Vegetarier haben ein wesentlich geringeres Risiko für fünf Krebsarten

Bacon was recently classified as a Group 1 carcinogen, same category as smoking and asbestos

Before people jump right to discounting this based on lifestyle / income associations, keep in mind there is a reasonable basis for this:

A) Unlike veganism, vegetarianism is a very common diet among South East Asians especially Hindus / Moderate Jains, of all income levels. So there is less of a concrete income association like there is for veganism.

B) There are plausible mechanisms, primarily that a high fiber diet is directly oppositional to colon and many other GI cancers by production of butyrate by fiber favoring microbes and by enhancing motility / clearance of excessive biofilm build up on GI mucous etc. Vegetarian diet is also associated with reduced nutritional excess; many cancers are favored (not necessarily caused) by not only caloric excess but things like protein and iron excess; iron in particular is of interest because it’s one nutrient that is almost impossible for the body to excrete unless you menstruate or donate blood etc. High iron stores in the body can not only support faster cancer growth (as iron availability is one key cell division bottleneck), but iron itself is very reactive / oxidative, able to form nitrosamines, AGES, etc. Other nutritional aspects of relevance are things like increased soy consumption being mildly protective against some breast cancers by isoflavones modulating estrogen (modulating meaning not necessarily pro or anti estrogenic, rather it „curves“ estrogenic signalling), and increased low-processed nut consumption results in higher Vitamin E levels, which are protective against a multitude of cancers (supplementation specifically has the opposite effect – Vitamin E is a double edged sword that can be degraded into harmful forms while stored as an extract, and is best received from food)

Think of it this way – vegetarian / vegan diets weaknesses are that they tend to be much less bioavailable for nutrients, which is a downside for things like athleticism or recovery from wasting illnesses, but this same downside is a strength for illnesses characterized by being stimulated by nutrient excess, like cancer, obesity.

Some disorders may occupy a gray area where vegetarian diets may be beneficial in some contexts or harmful in others. Alzheimers is thought to have a complex array of factors driving it’s onset and progression. On one hand, obesity is strongly correlated with it’s onset and severity. On the other hand, the nutritional deficit that can occur with vegetarian diets that aren’t carefully managed, can be detrimental to progression of Alzheimers as well, since some nutrients like B12, choline and carnosine which are high in meat diets, are supposedly moderately protective against Alzheimers.

It may be that a moderate approach, alternating between periods of vegetarianism and moderate low-processed meat consumption may be optimal, especially for those that can’t support a diverse vegetarian diet.

„vegetarians had a 21% lower risk of pancreatic cancer, a 12% lower risk of prostate cancer and a 9% lower risk of breast cancer compared with meat eaters….. also had a 28% lower risk of kidney cancer and a 31% lower risk of multiple myeloma“

The myeloma one surprised me. Also that colon cancer isn’t listed.