Vegans cannot claim to have a healthier gut than meat-eaters, as research shows that people’s daily food choices are more important than whether they eat meat and dairy.
A study that looked at 656 vegans, comparing them to more than 1,000 vegetarians and nearly 20,000 meat eaters, found that those who have given up meat, dairy and eggs don’t necessarily have a healthier balance of gut bacteria.
Many vegans may think they have the best gut viruses – the bacteria that live inside us and are affected by our diet – that can prevent dangerous inflammation in the body linked to heart problems, strokes and cancer.
But carnivores who don’t eat an excessive amount of meat, and who also consume a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, have similar types of “good” bacteria living inside their gut as healthy vegans, the new research found.
Vegans with an unhealthy diet were found to have less beneficial gut bacteria.
This finding was based on a large group of people in the UK, who enrolled in the ZOE personal nutrition app and research study and recorded what they ate, before their gut bacteria were analyzed from stool samples. .
The study, involving researchers from King’s College London and published in the journal Nature Microbiology, also found that vegans had few gut bacteria that enter the body when people eat dairy products.
These insects are so important that they are included in some probiotic drinks to improve people’s intestinal health.
Pro-vegan activists have long advocated the benefits of plant-based diets for the millions of microbes in our guts. But experts say this may not be strictly the case.
Professor Nicola Segata, lead author of the study from the University of Trento in Italy, said: “Being vegan or vegetarian, unlike a carnivore, is not as important for gut bacteria as what you actually eat.”
‘When it comes to bacteria that live in the gut, this research suggests that there is no reason to be vegan or vegetarian and eliminate individual types of foods such as meat or dairy from your diet.
‘Meat and dairy, like any food, will not substantially change the balance of bacteria in the intestine in a negative way if consumed in moderation.
“Vegans who eat a lot of ultra-processed foods may have an unhealthy gut, while meat-eaters with a varied diet that includes many different plants may have a healthy gut.”
However, the authors note that, in practice, vegans and vegetarians tend to eat healthier than meat-eaters and have a better balance of gut bacteria.
The study, which analyzed the gut viruses of 21,561 people from the UK, US and Italy, found that vegans generally have more gut bacteria needed to break down the fiber in fruits and vegetables.
These gut bacteria typically produce short-chain fatty acids, which are linked to lower inflammation in the gut and body, so they may reduce the risk of heart attacks and strokes.
Unsurprisingly, meat eaters were found to have intestinal viruses that help digest meat and have been linked to an increased risk of bowel cancer (seen more often in people who eat too much red and processed meat) and an increased risk of intestinal inflammation. diseases such as Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis.
But vegans had lower levels than vegetarians and meat-eaters of bacteria that enter the body when people eat dairy, called Streptococcus thermophilus and lactic acid bacteria.
These bacteria are important for the immune system and reduce inflammation in the body, which could lower the risk of inflammatory bowel diseases such as ulcerative colitis, as well as inflammatory medical conditions such as arthritis and heart problems.
The research looked at both the variety of plant foods people ate and their quantity, and found that this was more closely related to the health of their gut bacteria than whether they were vegan, vegetarian or omnivorous.
Professor Segata said: “From a gut bacteria point of view, what we can generally recommend is that it is important to eat substantial amounts of as many different plant foods as possible, especially those rich in fibre, and that the diversity of foods is important.’