up with a group in New York that is

actually

> where the Meatless Monday campaign is based. We're providing the

kind of

> scientific validation, and we have staff at the centre who vet the

recipes

> on the Meatless website. And the site (www.meatlessmonday.com) has

been

> specially designed to make it very accessible for everyone -

bright and

> jazzy. We also work closely with the Global Resource Action Center

for the

> Environment in New York, and they've been involved with doing a

cartoon

> called The Meatrix.

>

> *Like The Matrix?

>

> Yes, but it's making the point about industrial animal production

in the

> US through a spoof of the film. It's won lots of awards - and does

a great

> job of raising the issues in a way people can relate to.

>

> *This hints at the dark side of animal production...

>

> Yes, it can get quite dark. We've got a couple of studies going on

with

> the chicken industry following hurricane Floyd. In all of the big

hog

> farms in North Carolina, their open septic pools were flooded out

by the

> hurricane. Twenty-three of the 26 river systems in North Carolina

were

> polluted with animal waste run-off from the hog industry. There

are 11

> million hogs in North Carolina and there are 7.5 million people,

and each

> hog produces about five times the waste of one human.

>

> *Are things improving at all? How many animals are killed in the

US?

>

> We now have a population of 286 million, and we kill and consume 9

billion

> animals a year, 35 million head of cattle, 100 million hogs and 8

billion

> chickens and turkeys. In terms of total meat consumption, the

average

> American male consumes twice what the US Department of Agriculture

> recommends, and the average American woman consumes about 1.6

times. Way

> above even the high meat-eating countries of Europe.

>

> *So what does meat do to you?

>

> No matter how lean the cut of meat you still take in saturated

fat, and

> the saturated fat content of the American diet is much, much

higher than

> it should be. The cholesterol story and the saturated fat story

have been

> around a long time, and the meat industry says that for 30 or 40

years

> they have been breeding leaner cattle. But when they talk about

lean cuts

> of meat, they don't acknowledge the vast quantities of beef

consumed that

> is in the form of hamburger, and that typically has about 50 per

cent fat.

> In fact, they take the meat that is not used for steaks and

chucks and

> things like that, the part that raises concerns about BSE. Some of

that

> meat is actually quite lean, but then they take some of the

trimmed fat,

> grind it up and add it back to the meat so that the beef patty in

> McDonalds or Wendy's or Burger King will retain some moisture and

juices

> because a very lean patty ends up being pretty dry.

>

> *That sounds rather contradictory!

>

> You have them talking out of both sides of their mouth. On the one

hand

> the industry says: " But you can have a 3-ounce portion of lean

beef and it

> has fewer calories, fewer fat calories than lots of other things. "

But if

> you go to an American restaurant, and they came out with the 3-oz

serving,

> it would be about the size of a deck of playing cards. The

customer would

> say: " Is that all I'm getting? " A typical serving is 12, 14 or 16

oz.

> Enormous.

>

> *But that can't be good?

>

> Our agriculture system produces 3900 calories for every man, woman

and

> child in the US every day, and since we only need about 2400

calories on

> average, what are you going to do with that excess? Well, you're

going to

> super-size everything, and people either throw it away so there's

> tremendous waste or they consume it and gain waist!

>

> *Where do you shop?

>

> My wife and I go to Whole Food and Trader Joe's in the north of

Baltimore,

> which are good but they are more expensive. And one of the

things that is

> a real equality issue in the US is that poor neighbourhoods like

the one

> our school is in don't have any supermarkets at all. They rely on

these

> little corner stores that don't have any perishables, just canned

and

> packaged food. To get decent produce, a poor person living in east

> Baltimore would have to take the bus and change twice to get to

another

> part of the city.

>

> *They'd have to be very motivated. Maybe if they knew about the

other

> health effects of eating meat?

>

> Well, maybe. Another big problem with eating a lot of animal fats

is the

> organic pollutants that travel in the fatty layer of tissues. So

dioxins,

> PCBs and pesticides end up in the food supply. About 30 per cent

of animal

> feed for hogs and beef is recycled animal fat. And then there are

> endocrine disrupters, hormones and growth promoters used in the

beef

> industry and increasingly in some of the other animal products. We

need a

> lot more data, but what is emerging suggests that these endocrine

> disrupters play a role in everything from lowering the age of

menarche to

> explaining the continued increase in breast cancer compared with

other

> cancers.

>

> *What about food poisoning?

>

> We have about 75 million cases of food-borne diarrhoeal disease in

the US

> each year. And 75 million cases out of 286 million Americans is

quite a

> lot.

>

> *Do these problems with meat-eating show up anywhere else?

>

> Leaving aside the epidemic of obesity, Americans were once the

tallest and

> leanest people in the world and now we are collectively getting

shorter

> too.

>

> *Shorter?

