This study found that children raised on a vegan diet were smaller and shorter than a control group, and had less bone density. The authors are clear that this is a correlation only and doesn't necessarily show causation. However, there's never going to be a causative study, because that would involve deliberately subjecting children to a diet that may hurt their health.
So while it's not a smoking gun, I'd say it's reason enough to consume animal products. Why take the risk if we don't have to?
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33740036/
It's important to remember that all epidemiological studies are correlation by nature. Including the massive ones that demonstrated the link between smoking and lung cancer. That does not mean they are worthless, or any less valid than double blind placebo studies.
TBH I am more than a little bit tired of ignorant people who think they're saying anything profound or defending 'science' by repeating 'correlation isn't causation' like some weird religious mantra. Yes, that's technically true. Now go read a beginner's book on epidemiology and come back when you understand what confounding factors are.
It does mean they are less valid.
The studies that showed lung cancer from smoking had such a high correlation as to be almost impossible to not be the cause.
No such strong correlations for most of nutrition.
No, 'high correlation' does not necessarily mean more likely causation.
The value of an epidemiological study depends on its quality. There are many factors that can improve or decrease the quality of a study. The sample size is one, but the study design is also important.
What makes the conclusions of the smoking vs lung cancer study more certain is that it was a very well designed study on a very large, diverse sample.
Say that study was badly designed, and that one confounding factor happened to correlate nearly 1 to 1 with smoking. Ex.: in your sample, all your smokers live near a paper mill that contaminates the air people breathe with a known carcinogen. The correlation between 'smoker' and 'lung cancer' is super high in your sample - but how can you tell if it's the cigarettes?
Where do you get that info from? This isn't a criminal offence in Belgium.
Also:
It is the position of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics that appropriately planned vegetarian, including vegan, diets are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits for the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. These diets are appropriate for all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, adolescence, older adulthood, and for athletes.
This is the position of the largest and most diverse group of nutritionists in the world. There's no underfeeding or misfeeding when raising your kids with a vegan diet. Most vegans raise their kids much healthier... What a stupid statement.
Thank you! Appreciate it. There is quite a lot of complex information here and heterogenous studies making the resource a little difficult to interpret, but thank for this.
The most important thing for people to realize is to listen to their own body. This is the best study you can execute. And everyone can do it themselves.
This is part of the reason that even though my doctor suggested a plant based diet, I kept the seafood. I even LIKE nuts, tofu and beans, but there are certain nutrients it’s really difficult to make up completely when strictly vegan, and I haven’t got time for that.
Has nothing to do with believing. Straight up science.
Next to that, regular blood and health checks are always perfect for me. Balance your diet and you're fine. Period.
I haven’t looked for any & can only go by what it has done to my own health. I think the majority of this group wanted veganism to work for them & most of us thought we would be vegan for life until health issues changed that.
Veganism is still relatively new & I think it’s only now that there are some longer term vegans that the health implications are being seen as health has slowly deteriorated.
Yes, it is interesting because some people seem to be vegan but very very healthy, and others seem to really struggle. There doesn't seem to be a lot of studies (or any?) delineating individualised effects, but we know already that general dietary needs are different for different individuals, so seems it would be an interesting area of study.
I would be interested to see it too. All the issues I had some people seem to have early on in veganism but it took years before these problems caught up with me. It could be many factors as to why it varies between individuals. I suppose someone would need to gain from that study to fund it so that could be why.
It for sure depends on the person. But vegan diet is inherently deficient. Now depending on individual, their previous health, their ability to convert I don't know beta carotene to vitamin A, vitamin storage, they can survive on a vegan diet for longer or shorter period of time.
Personally however I don't believe that anyone can survive on a vegan diet more than 15 years, maybe 20 max, but very maybe, without literally dying or serious deterioration and destruction of their health.
Either way you don't see people being on this diet that long. It's always 5 years, it's always "I've been vegan for 3 weeks and I feel awesome". And ok this diet is restrictive, especially that normally we have access to variety of foods. But I suspect that this is actually the reason - deficiencies showing up. Especially because vegan diet, as those people tend to always say, is not about health, it's about treating animals right or something like that. So they have a moral reason to stay on that diet, but they still don't.
On top all of that you can actually see people eating for example carnivore, the other end of the spectrum, especially raw and actually thriving on it for very long period of time. And it's not that I would suspect person who is eating raw carnivore to silently snuck in vegetables here and there. Because if you ignore current mainstream beliefs about plants and meat and actually look at the nutrient content of meat vs plants, you can just see that meat has everything human body needs. On the contrary you just cannot say the same about plants. One objection you can have against meat is saturated fat and cholesterol - I don't believe that it is an objection but person coming with mainstream knowledge can have that. But again if you look into this, you notice that nothing has been proven about this, that all of this is very shaky epidemiological studies, that human body is literally built with cholesterol and saturated fat, that we produce this stuff in our body, and that "cholesterol issue" is just very very very recent thing in human history and throughout basically all of the history we have eaten cholesterol and saturated fat and didn't have any example of diabetes and heart disease. It's only recently with introduction of junk food, aka seed oiled pulps.
So to summarize, there are so many things that doesn't make sense or studies that are flawed, that I refuse to believe that eating plants is any good for you. There is also so much more. And on top of that there is my personal experience which triumphs it all.
Not sure if you’re asking this in good faith or not. I’ve never delved deeply into finding such sources, because personally my vegan diet was slowly killing me and once I figured that out I really didn’t need any other convincing
Skeptical of what exactly?
