It seems like with each passing day more and more people are deciding to convert to a strictly vegan or vegetarian diet—but a new study recently uncovered some disturbing findings that could make eating meat not seem so bad after all.
According to @CNN, the EPIC-Oxford study is providing some unsettling news for both vegans and vegetarians, as the results revealed that they have a 20% higher chance of suffering a stroke compared to those who eat meat. The research found that vegetarians and vegans had a 20% higher risk of stroke, specifically hemorrhagic stroke, which is caused when blood from an artery begins to bleed into the brain. The findings translate to 3 more cases of stroke per 1,000 people over 10 years.
Lead researcher Tammy Tong, a nutritional epidemiologist at the Nuffield Department of Population Health at the University of Oxford, offered up this statement on the study:
“It does seem that the lower risk of coronary heart diseases does exceed the higher risk of stroke, if we look at the absolute numbers. It is possible that this is due to very low cholesterol levels or very low levels of some nutrients.
There is some evidence which suggests that very low cholesterol levels might be associated with a slightly higher risk of hemorrhagic stroke. Similarly, other research points to deficiencies of some nutrients, like vitamin B12, may be linked to a higher risk of stroke.”
Although these results may seem grim for vegans and vegetarians, pescatarians were in the clear, as they were found to not be at higher risk for suffering a stroke. Tong’s research team followed more than 48,000 people in UK with an average age of 45, who were grouped into meat eaters (24,428), pescatarians (7,506), and vegetarians, including vegans (16,254).
Participants were tracked on average for 18 years and during the study period there were 2,820 cases of coronary heart disease and 1,072 cases of stroke. The study calculations took into account influential factors, such as smoking or physical activity.
The explanation for pescatarians not being at higher risk is pretty easily explained. It’s due to fish-eaters’ cholesterol levels, which are not as low as vegetarians. Pescatarians are also unlikely to be vitamin B12 deficient, “because you can get some B12 from fish and other animal products that they do eat,” Tong said. Whereas “vegetarians and vegans have very low consumption of animal products, the only way they can get B12 is from either supplements or fortified foods,” she added.
Not everyone is on board with Tong’s research regarding vegans and vegetarians. Dr. Malcolm Finlay, consultant cardiologist at Barts Heart Centre, Queen Mary University of London, had this to say:
“The study put too much weight on a complex statistical method to try and correct for the fact that the vegetarians were very much healthier than meat eaters. While this method can say the risk of stroke isn’t as low as one might expect it to be in vegetarians considering how much healthier they are in general compared to meat-eaters, their overall risk of a major life-changing cardiovascular event happening still appears much lower.”
Still, vegans and vegetarians have a significantly lower risk of heart disease, 22% less to be exact compared to meat eaters. Pescatarians have a 13% lower risk of heart disease than meat eaters as well.
It will be interesting to see how vegans and vegetarians respond to this news.
Roommates, what are your thoughts on this?