>

> There's a lot of speculation but part of it must be lower

nutritional

> values. This is not unlike what happened in the past. Take my

uncle, who

> grew up in the Rhondda Valley in south Wales and was barely 5 feet

tall.

> He was a conscientious objector in the first world war and served

in the

> ambulance corps. The average enlisted man in the British army was

four

> inches shorter than the average officer. My father was the tallest

in his

> family at 5 foot 3 inches, and my older brother is the same height

as me -

> 6 foot - so in high school we had to endure all these jokes about

the tall

> milkman because they would see my brother and me with our parents!

>

> *But now Americans are getting shorter?

>

> We may be in the midst of stepping back, of seeing collectively

some of

> the real manifestations of a degraded American diet.

>

> *What's it like trying to get the message across to government

officials?

>

> I recently chaired a panel at the Institute of Medicine on dioxin

in the

> food supply. It was sponsored, as most of the National Academy of

Science'

> s Institute of Medicine things are, by the US Department of

Agriculture;

> the Food and Drug Administration; the Environmental Protection

Agency, and

> the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry of the

Centers for

> Disease Control. And when we met seven or eight of the people from

these

> agencies and told them what we were going to say in advance of the

press

> conference, the EPA and the ATSDR people were fine, the FDA was a

bit more

> concerned but USDA was really unhappy.

>

> *Why?

>

> They have this totally untenable situation where part of their job

is to

> make recommendations to the American people about diet and the

other is to

> promote the US agricultural sector. They were very, very concerned

that we

> were going to make some recommendations that would create huge

political

> problems for them.

>

> *Did you?

>

> One of the things we said was that school lunches needed to be

> dramatically altered to reduce the animal fat served to school-

aged

> children because that is where the dioxins and other chemicals are

> accumulating - and nothing has happened yet.

>

> *How much meat do you eat?

>

> I would say on average in a typical week we would end up having

fish once

> and then chicken about once in two weeks and I can't even remember

the

> last time that beef or pork was prepared.

>

> © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

> http://www.newscientist.com/opinion/opinterview.jsp?id=ns24601

>

>

>

> Martha Gellhorn set off with a knapsack and $50

> to cover the Spanish Civil War in 1937. She was

> 29 and would spend the next 53 years of her life

> covering wars. " War is a malignant disease, " she

> once wrote, " an idiocy, a prison, and the pain it

> causes is beyond our telling or imagining. "

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I really don't think this is the place to defend eating meat. Eat what you

want, but most of us just don't care.

 

Cindy <cindybin2001 wrote:

 

>However, the lower carb plan I'm on says that saturated fat is okay, and part

of a healthy diet.

 

A lot of people say a lot of things.

 

>There was a study in Framingham, Massachusetts

in which Dr. William Castelli said that " the more saturated fats one ate, the

more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the lower people's serum

cholesterol...We found that the people who ate the most cholesterol, the most

saturated fat, ate the most calories, weighed the least and were the most

physically active. "

 

Oddly, that study would then contradict almost every other study done on the

subject.

 

The kind of fats we eat are important, as well as the sources of those fats.

>She supports Atkins and Somersize (the plan I'm

on), and agrees that it is only a problem when you combine it with refined

carbs.

 

So, fat is only a problem if you eat sugar? This has been shown to be untrue.

Excessive calories are problems in general, and fats and sugars both wreak their

own damage on our bodies. Claiming tht one or the other is harmless is

irresponsible.

 

>All I know is that I eat meat, and fish--not alot,

but a normal amount--and mostly vegetables, and the pounds dropped off me,

because I cut out sugar.

 

Did you even evaluate this sentence? The pounds dropped off you, *because you

cut out sugar*. Sugar is a huge part of the Western diet today, and accounts

for a large portion of the calories most people consume. In addition, most

people eat far more calories than they burn off.

 

Anyone who cuts out sugar will lose weight, regardless of whether they eat meat

or not.

 

>I really think this person should focus more on eliminating refined carbs, and

then promote more vegetables!

 

That's nice. I notice that refined carbs are not mentioned in the interview, so

you don't know his position on them. However, we *do* know that most Americans

do not eat enough vegetables, and that vegetables are good for you. So imo,

promoting the eating of more vegetables is very healthy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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I'm not defending eating meat--as I've said before, I respect the

vegetarian way of eating--my point is that there just seems to be so

much conflicting information. It's like, " What am I supposed to

believe? " lol! One doctor says one thing, another doctor says the

complete opposite. I go to my health food store and there's a whole

shelf of diet books, with one saying you don't have to cut back on

fat and calories, and right next to that there will be one saying

you must cut back on fat and calories, etc. If I were still trying

to lose weight, I think I'd be pulling my hair out. But anyway, just

wanted to point out how annoying it is that there is so much

conflicting information. I thought I was so nice and polite about it

and thought you would understand; didn't mean to upset anyone. I'm

all for vegetables!