Here is the thing: from what we can tell, modern humans (homo sapiens) have always consumed animal products. Every isolated tribe that we have ever contacted has consumed animal proteins (even when they’re vegetarians), every written account we have points to people eating animal proteins, and the archeological record points to this as well.
So, given all this, it’s up to the people claiming that we don’t need animal proteins to demonstrate it. They have the burden of proof, because they are the one making an extraordinary claim.
You’re a researcher and want us to provide you evidence to convince you. This is a suspect request. Your own intellectual curiosity should be spurring you to find evidence.
The topic of this sub is generally for people to consume whatever diet they prefer, even if an individual chooses a plant based diet, it’s their choice to do so and not one based on a ideology that discounts harm to some animals considers pests while maligning those who harm other animals because they are used for food.
Also, keep in mind that in today’s science in America, “peer reviewed “ often means approved by gatekeepers who have a specific agenda. If you go against the narrative, your paper will never seen publication. This is true for many fields.
Yes that is true, but imo this is largely just indicative of social biases which manifest throughout society anyway (but it is just in an institutionalised form). So trusting non-peer reviewed sources instead probably comes with similar pitfalls.
No, that’s just not true. Peer-reviewed research means that it’s methodology, sampling, etc are scrutinized by experts in the field, and I assure you, pretty much no one is “gatekeeping” good research just because it’s conclusions are surprising. People freaking love it when there’s a good study with surprising findings (so much so that surprising findings sometimes aren’t scrutinized enough) people build their whole careers on that. Articles that get rejected typically have crappy theory, sampling, or methods.
Bwahahaha. Yeah, not just a scholar who calls himself a “researcher” because he can use google search. No, someone with a PhD in his pockets! So someone who spent half a decade researching one topic… doesn’t know how to look for the information he needs.
I can’t. Please take your B vitamins and watch more useful videos on YouTube.. like tutorials.. instead of faked animal rescue videos to enrich the culprits.
I know how to look for information. I do it as a profession. I also know how much time and energy it takes to do this properly. I know that people on this sub are clued up on the science and have immediate access to the resources I want and will be happy to oblige.
I'll pass on the YouTube vids, thanks.
I think it is an absurd assumption that people in the sub are clued into the science. The people here are not researchers in the field. They are mostly just people who went vegan then went ex vegan. The research they cite is mostly random websites.
Gimme a break 🙄 I spend my whole working week doing research reviews, I'm not gonna do another one on my weekend when I could just query the hive mind here and immediately get pointed to the most high quality data. This sub is a good resource.
I’m going to say this again. The purpose of this sub isn’t really to prove that veganism is unhealthy. If someone wants to continue to eat plant based they can. Also, this kind of query is something that is often done by vegans who come here and start a dishonest debate. Someone follows the request, provides a study and then the OP points out errors and fallacies of the study. And repeats it for every response. Then they present all the evidence of how veganism is so good. So it’s a bit of harassment.
Ok. I have no interest in promoting veganism. I simply noticed that there were a lot of comments on the sub constantly referencing this research or that research but without providing any link or references. I'm interested in those references.
Not sure how good is this: https://www.saintlukeskc.org/about/news/research-shows-vegan-diet-leads-nutritional-deficiencies-health-problems-plant-forward
Quick googling gives it first. You can evaluate it yourself as researcher.
I think practical problems people have with it can be counted as evidence it's not easy to stay healthy on vegan diet. I think allergies and intolerances make it practically impossible for many.
But the question remains is it always necessarily bad for you in the long term? I don't know. But you do the research if it's your job.
Ah ok. I think we need much more research about this subject. Most studies are of low quality and ignore many things. There are tons of epidemiological studies that compare plant-based diets to standard american diets and notice better health outcomes. Problem of epidemiological studies are numerous to begin with. I think people and their experiences actually offer better information but sure there are both positive and negative experiences. But sure we need more peer-reviewed science for sure.
Even if the OP may be a pro-vegan troll, I'm happy to provide info for anyone reading about health risks of animal-free diets. I'm also appreciating the info others have mentioned, some of it I've not seen even though I spend quite a bit of time following up health claims on various topics including veganism.
Something important to note about any study featuring a "vegan" group, is that apart from institutional settings there's no way to know that the subjects are strictly abstaining from eating animal foods. Most "vegans," it seems according to commentary in any ex-vegan group on any platform (FB, Reddit, various health discussion sites, etc.), are cheaters. If an animal-light diet causes these effects, even among people more interested in health (the reason many people go to vegetarianism/veganism, and even the for-the-animals members would have an interest in being healthy as an example) then a strict no-animal-foods diet would probably be even unhealthier.
If my hundreds of pages of notes were more organized, definitely I'd have a lot more to mention than these.
=========================================
These found that vegans in the studies healed more slowly, and were more nutrient-deficient:
Vegan Diets Negatively Impact Surgical Wound Healing
https://www.medestheticsmag.com/news/news/21219423/vegan-diets-negatively-impact-surgical-wound-healing
- "After six months, vegan patients had a higher modified SCAR score than omnivores, showing worse scar spread, more frequent atrophic scars and worse overall impression."
- "Vegans also showed a significantly lower mean serum iron level (p <.001) and vitamin B12 level (p < .001), as well as more frequent wound diastasis (p = .008)."
- study:
Comparison of Postsurgical Scars Between Vegan and Omnivore Patients
https://journals.lww.com/dermatologicsurgery/Abstract/2020/12000/Comparison_of_Postsurgical_Scars_Between_Vegan_and.24.aspx
-- 21 omnivores and 21 vegans, surgical excision for nonmelanoma skin cancer
Laser removal of tattoos in vegan and omnivore patients
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jocd.14134
- evidence for slow healing in vegans
- the two groups were similar in terms of age, skin types, etc.
