Is Being A Vegan Really That Unhealthy?

On some day in June of 2013, I happened to be on tumblr at around 3 in the morning. I was interested in a debate one of my followers seemed to be having. Someone had referred to being vegan as “unnatural” and being a vegan, he just had to respond. Up until this point in my life, I had no idea what a vegan was, I thought not eating meat was a vegetarian’s things. I learned that night (or morning rather), that vegans were, if anything, the real deal. Not only do they avoid meat products, they avoid all products that have anything to do with the death of a living animal. No clothing made at the expense of an animals life and especially no food.

2a82182e8933effffe17fd2c8b62c02f

But what was interesting about this debate was that this guy, like so many others apparently, thought that humans needed meat to survive. Humans are omnivores, making us able to eat both plant and meat products, but do we need to eat both to live long, healthy lives? These people would get so defensive about their love of eating hamburgers that they would downright dehumanize these people for choosing to be vegan. Of course, there debate was essentially a argument about eating and not eating animals and having the right to choose either way, but It seeing as this was drawing so much hate and debate, I had to find out what it was all about. It started with know what being Vegan even meant.

I did some reseach and eventually learned that many people are under the impression that being vegan is unhealthy and that you have virtually no intake of certain nutrition that they need, but their assumptions are often blind and have no real scientific knowledge behind them. Not because those people are wrong per se, but because they just don’t know much about the vegan diet when they make these claims. It is true that in choosing to be vegan you lose a number of nutrients found in meat and dairy, but a successful vegan diet is simply about making the right substitutions for those products you would otherwise be missing. In fact, being vegan can be a healthy choice or a extremely healthy one, it just depends on the choices one makes in terms of food.  Largely, these potentially lost nutrients would be protein, calcium, vitamin D and vitamin b12 and iron. There are plenty of ways vegans can make substitutions for these and it’s all about a varied and smart diet of course!

Veganfoodpyramid

In learning of what makes up vegan diet, I found that it, of course, relied heavily on vegetables. To make up for the loss of what would have been protein, vegans should look to things like chickpeas, tofu, peas, peanut butter, almonds, rice, potatoes, broccoli, kale and more. As for calcium, vegans should turn to spinach, collard and turnip greens, broccoli and beans. While vitamin D can’t be made up in food without dairy products, some exposure to the sun daily can act as a healthy replacement. Vitamin b2 is found in animal products and soil, but can be gained from vitamin supplements if needed. Lastly, iron is found in dried beans and dark green leafy vegetables, but can also be gained from vitamin C too!

As a vegetarian, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to commit to being a vegan, but should I ever decide on it, I can be sure that there is a way to stay healthy and well. Although, this information may never put a end to the rift between vegans and those who eat meat when it comes to the arguments had around killing and consuming animals, it can stand against those claiming that it’s unhealthy to be vegan and that human absolutely need meat to live.

 

Sources:
http://www.brown.edu/Student_Services/Health_Services/Health_Education/nutrition_&_eating_concerns/being_a_vegetarian.php
http://www.vrg.org/nutshell/vegan.htm

 

 

4 thoughts on “Is Being A Vegan Really That Unhealthy?

  1. jvh5620

    I enjoyed this post. Whenever someone tells me they are a vegan i think to myself ” oh so healthy”. After reading this post being a vegan is really a lifestyle. What someone thinks to be healthy is 100 % an opinion and varies on each persons food preference, allergies, body, genetics etc. I think this would be hard to experiment because each persons body is different and has different reactions. I believe there is a way to depict the difference between being a vegan or a vegetarian, just not sure of what. Being a vegan, i believe is definitely harder than being a vegetarian. These people, and the people who choose to eat meat, can be equally as healthy depending on the choices they make with other foods. Have you ever wondered if being a vegan is bad for you? I know that sound crazy but not getting the right type of protein can be bad for you. ( Chicken, fish). I used to eat red meat all of the time and i stopped eating it regularly in the beginning of senior year. I would eat it occasionally and I could tell a difference in my body. If I stopped eating chicken, Im not sure how my body would react. I think doing experiments on vegetarians, and vegans would be really hard to do.

  2. Katelyn May Schreckengast

    This is an intriguing topic for many reasons. I believe what is considered to be healthy varies from person to person depending on their food preferences, genetics, and what their body reacts to. That being said this would be a very hard experiment to carry out because one would have to take into account each persons different body types while also following subject for a long period of time to find out which lifestyle is healthier. I definitely believe there is a difference between choosing to be a vegan or vegetarian and eating healthy once that choice is made. It may be harder to make choices that fit into a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle in today’s world, but I do agree that if making the right choices, these people can be just as healthy as a person that eats meat. Maybe a study in the future will look into the differences between the two.

  3. Olivia Diane Talbot

    I thought this was a very interesting post. Whenever someone told me they were a “vegan” i just brushed it off because I thought it was just a way to state “save the environment” or something like that but it really is a life style choice and a way to live. I was a vegetarian in 7th grade because I saw a youtube video that repulsed me. I also have celiac disease, meaning I can not eat gluten. With cutting both gluten and meat out of my diet, I lose a lot of essential vitamin intake. My doctor recommended vitamins, but said if I wanted to stay healthy I should probably go back to eating meat. It was a hard choice for me…(I now eat meat). There are so many substitutes for our essentials that I probably did not realize when i was going through my decision, but this blog sums it up perfectly. Anything can substituted for something else, probably something even healthier. But one question, can vegans not drink orange juice? That contains vitamin D

Leave a Reply