 

~Cindy

 

, reptile grrl

<reptilegoddess> wrote:

> I really don't think this is the place to defend eating meat. Eat

what you want, but most of us just don't care.

>

> Cindy <cindybin2001> wrote:

>

> >However, the lower carb plan I'm on says that saturated fat is

okay, and part of a healthy diet.

>

> A lot of people say a lot of things.

>

> >There was a study in Framingham, Massachusetts

> in which Dr. William Castelli said that " the more saturated fats

one ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate,

the lower people's serum cholesterol...We found that the people who

ate the most cholesterol, the most saturated fat, ate the most

calories, weighed the least and were the most physically active. "

>

> Oddly, that study would then contradict almost every other study

done on the subject.

>

> The kind of fats we eat are important, as well as the sources of

those fats.

> >She supports Atkins and Somersize (the plan I'm

> on), and agrees that it is only a problem when you combine it with

refined carbs.

>

> So, fat is only a problem if you eat sugar? This has been shown

to be untrue. Excessive calories are problems in general, and fats

and sugars both wreak their own damage on our bodies. Claiming tht

one or the other is harmless is irresponsible.

>

> >All I know is that I eat meat, and fish--not alot,

> but a normal amount--and mostly vegetables, and the pounds dropped

off me, because I cut out sugar.

>

> Did you even evaluate this sentence? The pounds dropped off you,

*because you cut out sugar*. Sugar is a huge part of the Western

diet today, and accounts for a large portion of the calories most

people consume. In addition, most people eat far more calories than

they burn off.

>

> Anyone who cuts out sugar will lose weight, regardless of whether

they eat meat or not.

>

> >I really think this person should focus more on eliminating

refined carbs, and then promote more vegetables!

>

> That's nice. I notice that refined carbs are not mentioned in the

interview, so you don't know his position on them. However, we *do*

know that most Americans do not eat enough vegetables, and that

vegetables are good for you. So imo, promoting the eating of more

vegetables is very healthy.

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

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Oh yes, about the calories--that's another thing I keep hearing

conflicting information about. So many people say that losing weight

is all about cutting calories, but then I hear the exact opposite!

There are many studies that show those on lower-carb plans actually

consume MORE calories. And Dr. Diana Schwarzbein's book is all about

how low-calorie diets can be dangerous. I realize that cutting out

sugar reduces calories, but I also eat lots of rich foods, which are

hardly low in calories. Cutting calories slows down your metabolism.

I'm just saying this was my experience.

 

, reptile grrl

<reptilegoddess> wrote:

> I really don't think this is the place to defend eating meat. Eat

what you want, but most of us just don't care.

>

> Cindy <cindybin2001> wrote:

>

> >However, the lower carb plan I'm on says that saturated fat is

okay, and part of a healthy diet.

>

> A lot of people say a lot of things.

>

> >There was a study in Framingham, Massachusetts

> in which Dr. William Castelli said that " the more saturated fats

one ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate,

the lower people's serum cholesterol...We found that the people who

ate the most cholesterol, the most saturated fat, ate the most

calories, weighed the least and were the most physically active. "

>

> Oddly, that study would then contradict almost every other study

done on the subject.

>

> The kind of fats we eat are important, as well as the sources of

those fats.

> >She supports Atkins and Somersize (the plan I'm

> on), and agrees that it is only a problem when you combine it with

refined carbs.

>

> So, fat is only a problem if you eat sugar? This has been shown

to be untrue. Excessive calories are problems in general, and fats

and sugars both wreak their own damage on our bodies. Claiming tht

one or the other is harmless is irresponsible.

>

> >All I know is that I eat meat, and fish--not alot,

> but a normal amount--and mostly vegetables, and the pounds dropped

off me, because I cut out sugar.

>

> Did you even evaluate this sentence? The pounds dropped off you,

*because you cut out sugar*. Sugar is a huge part of the Western

diet today, and accounts for a large portion of the calories most

people consume. In addition, most people eat far more calories than

they burn off.

>

> Anyone who cuts out sugar will lose weight, regardless of whether

they eat meat or not.

>

> >I really think this person should focus more on eliminating

refined carbs, and then promote more vegetables!

>

> That's nice. I notice that refined carbs are not mentioned in the

interview, so you don't know his position on them. However, we *do*

know that most Americans do not eat enough vegetables, and that

vegetables are good for you. So imo, promoting the eating of more

vegetables is very healthy.

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

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Beef lowers cholesterol? It is one of the main sources of it! Wow, something

that contradicts itself. That's so confusing.

Coco

Cindy [cindybin2001]

Saturday, August 14, 2004 1:08 PM

Re: Meat's True Cost

 

 

I keep hearing so much conflicting information, aaargghhh--makes me

feel like pulling my hair out, lol! I agree that it's not good to

eat those antibiotics and hormones, etc. in meat, which is why I try

to buy the organic, grain fed products as much as possible.

