Health Journal Online

Tag: Meats

  • Plant-Based Meats and Puberty, Obesity, and Fracture Risk

    Plant-Based Meats and Puberty, Obesity, and Fracture Risk

    What are the effects of plant-based meats on premature puberty, childhood obesity, and hip fracture risk?

    As noted in an editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association on plant-based meats, if you look only at the nutrition facts information for a conventional burger versus a Beyond Meat or Impossible Burger, as seen here and at 0:20 in my video Plant-Based Meat Substitutes Put to the Test, you wouldn’t necessarily be able to predict the health consequences without further studies.

    We’ve had plant-based meats in the marketplace for more than a century, though, as you can see in this ad for “good eating” Protose, below and at 0:35 in my video. Dr. John Harvey Kellogg filed a patent for Protose, what he called “the modern vegetable meat,” in 1899.

    Of course, products like tempeh and tofu have been eaten throughout Asia for centuries, but I think of those as separate foods in their own right, as opposed to products intentionally designed to mimic the taste and texture of meat. With such a rich history, harkening back to the days of pass-the-Proteena—another great ad here and at 1:06 in my video—you’d think there’d be some studies of consumers—and indeed, there are. 

    Researchers have found, for example, that girls who eat meat may start their periods six months earlier than girls who don’t. Is the earlier menstruation because the meat-eating girls were eating a lot of protein and fat? No, because vegetarian girls who instead ate meat analogs, like veggie burgers and veggie dogs, were able to delay menstruation by nine months. Of course, it’s hard to tease out how much of that is just from avoiding meat, but compared with girls who ate meat a few times a week, those who ate meat a few times a day had a significantly earlier age of first menstruation. This may help explain why childhood meat consumption is linked to breast cancer later in life, since the earlier you start your period, the higher your lifetime risk. 

    Now, obesity itself may contribute to the early onset of puberty in girls, so that could be another factor. Studies have suggested that “vegetarian children tend to be lighter and leaner than nonvegetarian children,” but veg kids aren’t smaller in general, though. Vegetarian boys and girls may measure to be about an inch taller than their classmates; they just aren’t as wide. So, the fact that girls who eat plant-based meats may be less likely to experience premature puberty may, in part, be because they were leaner.

    Indeed, as shown here and at 2:48 in my video, childhood obesity research found that meat consumption seems to double the odds of schoolchildren becoming overweight, compared to plant-based meat. Now, whole plant food sources of protein, such as beans, do even better and are associated with halving the odds of kids becoming overweight.

    This is why I consider plant-based meats like the Impossible Burger and Beyond Meat more of a useful stepping stone towards a healthier diet, rather than the endgame ideal. The same amount of protein in a bean burrito would be better in nearly every way, as you can see here and at 3:05 in my video. 

    Similarly, in terms of hip fracture risk, in the Adventist Health Study–2, which followed tens of thousands of men and women for years, researchers found that daily intake of plant-based meats appeared to reduce the risk of hip fracture by nearly half, but daily intake of legumes—beans, split peas, chickpeas, and lentils—may drop the risk of hip fracture by even more—by nearly two-thirds.

    This is the fourth in a nine-part series on plant-based meats. If you missed the first three, see the related posts below.

    Stay tuned for: 



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  • Are Plant-Based Meats Good for Us?

    Are Plant-Based Meats Good for Us?

    What are the different impacts of plant protein versus animal protein, and do the benefits of plant proteins translate to plant protein isolates?

    Are plant-based burgers healthy or not? The answer is: Compared to what? Eating is kind of a zero-sum game where every food has an opportunity cost. Each time we put something in our mouth, it’s a lost opportunity to eat something even healthier. So, if we want to know if something is healthy, we have to compare it to what we’d be eating instead. For example, are eggs healthy? Compared to a breakfast sausage link, yes, but compared to oatmeal? Not even close. Sausage is considered a Group 1 carcinogen. We know that consumption of processed meat causes cancer. Each 50-gram serving a day (equal to about one or two breakfast sausages) has been linked to an 18 percent higher risk of colorectal cancer. In fact, the risk of getting colorectal cancer from eating those daily sausages is about the same as the increased risk of lung cancer we’d get from breathing in secondhand cigarette smoke living with a smoker. So, compared to sausage, eggs are healthy, but compared to oatmeal, eggs are not.

    When it comes to Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods plant-based burger patties, they may be better in that they have less saturated fat than conventional meat burgers, but if you really want less saturated fat, plant-based meats are no match for unprocessed plant foods, such as lentils and beans. And lentil soup or a bean burrito could certainly fill the same culinary niche as a lunchtime burger. But, if you are going to have some kind of burger, it’s easy to argue that plant-based versions are more healthful, as seen below and at 1:43 in my video Plant-Based Protein: Are Pea and Soy Protein Isolates Harmful?.

