Last Updated on November 9, 2023 by Fasting Planet
You just started on the vegetarian diet and you’ve got to say, so far, you’re really enjoying it. You wonder whether, with time, your vegetarianism might shift to veganism or if you should keep your diet just the way it is. Is it better to be a vegetarian or a vegan?
Vegetarians and vegans avoid red meat that may lead to heart disease and some cancers, so in that regard, they’re both good diets to follow. Vegans may have lower cholesterol by omitting eggs and they could find it somewhat easier to lose weight by eating plant-based foods, but they may develop nutrient deficiencies too.
In this article, we’ll first examine the health benefits of vegan and vegetarian diets, then the potential downsides. This will help paint a clearer picture of which diet is considered better. You’re not going to want to miss it!
Is the Vegan or Vegetarian Diet Better? The Health Benefits of Both
First, let’s start with the good stuff, as there are plenty of health benefits that vegans and vegetarians alike experience.
Weight Loss
Plant-based foods are naturally lower in calories than red meat, so when you also quit poultry and even dairy, it makes sense that weight loss will follow.
Even if you only adhere to the rules of vegetarianism, Harvard Health says that vegetarian diets are healthier in other ways besides being low-cal. For instance, vegetarians consume more plant chemicals or phytochemicals (including flavonoids and carotenoids) as well as increased amounts of magnesium, potassium, folic acid, dietary fiber, and vitamins. Their diets are also typically lower in cholesterol and saturated fat than an average meat-eater.
So who might lose more weight through their eating habits, vegans or vegetarians? The answer is vegans.
The International Journal of Obesity in 2006 studied more than 21,000 people over a span of five years to track their weight gain. Some participants were vegan, others vegetarian, and the rest fish and meat-eaters.
Vegans weighed less than meat-eaters, which is unsurprising, but the same was also true of vegetarians, the study found. Now, we do want to mention that the vegans in the study didn’t necessarily lose weight, but rather, gained the least amount of weight.
The study participants who did lose weight were those who cut back on animal products, which is still saying something.
Another study on the topic, this time from a 2018 publication of the journal Nutrition & Diabetes, had a much smaller sample size, only 75 participants. They were all overweight and tasked with losing weight by eating meat or going vegan. The study lasted for 16 weeks, after which the participants were weighed again. The vegan group had much less abdominal fat and weighed less.
Lower Diabetes Risk
The consumption of red meat elevates your diabetes risk, and why that is might be due to several reasons. The amino acids in red meat, which are especially high, can affect your blood sugar metabolism, making your body more resistant to insulin. Red meat is also rich in iron, which may raise your insulin resistance by introducing more oxidative stress.
By cutting down on how much red meat you eat or even quitting it altogether, does your diabetes risk similarly go down? Yes, it does! This 2018 study from Current Diabetes Reports notes that you can reduce your diabetes risk by up to 35 percent provided you’ve followed the vegetarian diet your entire life.
What if you’re a new vegetarian? You might be in even better shape, says the data. If you’ve spent most of your life as a non-vegetarian but cut out meat, fish, and poultry, your diabetes risk decreases by as much as 53 percent!
As for veganism and its effects on diabetes risk, the Journal of Geriatric Cardiology, in a 2017 publication, had this to say: “There is a general consensus that the elements of a whole-foods plant-based diet–legumes, whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and nuts, with limited or no intake of refined foods and animal products–are highly beneficial for preventing and treating type 2 diabetes.”
That makes the vegetarian and vegan diets about equally as beneficial for avoiding the onset of diabetes.
Reduced Cancer Risk
If you read our eBook on animal products and byproducts, you may remember how we went in-depth on how red meat likely causes cancer. If not, we’ll explain it quickly for you now (although you really should read the eBook). The chemicals used to prepare processed meat are what may make it a carcinogen.
As a reminder, processed meat includes canned meat, jerky, bologna, sausage, lunch meat, ham, bacon, salami, pepperoni, and hot dogs, so it’s a lot of different types of meat.
This Mayo Clinic article mentions a study involving 70,000 participants with different diets. The ones who ate no meat and animal products had the lowest cancer risk. That would make the vegan diet your safest bet here considering that some vegetarian diets allow for the occasional consumption of meat.