Sometimes they are hard to get and expensive, but it's worth it.

However, the lower carb plan I'm on says that saturated fat is okay,

and part of a healthy diet. Combining it with sugar and refined

carbs is the culprit. There was a study in Framingham, Massachusetts

in which Dr. William Castelli said that " the more saturated fats one

ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the

lower people's serum cholesterol...We found that the people who ate

the most cholesterol, the most saturated fat, ate the most calories,

weighed the least and were the most physically active. "

 

I've also read that beef has steric acid in it, which helps lower

cholesterol. And Dr. Christiane Northrup, author of the best-

seller, " The Wisdom of Menopause " , says that saturated fat " is an

overrated threat " . She supports Atkins and Somersize (the plan I'm

on), and agrees that it is only a problem when you combine it with

refined carbs. All I know is that I eat meat, and fish--not alot,

but a normal amount--and mostly vegetables, and the pounds dropped

off me, because I cut out sugar. I really think this person should

focus more on eliminating refined carbs, and then promote more

vegetables!

 

, The Stewarts

<stews9@c...> wrote:

> The True Cost Of Meat

> NewScientist.com

> 8-13-4

>

>

> Americans each chomp their way through an astounding 100 kilos of

meat

> every year - that's a medium steak per person per day. This

worries Robert

> Lawrence, because a meaty diet with so many calories in saturated

fats

> squeezes out healthier fruits, vegetables and grains. But, as he

told Liz

> Else, he's busy providing the academic ballast for a national

campaign to

> save the country from itself. And fortunately for him, he's an

optimist

>

> *What is the campaign called? Can you really change the way

Americans eat?

>

> It's called Meatless Monday - the name goes back to the first

world war

> when it was used as a catchy phrase to help people live with

rationing. In

> a way we're doing the same thing but it's a voluntary rationing at

a time

> when the average citizen is " eating " 800 kilos of grain per year

compared

> with 250 kilos in China. Our grain feeds animals, mainly beef,

where 1

> kilo of beef takes around 7 kilos of grain to produce. And yes,

the food

> industry is enormous but I'm a great believer that the truth will

> ultimately out, and the more good data that we have the more

likely it is

> that we will be able to persuade people either to change their

behaviour

> or, even more importantly, to use their behaviour to change policy.

>

> *Why Mondays?

>

> We liked the way it sounded! But also people often overdo things

at the

> weekend so it makes a different start to the week.

>

> *How meatless is Meatless?

>

> Basically, no red meat, pork or poultry. Fish - which is high in

> nutritional value - and " good fats " are fine.

>

> *What was the motivation?

>

> Maybe it was because I had my first grandchild and started

worrying about

> the future. I began to think a great deal more about what policy

> interventions we could develop that would integrate human health

with the

> health of the ecosystem. After all, we've known for years about

the

> important environmental effects, starting back with the London

chimney

> sweeps in the 18th century who got scrotal cancer because they

were being

> exposed to all the tars of the soot. But the environment as

something that

> is intimately related to the health of the entire population

hasn't been

> explored in this much depth. It particularly relates to ideas of

food

> security, how we are using arable land and water, and how food

production

> contributes to inequities in food security around the world as

well as

> within our own society.

>

> *This is all highly political.

>

> Oh, highly political. The agricultural industry and the food

industry have

> a lot of political power.

>

> *Could it be as tough as taking on the tobacco industry?

>

> Well, it's interesting that there is a group called the Center for

> Consumer Freedom in the US which is a front for the tobacco

industry, the

> Cattlemen's Association, the Pork Producers' Association, the

Dairy

> Producers' Association, the Egg Board and so on. They have

declared

> several of us here at the School of Public Health " environmental

> extremists " because we are talking about the safety of the human

food

> supply, going right back to the safety of the animal feed supply.

>

> *Are there environmental health problems associated with meat

production?

>

> Absolutely. One striking example is in our own back yard. We are

looking

> at changes in the microbiologic flora and fauna of the surface

water on

> the eastern shore of Maryland, where a billion chickens a year are

raised.

> The chicken feed contains antibiotics and arsenic, which is used

as a

> biocide. And the arsenic ends up in what we euphemistically

call " chicken

> litter " , chicken excrement. That is put back on the fields to grow

> soybeans and the corn to feed the chickens, but in such quantities

that

> the arsenic is now leaching into the surface water.

>

> A colleague was trying to see whether this enormous industrial

> agricultural production could explain the arsenic in drinking

water on the

> eastern shore, and the appearance of antibiotic-resistant bacteria

because

> of chronic exposure to low levels of antibiotics.

>

> *What are the risks of doing this kind of research?

