Clipmarks | mykoo's 'meat' clips

Vegetarianism: the Choice of the 'More Intelligent' Child

Sun, 17 Dec 2006 22:00:47 GMT

clipped by: invictus
clipper's remarks: I could clip this just for the first sentence: "It's official - vegetarians really are smarter." Well, what can we say, thanks.

Clip Source: www.commondreams.org

Vegetarianism: the Choice of the 'More Intelligent' Child

It's official - vegetarians really are smarter. But it is not because of what they eat. Bright children are more likely to reject meat and opt to become vegetarians when they grow up, a study has shown. Clever veggies are born not made.

The finding helps explain how a team of vegetarians won the BBC Test the Nation competition in September, when they beat off competition from six other teams including butchers, public school pupils and footballers' wives to achieve the highest overall IQ score.

The top scoring individual in the contest, Marie Bidmead, 68, a mother of five from Churcham, Gloucester, was also a vegetarian. "I think it shows we veggies are good thinkers. We think about what we eat for a start," she said.

Researchers from the University of Southampton who conducted the study agree. They suggest that vegetarians are more thoughtful about what they eat. But they say it is unclear whether bright children choose to become vegetarians for the health benefits or for other reasons, such as a concern for animals, or as a lifestyle choice.

The scientists began investigating the link between IQ and vegetarianism because people with higher intelligence have a lower risk of heart disease, which has long puzzled doctors.

A vegetarian diet is associated with a lower cholesterol level, lower blood pressure and less obesity - all risk factors for heart disease. The researchers wondered if this could explain the health advantage of having a high IQ. They cite Benjamin Franklin, the 18th-century statesman and scientist, who said that a vegetarian diet results in a "greater clearness of head and quicker comprehension". He may not have realised that this was because of whom was eating rather than what was eaten.

Tags: eating, health, intelligence, vegetarian

Kids with high IQs grow up to be vegetarians

Sat, 16 Dec 2006 05:30:14 GMT

clipped by: gingembre
clipper's remarks: "Vegetarians were more likely to be female, of higher social class and better educated, but IQ was still a significant predictor of being vegetarian after adjustment for these factors, Gale said.

"Vegetarian diets are associated with lower cardiovascular disease risk in a number of studies, so these findings suggest that a such a diet may help to explain why children or adolescents with a higher IQ have a lower risk of coronary heart disease as adults," Gale said."

Not everyone agrees, of course. But it makes a lot of sense to me.

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

Kids With High IQs Grow Up to Be Vegetarians

By Steven Reinberg
HealthDay Reporter Fri Dec 15, 2:01 PM ET

FRIDAY, Dec. 15 (HealthDay News) -- As a child's IQ rises, his taste for meat in adulthood declines, a new study suggests.

British researchers have found that children's IQ predicts their likelihood of becoming vegetarians as young adults -- lowering their risk for cardiovascular disease in the process. The finding could explain the link between smarts and better health, the investigators say.

"Brighter people tend to have healthier dietary habits," concluded lead author Catharine Gale, a senior research fellow at the MRC Epidemiology Resource Centre of the University of Southampton and Southampton General Hospital.

Recent studies suggest that vegetarianism may be associated with lower cholesterol, reduced risk of obesity and heart disease. This might explain why children with high IQs tend to have a lower risk of heart disease in later life.

The report is published in the Dec. 15 online edition of the British Medical Journal.

"We know from other studies that brighter children tend to behave in a healthier fashion as adults -- they're less likely to smoke, less likely to be overweight, less likely to have high blood pressure and more likely to take strenuous exercise," Gale said. "This study provides further evidence that people with a higher IQ tend to have a healthier lifestyle."

In the study, Gale's team collected data on nearly 8,200 men and women aged 30, whose IQ had been tested when they were 10 years of age.

"Children who scored higher on IQ tests at age 10 were more likely than those who got lower scores to report that they were vegetarian at the age of 30," Gale said.

The researchers found that 4.5 percent of participants were vegetarians. Of these, 2.5 percent were vegan, and 33.6 percent said they were vegetarian but also ate fish or chicken.

There's more on vegetarian diets at the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Tags: vegetarian, diet, food, health, iq, intelligence, research

UN: Cattle #1 Cause of GLOBAL WARMING

Sun, 10 Dec 2006 10:47:42 GMT

clipped by: mykoo
clipper's remarks: Article dated November 30th, 2006. Click the link to read the whole article

For more resources, simply GOOGLE "meat + global warming"

Clip Source: www.dnaindia.com

NEW YORK: Who is contributing most to global warming? Dumb cattle and not emissions from factories and power plants, says the United Nations.

