>>99504Despite vegetarians having more non-haeme iron in their diet, your body absorbs 70% LESS non-haeme iron.
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/69/5/944.full You're iron deficient as a consequence. One study found that 20% of ovo-lacto vegetarians are iron deficient, while 30% of vegans are iron deficient, defined as less than 25 ng of Ferritin per ml
http://www.nature.com/ejcn/journal/v53/n3/pdf/1600696a.pdf?origin=publication_detailAsk yourself this: If it's normal to receive sufficient iron from a plant based diet, why isn't your body absorbing the non-haeme iron on which it depends? Why do omnivores absorb more non-haeme iron?
The average vegan is lysine deficient.
http://veganhealth.org/articles/protein The fun thing is that lysine deficiency also means you absorb less iron from your diet. In other words, the different deficiencies reinforce each other. Vegans who read about this tend to declare "well then I'll eat more of this particular food stuff to address this particular deficiency". Not realizing that this doesn't solve the problem. Eating more lysine rich food means eating less vitamin B12 rich food or less zinc rich food, etcetera. You can try to stuff legumes or pumpkin seeds down your throat, but do you really believe this to be healthy, or something you can sustain for years?
Vitamin B12: Only 9% of vitamin B12 in an egg is absorbed, so that won't bail you out.
http://ebm.sagepub.com/content/232/10/1266.abstract The typical cheese might have enough vitamin B12 in 200 gram. Dairy B12 seems to be 65% bio-available, thus leaving you with about 300 gram of cheese per day to consume, based on a need of six microgram per day. Should it come as a shock that most vegans and vegetarians are vitamin B12 deficient?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24667752Keep in mind, that deficiency rates rise in those who have had vegetarian diets for a longer period. There's a 62% deficiency rate among pregnant women
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23356638, how could anyone not consider this to be very alarming? These children will end up growing up with nerve damage.
Human evolution made us differ in the degree to which we can obtain omega 3 fatty acids from our diet. If you're European, Native American or North East Asian, you're in for some bad news: You're genetically adapted to dietary omega 3 fatty acids in your diet.
Omega 3 fatty acid content in the brains of vegans and vegetarians is lower. Vegans have less than half the content of DHA and EPA in their blood stream that omnivores have, vegetarians sit somewhere in between.
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/82/2/327/T2.expansion.html Perhaps your body can produce enough if you're African or Indian, but the evidence shows that most people who don't eat meat that contains sufficient DHA and EPA are screwed. What happens if you don't have enough DHA and EPA? You become depressed.
Soy, a favourite of vegans and vegetarians, causes dementia in men, multiple studies have shown this. The phytoestrogens seem to take the place of the natural estrogens that men's brains use to protect their neurons.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24440006http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18583909http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18583909This brings us to the next topic. Ever notice how low energy vegans and vegetarians are, how the life has leached from their bodies? Well, the statistics back it up. Twice as likely to be depressed, 2.5 times as likely to suffer anxiety disorders, etcetera.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3466124/table/T2/ This diet is a recipe for mental illness, how could anyone consider it healthy?