>

> There is a risk, particularly in the US, of science being used for

> political purposes. A few months ago, the Union of Concerned

Scientists

> issued a statement that was signed by about 60 Nobel prizewinners,

> criticising the political manipulation of scientific data. And

when you

> get into the environment in the US, of course, it brings out all

the worst

> aspects of that.

>

> *What can you do?

>

> The Center for a Livable Future, which is where we provide the

academic

> background for Meatless Monday, focuses on the way diet, food

production,

> environment and health are interrelated, with particular emphasis

on the

> environmental and health impacts of industrial animal production.

Animal

> rearing on an industrial scale adds to the air quality problem,

for

> example, by releasing ammonia and other chemicals related to

intensive

> agriculture. The centre is all about promoting policies to protect

our

> health, our planet, and our ability to sustain life in the future.

>

> *Why did you pick meat? Why not fizzy drinks, dairy products,

cakes or

> cookies?

>

> One reason was that we could map onto the Healthy People 2010

initiative

> from our Department of Health and Human Services. Every 10 years,

it comes

> up with a set of objectives - this time cutting saturated fat

intake by 15

> per cent. Now if you do the math, one day a week without saturated

fat

> from animal sources is about 15 per cent.

>

> And the other reason is that because of subsidies and other

factors, we

> don't capture the externalities in the true cost of things. Meat

is a

> particularly good example of where we don't capture the true

costs -

> environmental degradation - and price that in.

>

> *But you're up against huge sums of money?

>

> Yes, and it's not just the subsidies. Around $34 billion a year is

spent

> by the food and beverage industry on marketing to the American

population.

> By contrast, the social marketing budget of the National Cancer

Institute

> for its big Five-a-Day campaign, promoting five servings of fruit

and

> vegetables a day, was $2 million.

>

> *In such an unequal fight, leverage must be important...

>

> That's right. So the idea of Meatless Monday is to get something

that is

> catchy, that people will remember. What we've really learned from

> promoting health education is that frequent simple messages work

much

> better than complicated ones. Or, sadly, than talking about the

plight of

> the developing world.

>

> *But you're not going to get anywhere unless you join up with

activists,

> are you?

>

> Right. And we have joined up with a group in New York that is

actually

> where the Meatless Monday campaign is based. We're providing the

kind of

> scientific validation, and we have staff at the centre who vet the

recipes

> on the Meatless website. And the site (www.meatlessmonday.com) has

been

> specially designed to make it very accessible for everyone -

bright and

> jazzy. We also work closely with the Global Resource Action Center

for the

> Environment in New York, and they've been involved with doing a

cartoon

> called The Meatrix.

>

> *Like The Matrix?

>

> Yes, but it's making the point about industrial animal production

in the

> US through a spoof of the film. It's won lots of awards - and does

a great

> job of raising the issues in a way people can relate to.

>

> *This hints at the dark side of animal production...

>

> Yes, it can get quite dark. We've got a couple of studies going on

with

> the chicken industry following hurricane Floyd. In all of the big

hog

> farms in North Carolina, their open septic pools were flooded out

by the

> hurricane. Twenty-three of the 26 river systems in North Carolina

were

> polluted with animal waste run-off from the hog industry. There

are 11

> million hogs in North Carolina and there are 7.5 million people,

and each

> hog produces about five times the waste of one human.

>

> *Are things improving at all? How many animals are killed in the

US?

>

> We now have a population of 286 million, and we kill and consume 9

billion

> animals a year, 35 million head of cattle, 100 million hogs and 8

billion

> chickens and turkeys. In terms of total meat consumption, the

average

> American male consumes twice what the US Department of Agriculture

> recommends, and the average American woman consumes about 1.6

times. Way

> above even the high meat-eating countries of Europe.

>

> *So what does meat do to you?

>

> No matter how lean the cut of meat you still take in saturated

fat, and

> the saturated fat content of the American diet is much, much

higher than

> it should be. The cholesterol story and the saturated fat story

have been

> around a long time, and the meat industry says that for 30 or 40

years

> they have been breeding leaner cattle. But when they talk about

lean cuts

> of meat, they don't acknowledge the vast quantities of beef

consumed that

> is in the form of hamburger, and that typically has about 50 per

cent fat.

> In fact, they take the meat that is not used for steaks and

chucks and

> things like that, the part that raises concerns about BSE. Some of

that

> meat is actually quite lean, but then they take some of the

trimmed fat,

> grind it up and add it back to the meat so that the beef patty in

> McDonalds or Wendy's or Burger King will retain some moisture and

juices

> because a very lean patty ends up being pretty dry.

>

> *That sounds rather contradictory!

>

> You have them talking out of both sides of their mouth. On the one

hand

> the industry says: " But you can have a 3-ounce portion of lean

beef and it

> has fewer calories, fewer fat calories than lots of other things. "

But if

> you go to an American restaurant, and they came out with the 3-oz

serving,

> it would be about the size of a deck of playing cards. The

customer would

> say: " Is that all I'm getting? " A typical serving is 12, 14 or 16

oz.

