A study conducted in the UK has found that vegans take twice as many sick days as meat eaters.

Source: Daily Mail

The findings of this study goes against conventional thinking, though I’ve known for some time that veganism is not a healthier lifestyle. The difficulty in obtaining protein and the near-impossibility of finding alternative sources of necessary B vitamins (a deficiency of which can result in irreversible neurological damage) makes veganism a disastrous lifestyle choice.

By the looks of it, science is increasingly backing up the understanding that veganism is terrible for one’s health. This understanding may make it more difficult to conduct studies on the topic, as one can certainly question the ethics of asking someone to undertake a particular diet with the potential of causing neurological damage for science. However, the information we already have access to is sufficient to conclude that a vegan lifestyle should be avoided.

Still, those pushing the vegan lifestyle do succeed in winning impressionable minds to their cause. Among the selling points are treating vague symptoms like “brain fog” or “fatigue”, or appealing to an inordinate sense of guilt. “Brain fog” is a concept that is vague enough that one can easily make the case that just about anything can be blamed for it, and “fatigue” is a natural consequence of doing stuff. After going on a long hike, fatigue is normal. One can even experience fatigue after a few hours of typical activities. It’s not realistic to feel alert and focused all day, every day, no matter what your diet may be.

And the guilt thing a person should easily get over with a simple dose of realism: human beings are biological constructs suited to a predatory lifestyle. We’ve hunted and ate meat over the course of aeons, and our bodies are well-suited to this.

When a person goes against what’s worked well over the course of human history, it shouldn’t be surprising when things don’t go very well for that person. For example, that person may get to be in poorer health and require more sick days for convalescence as a result of their impractical diet.

What’s more, the study showed that vegans took more time off from work to recuperate from the cold or flu, minor ailments that most people just shrug right off. That vegans have a much more difficult time with what most of us consider a mere inconvenience doesn’t really make their diet seem very effective.

While vegans imagine that the rest of us like meat just to be mean, we eat it because it plays a critical role in maintaining good health. It certainly helps that it’s delicious.