Questioning the Meat-Cancer Link

The link between food and health is often painted in broad sweeps and generalizations. Fats are bad, salt is bad, lean protein is good. You know what I mean. While over-simplifications like these may reflect a level of truth, they span too wide a spectrum and encompass more than they should. If we hope to discuss the link between food and health in a meaningful way, and to create meals that nourish us without being unnecessarily limiting, generalizations should give way to distinctions.

Consider the question of meat and whether or not its consumption is linked to a variety of cancers. The National Cancer Institute says that it is. So do the National Institute of Health, Harvard University, the World Health Organization, and the American Institute for Cancer Research.

To these and others, I say, we should all say, tell us what you mean by meat. For as long as there have been people, there have been meat eaters, and these meat eaters didn’t always get cancer. So, we need qualitative distinctions that will help us make sense of the link:

• How were the animals raised? Are we talking about meat from cows that spent their lives on concrete under artificial lighting, eating genetically-altered corn and soy, and receiving antibiotics and hormones before being trucked long distance for slaughter? Or do we mean meat from cows that lived on grass in the sunshine, without medication or grain supplements, who were then slaughtered on the farm or nearby? These are sources of two very different meats.

  What varieties of meat are we referring to and was the meat processed? Do we mean muscle meat, organs, or stock made from bones? Are we discussing processed meats like cold cuts and sausage, or unprocessed meats without additives or preservatives?

  How was the meat cooked? Was the meat charred on a grill? Baked or broiled at high temperatures? Or was it boiled or roasted at a low temperature?

  How much meat was consumed? Do we mean large portions of meat served as an entree or small portions served as an accompaniment? Meat eaten daily, weekly, or only now and then? Which of these is linked to cancer?

With so many unanswered questions, and with an obvious need for solid information, it can be a challenge to resolve this issue for ourselves. Whenever I’m unsure of what to eat or what preparation methods to use, I look to the past, to a time when people didn’t get the diseases we’re trying to avoid. In this case, the past provides a key piece of information. The incidence of cancer among traditional people, hunter-gatherers and those living in non-industrial cultures, was exceedingly rare. These people ate both cooked and raw meat and, because our genes still bear traces of our hunter-gatherer heritage, they were also our genetic brethren.

Inuits

Let’s start with the Inuits, who have been widely studied. As I learned from Stephan Guyenet, Ph.D., Vilhjalmur Stefansson was a 19th century anthropologist and arctic explorer who undertook a search for cancer among the Inuit in Canada in Alaska. These are people who, at the time, consumed a diet of 80% fat, nearly all from raw and cooked fish and meat. They were physically active for part of the year, and relatively inactive in the coldest months. They also tended to be lean. Stefansson found no trace of cancer among them. American and European physicians were inspired by these results and conducted their own search from 1850-1920, studying 25,000-50,000 Inuits a year. They also found no trace of cancer. Incidentally, they also found no heart disease, obesity, tooth decay or diabetes. You may be wondering if the Inuit had physiological differences that allowed them to eat this way. Stefansson wondered this as well and so in the early 1900s, under the supervision of the American Medical Association, he and his fellow researchers subsisted for several years on the Inuit diet, remaining healthy and strong with no sign of disease.

Other Traditional Cultures

Hundreds of other hunter-gatherer cultures have been studied, and while all obtained a portion of their calories from meat, many up to half their calories or more, cancer was rare if it existed at all. Take Sir Robert McCarrison’s study of the Asian Hunzas; he found the 11,000 people he examined to be entirely cancer-free. In contrast to the Inuits, they ate a plant-based diet but supplemented it with grass-fed dairy and a small amount of meat, including organ meat. There is also Dr. Eugene Payne, who over 25 years studied 60,000 natives in Brazil and Ecuador and found no evidence of cancer. And in 1913, Dr. Albert Schweitzer set up a hospital in Gabon, West Africa where he examined more than 10,000 natives and likewise found them to be cancer-free.

My Conclusion

There are many more studies and examples, but we all possess common sense and can ask questions and seek answers ourselves. My own research turned up this information. The world’s highest levels of beef are currently consumed in Uruguay, Argentina, and Hong Kong. I looked at beef because red meat is the variety most often implicated in cancer studies. But the world’s highest rates of colorectal cancer, the type most often linked to red meat consumption, are reported to be in Hungary, South Korea, and Slovakia. If meat is carcinogenic, shouldn’t the highest rate of meat-related cancer be in Uruguay or Argentina? Uruguay is 16th on the list and Argentina isn’t even in the top 25.

We all need to be wary of generalizations when they conflict with common sense, with regard to this question and all questions. No matter what experts tell us, our current understanding of food and its link to health is rudimentary; there is much we still don’t know. When we have questions, it can help to look to the past, and to respect and value the wisdom within the food ways and lifestyles of people who didn’t contract the diseases we’re trying to avoid.

It’s likely there is a link between the consumption of certain kinds of meat and cancer: meat that is charred or cooked at a high temperature, for example, or meats like cold cuts and sausages that are highly processed. It might be the chemicals in the meat, or it could be the processing methods or the way the animals are raised. It is also possible there are other factors at work when modern meat eaters get cancer. Regardless, the studies of traditional people and our common sense tell us that it is possible to be a meat eater and remain cancer free.

Copyright, Ellen Arian, Ellen’s Food & Soul

Living Foods

We are all made up of trillions of living microorganisms. Although it may sound surprising, this is good news because these microorganisms keep us alive and well. They live inside our bodies and on our bodies, and the largest colonies reside in the digestive tract, which comprises the core of our immune system. When we make these microorganisms welcome within us, they flourish. And when they do, they help our bodies break down the foods we eat to absorb their nutrients. They also bolster our immunity to keep us strong and well.