> Enormous.

>

> *But that can't be good?

>

> Our agriculture system produces 3900 calories for every man, woman

and

> child in the US every day, and since we only need about 2400

calories on

> average, what are you going to do with that excess? Well, you're

going to

> super-size everything, and people either throw it away so there's

> tremendous waste or they consume it and gain waist!

>

> *Where do you shop?

>

> My wife and I go to Whole Food and Trader Joe's in the north of

Baltimore,

> which are good but they are more expensive. And one of the

things that is

> a real equality issue in the US is that poor neighbourhoods like

the one

> our school is in don't have any supermarkets at all. They rely on

these

> little corner stores that don't have any perishables, just canned

and

> packaged food. To get decent produce, a poor person living in east

> Baltimore would have to take the bus and change twice to get to

another

> part of the city.

>

> *They'd have to be very motivated. Maybe if they knew about the

other

> health effects of eating meat?

>

> Well, maybe. Another big problem with eating a lot of animal fats

is the

> organic pollutants that travel in the fatty layer of tissues. So

dioxins,

> PCBs and pesticides end up in the food supply. About 30 per cent

of animal

> feed for hogs and beef is recycled animal fat. And then there are

> endocrine disrupters, hormones and growth promoters used in the

beef

> industry and increasingly in some of the other animal products. We

need a

> lot more data, but what is emerging suggests that these endocrine

> disrupters play a role in everything from lowering the age of

menarche to

> explaining the continued increase in breast cancer compared with

other

> cancers.

>

> *What about food poisoning?

>

> We have about 75 million cases of food-borne diarrhoeal disease in

the US

> each year. And 75 million cases out of 286 million Americans is

quite a

> lot.

>

> *Do these problems with meat-eating show up anywhere else?

>

> Leaving aside the epidemic of obesity, Americans were once the

tallest and

> leanest people in the world and now we are collectively getting

shorter

> too.

>

> *Shorter?

>

> There's a lot of speculation but part of it must be lower

nutritional

> values. This is not unlike what happened in the past. Take my

uncle, who

> grew up in the Rhondda Valley in south Wales and was barely 5 feet

tall.

> He was a conscientious objector in the first world war and served

in the

> ambulance corps. The average enlisted man in the British army was

four

> inches shorter than the average officer. My father was the tallest

in his

> family at 5 foot 3 inches, and my older brother is the same height

as me -

> 6 foot - so in high school we had to endure all these jokes about

the tall

> milkman because they would see my brother and me with our parents!

>

> *But now Americans are getting shorter?

>

> We may be in the midst of stepping back, of seeing collectively

some of

> the real manifestations of a degraded American diet.

>

> *What's it like trying to get the message across to government

officials?

>

> I recently chaired a panel at the Institute of Medicine on dioxin

in the

> food supply. It was sponsored, as most of the National Academy of

Science'

> s Institute of Medicine things are, by the US Department of

Agriculture;

> the Food and Drug Administration; the Environmental Protection

Agency, and

> the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry of the

Centers for

> Disease Control. And when we met seven or eight of the people from

these

> agencies and told them what we were going to say in advance of the

press

> conference, the EPA and the ATSDR people were fine, the FDA was a

bit more

> concerned but USDA was really unhappy.

>

> *Why?

>

> They have this totally untenable situation where part of their job

is to

> make recommendations to the American people about diet and the

other is to

> promote the US agricultural sector. They were very, very concerned

that we

> were going to make some recommendations that would create huge

political

> problems for them.

>

> *Did you?

>

> One of the things we said was that school lunches needed to be

> dramatically altered to reduce the animal fat served to school-

aged

> children because that is where the dioxins and other chemicals are

> accumulating - and nothing has happened yet.

>

> *How much meat do you eat?

>

> I would say on average in a typical week we would end up having

fish once

> and then chicken about once in two weeks and I can't even remember

the

> last time that beef or pork was prepared.

>

> © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

> http://www.newscientist.com/opinion/opinterview.jsp?id=ns24601

>

>

>

> Martha Gellhorn set off with a knapsack and $50

> to cover the Spanish Civil War in 1937. She was

> 29 and would spend the next 53 years of her life

> covering wars. " War is a malignant disease, " she

> once wrote, " an idiocy, a prison, and the pain it

> causes is beyond our telling or imagining. "

 

 

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> I really think this person should focus more on

eliminating >>refined carbs, and then promote more

vegetables!

 

I won't tell you what I think, Cindy, but I will tell

you what I thought I knew: I thought this was a

vegetarian list.

 

You've succeeded in quite putting this vegetarian off

anything you might have to say.