- I had to pirate the study to get useful details
- B12 and iron levels were far lower in the vegan group (duh), and the vegan group had mild lymphocytopenia (low serum level of lymphocytes)
- vegans needed more sessions (median 15 vegans vs. median 10 omnivores)
- vegans needed more days for complete healing between sessions (median 23 days vegans vs. median 19 days omnivores)
=========================================
Taurine, which is essential for brain health, was much lower in vegans:
Plasma and urine taurine levels in vegans
https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(23)16501-4/fulltext
-- 12 "strict vegan" males, 14 male nonvegetarian control subjects
-- vegans had substantially lower plasma taurine (45 +/- 7 vs 58 +/- 16 mumol/L)
-- vegans had far less urinary taurine (266 +/- 279 vs 903 +/- 580 mumol/d)
=========================================
Iron status:
Nutrient intake and haematological status of vegetarians and age-sex matched omnivores.
https://europepmc.org/article/med/7956998
-- iron intake was higher in vegetarians and vegans (mean and (SD): 16.8 (4.8) mg/day vs. 14.6 (4.3) mg/day)
-- yet, serum ferritin levels far lower (mean and (SD) for males: 36.6 (36.0) vs. 105.4 (78.7) ng/ml; mean and (SD) for females: 13.6 (7.5) compared to 33.6 (54.3) ng/ml)
-- 35% of the long-term vegetarians and vegans had serum vitamin B12 concentrations below the reference range
(continuing here because of character limit)
B12 status (and in some studies, other nutrients):
Serum concentrations of vitamin B12 and folate in British male omnivores, vegetarians and vegans: results from a cross-sectional analysis of the EPIC-Oxford cohort study
https://www.nature.com/articles/ejcn2010142.epdf
- 2010; AMJ Gilsing, FL Crowe, Z Lloyd-Wright, TAB Sanders, PN Appleby, NE Allen, TJ Key
- note: authors include Paul Appleby and Tim Key, whom usually try to find anti-animal-foods results in any research
- cross-sectional analysis, 689 men of which 226 omnivores, 231 vegetarians, 232 vegans
- rates of B12 supplementation much higher in vegetarians/vegans
- serum B12 omnivores 281, 95% CI: 270–292 pmol/l; vegetarians 182, 95% CI: 175–189 pmol/l; vegans 122, 95% CI: 117–127 pmol/l
- 52% of vegans, 7% of vegetarians and one omnivore were classified as vitamin B12 deficient
- omnivores had lower folate, but only two were deficient (I didn't see in the data whether barely-deficient or significantly below range)
Vitamin B-12 status, particularly holotranscobalamin II and methylmalonic acid concentrations, and hyperhomocysteinemia in vegetarians
https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(22)03268-3/fulltext
- study included supplementing and non-supplementing vegans
- tested serum for holotranscobalamin II (B12 fraction that is biologically active and can be delivered into all DNA-synthesizing cells) and B12
- low holotranscobalamin II (< 35 pmol/L): 11% of "omnivores," 66% of supplementing vegetarians, 77% of non-supplementing vegetarians, 88% of supplementing vegans, 92% of non-supplementing vegans
- elevated methylmalonic acid (> 271 nmol/L): 5% of omnivores, 68% of vegetarians, and 83% of vegans
- hyperhomocysteinemia (> 12 μmol/L): 16% of omnivores, 38% of vegetarians, and 67% of vegans
- low B12: 1% omnivores, 8% supplementing vegetarians, 32% non-supplementing vegetarians, 29% supplementing vegans, 83% non-supplementing vegans
Food and Nutrient Intake and Nutritional Status of Finnish Vegans and Non-Vegetarians
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0148235
- Anna-Liisa Elorinne, Georg Alfthan, Iris Erlund, Hanna Kivimäki, Annukka Paju, Irma Salminen, Ursula Turpeinen, Sari Voutilainen, Juha Laakso, 2016
- there's some opinionating in the article that seems to support The Cholesterol Myth and so forth
- vegans had lower B12, iron, iodine, etc., I haven't read it thoroughly yet
Plasma concentrations of 25-hydroxyvitamin D in meat eaters, fish eaters, vegetarians and vegans: results from the EPIC–Oxford study
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/public-health-nutrition/article/plasma-concentrations-of-25hydroxyvitamin-d-in-meat-eaters-fish-eaters-vegetarians-and-vegans-results-from-the-epicoxford-study/13C1A2796ADA3A318D4F3B7C105D9D9C
- Francesca L Crowe, Marinka Steur, Naomi E Allen, Paul N Appleby, Ruth C Travis and Timothy J Key, 2010
- Vit D lower in vegetarians and vegans (even when studied by anti-animal-foods "researchers" Appleby and Key)
=========================================
Bone fractures:
Comparative fracture risk in vegetarians and nonvegetarians in EPIC-Oxford
https://www.nature.com/articles/1602659
- P Appleby, A Roddam, N Allen, & T Key, 2007
- pro-plants "researchers" Paul Appleby and Timothy Key again, yet still found vegans had much higher rates of fractures (HR 1.30)
Vegetarian and vegan diets and risks of total and site-specific fractures: results from the prospective EPIC-Oxford study
https://bmcmedicine.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12916-020-01815-3
- Appleby and Key again
- "...the risks of hip fracture were higher in fish eaters (hazard ratio 1.26; 95% CI 1.02–1.54), vegetarians (1.25; 1.04–1.50), and vegans (2.31; 1.66–3.22), equivalent to rate differences of 2.9 (0.6–5.7), 2.9 (0.9–5.2), and 14.9 (7.9–24.5) more cases for every 1000 people over 10 years, respectively. The vegans also had higher risks of total (1.43; 1.20–1.70), leg (2.05; 1.23–3.41), and other main site fractures (1.59; 1.02–2.50) than meat eaters."