    There is a sodium issue with those plant-based patties, though, and they aren’t that much lower in saturated fat. That is due to coconut oil, which is as bad as animal fat, so there isn’t much advantage on that front. I am excited to say that Beyond Meat has since significantly improved their formula since I made that graph for UBS. Now Beyond has 310mg of sodium and only 2 grams of saturated fat thanks to a switch from coconut oil to avocado oil.

    The total protein is similar across the board. Does that matter? Is there any advantage to eating protein from plants over animals? Let’s look at the association between plant and animal protein intake and mortality. In the twin Harvard cohorts, which followed more than 100,000 men and women over decades, researchers wrote: “After adjusting for other dietary and lifestyle factors, animal protein intake was associated with a higher risk for mortality, particularly CVD mortality,” that is, dying from cardiovascular disease, “whereas higher plant protein intake was associated with lower all-cause mortality,” meaning a lower risk of dying from all causes put together. So, “replacing animal protein of various origins with plant protein was associated with lower mortality,” especially if processed meat and egg protein were replaced, as they were the worst.

    When it comes to living a longer life, plant protein sources beat out each and every animal protein source. Not just better than bacon and eggs, but better than burgers, chicken, turkey, fish, and dairy protein, as shown here and at 2:53 in my video. 

    Together with other studies, these “findings support the importance of protein sources for the long-term health outcome and suggest that plants constitute a preferred protein source compared with animal foods.” Why? Well, “unlike animal protein, plant protein has not been associated with increased insulin-like growth factor 1 levels.” (IGF-1 is a cancer-promoting growth hormone.) Soy protein is similar enough to animal protein that, at high enough doses, like eating two Impossible burgers a day, our IGF-1 may get a bump. But the only reason we care about IGF-1 is cancer risk, and, if anything, “higher soy intake is associated with a decreased risk of breast and prostate cancer.”

    A recent systematic review and meta-analysis found that “soy protein intake was associated with a decreased risk in the mortality of breast cancer,” for instance. “A 12% reduction in breast cancer death was observed for each 5-g/day increase in soy protein intake.” But, as shown below and at 4:07 in my video, the high-soy groups in these studies were on the order of more than 16 grams a day, which was associated with an incredible 62 percent lower risk of dying from breast cancer. More than 10 daily grams of soy protein may be good, associated with nearly halving breast cancer mortality risk, and getting more than 16 grams a day may be better, which is like one Impossible burger a day. (We simply don’t know what happens at consumption levels far above that.) 

    Plant protein has also “been linked to lower blood pressure, reduced low-density lipoprotein [LDL cholesterol] levels, and improved insulin sensitivity. Substitution of plant protein for animal protein has been related to a lower incidence of CVD [cardiovascular disease] and type 2 diabetes.” Indeed, 21 different studies following nearly half a million people found that “high…animal protein intakes are associated with an increased risk of T2DM [type 2 diabetes], whereas moderate plant protein intake is associated with a decreased risk of T2DM.” Those were just observational studies, though. The researchers tried to control for other dietary and lifestyle factors, but cause and effect can’t be proven until it’s put to the test.

    Enter “Effect of Replacing Animal Protein with Plant Protein on Glycemic [Blood Sugar] Control in Diabetes: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.” Researchers found that replacing only about a third of protein from animal sources with plant sources yielded significant improvements in long-term blood sugar control, fasting blood sugars, and insulin.

    Same with cholesterol. A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials on the effect of plant protein on blood fats again found that replacing animal protein with plant protein decreases LDL cholesterol. What’s more, this benefit occurs whether you start out with high or low cholesterol, whether you’re replacing dairy, or meat and eggs, and whether you’re swapping in soy or other plant proteins, as seen here and at 5:31 in my video.

    We’ve known about soy’s beneficial effects on cholesterol for nearly 40 years, but other sources of plant protein can be helpful, too. However, in the case of plant-based burgers like Beyond Beef and the Impossible Burger, beef isn’t being replaced with beans. Those products are mostly isolated plant proteins—mostly pea protein isolate in Beyond Meat products and concentrated soy protein in Impossible Foods products. If you isolate the plant proteins themselves, will you still get benefits? Surprisingly, yes. Check it out.

    The researchers concluded: “Interestingly, our…analyses did not find a significant difference between protein isolate products and whole food sources for any given endpoint, suggesting that the cholesterol-lowering effects are at least, in part, attributable to the plant protein itself rather than just the associated nutrients.” So, it isn’t just because plant protein travels with fiber or less saturated fat. Plant proteins break down into a different distribution of amino acids. So, if you give people arginine, an amino acid found more in plant foods, that alone can bring down cholesterol, for example. And the plant protein concentrates used in these meat-free products aren’t just pure protein; they retain some active compounds, such as phytosterols and antioxidants, which also can have beneficial effects.