 

Pat

 

=====

psybermus

LISTS: townhounds/

/

vegetarianslimming/

HOMEPAGE: http://www.angelfire.com/art/pendragon/

----

 

 

 

 

 

New and Improved Mail - Send 10MB messages!

 

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--- Cindy <cindybin2001> wrote:

 

>There was a study in Framingham, Massachusetts in which Dr. William

Castelli said that " the more saturated fats one ate, the more

cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the lower people's

serum cholesterol...We found that the people who ate the most

cholesterol, the most saturated fat, ate the most calories, weighed

the least and WERE THE MOST PHYSICALLY ACTIVE. " (my emphasis)

 

This is an important point. The way this sentence is written, seems

to imply that more saturated fats, cholesterol, and calories that one

eats, the more physically active one becomes!! I think not, but

rather the logic is that the more physically active you are, the less

you will weigh and the healthier you will be, regardless of diet. I

think if you look at the way people used to live in the not-so-

distance past, being physical was a full-time job (i.e. the pioneers

living off the land, farming, chopping wood, tending the hearth,

walking everywhere for supplies etc etc.). Eating a diet high in

saturated fat (obtained from the fruit of thy labour) wasn't such a

big deal because it was burned off in the process of growing and

raising food.

 

My own father worked on a farm in the Prairies in the 1930's and 40's

and that's just the way things were. His family was healthy and

physically fit, despite copious amounts of meat and potatoes. Ditto

for my (Italian, meat and pasta-based) father-in-law who used to work

as a tree faller for the coastal logging industry. And ditto for me,

who has worked in the woods for 12-14 hours a day, managing to do so

very nicely on a lower fat, high-veggie vegetarian diet. No meat

required for this Forester.

 

Of course, I think we'd be hard pressed to find many people (forestry-

types, farmers and triatheletes aside) who can follow Dr. William

Castelli's advice and still be active enough to NOT see the negatives

of eating high cholesterol, high fat diet. IMHO, if we continue to be

primarily a continent of workers who sit at desks or stand at

counters all day, and who go to the gym a couple times a week

for " physical activity " , then we should seriously consider whether

what Castelli says applies to us.

 

As well, I've taken enough classes in statistics and research methods

to want to know what kind of " study " this guy did. Every study seems

to use a different method to determine their results, but few studies

are replicated. Until someone else confirms this research with a

replicated study, I'll take it with a seriously big grain of salt.

And watch my sodium of course. ;)

 

My two cents',

(4S)treegrrl

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Kathy <treegrrl29 wrote:

 

>This is an important point. The way this sentence is written, seems to imply

that more saturated fats, cholesterol, and calories that one eats, the more

physically active one becomes!! I think not, but rather the logic is that the

more physically active you are, the less you will weigh and the healthier you

will be, regardless of diet.

 

This is a great point, Kathy. The sentence is misleadingly worded, and it

doesn't address the actual contributor to health. Seems as though the author of

the abstract had an angenda.

 

>I think if you look at the way people used to live in the not-so-distance past,

being physical was a full-time job (i.e. the pioneers living off the land,

farming, chopping wood, tending the hearth, walking everywhere for supplies etc

etc.). Eating a diet high in saturated fat (obtained from the fruit of thy

labour) wasn't such a big deal because it was burned off in the process of

growing and

raising food.

 

This is a bit wandery, but the place that I first saw evidence of this was in

the Native American community. (I lived on the res with my dad when I was a

kid, and was for many years active in our locl intertribal council.) Most

Indians today are overweight and have heart conditions. (They also do not have

access to good health care, but that's another story.) This is due not only to

changes in diet, but to changes in lifestyle. Our ancestors worked all day

long. They ate a lot of roots and other carbs (squash, maize, and beans were

the pillars of my particular tribe's diet), but you never saw a fat Indian.

When Euros came, they were herded onto reservations, prevented from hunting,

gathering, and the sustainable farming that they had done before, and given bags

of flour to eat. It made a huge change in the health of the Native people, one

that has lasted for generations.

 

 

 

 

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I was promoting vegetables! I thought I was being as nice and polite

as possible. That's why I added this last sentence, in order make my

intentions clear. But of course they were misconstrued anyway, so

irritating. I have said before that I support the vegetarian

lifestyle. I was merely stating all the facts I have learned about

meat, cholesterol, fat, calories, etc. because I see so much

misinformation about these things. On the lower-carb plan I am on,

you can do it as a vegetarian, and the Schwarzbein Principle as

well. I have no problem with it. But I just wanted to let you know

that there is misinformation out there, and contradictions in the

medical field. For instance, if I had listened to my doctor, I would

still be overweight. Hope that makes sense. I honestly did not mean

to offend anyone.

 

~Cindy

 

, psybermus

<psybermus> wrote:

> > I really think this person should focus more on

> eliminating >>refined carbs, and then promote more

> vegetables!

