Anyone that knows me knows that I eat, sleep, and love vegetables. I have been a vegetarian for the last 3 years. People always tend to ask me why I do it? The truth is that you can reap a lot of benefits by being a vegetarian and people are becoming more aware of the health benefits of being a vegetarian. In fact, animal rights issues is only one of the reasons why people decide to go on a vegetarian diet. People are even becoming vegetarian because they are beginning to care more about the environment. However, the main reason why people go on a vegetarian diet is because of the health benefits.
All meat in general is not good for you as it has many negative effects on the body. This is especially true if you eat red meat, as it has much more fat compared to white meat. Excessive intake of fats into the body can result in having a high level of cholesterol.
A study done at Oxford of 44,500 people showed that people were 32% less likely to die or need hospital treatment as a result of heart disease. Now I’m no statistician but 32% is a huge number seeing, as heart disease is the number cause of death in North America. Heart disease is responsible for about 29,340 out of 100,000 deaths per year that’s almost 70,000 deaths per year in Canada alone. Not to mention that Canadian acute care hospitals handle almost three million hospitalizations due to heart disease and account for 17% of total hospitalizations per year.
Heart disease occurs when the heart’s own blood supply becomes blocked up by fatty deposits in the arteries that nourish the heart muscle. It can cause angina or even lead to a heart attack if the blood vessels become completely blocked.
Most heart attacks happen when a clot in the coronary artery blocks the supply of blood and oxygen to the heart. A blockage that is not treated within a few hours causes the affected heart muscle to die.
Image: National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, Diseases and Conditions Index
Scientists at Oxford University analyzed data from 15,100 vegetarians and 29,400 people who ate meat and fish. Over the course of 11 years, 169 participants in the study died from heart disease and 1,066 needed hospitalization – and they were more likely to have been meat and fish eaters than vegetarians. The results also showed that vegetarians had lower blood pressure, lower levels of “bad” cholesterol and were more likely to be at a healthy weight. Moreover, vegetarians had a 32% lower risk of heart disease than non-vegetarians.
Now I’m not advocating that everyone eats a vegetarian diet. Vegetarians have a lower intake of saturated fats so it makes sense that there is a lower risk of heart weight. All I’m saying that incorporating more vegetables into your diet instead of meat and fish could ultimately save your life.
