Relatively low if you compare it only to other meats or animal products. So while you can choose animal products that might progress these chronic metabolic diseases slower, you are still advancing them. But there are lots of factors that complicate things. For example the health impacts of animal products also depend on how you cook them, and what you eat them with. Cured meats are unanimously considered one of the worst things you can consume, right up there with smoking. Steamed fish would probably be about the least harmful (except that fish have some of the highest levels of bioaccumulated toxins and heavy metals). Actually, bugs are likely the least harmful, for those who are comfortable with that. Eating a source of fiber mitigates some of the harm from animal products as shown in this video:
Further complicating things is that single nutrients often behave differently depending on context. For example antioxidants other than some of the essential vitamins have never been shown to produce their purported effects outside of laboratory conditions, and some supplemented sources of antioxidants have even been shown to be a little harmful. But when we test the whole foods that contain those antioxidants, we get data like how increasing leafy green consumption has been correlated with a longer life expectancy.
And it’s similar for saturated fats and animal products. In the most established science on the matter you’ll see they don’t just talk about saturated fat alone - the science appears to show a relationship between the ratio of saturated and unsaturated fats consumed, particularly polyunsaturated fats. This book describes that science quite well-
But going back to that nutrients vs whole foods, there might be more than just the fats at play. This piece by Colin Campbell is a bit of a manifesto against nutritional reductionism, and suggests that the animal proteins themselves might play more of a role than we had thought:
When you put whole diets to the test, what starts to become most consistent is how the most whole-plant-dominant diets by far achieve the most remarkable results. It’s apparent in the Adventist Health Studies, the Esselstyn Heart Disease Reversal diet, as well as Dean Ornishes full lifestyle intervention program. The latter two claim they can reverse heart disease, which is a controversial claim. More study is needed to prove whether that’s true or false, but regardless it’s still apparent that these fully plant-based dietary interventions do more than any others to restore people to good health.
And it’s a thing where science and personal experience match. If you check out the online whole-food plant-based support communities, you see people routinely report almost miraculous changes to their health and wellbeing in a matter of weeks or even days. It’s the kind of thing that once you experience it fully enough, you don’t want to go back.
Relatively low if you compare it only to other meats or animal products. So while you can choose animal products that might progress these chronic metabolic diseases slower, you are still advancing them. But there are lots of factors that complicate things. For example the health impacts of animal products also depend on how you cook them, and what you eat them with. Cured meats are unanimously considered one of the worst things you can consume, right up there with smoking. Steamed fish would probably be about the least harmful (except that fish have some of the highest levels of bioaccumulated toxins and heavy metals). Actually, bugs are likely the least harmful, for those who are comfortable with that. Eating a source of fiber mitigates some of the harm from animal products as shown in this video:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=C08mqjMuwyY
Further complicating things is that single nutrients often behave differently depending on context. For example antioxidants other than some of the essential vitamins have never been shown to produce their purported effects outside of laboratory conditions, and some supplemented sources of antioxidants have even been shown to be a little harmful. But when we test the whole foods that contain those antioxidants, we get data like how increasing leafy green consumption has been correlated with a longer life expectancy.
And it’s similar for saturated fats and animal products. In the most established science on the matter you’ll see they don’t just talk about saturated fat alone - the science appears to show a relationship between the ratio of saturated and unsaturated fats consumed, particularly polyunsaturated fats. This book describes that science quite well-
https://www.redpenreviews.org/reviews/eat-drink-and-be-healthy/
But going back to that nutrients vs whole foods, there might be more than just the fats at play. This piece by Colin Campbell is a bit of a manifesto against nutritional reductionism, and suggests that the animal proteins themselves might play more of a role than we had thought:
https://nutritionstudies.org/is-saturated-fat-really-that-bad/
When you put whole diets to the test, what starts to become most consistent is how the most whole-plant-dominant diets by far achieve the most remarkable results. It’s apparent in the Adventist Health Studies, the Esselstyn Heart Disease Reversal diet, as well as Dean Ornishes full lifestyle intervention program. The latter two claim they can reverse heart disease, which is a controversial claim. More study is needed to prove whether that’s true or false, but regardless it’s still apparent that these fully plant-based dietary interventions do more than any others to restore people to good health.
And it’s a thing where science and personal experience match. If you check out the online whole-food plant-based support communities, you see people routinely report almost miraculous changes to their health and wellbeing in a matter of weeks or even days. It’s the kind of thing that once you experience it fully enough, you don’t want to go back.
https://adventisthealthstudy.org/studies/AHS-2/findings-lifestyle-diet-disease
https://my.clevelandclinic.org/departments/wellness/integrative/esselstyn-program
https://www.ornish.com/