Heart Health
You only have one heart, so you must treat it well to keep it steady and strong for years to come. Eating red meat is the opposite of maintaining your heart health. The carnitine and choline in red meat lead to the production of trimethylamine-N-oxide or TMAO when broken down. The more TMAO in your system, the higher your heart disease risk, yes, but also your chances of having a stroke or heart attack.
Eating plant-based is the key to heart health and longevity, as this Medical News Today article proves. Researchers at the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine reported that your risk of high blood pressure is 34 percent lower when on a plant-based diet.
More so, you can slash your chances of having coronary heart disease by 40 percent and your cardiovascular disease death risk by the same amount.
The Potential Health Disadvantages of Veganism and Vegetarianism
As healthful as eating vegetarian or vegan can be, you should be aware of some possible downsides of these diets.
Nutrient Deficiencies
Vegans are much more likely to experience nutrient deficiencies than vegetarians, as a vegetarian’s diet is relatively well-rounded. Nutrients like taurine, heme iron, docosahexaenoic acid or DHA, vitamin D3, carnosine, creatine, and vitamin B12 cannot be obtained through plant-based food.
That’s not to say a vegan can’t take supplements to ensure all their nutritional needs are met, as they absolutely can. New vegans who aren’t sure which nutrients they’re getting out of the foods they eat may be more likely to have nutrient deficiencies though. The symptoms can include weight gain, depression, forgetfulness, feet and hand tingling, dry skin, and lack of energy.
You can see how some of these symptoms seem innocuous, well, at least until they aren’t.
Isolation
When you cut meat out of your diet, a lot of other facets of your life will change. You may have a hard time planning meals with your family or partner. When you go out with friends to a restaurant, you tend to find yourself stuck with a salad because there are so few plant-based options on a lot of menus.
As a vegan, these effects can be even more pronounced. You may have to start shopping at new grocery stores to buy foods that are allowable on your diet. Your menu options are even more limited, which makes social eating hard.
Possible Mood Changes
Most research about the mood effects of the vegan and vegetarian diets are very positive, with some studies even suggesting you can reduce depressive symptoms through plant-based eating. Yet other research posits that the opposite can be true, such as this 2018 publication of the Journal of Affective Disorders.
The study featured participants from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children or ASLPAC, 9,668 people in all. Some were pregnant women and the rest were male partners. The data concludes that vegetarians were more depressed compared to their non-vegetarian counterparts.
There are a few things to mention about this study. For one, all results were self-reported and thus may not be completely accurate.
Second, the researchers mentioned that they considered the effect of many health outcomes. These include alcohol and cigarette consumption, past childhood psychiatric contact, family depression history, religion, how many kids the family had, housing tenure, employment status, marital status, and age.
If you notice, pregnancy is not a factor that’s accounted for. Postpartum depression can affect women who have just given birth as well as several months afterward. We don’t know how pregnant the women were in this study, so that’s something to keep in mind. Although the male partners wouldn’t be affected directly by postpartum depression, the mood changes of their female partners could possibly impact their own mental health.
That’s not to discount the study, but there are some variables that weren’t addressed that should have been.
Low-Quality Diet by Eating Vegan Junk Food
The last possible downside of being a vegan or vegetarian is veering off-course from healthful choices. People tend to associate these plant-based diets with salads, salads, salads. There is just as much vegan junk food as there is non-vegan junk food.
Losing weight is not automatic as a vegetarian or vegan, especially if you eat junk food often. It’s okay to enjoy junk food on occasion, but not every day, and certainly not as a big part of your diet. At that point, your health is not too much better off than a meat-eater.
Conclusion
Being a vegan might be slightly better for your health than eating a vegetarian diet, but that shouldn’t dissuade you from wanting to become a vegetarian. Any diet that’s meat-free is a good one, as you’re reducing your risk of heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.
Vegetarianism can be a great introduction into the world of veganism or it could be a diet that you maintain going forward. By making nutritious choices as a vegetarian, you can live your best and healthiest life yet!