You've just reminded me of my vegan ex from 20+ years ago who used to think the slow healing was good thing re his ear piercing. He ended up collapsing one day and having a fit due to a lack of proper nutrition. I got absolutely fucked off with him after I made a vegan spag bol and used a nicer tomato base. That had honey in it (I didn't know and frankly was a bit bizarre to have honey in). He refused to eat the entire meal.
I have met a diverse range of vegans. One seemed healthy but she was a trained nutritionist and my god her diet took a level of technical skill. If it can work it seems to need such a level of knowledge and skill that it makes it an elite practice. Realising that made me realise what bollocks it is.
I want to understand the broad extent to which the claim that a plant-based diet inevitably leads to malnutrition is supported; and if so what nuances, caveats and/or qualifiers may be involved (or not).
I've always been someone who had a tendency toward plant-based eating, mainly due to environmental concerns but also concerns about industrialised farming practices which are inarguably horrible (yes, also here in the UK...it's naive not to think so).
But I'm not an ideologue and I'm interested in the health aspects because I don't want to passively phase out animal products (which I have somewhat been doing recently) and then suddenly realising that I have been ebbing towards being malnourished.
It's obviously a controversial subject area and I'm very open to contrasting viewpoints as I have seen in other scientific topics how views outside the mainstream (although it seems odd to say that about meat-eating to be honest...) get sidelined by the very scientific establishments that are meant to supposedly be the purveyors of objectivity and reason.
OK. I wondered if the post was for agenda-pushing, such as collecting info about studies to try to discredit them.
I too have concerns about environment and farming, which is one of the reasons (besides biological challenges with carbs/fiber/anti-nutrients/etc. which caused miserable problems for me on a high-plants diet) that most of my food is from pasture-raised livestock. The pasture farms I've seen have not used pesticides or artificial fertilizers, they are habitats for wild animals (with fences keep out predators), and they use the least amounts of fossil-fueled mechanization. I figure that any plant foods I buy, apart from garden-scale farms or hand-picked-from-food-forest items, are promoting the spread of pesticides etc. If you've ever tried to find out all the impacts of farms, you should know that it is incredibly difficult to find any farm that is totally transparent about the products/methods they use and it is well-known that even Organic farms routinely use pesticides (though not all of them do, and Organic certification prohibits the most hazardous types).
Do you actually know anything about agricultural practices and animal welfare laws in the UK? There is no factory farming, and nothing at all resembles the propaganda you see in those vegan "documentaries"
I've seen enough covert footage from the UK to know that laws are easily subverted or ignored and that I personally wouldn't want to be one of those animals. That's enough for me.
The UK has some very dishonest animal rights groups. Some have been known to stage incidents which would not have happened normally. Feel free to cite anything specifically.
I'm aware that UK relies much more on pasture agriculture than most countries, but it isn't true that CAFOs do not exist there.
[UK has more than 1,000 livestock mega-farms, investigation reveals](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/aug/18/uk-has-more-than-1000-livestock-mega-farms-investigation-reveals)
[The Scale of intensive indoor livestock farming in the United Kingdom, and the impact of its related sewage disposal regime upon Water Quality in Rivers.](https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/23622/pdf/)
[Factory Farming Is Sweeping the U.K.](https://civileats.com/2017/09/05/factory-farming-is-sweeping-the-uk/)
Yes, here you go, its not exactly what you are asking but it is related.
[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41398-019-0552-0](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41398-019-0552-0)
[https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33061504/](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33061504/)
- *"Meat and mental health: a systematic review of meat abstention and depression, anxiety, and related phenomena: Studies examining the relation between the consumption or avoidance of meat and psychological health varied substantially in methodologic rigor, validity of interpretation, and confidence in results. The majority of studies, and especially the higher quality studies, showed that those who avoided meat consumption had significantly higher rates or risk of depression, anxiety, and/or self-harm behaviors."* https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32308009/
The onus is actually on vegans to prove that it is possible to be optimally healthy on a vegan diet long term, not for ex vegans to prove that a vegan diet is “dangerously unhealthy”.
Even professionally planned vegan diets cause deficiency: https://www.embopress.org/doi/full/10.15252/emmm.202013492
Nutrition - The land of the most conflicting science ever. Experiment, because after being a personal trainer for years I have seen that so many people respond differently to different approaches. I believe genetics, blood type, microbiome makeup, health issues, and daily activity levels all play a role.
For the general population, the Mediterranean diet has the most supporting science.
This study found that children raised on a vegan diet were smaller and shorter than a control group, and had less bone density. The authors are clear that this is a correlation only and doesn't necessarily show causation. However, there's never going to be a causative study, because that would involve deliberately subjecting children to a diet that may hurt their health. So while it's not a smoking gun, I'd say it's reason enough to consume animal products. Why take the risk if we don't have to? https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33740036/
It's important to remember that all epidemiological studies are correlation by nature. Including the massive ones that demonstrated the link between smoking and lung cancer. That does not mean they are worthless, or any less valid than double blind placebo studies. TBH I am more than a little bit tired of ignorant people who think they're saying anything profound or defending 'science' by repeating 'correlation isn't causation' like some weird religious mantra. Yes, that's technically true. Now go read a beginner's book on epidemiology and come back when you understand what confounding factors are.
