Research on vegetarianism has historically primarily examined possible nutritional deficits, but in recent years, the tide has turned, with studies verifying the advantages of a meatless diet for health. Eating a plant-based diet is now acknowledged to be both nutritionally adequate and a means of lowering the risk of numerous chronic illnesses. The American Dietetic Association states that "appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases."
It's "appropriately planned" that matters. Being a vegetarian won't always be healthy for you unless you adhere to advised guidelines regarding fat intake, nutrition, and weight management. After all, a diet consisting of cheese pizza, soda, and candies isn't exactly "vegetarian." Eating a wide variety of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains is important for your health. It's also critical to swap out bad fats, like those in nuts, olive oil, and canola oil, for healthy fats like those found in saturated and trans fats. And never forget that eating too many calories will cause you to gain weight—even from wholesome, low-fat plant-based foods. Therefore, it's crucial to read food labels, exercise frequently, and practice portion control.
Many of the health advantages of vegetarianism can be obtained without fully committing to the diet. For instance, a Mediterranean diet emphasizes plant-based foods with a limited intake of meat and is linked to longer life expectancy and a lower risk of developing a number of chronic illnesses. Even if you don't want to go entirely plant-based, you can still make some easy dietary changes to move in that direction. For example, you could replace some of your meat with fish a few times a week or use plant-based protein sources like tofu or beans.
Whether a vegetarian diet is good for you is a personal decision. If you want to improve your health, here are some things to think about.
Vegetarian varieties
Vegetarians are, strictly speaking, those who abstain from eating any meat, poultry, or seafood. However, a wide range of dietary patterns—including the following—are identified as vegetarians:
For vegans (whole vegetarians), this means abstaining from all animal products, including dairy, gelatin, eggs, and poultry as well as fish.
Perhaps. Vegetarians typically consume more vitamins C and E, dietary fiber, folic acid, potassium, magnesium, and phytochemicals (plant chemicals) like carotenoids and flavonoids and less saturated fat and cholesterol than meat eaters. Because of this, individuals are probably going to have lower blood pressure, body mass index (BMI), total and LDL (bad) cholesterol, and all of these things are linked to longer life expectancy and a lower chance of developing a number of chronic illnesses.
However, insufficient data currently exist to determine the precise impact of a vegetarian diet on long-term health. Separating the influence of vegetarianism from other habits that vegetarians are more likely to adhere to, like quitting smoking, consuming moderation in alcohol, and getting enough exercise, can be challenging. However, some of the current research indicates the following:
Heart conditions. Vegetarians may be less likely to experience cardiac events (like heart attacks) and die from cardiac causes, according to some research. Vegetarians were, on average, 25% less likely to die from heart disease in one of the largest studies, which was a combined analysis of data from five prospective studies involving over 76,000 participants and published several years ago. This outcome supported previous research comparing Seventh-day Adventists, a religious group whose members abstain from caffeine, alcohol, and tobacco use and of which 40% are vegetarians. In another study, researchers found that vegetarians had a 19% lower risk of dying from heart disease.
High-fiber whole grains and legumes are the best options for heart protection because they digest slowly and have a low hypoglycemic index, which helps to maintain stable blood sugar levels. Additionally, soluble fiber lowers cholesterol levels. White rice, potatoes, and other refined starches and carbs raise blood sugar levels quickly, increasing the risk of heart attacks and diabetes (a risk factor for heart disease).
Nuts are also heart-protective. They have a low glycemic index and contain many antioxidants, vegetable protein, fiber, minerals, and healthy fatty acids. The downside: nuts pack a lot of calories, so restrict your daily intake to a small handful (about an ounce). The upside: because of their fat content, even a small amount of nuts can satisfy the appetite.
Walnuts, in particular, are a rich source of omega-3 fatty acids, which have many health benefits. Even so, fish are the best source of omega-3s, and it's not clear whether plant-derived omega-3s are an adequate substitute for fish in the diet. One study suggests that omega-3s from walnuts and fish both work to lower heart disease risk, but by different routes. Walnut omega-3s (alpha-linolenic acid, or ALA) help reduce total cholesterol and LDL (bad) cholesterol, while omega-3s from fish (eicosapentaenoic acid, or EPA, and docosahexaenoic acid, or DHA) lower triglycerides and raise HDL (good) cholesterol levels.
Cancer. Hundreds of studies suggest that eating lots of fruits and vegetables can reduce the risk of developing certain cancers, and there's evidence that vegetarians have a lower incidence of cancer than non-vegetarians do. But the differences aren't large. A vegetarian diet can make it easier to get the recommended minimum of five daily servings of fruits and vegetables, but a purely vegetarian diet is not necessarily better than a plant-based diet that also includes fish or poultry. For example, in a pooled analysis of data from the Oxford Vegetarian Study and EPIC-Oxford, fish-eaters had a lower risk of certain cancers than vegetarians.
If you stop eating red meat, you'll eliminate a risk factor for colon cancer. It's not clear whether avoiding all animal products reduces the risk further. Vegetarians usually have lower levels of potentially carcinogenic substances in their colons, but studies comparing cancer rates in vegetarians and non-vegetarians have shown inconsistent results.
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