One of the most important ways we have of replenishing and strengthening the population of microorganisms inside of us is by eating living foods, also called fermented foods. Fermentation transforms what we eat, preserving it and making it more nutritious and digestible. The food then transforms us.

Around the world, people prize fermented foods for their contribution to good health and long life. Our modern American culture, however, has lost much of its connection to fermented foods, which can be hard to come by, and where they are still found, we often don’t recognize them or value their importance.

Put simply, living fermented foods matter. They have the potential to impact our well being in a significant way and are worth getting to know. They're also worth appreciating for their power to support a level of good health that is vibrant, deep, and lasting.

Defining Living Fermented Foods

Fermentation gives us chocolate, wine, beer, bread, and sauerkraut. It also transforms milk and cream into yogurt, cheese, cultured butter, and buttermilk. For more adventurous eaters, fermented foods may include tempeh, miso, kimchee, beet kvass, kefir and more. In truth, a great many of the foods we consider “gourmet” are the product of fermentation.

It’s important to know that not all fermented foods are still alive when we consume them. To be living—that is, to provide us with the benefits that living microorganisms offer—they must not have been heated to the point at which microorganisms die. So, sourdough bread is alive before it’s baked, and even though it can be highly nutritious, it is not a living food when we eat it. Likewise, fermented foods like pickles or sauerkraut that are bottled and heat-processed to remain stable on a shelf are not living foods. And sauerkraut or pickles made with vinegar may taste good, but they are more correctly preserved foods; they are neither living nor fermented.

Some fermented foods bear tell-tale signs that they are alive. Miso and fermented vegetables like sauerkraut, kimchee, and pickles are refrigerated when you buy them. Fermented vegetables contain herbs, spices, and salt as their only other ingredients; vinegar is not be listed on the label. Yogurt, yogurt shakes, and buttermilk say “contains live cultures” on the container. For all of these to remain potent living foods, you need to refrain from heating them.

The Many Ways That Living Fermented Foods Improve Our Health

Before our ancestors had refrigerators, fermentation was their primary means of preserving milk, cream, vegetables, fish, and meat. It worked as a natural preservative by using microorganisms to break down foods, a process that happens to be toxic to food-spoiling microbes. Now that we have refrigeration, there are other reasons to treasure these foods; the main one is that fermentation is a living process capable of changing, in important ways, the character of our gut and what we eat. More specifically, fermentation:

• Improves digestion. Most of us have used or consumed antibiotics, processed foods, sugar, and chlorinated water. All of these make it difficult for the diverse population of microorganisms within us to flourish. Fermented foods dramatically improve digestion by promoting the growth of healthy intestinal flora. This enables us to absorb more nutrients from the foods we eat so, over time, we get a higher level of nutrition from the same quality and quantity of food.

• Makes foods more digestible. Fermented foods are essentially pre-digested, which makes it easier for us to absorb their nutrients. Some people who don’t tolerate milk, for example, can eat yogurt without difficulty.

• Makes foods more nutritious. Fermentation creates new nutrients in foods. More specifically, as the microorganisms in fermented foods mature through their full life cycle, they create vitamins that were not there before, including B vitamins like folic acid, riboflavin, niacin, thiamin, and biotin.

• Strengthens immunity. Since 70%-80% of our immune system resides in the digestive tract, a healthy digestive system is the key to a properly-functioning and robust immune system. It's also our first line of defense against disease.

• Removes toxins from food. Fermentation reduces or eliminates toxins in food. Cassava, for example, contains cyanide until it is fermented. Many whole grains and beans contain phytic acid, which is an anti-nutrient that limits our ability to absorb and retain minerals. Soaking, which is a form of fermentation, neutralizes phytic acid.

• Makes foods more flavorful. Fermentation changes the flavor, aroma, and texture of foods in wonderful ways. Consider how milk becomes tangy yogurt or the way fresh, crunchy cucumbers turn into sour dill pickles.

Living fermented foods are ideally taken as condiments, and a small portion a day seems to be enough to reap their many benefits.

What About Probiotics?

A high-quality probiotic supplement may be useful for a period of months if you are ill, have been on antibiotics, tend not to remember to eat fermented foods regularly, or have weak digestion.

Our grocery store shelves are also lined with foods and drinks that have probiotics added to them, but these seem to be a costly marketing ploy. They approximate old-fashioned living fermented foods that contain diverse microorganisms, but the fermentation process is missing, and the process is the point. If you need a probiotic supplement, it would be better to find a good one and take it as medicine.

Living fermented foods are natural probiotics. They sow your inner garden with seeds that have been used for all time and, unlike manufactured foods, have always been a part of our culinary tradition.

Finding Living Fermented Foods

Fermentation is generally not an industrial process; it can’t be in our litigious society where foods have to be sterilized with chemicals or heat to remain stable during transport and for long periods on store shelves. Further, making fermented foods is as much an art as it is a science, which makes the process difficult to standardize; each batch is unique. For these reasons, living fermented foods are best made at home or on small farms by people who care about quality and tradition.

The best way to obtain living fermented foods is to look for them at farmers’ markets or in the refrigerated sections of local health food stores. You can also make them yourself, which is not difficult. You might look at making your own fermented foods as a way of embracing the living energy in your own environment, building inner well being out of the living forces around you.

My favorite book on this topic is Wild Fermentation, by Sandor Katz. If you are at all intrigued by the idea of home fermentation, you will want to have this book on your shelf. And if you decide to give fermenting a try, consider starting with yogurt. When you make it yourself, which takes little time, the quality and flavor are superior to that of even the best commercial yogurt.

Copyright, Ellen Arian, Ellen’s Food & Soul