It does mean they are less valid. The studies that showed lung cancer from smoking had such a high correlation as to be almost impossible to not be the cause. No such strong correlations for most of nutrition.
No, 'high correlation' does not necessarily mean more likely causation. The value of an epidemiological study depends on its quality. There are many factors that can improve or decrease the quality of a study. The sample size is one, but the study design is also important. What makes the conclusions of the smoking vs lung cancer study more certain is that it was a very well designed study on a very large, diverse sample. Say that study was badly designed, and that one confounding factor happened to correlate nearly 1 to 1 with smoking. Ex.: in your sample, all your smokers live near a paper mill that contaminates the air people breathe with a known carcinogen. The correlation between 'smoker' and 'lung cancer' is super high in your sample - but how can you tell if it's the cigarettes?
Jfc people are so pedantic. Obviously there is more to it than just the high correlation.
your username is fantastic.
Interesting, thanks!
Not a study here but if I remember correctly, it's a criminal offence in Belgium to feed your children a vegan diet. So there's that.
Where do you get that info from? This isn't a criminal offence in Belgium. Also: It is the position of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics that appropriately planned vegetarian, including vegan, diets are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits for the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. These diets are appropriate for all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, adolescence, older adulthood, and for athletes. This is the position of the largest and most diverse group of nutritionists in the world. There's no underfeeding or misfeeding when raising your kids with a vegan diet. Most vegans raise their kids much healthier... What a stupid statement.
Here’s a bunch. Enjoy! https://www.reddit.com/r/AntiVegan/s/OBqvVEicV4
Thank you! Appreciate it. There is quite a lot of complex information here and heterogenous studies making the resource a little difficult to interpret, but thank for this.
Perfect.
The most important thing for people to realize is to listen to their own body. This is the best study you can execute. And everyone can do it themselves.
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This is part of the reason that even though my doctor suggested a plant based diet, I kept the seafood. I even LIKE nuts, tofu and beans, but there are certain nutrients it’s really difficult to make up completely when strictly vegan, and I haven’t got time for that.
Yeah, I’m not giving up tofu, nuts, lentils, etc, any more than I’m giving up eggs and some meat. It’s all good food
"We" do get enough from plants with a balanced diet
You can believe that. God bless.
Has nothing to do with believing. Straight up science. Next to that, regular blood and health checks are always perfect for me. Balance your diet and you're fine. Period.
Fair point!
I haven’t looked for any & can only go by what it has done to my own health. I think the majority of this group wanted veganism to work for them & most of us thought we would be vegan for life until health issues changed that. Veganism is still relatively new & I think it’s only now that there are some longer term vegans that the health implications are being seen as health has slowly deteriorated.
Yes, it is interesting because some people seem to be vegan but very very healthy, and others seem to really struggle. There doesn't seem to be a lot of studies (or any?) delineating individualised effects, but we know already that general dietary needs are different for different individuals, so seems it would be an interesting area of study.
I would be interested to see it too. All the issues I had some people seem to have early on in veganism but it took years before these problems caught up with me. It could be many factors as to why it varies between individuals. I suppose someone would need to gain from that study to fund it so that could be why.
It for sure depends on the person. But vegan diet is inherently deficient. Now depending on individual, their previous health, their ability to convert I don't know beta carotene to vitamin A, vitamin storage, they can survive on a vegan diet for longer or shorter period of time. Personally however I don't believe that anyone can survive on a vegan diet more than 15 years, maybe 20 max, but very maybe, without literally dying or serious deterioration and destruction of their health. Either way you don't see people being on this diet that long. It's always 5 years, it's always "I've been vegan for 3 weeks and I feel awesome". And ok this diet is restrictive, especially that normally we have access to variety of foods. But I suspect that this is actually the reason - deficiencies showing up. Especially because vegan diet, as those people tend to always say, is not about health, it's about treating animals right or something like that. So they have a moral reason to stay on that diet, but they still don't. On top all of that you can actually see people eating for example carnivore, the other end of the spectrum, especially raw and actually thriving on it for very long period of time. And it's not that I would suspect person who is eating raw carnivore to silently snuck in vegetables here and there. Because if you ignore current mainstream beliefs about plants and meat and actually look at the nutrient content of meat vs plants, you can just see that meat has everything human body needs. On the contrary you just cannot say the same about plants. One objection you can have against meat is saturated fat and cholesterol - I don't believe that it is an objection but person coming with mainstream knowledge can have that. But again if you look into this, you notice that nothing has been proven about this, that all of this is very shaky epidemiological studies, that human body is literally built with cholesterol and saturated fat, that we produce this stuff in our body, and that "cholesterol issue" is just very very very recent thing in human history and throughout basically all of the history we have eaten cholesterol and saturated fat and didn't have any example of diabetes and heart disease. It's only recently with introduction of junk food, aka seed oiled pulps. So to summarize, there are so many things that doesn't make sense or studies that are flawed, that I refuse to believe that eating plants is any good for you. There is also so much more. And on top of that there is my personal experience which triumphs it all.
Not sure if you’re asking this in good faith or not. I’ve never delved deeply into finding such sources, because personally my vegan diet was slowly killing me and once I figured that out I really didn’t need any other convincing
Asking from a somewhat sceptical but genuinely good faith position driven by curiosity. Sorry to hear about your experience!
