Is Red Meat Intrinsically Bad?

One of the most common questions I am asked by my patients is if red meat is bad for them. The answer to this question could fill a book, but I will try to give a more concise and succinct answer here.

I will not address the moral issues associated with eating red meat; rather, I will only focus on the health consequences.

Here's what I have gleaned from my research.  From an evolutionary perspective, man's becoming a carnivore is what allowed the human brain to develop into its current form. Apparently, the addition of animal protein to early man's diet allowed the brain to further develop and evolve to its superiority in the animal kingdom.  At one point in evolution when meat became scarce, allegedly the human brain also degenerated. When the animal population regained its numbers and meat became more readily available, the brain regained its stature. Therefore, the immediate answer to the question above is that meat is not intrinsically unhealthy.

However, there is no question that the meat that was eaten by our ancestors is not the same meat we eat today and most likely not the same quantities. Today's meat is mass produced by feeding cows all sorts of additives such as hormones, antibiotics, corn feed, etc.  According to T. Colin Campbell, PhD, in his controversial book, The China Study, bovine (cow) meat and its byproducts such as milk and cheese are the root cause of most cancers and autoimmune diseases in the world.  (As an aside, every person I have met in my life who told me they had been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (MS), a degenerative nerve disease, had a history of taking animal derived amino acid supplements and using protein powder products to build muscle. This is not a scientifically valid sample, but one hell of a coincidence. Of note, Campbell claims that MS is one of the consequences of using animal derived protein.)

The other problem with meat is the quantities we consume. Our forebearers had to hunt for their meat and so it was not as readily available as being on a supermarket shelf. It also had less saturated fat because the animals were leaner and more active than the pasture dwelling, sedentary, fattened cows from which we derive most of our meat today. 

The other problem with meat is how it is prepared. Processed meats like salami, bologna, pastrami, etc. have always been notoriously unhealthy because of added nitrites, a known carcinogen.

Furthermore, according to a new study involving more than 2,000 men performed by the University of Southern California and the Cancer Prevention Institute of California, pan-frying red meat may increase man's risk for prostate cancer by up to 40 percent.

"We found that men who ate more than 1.5 servings of pan-fried red meat per week increased their risk of advanced prostate cancer by 30 percent," study leader Mariana Stern, associate professor of preventive medicine at the Keck School of Medicine at USC, said in a university news release. "In addition, men who ate more than 2.5 servings of red meat cooked at high temperatures were 40 percent more likely to have advanced prostate cancer."

Hamburgers, an American favorite, in particular, were linked to an increased risk of prostate cancer, the study found. If people knew how most hamburger meat is prepared and processed here in the U.S., including the nature of fillers added, they would probably never eat a hamburger again. I know I've stopped eating hamburger's based on two videos I saw, one that dealt with the cardiovascular effects of the hamburger in regards to clotting arteries and another that demonstrated what is typically added to them such as other parts of the cow that should be discarded.

The reason for the increased rate of prostate cancer demonstrated by the USC study is not known and may have to do with the formation of DNA-damaging carcinogens -- known as heterocyclic amines -- during the cooking process.

So what's the bottom line?

In my study of longevity and the cultures that seem to enjoy the highest rates, one thing is certain. If they eat any meat at all, it is always as a side dish.

For the record, I am not a vegan and I have no plan anytime soon to become one. First, because as you know I am wild about wild salmon. Vegans don't eat any meat, fish, chicken or otherwise. Second, vegans need to supplement with Vitamin B12, which tells me that it's not natural for us to be vegans if we need a pill made in a plant to maintain our health. Third, because I'm not convinced that a bite here or there of some unprocessed red meat is the poison that some people would have you believe it is.  Fourth, most of the time I come across it when invited to a meal and I don't want to insult my hosts. Having a strong social network is more important to my overall good health and longevity that sticking to an uncompromising position on red meat.

For those looking for yet another reason to minimize red meat and/or have an ecological focus, scientists have calculated that reducing red meat consumption would decrease global warning. So if you've been keeping score, there are a lot more reasons to limit your red meat consumption than maintain it.

In conclusion, I don't think that the red meat we generally have available to us is too healthy from both a heart-wise and overall health perspective (and don't forget ecological). So if you insist on eating red meat, I suggest you think of it as a side dish.