    This is the third in a series on plant-based meats. If you missed the first two, see The Environmental Impacts of Plant-Based Meat Substitutes and Are Beyond Meat and the Impossible Burger Healthy?.

    Check the related posts below for the upcoming videos on plant-based meats.
     



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  • What Are the Environmental Impacts of Plant-Based Meats? 

    What Are the Environmental Impacts of Plant-Based Meats? 

    Environmental assessments of 50 different plant-based meats show them to be vastly more sustainable than animal-based meats.

    “There is increasing consensus that transitioning towards reduced meat consumption and more plant-based diets is a key feature to address important health and sustainability challenges” that humanity is facing, yet the graph below and at 0:25 in my video The Environmental Impacts of Plant-Based Meat Substitutes shows that the trajectory of global meat consumption has increased.

    According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, “we will have to double the production of meat and dairy to meet the predicted demand for animal proteins in 2050.” However, we would have to do the exact opposite to contain the ecological damage and “environmental impact of livestock.”

    “Nearly every credible forecast shows that if we’re to have any chance of meeting future food in a sustainable fashion, lowering our meat consumption will be absolutely essential.”

    More centralized governments may be effective in influencing consumption patterns. For example, the “Chinese government has outlined a plan to reduce its citizens’ meat consumption by 50%,” but since the main drivers of global meat consumption are factors such as rising incomes, urbanization, and Western culture, the “main identified drivers of meat demand are difficult to influence through direct policy intervention.” Thus, we must take our case directly to the consumer. However, information and education may not be enough. We may need the “increased availability of ready-made plant-based products.”

    Too often, alone, “ethics and sustainability does not stand much of a chance in a world of consumers…Many consumers seem deaf to ethical arguments…[that] are quickly forgotten when one is buying food.” When it comes to “consumers’ perceived barriers to following a plant-based diet,” the largest barrier may simply be “meat appreciation,” enjoying the taste of meat. So, in practice, if we want people to shift to plant-based options, “the taste, structure and nutritional value of vegetarian meals could be developed to more closely follow the preferences of meat eaters.” Why design a veggie burger primarily for vegetarians? They’re already not eating meat. When Patrick Brown founded Impossible Foods, “his goal was to create something a burger lover would say is better than any burger they’ve ever had.’” Also in the marketplace is “the Beyond Burger, created by Beyond Meat, a company founded to tackle climate change by creating vegan products free from meat and animal by-products” that are “Juicy, Meaty and Delicious.”

    But are they better for the climate? If so, how much better? Reputable groups have published environmental lifecycle assessments covering the Impossible Burger and the Beyond Burger, and I did a short piece for the Swiss investment firm UBS summarizing the results, as you can see below and at 2:48 in my video. 

    Indeed, switching to either plant-based meat option, the Impossible Burger and the Beyond Burger reduce greenhouse gas emissions, land use, and water footprints by about 90 percent, compared to beef.

    Similar lifecycle analyses have been performed on more than 50 different plant-based meats. All such studies found them to be vastly more sustainable than meat and processed meat products, with no real differences in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions observed between the different sources of protein used in the plant-based meats, whether wheat, soy, or another. Though, obviously, any products containing eggs would be significantly worse with “significantly higher amounts of GHG.”

    Now, of course, if we went straight to the unprocessed peas and soybeans from which the Beyond and Impossible Burgers are made, we wouldn’t get just a 90 percent lower environmental impact, but around a 99 percent lower impact. That impact drops to zero, however, if no one is willing to eat it.

    A review of consumer research on meat alternatives found that although considerations like “health, environmental and animal welfare aspects can persuade consumers and influence their decision to try a meat substitute, the appearance, and taste of those meat substitutes are crucial factors for their consumption on a regular basis.”

    Interestingly, these days, plant-based foods may actually have a leg up. Researchers gave omnivorous college students both animal- and plant-based chocolate milk, macaroni and cheese, chicken tenders, and meatballs, but told them they were actually all made from plants. The researchers “surprisingly and unexpectedly found that when subjects tasted the food and rated how much they liked the taste, those who were told the food was vegan liked the food significantly better than did those who were told the food was of animal origin. Thus, thinking a food was vegan actually increased liking for the taste of that food.”

    Other demographics may have a different reaction, though, in which case there is always “sustainability-by-stealth,” using blended products that substitute some of the animal protein for plant protein. Recently, such “hybrid products (meat analogs in which part of the meat is replaced by plant-based ingredients) have made a promising entrance,” so much so that Perdue and Tyson, two major meat producers, are bragging about the incorporation of plant protein into their blended products, as you can see here and at 4:41 in my video. 

    This is from the first of nine videos in a series on plant-based meats, which includes the titles in the related posts below.

    For background on food and climate change, see Diet and Climate Change: Cooking Up a Storm. 



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