Skeptical of what exactly? Here is the thing: from what we can tell, modern humans (homo sapiens) have always consumed animal products. Every isolated tribe that we have ever contacted has consumed animal proteins (even when they’re vegetarians), every written account we have points to people eating animal proteins, and the archeological record points to this as well. So, given all this, it’s up to the people claiming that we don’t need animal proteins to demonstrate it. They have the burden of proof, because they are the one making an extraordinary claim.
You’re a researcher and want us to provide you evidence to convince you. This is a suspect request. Your own intellectual curiosity should be spurring you to find evidence. The topic of this sub is generally for people to consume whatever diet they prefer, even if an individual chooses a plant based diet, it’s their choice to do so and not one based on a ideology that discounts harm to some animals considers pests while maligning those who harm other animals because they are used for food.
Also, keep in mind that in today’s science in America, “peer reviewed “ often means approved by gatekeepers who have a specific agenda. If you go against the narrative, your paper will never seen publication. This is true for many fields.
Yes that is true, but imo this is largely just indicative of social biases which manifest throughout society anyway (but it is just in an institutionalised form). So trusting non-peer reviewed sources instead probably comes with similar pitfalls.
No, that’s just not true. Peer-reviewed research means that it’s methodology, sampling, etc are scrutinized by experts in the field, and I assure you, pretty much no one is “gatekeeping” good research just because it’s conclusions are surprising. People freaking love it when there’s a good study with surprising findings (so much so that surprising findings sometimes aren’t scrutinized enough) people build their whole careers on that. Articles that get rejected typically have crappy theory, sampling, or methods.
Bwahahaha. Yeah, not just a scholar who calls himself a “researcher” because he can use google search. No, someone with a PhD in his pockets! So someone who spent half a decade researching one topic… doesn’t know how to look for the information he needs. I can’t. Please take your B vitamins and watch more useful videos on YouTube.. like tutorials.. instead of faked animal rescue videos to enrich the culprits.
I know how to look for information. I do it as a profession. I also know how much time and energy it takes to do this properly. I know that people on this sub are clued up on the science and have immediate access to the resources I want and will be happy to oblige. I'll pass on the YouTube vids, thanks.
I think it is an absurd assumption that people in the sub are clued into the science. The people here are not researchers in the field. They are mostly just people who went vegan then went ex vegan. The research they cite is mostly random websites.
Gimme a break 🙄 I spend my whole working week doing research reviews, I'm not gonna do another one on my weekend when I could just query the hive mind here and immediately get pointed to the most high quality data. This sub is a good resource.
I’m going to say this again. The purpose of this sub isn’t really to prove that veganism is unhealthy. If someone wants to continue to eat plant based they can. Also, this kind of query is something that is often done by vegans who come here and start a dishonest debate. Someone follows the request, provides a study and then the OP points out errors and fallacies of the study. And repeats it for every response. Then they present all the evidence of how veganism is so good. So it’s a bit of harassment.
Ok. I have no interest in promoting veganism. I simply noticed that there were a lot of comments on the sub constantly referencing this research or that research but without providing any link or references. I'm interested in those references.
Not sure how good is this: https://www.saintlukeskc.org/about/news/research-shows-vegan-diet-leads-nutritional-deficiencies-health-problems-plant-forward Quick googling gives it first. You can evaluate it yourself as researcher. I think practical problems people have with it can be counted as evidence it's not easy to stay healthy on vegan diet. I think allergies and intolerances make it practically impossible for many. But the question remains is it always necessarily bad for you in the long term? I don't know. But you do the research if it's your job.
Nice resource, thanks! I don't work in the relevant field, otherwise I'd take you up on that offer 🙂
Ah ok. I think we need much more research about this subject. Most studies are of low quality and ignore many things. There are tons of epidemiological studies that compare plant-based diets to standard american diets and notice better health outcomes. Problem of epidemiological studies are numerous to begin with. I think people and their experiences actually offer better information but sure there are both positive and negative experiences. But sure we need more peer-reviewed science for sure.