Another Benefit of Wild Salmon

To say I am a wild salmon fan would be an understatement. The more I learn about it, the more excited I get. The other day I wrote about how I was in heaven consuming it in the great Northwest.

Here's another reason (for some a caution) to ingest wild salmon. Interestingly, I just learned about this not very well known benefit.  It's why I say you can never stop pursuing knowledge.

The omega-3 fatty acids in Salmon, eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA, 20 carbons and 5 double bonds), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA, 22 carbons and 6 double bonds), in addition to their positive anti-inflammatory, cholesterol lowering, and brain health effects, also have apparent anti-coagulant benefits that can prevent blood clots.

For most people that's a really good thing to have a natural source of blood thinning as protection against heart attacks and strokes. However, for people on anti-coagulants such as Coumadin, aspirin, Plavix, etc. this may be problematic. If you are on any anti-coagulant(s) and commonly consume salmon, my favorite food, please check with your doctor to determine if your medication needs to be adjusted.

Do not take fish oil pills for this purpose because they are not processed similarly in the body. Flax seeds, which also contain the α-linolenic acid (ALA, 18 carbons and 3 double bonds) omega-3 fatty acids are also noted to have similar benefits.

This is not intended as medical advice and consulting with your own physician is always advised.

Wild Salmon Country

Regular readers of my blog know that I haven't written much of late.  There are two reasons for my literary absence. First, I recently returned from visiting Seattle and Vancouver, Canada. For a wild salmon lover,  I had died and gone to heaven. I was in Wild Salmon country.

Here on this east-side of the country, it is a foregone conclusion that unless stated otherwise, any salmon sold in a restaurant is farm-raised. In Seattle and Vancouver, it is just the opposite. In fact, I got tired of having restaurateurs and wait staff look at me strangely when asked if the fish they were serving was wild. "Of course," was the repeated response.

It was nirvana. I even visited a place where you can see the salmon leap up out of the water and swim against the current. It was an amazing sight to behold. I just couldn't get enough of the wild fish and its incredible nutritional contents. Rich with omega-3s, Vitamin D, and the healthiest saturated fat, it is the perfect source of fatty acids and protein for almost any diet.  In fact, I love wild salmon's bounty so much that I carried about six pounds of an assorted variety back home with me.

The other reason for my absence was my ongoing work on my two forthcoming books. One book is about eating and living for longevity based on centenarian diets and lifestyles, and the second book is on the dangers of taking medical advice from celebrity doctors and the mass media.

Much progress has been made on both books and one publisher has already offered to publish one of the books. So stay tuned and I'll keep updating you when something worth writing about comes along.

Vitamin D Benefits Still Inconclusive

http://mdprevent.blogspot.com/2012/03/whats-big-deal-about-vitamin-d-lot.html


On Tuesday March 20, 2012 I wrote a blog (link above) about Vitamin D. Vitamin D, like other vitamins, is an essential part of human functioning. Over the past couple of years its value has been so overblown that many supplement marketers have advocated mega-dosing with it. Many of my first-time patients present with multiple forms of Vitamin D which they have added over the years, which they don't seem to need.

In 2010, the Institute of Medicine explicitly warned against mega-dosing with Vitamin D, but the message apparently never got out to the general public probably because the marketers are very successful in out-shouting reliable medical sources most of the time.

So here's my attempt to get the latest news out. The Endocrine Society, the world's oldest, largest, and most active organization devoted to research on hormones and the clinical practice of endocrinology, put together a task force to look at Vitamin D and basically concluded that "large randomized trials are needed to determine whether vitamin D can prevent or treat cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and other non-skeletal disorders."


The task force examined more than 300 studies of vitamin D's role in tissues other than bone and published their report as an official "scientific statement" in the June issue of Endocrine Reviews.

The task force's most important conclusion was that although many of the studies offered tantalizing hints that the substance helps maintain health in a variety of ways, there remains "little hard proof."

So there you have it. You don't need to supplement with Vitamin D in the absence of a known deficiency, but if you insist, take into consideration the amounts of Vitamin D you get from sunlight (15-20 minutes a day typically reported to produce the recommended daily allowance), wild salmon (2-3 times recommended amounts), Almond milk, regular milk and other dairy products, etc. and adjust accordingly to avoid mega-dosing.

Please share this with your friends so that everyone has the facts and aren't ruled by the fiction.

An educated patient is my favorite type.