The increasing world population, a new UN report warns, would lead to further increase in the number of livestock as demand for meat and milk increases and that would mean emission of more greenhouse gases.

Not only that. Cattle are also a major contributor to land degradation and pollution of water, the report says.

"The environmental costs per unit of livestock production must be cut by one half, just to avoid the level of damage worsening beyond its present level," it warns.

When emissions from land use and land use change are included, the livestock sector accounts for 9 per cent of carbon dioxide deriving from human-related activities, but produces a much larger share of even more harmful greenhouse gases. It generates 65 per cent of human-related nitrous oxide, which has 296 times the Global Warming Potential (GWP) of carbon dioxide. Most of this comes from manure.

And it accounts for respectively 37 per cent of all human-induced methane (23 times as warming as carbon dioxide), which is largely produced by the digestive system of ruminants, and 64 per cent of ammonia, which contributes significantly to acid rain.

Stressing that cattle-rearing generates more global warming greenhouse gases as measured in carbon dioxide equivalent, the United Nations has called for improved animal diets to reduce enteric fermentation and consequent methane emissions.

With increased prosperity, people are consuming more meat and dairy products every year, the report notes. Global meat production is projected to more than double from 229 million tonnes in 1999/2001 to 465 million tonnes in 2050, while milk output is set to climb from 580 to 1043 million tonnes.

Tags: health, meat, global warming, cattle, united nations, politics, vegetarianism

Eating Meat Could Destroy the Planet

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 03:04:40 GMT

clipped by: mykoo

Clip Source: www.emagazine.com

Organizations from Greenpeace to the Union of Concerned Scientists, World Bank and the Pentagon, all agree that global warming is, perhaps, the most serious threat to our imperiled planet. The Pentagon report, for example, states that climate change in the form of global warming “should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a U.S. national security concern,” higher even than terrorism.

What many people do not know, however, is that the production of meat also significantly increases global warming. Cow farms produce millions of tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane per year, the two major greenhouse gases that together account for more than 90 percent of U.S. greenhouse emissions, substantially contributing to “global scorching.”

Geophysicists Gidon Eshel and Pamela Martin from the University of Chicago concluded that changing one’s eating habits from the Standard American Diet (SAD) to a vegetarian diet does more to fight global warming than switching from a gas-guzzling SUV to a fuel-efficient hybrid car. Of course, you can do both — and more! It has been said that “where the environment is concerned, eating meat is like driving a huge SUV.... Eating a vegetarian diet is like driving a mid-sized car [or a reasonable sedan, according to Eshel]. And eating a vegan diet (no dairy, no eggs) is like riding a bicycle or walking. Shifting away from SUVs and SUV-style diets, to much more energy-efficient alternatives, is key to fighting the warming trend.

According to the United Nations Environment Programme’s Unit on Climate Change, “There is a strong link between human diet and methane emissions from livestock.” The 2004 State of the World is more specific regarding the link between animals raised for meat and global warming: “Belching, flatulent livestock emit 16 percent of the world’s annual production of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas.”

Tags: health, meat, global warming, vegetarianism, vegetables, science, diet

Taco Bell E. Coli Sickens 39 in New Jersey and New York

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 21:27:56 GMT

clipped by: mykoo

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

At least 39 people in central New Jersey and on Long Island were infected, two of them critically, with E. coli bacteria in an outbreak of food poisoning last month that has been traced to the Taco Bell restaurant chain, health officials in New York and New Jersey said yesterday.

It was the nation’s most serious outbreak of E. coli toxins since mid-September, when the same strain of the bacteria, linked to packages of contaminated spinach grown in California, killed three people and infected more than 200 in 26 states.

Taco Bell, which serves burritos, quesadillas and other Mexican specialties in 5,800 outlets in the United States and generated sales of $6.2 billion last year, voluntarily closed one outlet in South Plainfield, N.J., where 20 customers and 2 workers became infected, and eight other restaurants on Long Island, in what it called a temporary precaution to sanitize and restock outlets where E. coli had been traced.

Epidemiologists in New Jersey and New York said that no new cases had been reported since Wednesday but that they were continuing to monitor the situation. Taco Bell said it was cooperating with state investigators, who were still searching for the ingredient that carried the contamination. “Health officials have indicated that there is no immediate threat and whatever may have occurred has most likely passed through the system,” said Greg Creed, Taco Bell’s president.

Some health officials acknowledged that an announcement of the contamination had been delayed in New Jersey for several days, in part over concerns for possible overreaction by the public. Some critics questioned the delay.

Tags: taco bell, meat, e. coli, health