Meat is Making You Sick

November 23, 2020

Many people seem to think processed meat and red meat are healthy, few understand the negative effects it can have on your health.

Food tray with delicious salami pieces of sliced ham sausage tomatoes salad and vegetable – Meat platter with selection – Cutting sausage and cured meat. Photo credit: Lauren

Origins and Purpose

In daily life, we mostly eat processed meat such as ham, sausage, hot dog, pepperoni, roast beef, etc. We also eat red meat such as beef, lamb, pork, goat, etc. But have you ever thought: “Is this food healthy?” Processed meat is any meat to be modified to either extend its shelf life or improve its taste. This includes fermentation, smoking, curing, and salting. Processed meat is almost the same as red meat, but the only difference is that red meat is all mammalian muscle meat such as beef, pork, lamb, and mutton.

Processed meat or red meat has a good amount of protein, iron, vitamin, and zinc. As health research organizations say as humans we need lots of protein and iron due to protein support our muscle growth and healthy metabolism and iron is a mineral that is found in beef and pork which are red meat. However, eating processed meat or red meat can be a high risk for your health. Some meat is high in fat, which can raise cholesterol levels in the blood which can cause heart disease and diabetes. Consuming processed meat can also cause cancer.

Cancer

Consuming processed meat and red meat can be healthy for you, but both are highly associated with an increased risk of colorectal cancer, cancer that occurs in the rectum or colon. The National Cancer Institute states that most of the risk may be explained by the iron and fat content in red meat, or it can be salt and nitrites in the processed meat. Many studies and researchers have been involved with how processed meat and red meat can cause cancer. But not much evidence was found, due to most people’s health being normal after eating meat. Consuming a 50-gram portion of processed meat daily increases the risk of colorectal cancer by 18%, it also can be as dangerous as smoking cigarettes. The World Organization looked at over 800 studies from different countries and they have classified processed meat as a group one carcinogen, which is in the same group as cigarettes asbestos, and plutonium. Red meat is a group of two carcinogens.

In the U.S, one out of every four deaths is from cancer. Dr. Joel Kahn is a Cardiologist in Kahn Center for Cardiac Longevity says that “cancer is affecting about 70% of deaths.” Most cancers are caused by what we eat and what our diets are.

Diabetes

Where does diabetes come from? Most of you will say “sugar.” In fact, sugar is not the cause of diabetes. But the fat of meat is the cause. In the human body, when we consume fat meat you can find that there will be tiny particles of fat that are building up and causing insulin resistance, which means the sugar that is naturally from the foods that you are eating can’t get into the cells where it belongs. The cause of diabetes is the build-up of the amount of fat into the blood typical meat-based, animal-based diet. Dr. Neal Barne, a Clinical Researcher says “diabetes is not and never was caused by a high carbohydrate diet and it is not caused by eating sugary food.”

Most people don’t know most of the reason how diabetes is formed, most of the media almost exclusively blame the lack of exercise and eating sugary food as a cause of diabetes. This statement makes others think that they can eat all the food they want without having health problems. As Kip Anderson says, ⅔ of Americans are overweight (there’s a food issue) and that around the next 25 years one out of every three Americans will have diabetes. This can mean that people will not pay attention to what doctors are telling them. As Dr. Michael Greger, a Physician, states that most kids at age 10 already have fatty streaks in their arteries, the first stage of atherosclerosis leading to heart attacks, strokes. This can mean that as a young kid, parents don’t know what processed meat can do to your health and this leads to children loving the taste of the food and getting addicted. American Diabetes Association Dr.Robert Ratner estimates that approximately 350 million people have diabetes. In this world it is hard to get a health treatment because all one in three Medicare dollars is spent on the care of people with diabetes, one in ten heal care dollars is spent on people with diabetes.

Diets

Professional doctors say having a limited amount of eating red meat and processed meat could make you healthier. It’s not good to eat meat daily, since we’ve seen it highly increases your health risk. You can improve your health by eating more chicken and white meat. You could still eat all the food in the world, but the World Health Organization recommends having a balanced amount of eating red meat and eating your veggies. Having a good diet can help you lose weight and gain more energy, it also can reduce your risk of disease such as diabetes, blood pressure, and cholesterol and it can improve your mood.

Work Cited