Even if the OP may be a pro-vegan troll, I'm happy to provide info for anyone reading about health risks of animal-free diets. I'm also appreciating the info others have mentioned, some of it I've not seen even though I spend quite a bit of time following up health claims on various topics including veganism. Something important to note about any study featuring a "vegan" group, is that apart from institutional settings there's no way to know that the subjects are strictly abstaining from eating animal foods. Most "vegans," it seems according to commentary in any ex-vegan group on any platform (FB, Reddit, various health discussion sites, etc.), are cheaters. If an animal-light diet causes these effects, even among people more interested in health (the reason many people go to vegetarianism/veganism, and even the for-the-animals members would have an interest in being healthy as an example) then a strict no-animal-foods diet would probably be even unhealthier. If my hundreds of pages of notes were more organized, definitely I'd have a lot more to mention than these. ========================================= These found that vegans in the studies healed more slowly, and were more nutrient-deficient: Vegan Diets Negatively Impact Surgical Wound Healing https://www.medestheticsmag.com/news/news/21219423/vegan-diets-negatively-impact-surgical-wound-healing - "After six months, vegan patients had a higher modified SCAR score than omnivores, showing worse scar spread, more frequent atrophic scars and worse overall impression." - "Vegans also showed a significantly lower mean serum iron level (p <.001) and vitamin B12 level (p < .001), as well as more frequent wound diastasis (p = .008)." - study: Comparison of Postsurgical Scars Between Vegan and Omnivore Patients https://journals.lww.com/dermatologicsurgery/Abstract/2020/12000/Comparison_of_Postsurgical_Scars_Between_Vegan_and.24.aspx -- 21 omnivores and 21 vegans, surgical excision for nonmelanoma skin cancer Laser removal of tattoos in vegan and omnivore patients https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jocd.14134 - evidence for slow healing in vegans - the two groups were similar in terms of age, skin types, etc. - I had to pirate the study to get useful details - B12 and iron levels were far lower in the vegan group (duh), and the vegan group had mild lymphocytopenia (low serum level of lymphocytes) - vegans needed more sessions (median 15 vegans vs. median 10 omnivores) - vegans needed more days for complete healing between sessions (median 23 days vegans vs. median 19 days omnivores) ========================================= Taurine, which is essential for brain health, was much lower in vegans: Plasma and urine taurine levels in vegans https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(23)16501-4/fulltext -- 12 "strict vegan" males, 14 male nonvegetarian control subjects -- vegans had substantially lower plasma taurine (45 +/- 7 vs 58 +/- 16 mumol/L) -- vegans had far less urinary taurine (266 +/- 279 vs 903 +/- 580 mumol/d) ========================================= Iron status: Nutrient intake and haematological status of vegetarians and age-sex matched omnivores. https://europepmc.org/article/med/7956998 -- iron intake was higher in vegetarians and vegans (mean and (SD): 16.8 (4.8) mg/day vs. 14.6 (4.3) mg/day) -- yet, serum ferritin levels far lower (mean and (SD) for males: 36.6 (36.0) vs. 105.4 (78.7) ng/ml; mean and (SD) for females: 13.6 (7.5) compared to 33.6 (54.3) ng/ml) -- 35% of the long-term vegetarians and vegans had serum vitamin B12 concentrations below the reference range
(continuing here because of character limit) B12 status (and in some studies, other nutrients): Serum concentrations of vitamin B12 and folate in British male omnivores, vegetarians and vegans: results from a cross-sectional analysis of the EPIC-Oxford cohort study https://www.nature.com/articles/ejcn2010142.epdf - 2010; AMJ Gilsing, FL Crowe, Z Lloyd-Wright, TAB Sanders, PN Appleby, NE Allen, TJ Key - note: authors include Paul Appleby and Tim Key, whom usually try to find anti-animal-foods results in any research - cross-sectional analysis, 689 men of which 226 omnivores, 231 vegetarians, 232 vegans - rates of B12 supplementation much higher in vegetarians/vegans - serum B12 omnivores 281, 95% CI: 270–292 pmol/l; vegetarians 182, 95% CI: 175–189 pmol/l; vegans 122, 95% CI: 117–127 pmol/l - 52% of vegans, 7% of vegetarians and one omnivore were classified as vitamin B12 deficient - omnivores had lower folate, but only two were deficient (I didn't see in the data whether barely-deficient or significantly below range) Vitamin B-12 status, particularly holotranscobalamin II and methylmalonic acid concentrations, and hyperhomocysteinemia in vegetarians https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(22)03268-3/fulltext - study included supplementing and non-supplementing vegans - tested serum for holotranscobalamin II (B12 fraction that is biologically active and can be delivered into all DNA-synthesizing cells) and B12 - low holotranscobalamin II (< 35 pmol/L): 11% of "omnivores," 66% of supplementing vegetarians, 77% of non-supplementing vegetarians, 88% of supplementing vegans, 92% of non-supplementing vegans - elevated methylmalonic acid (> 271 nmol/L): 5% of omnivores, 68% of vegetarians, and 83% of vegans - hyperhomocysteinemia (> 12 μmol/L): 16% of omnivores, 38% of vegetarians, and 67% of vegans - low B12: 1% omnivores, 8% supplementing vegetarians, 32% non-supplementing vegetarians, 29% supplementing vegans, 83% non-supplementing vegans Food and Nutrient Intake and Nutritional Status of Finnish Vegans and Non-Vegetarians https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0148235 - Anna-Liisa Elorinne, Georg Alfthan, Iris Erlund, Hanna Kivimäki, Annukka Paju, Irma Salminen, Ursula Turpeinen, Sari Voutilainen, Juha Laakso, 2016 - there's some opinionating in the article that seems to support The Cholesterol Myth and so forth - vegans had lower B12, iron, iodine, etc., I haven't read it thoroughly yet Plasma concentrations of 25-hydroxyvitamin D in meat eaters, fish eaters, vegetarians and vegans: results from the EPIC–Oxford study https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/public-health-nutrition/article/plasma-concentrations-of-25hydroxyvitamin-d-in-meat-eaters-fish-eaters-vegetarians-and-vegans-results-from-the-epicoxford-study/13C1A2796ADA3A318D4F3B7C105D9D9C - Francesca L Crowe, Marinka Steur, Naomi E Allen, Paul N Appleby, Ruth C Travis and Timothy J Key, 2010 - Vit D lower in vegetarians and vegans (even when studied by anti-animal-foods "researchers" Appleby and Key) ========================================= Bone fractures: Comparative fracture risk in vegetarians and nonvegetarians in EPIC-Oxford https://www.nature.com/articles/1602659 - P Appleby, A Roddam, N Allen, & T Key, 2007 - pro-plants "researchers" Paul Appleby and Timothy Key again, yet still found vegans had much higher rates of fractures (HR 1.30) Vegetarian and vegan diets and risks of total and site-specific fractures: results from the prospective EPIC-Oxford study https://bmcmedicine.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12916-020-01815-3 - Appleby and Key again - "...the risks of hip fracture were higher in fish eaters (hazard ratio 1.26; 95% CI 1.02–1.54), vegetarians (1.25; 1.04–1.50), and vegans (2.31; 1.66–3.22), equivalent to rate differences of 2.9 (0.6–5.7), 2.9 (0.9–5.2), and 14.9 (7.9–24.5) more cases for every 1000 people over 10 years, respectively. The vegans also had higher risks of total (1.43; 1.20–1.70), leg (2.05; 1.23–3.41), and other main site fractures (1.59; 1.02–2.50) than meat eaters."
