Quote:
Originally Posted by liamona  Just keep in mind that correlation doesn't equal causation. |
I agree, which is why I said linked and not caused.
But when you see study after study saying the same thing, maybe they're onto something. And science is starting to identify the biological mechanisms that explain the strong correlation.
Quote:
|
since animal foods contain a lot of nutrients that are lacking from a plant-based diet....
|
Name me ONE nutrient that you can't get in a plant based diet and that your body can't make on its own.
The best people come up with is B12, which comes from bacteria not meat anyway. And the more I see what the average person eats, I don't believe the SAD meat-eater could get enough to meet the RDA anyway.
Quote:
|
a more reasonable solution is to clean up the environment and hold corporations accountable.
|
If consumers paid what it really cost to produce a pound of meat, nobody would be willing to pay $15 or $20/lb. Would you pay $20/lb for pork chops at the grocery store?
They get environmental regulations that no other industry can get around. Example: Did you know pigs produce about the same amount/potency of feces of day. A town of 5,000 people by law must have a sewage treatment facility. A factory farm of 5000 pigs needs nothing except perhaps a holding pond where the foul mess rots until it's sprayed on fields. Even a cottage where 1 person might only occasionally visit needs a septic system. Why don't livestock farms need to treat their waste?
When there is a heavy rain, these manure lagoons overfill and mix into drinking water. When manure is applied improperly, it ends up contaminating streams and wells. Taxpayers pay to clean that up.
And the entire industry is heavily subsidized, while most of fruits/veggies are not. A good example is the US Farm Bill. Taxpayers pay to keep beef cheap while families struggle to afford fresh fruits and vegetables (?!)
Someone besides the pork farmer pays when the reside of all those antibiotics, steroids, and other chemicals the pigs excreted ends up absorbed by our produce or in our drinking water. One of the reasons why we have these big scares with Swine Flu is because of overuse of antibiotics in livestock animals + overcrowding/sick conditions.
But meat eaters want their meat. And the meat producers and processors are a multi-billion dollar industry who are good at lobbying Congress for laws to make their supposedly healthy products more affordable. Until the public wakes up about the true cost of factory farming, nothing will change.