◊ By Lakshmi Venkataraman & Radhika Rao

 Visit ORGANIC SHOP by Pure & Eco India

Recent years have seen a dual focus on the risks of public health diseases from animal production facilities, and simultaneously, on health-centric consumption habits.

At the centre of both of these movements is the role of animal-based foods – meat, dairy, and eggs, in production and consumption.

Increased intensification of animal production facilities creates breeding grounds for the spread of zoonotic diseases. Recent outbreaks are a testimony to the fragility of our current animal-based food systems.

Consumers are prioritising the healthiness of their food choices, and are becoming more aware of the increased risks of contracting long-term lifestyle diseases through consumption of animal foods. The ongoing pandemic has forced us to introspect more deeply about these issues.

The past year has shown that consumers now, more than ever, are looking to make the switch to healthier foods, while the animal agriculture industry experienced more scrutiny on its practices that create unsafe and hazardous environments.

The demand for animal protein in Asia is set to increase exponentially in the coming years, with India and China in the lead. It is estimated that India will require 38 million tonnes of protein to meet growing needs, contributing 16% of global increase in demand by 2025, much of which will come from animals.

However, the production of meat, dairy, and eggs is responsible for some of the world’s gravest planetary health issues, driving land-use change, ocean dead zones and contributing to greenhouse gas emissions.

According to the FAO, animal agriculture is “one of the most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale, from local to global.”

Moreover, the unhygienic, crowded environments in which these animals are raised presents an urgent public health risk. The expansion of land to accommodate for raising billions of animals, and growing crops to feed them requires clearing forest areas – bringing humans and domestic animals closer to wild animals, increasing the chances for disease transfer and amplification.

Furthermore, the increasingly industrial set-up of production, where animals are so tightly packed that they can barely move, can greatly increase the rate of transmission within a production facility.

This also means that because of the close proximity of the animals, viruses that do affect animals in farms can stay alive for much longer – increasing the chances of the virus mutating and finding its way to humans, exacerbating the potential of a major public health crisis. While the coronavirus pandemic rages on, the irony of this risk must not be lost.

The 2020-2021 outbreak of avian influenza that disrupted the Indian poultry industry is testament to the seriousness of the issue.

Thousands of birds are culled in an effort to contain spread of the virus. However, the manner of culling raises serious ethical concerns, and the outbreaks with increasing frequency begs the question – is reactionary culling the only solution? An even more pressing concern is the reactionary killing of thousands of birds in response to a decrease in demand at the time of disease outbreak.

The choice to address the symptoms – that is, instances of outbreaks, and not the root cause of the problem – that is, intensification of animal agriculture, is only resulting in significant economic losses and livelihood insecurities for farmers.

Combating these outbreaks needs much more than adopting more biohazard protocols, or guidelines for handling and consumption of animal products during outbreaks. Understanding the precariousness of raising animals for food, and re-evaluating where we get our nutrition from is an extremely important component of this issue, carrying major implications for global health.

In addition to the extreme impacts of animal-based foods on planetary health, one’s individual health is also strongly negatively correlated with the consumption of animal-based foods.

Plant-based foods are considered significantly healthier on several metrics than their animal-origin counterparts. Even reduced consumption of animal-based foods can lead to significant health gains. Meat, especially processed meat, is loaded with cholesterol and saturated fat.

According to the American Heart Association, reduced meat consumption can lead to a host of health benefits – such as reduction in the risk of heart disease, stroke, obesity, high blood pressure, cholesterol, and many cancers.

Plant-based diets have been found to help people prevent or manage diabetes by reducing insulin resistance. They have also been found to not just prevent heart disease, but also reverse it.

Plant-based foods, in the form of pulses, grains, vegetables, fruits, nuts, and seeds are rich in complex carbohydrates, fibre, and water content. They are excellent sources of protein, calcium, zinc, and iron.

However, not all plant-based diets are healthy. High-fat, high-sugar plant-based foods must be avoided. The key is to switch to whole foods, nutrient-dense meals that consist of a large number of vegetables, fruits, nuts, and seeds of a variety of colours, for a variety of health benefits.

A common concern is that plant-based foods do not offer sufficient protein, especially in comparison to their meat counterparts. This is untrue.

A combination of pulses, soy (and its biproducts tofu, tempeh, edamame), and nuts, offer as much protein content as meat. Several common Indian dishes – lentils and pulses like dal, channa, and rajma; soya and tofu curries, keema, and bhurji, and most importantly, indigenous grains like oats and millets – are packed with protein. Additionally, animal protein intake is often associated with increase in the cancer-promoting hormone, IGF-1.

Another misconception is that dairy is our primary source of calcium, and therefore, plant-based diets are deficient in it. Contrary to this, animal-origin protein has often found to leach the calcium off our bones. Several plant-based foods are rich in calcium – green, leafy vegetables, rajma, channa, tofu, oranges, and almonds.

We also hear that plant-based diets are low in Vitamin B12. However, B12 is not produced by animals or plants themselves, but by microbes that are then consumed by plants and animals. B12 deficiencies are found across populations with varying eating habits. Vegan, vegetarian and meat-eating populations can all benefit from taking a B12 supplement.

Plant-based foods, as a replacement to animal protein, offer a solution to steadily transition towards a healthier and safer food supply chain. The urgency of this need to improve global health can be addressed by increasing consumers’ knowledge of plant-sourced nutrition, and by making plant-based foods accessible to all.

The pandemic continues to disrupt our lives and wreak havoc on our economy. It is another sign that our current system of food production is not working.

The next pandemic could well originate from a factory farm. The opportunity to change is now. The opportunity for us to swap an intensive, cruel, and unsustainable system of animal confinement for food production, with a system that offers us delicious, nutritious, and sustainable food for all – boosting individual, public, and planetary health.

Both authors are campaign managers at Humane Society International/India