Meat might be murder, but it feels so good
TO judge by queues at the chippy and headlines about deep-fried Easter eggs, we are not the most sophisticated diners in the global canteen. We may be mocked for our carrot-tops, but the sighting of a Scot publicly chomping on a raw vegetable would be rare enough to merit a photo spread in National Geographic – or so you’d think, given the bad press our eating habits attract. Yesterday’s news therefore came as something of a surprise.
Figures from NHS Scotland have shown a marked rise in thyroid disease in the past decade. This is linked to the number who consume a vegetarian diet that is also rich in soya, thereby inhibiting the uptake of iron, which is essential for the thyroid.
Getting enough iron has always been the main drawback of cutting out meat. Soya, meanwhile, seemed a good alternative source of protein. Now, according to Dr Damian Dowling of New Medicine Group, in London, “There are things in soya that can limit the body’s intake of iron and other important nutrients and minerals. Soya can disrupt the hormone function, particularly in women, and can disrupt the thyroid directly.”
Putting aside for a moment the gravity of this evidence, until these figures were released I had never guessed there were so many tender-hearted, vegetable-friendly folk. Now a lapsed vegetarian, I used to think we were an endangered species, one that many carnivores would prefer to encounter only on the extinct list. Certainly, the difficulty of finding a meal in a restaurant that wouldn’t have left a hamster ravenous or that did not close one’s arteries even before pudding arrived suggested we were rare. As did the astonishment of one’s fellow guests at discovering someone so eccentric among them. If nothing else, the NHS figures have given me a belated sense of community.
The news that a vegetarian diet may be bad for you is not, of course, new, but compared to the number of stories about the malign side effects of meat, the health scales have previously been heavily tipped towards vegetarianism. And yet, it’s often
I won’t be the only one who knows a vegetarian who has sky-high cholesterol
no more than a theoretical advantage. I won’t be the only one who knows a veggie who is overweight or has sky-high cholesterol, or is always catching flu. While cooking without meat and fish can provide everything a body needs, making sure it does involves a talent for culinary invention to rival Heston Blumenthal, not to mention a degree in nutrition. When I was a broccoli hugger, I had neither. Then again, I was as full of iron as a golf bag, despite being used as a human balloon by countless GPS over the years who couldn’t believe a woman so pale who didn’t eat meat wasn’t in some way chemically deficient. To my chagrin, though, it was for health reasons that I recently abandoned the moral high ground, after more than quarter of a century on that lofty peak, and sank my teeth into a leg of lamb. It was delicious.
Eating fish again, some time earlier, hadn’t proved troublesome – after all, I told myself, I could thwack one on the head if I were starving without too much soul-searching. It was going back to meat that felt momentous, and treacherous. I still can’t meet the eyes of sheep grazing in a field, and when a truck carrying cattle to slaughter drives past, I look away rather than making a rude gesture as of old.
The problem facing anyone who has qualms about eating something that once breathed, yet thinks they might be healthier for it, is how to offset guilt with selfinterest. How can one person’s wellbeing be placed higher than that of the thousands of creatures they’ll consume over a lifetime? And do you really want to support an industry that is inhumane and wasteful?
For those who believe we are a higher species, there is no quandary. But if like me you have put meat back on to your menu, or are considering doing so despite thinking it’s not quite right, the dilemma remains. If only the issue were more simple. Yet I’ve found one thing that is: I feel a lot better now than I have in a long time.