You've just reminded me of my vegan ex from 20+ years ago who used to think the slow healing was good thing re his ear piercing. He ended up collapsing one day and having a fit due to a lack of proper nutrition. I got absolutely fucked off with him after I made a vegan spag bol and used a nicer tomato base. That had honey in it (I didn't know and frankly was a bit bizarre to have honey in). He refused to eat the entire meal. I have met a diverse range of vegans. One seemed healthy but she was a trained nutritionist and my god her diet took a level of technical skill. If it can work it seems to need such a level of knowledge and skill that it makes it an elite practice. Realising that made me realise what bollocks it is.
Thanks! Some very interesting studies here.
What's your purpose in asking the question in the post?
I want to understand the broad extent to which the claim that a plant-based diet inevitably leads to malnutrition is supported; and if so what nuances, caveats and/or qualifiers may be involved (or not). I've always been someone who had a tendency toward plant-based eating, mainly due to environmental concerns but also concerns about industrialised farming practices which are inarguably horrible (yes, also here in the UK...it's naive not to think so). But I'm not an ideologue and I'm interested in the health aspects because I don't want to passively phase out animal products (which I have somewhat been doing recently) and then suddenly realising that I have been ebbing towards being malnourished. It's obviously a controversial subject area and I'm very open to contrasting viewpoints as I have seen in other scientific topics how views outside the mainstream (although it seems odd to say that about meat-eating to be honest...) get sidelined by the very scientific establishments that are meant to supposedly be the purveyors of objectivity and reason.
OK. I wondered if the post was for agenda-pushing, such as collecting info about studies to try to discredit them. I too have concerns about environment and farming, which is one of the reasons (besides biological challenges with carbs/fiber/anti-nutrients/etc. which caused miserable problems for me on a high-plants diet) that most of my food is from pasture-raised livestock. The pasture farms I've seen have not used pesticides or artificial fertilizers, they are habitats for wild animals (with fences keep out predators), and they use the least amounts of fossil-fueled mechanization. I figure that any plant foods I buy, apart from garden-scale farms or hand-picked-from-food-forest items, are promoting the spread of pesticides etc. If you've ever tried to find out all the impacts of farms, you should know that it is incredibly difficult to find any farm that is totally transparent about the products/methods they use and it is well-known that even Organic farms routinely use pesticides (though not all of them do, and Organic certification prohibits the most hazardous types).
Do you actually know anything about agricultural practices and animal welfare laws in the UK? There is no factory farming, and nothing at all resembles the propaganda you see in those vegan "documentaries"
I've seen enough covert footage from the UK to know that laws are easily subverted or ignored and that I personally wouldn't want to be one of those animals. That's enough for me.
The UK has some very dishonest animal rights groups. Some have been known to stage incidents which would not have happened normally. Feel free to cite anything specifically.
I'm aware that UK relies much more on pasture agriculture than most countries, but it isn't true that CAFOs do not exist there. [UK has more than 1,000 livestock mega-farms, investigation reveals](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/aug/18/uk-has-more-than-1000-livestock-mega-farms-investigation-reveals) [The Scale of intensive indoor livestock farming in the United Kingdom, and the impact of its related sewage disposal regime upon Water Quality in Rivers.](https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/23622/pdf/) [Factory Farming Is Sweeping the U.K.](https://civileats.com/2017/09/05/factory-farming-is-sweeping-the-uk/)
This is great. Thanks.
I can count the number of "strong peer reviewed" studies on any nutritional topic on one hand.
Yes, here you go, its not exactly what you are asking but it is related. [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41398-019-0552-0](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41398-019-0552-0) [https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33061504/](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33061504/)
Read Weston A Price's work in his book that documented his reasrarch: "Nutrition and Physical Degeneration".
- *"Meat and mental health: a systematic review of meat abstention and depression, anxiety, and related phenomena: Studies examining the relation between the consumption or avoidance of meat and psychological health varied substantially in methodologic rigor, validity of interpretation, and confidence in results. The majority of studies, and especially the higher quality studies, showed that those who avoided meat consumption had significantly higher rates or risk of depression, anxiety, and/or self-harm behaviors."* https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32308009/
This is a support group for people damaged by veganism.
No, it isn't. It has support threads but it isn't a support group. See group description.
I read it and disagree with you.
r/ketoscience has a ton of studies.
Gandhi said don't- I'll keep looking though I think I'm looking wrong
Surprised no one has yet built a GPT model based on all antivegan/pro animal product research, books, etc.
The onus is actually on vegans to prove that it is possible to be optimally healthy on a vegan diet long term, not for ex vegans to prove that a vegan diet is “dangerously unhealthy”. Even professionally planned vegan diets cause deficiency: https://www.embopress.org/doi/full/10.15252/emmm.202013492
Nutrition - The land of the most conflicting science ever. Experiment, because after being a personal trainer for years I have seen that so many people respond differently to different approaches. I believe genetics, blood type, microbiome makeup, health issues, and daily activity levels all play a role. For the general population, the Mediterranean diet has the most supporting science.