>

> I won't tell you what I think, Cindy, but I will tell

> you what I thought I knew: I thought this was a

> vegetarian list.

>

> You've succeeded in quite putting this vegetarian off

> anything you might have to say.

>

> Pat

>

> =====

> psybermus

> LISTS: townhounds/

> /

> vegetarianslimming/

> HOMEPAGE: http://www.angelfire.com/art/pendragon/

> -

---

>

>

>

>

>

> New and Improved Mail - Send 10MB messages!

>

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I didn't think you offended anyone, nor did I myself feel offended. But

since people can't be always forgiving, we'll have to get used to it.

Coco

Cindy [cindybin2001]

Tuesday, August 17, 2004 1:12 PM

Re: Meat's True Cost

 

 

I was promoting vegetables! I thought I was being as nice and polite

as possible. That's why I added this last sentence, in order make my

intentions clear. But of course they were misconstrued anyway, so

irritating. I have said before that I support the vegetarian

lifestyle. I was merely stating all the facts I have learned about

meat, cholesterol, fat, calories, etc. because I see so much

misinformation about these things. On the lower-carb plan I am on,

you can do it as a vegetarian, and the Schwarzbein Principle as

well. I have no problem with it. But I just wanted to let you know

that there is misinformation out there, and contradictions in the

medical field. For instance, if I had listened to my doctor, I would

still be overweight. Hope that makes sense. I honestly did not mean

to offend anyone.

 

~Cindy

 

, psybermus

<psybermus> wrote:

> > I really think this person should focus more on

> eliminating >>refined carbs, and then promote more

> vegetables!

>

> I won't tell you what I think, Cindy, but I will tell

> you what I thought I knew: I thought this was a

> vegetarian list.

>

> You've succeeded in quite putting this vegetarian off

> anything you might have to say.

>

> Pat

>

> =====

> psybermus

> LISTS: townhounds/

> /

> vegetarianslimming/

> HOMEPAGE: http://www.angelfire.com/art/pendragon/

> -

---

>

>

>

>

>

> New and Improved Mail - Send 10MB messages!

>

 

 

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Merely said I was put off the message by all the talk

of meat, lowcarb diets, etc. That's all. I don't think

I am unforgiving - there was nothing to forgive and

not my place to do so anyway ;=) - but I only get this

in digest so my response is a bit slow. Apologies for

tardiness.

 

pat

 

>I didn't think you offended anyone, nor did I myself

feel >>>>>offended. But since people can't be always

forgiving, we'll >>have to get used to it.

>Coco

 

=====

psybermus

LISTS: townhounds/

/

vegetarianslimming/

HOMEPAGE: http://www.angelfire.com/art/pendragon/

----

 

 

 

 

 

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You didn't do anything wrong either.

Short and probably sweet, but maybe not.

Coco

psybermus [psybermus]

Wednesday, August 18, 2004 9:11 AM

Re: Meat's True Cost

 

 

Merely said I was put off the message by all the talk

of meat, lowcarb diets, etc. That's all. I don't think

I am unforgiving - there was nothing to forgive and

not my place to do so anyway ;=) - but I only get this

in digest so my response is a bit slow. Apologies for

tardiness.

 

pat

 

>I didn't think you offended anyone, nor did I myself

feel >>>>>offended. But since people can't be always

forgiving, we'll >>have to get used to it.

>Coco

 

=====

psybermus

LISTS: townhounds/

/

vegetarianslimming/

HOMEPAGE: http://www.angelfire.com/art/pendragon/

----

 

 

 

Take Mail with you! Get it on your mobile phone.

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I think there is a meat politics in that people are eating less of

it and diets are appearing I would imagine those doing the diets,

etc are paid like by the meat companies. It is like music played by

the radio station to be popular while other better music doesn't get

heard, had this thought yesterday.

 

 

, " Rebecca "

<squinkabink@b...> wrote:

> You didn't do anything wrong either.

> Short and probably sweet, but maybe not.

> Coco

>

> psybermus [psybermus]

> Wednesday, August 18, 2004 9:11 AM

>

> Re: Meat's True Cost

>

>

> Merely said I was put off the message by all the talk

> of meat, lowcarb diets, etc. That's all. I don't think

> I am unforgiving - there was nothing to forgive and

> not my place to do so anyway ;=) - but I only get this

> in digest so my response is a bit slow. Apologies for

> tardiness.

>

> pat

>

> >I didn't think you offended anyone, nor did I myself

> feel >>>>>offended. But since people can't be always

> forgiving, we'll >>have to get used to it.

> >Coco

>

> =====

> psybermus

> LISTS: townhounds/

> /

> vegetarianslimming/

> HOMEPAGE: http://www.angelfire.com/art/pendragon/

> --------------------------------

-----

>

>

>

>

>

> Take Mail with you! Get it on your mobile phone.

> http://mobile./maildemo

>

>

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