A few days back, we had reported of the cancer-related benefits of vegetarians over non-vegetarians. Similarly, an updated position paper on vegetarian diet states that following a well planned diet may prove to be beneficial, healthy and nutritious for everyone. More so, such a diet may even prevent or treat various chronic diseases. This interesting paper was released by the American Dietetic Association.
It was stated that a healthy vegetarian diet may be appropriate for people during their various lifecycles – infancy, childhood, athletes, pregnancy, lactation etc. Evidently, vegetarian diets are noted to have a beneficial health effect on people. It seems that such diets may aid in lowering one’s risk of heart attack, lowering blood pressure and blood cholesterol among others.
Apart from this it was also noted that the people following a vegetarian diet often seem to have a lower body mass index, and also seem to have a lesser risk of developing cancer. It was also stated that vegetarian diets most often seem to have lower saturated fat and cholesterol; with higher amounts of vitamin C and E, magnesium, folate, dietary fiber and various other phytochemicals.
It is presumed that these health benefits may be the reason for the health advantages of the people following such a healthy and a well-planned diet. Apart from this, a healthy vegetarian diet was also believed to be nutritionally adequate in pregnancy. It was also associated with a reduced risk of dying due to ischemic heart diseases. Vegetarian diets are also presumed to be effective and have protective factors against the development of cancer.
The authors have stated that registered dietitians could possibly give the required information about crucial nutrients required by people, suggest alterations in one’s diet to fulfill deficiencies, and also provide beneficial information to supplement oneself in the different lifecycles.
These findings have been presented in the issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association.