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Should a diabetic or diabetics eat red meat?

Written by:Dr. Ergin
Publish Date:Dec 28, 2020

Today I'm going to talk to you about red meat and diabetes for all diabetics. As a diabetic, can you eat red meat? Well. Depends! Actually yes, you can eat red meat. But I have no problem with that, but you have to be careful about a few things about red meat, and I know if you're a red meat eater, it's going to be very hard to change you because you'll probably hate me for doing that, but on the other hand I'll tell you if you make a few changes. You can then realize how beneficial it can be for you. I am going to tell you a few things that you may not have heard before.

1. Red meat is although it looks delicious and it looks friendly and easy to come to your table, it takes a lot of effort.

It is a very intensive process to get red meat on your table. Here's how it works. To have one calory from the red meat, the cattle have to consume 100 calories. They have to eat a lot. What do they eat? They eat grass. Where do they get the grass from? From the deforestation, you have to get rid of the forest to get hay.

Now, that's a significant problem although you may not be thinking about this when you're eating red meat deforestation is a huge problem, especially for climate change.

2. You have to have a lot of cows to be able to feed all the people.

How many people do we have? 7 billion; it's going to be 10 billion before you know it. Now, 10 billion people are eating red meat. What's going to happen? You have to have a lot of cattle. These animals do not just have fun eating; and they also produce something called methane. How? They burp, they fart. When this happens that methane goes into your atmosphere and gets stuck in there.

This is called greenhouse emission. So it's not just the oil or the factories that pollute the air, but the burps and farts of these animals do that! You're probably laughing right now, but it's what it is. This is responsible for 22 percent of the greenhouse emissions, and it's just getting worse and worse. Now what can we do know about this, I'm not saying go all become vegan, but if you actually modify and reduce red meat consumption, you will help humanity.

3. Diabetics who love red meat! Watch out for Colorectal cancer!

If you don't care about humanity as a diabetic and want to eat red meat anyway, I will tell you something important. If you're not eating red meat in a pure form like if you're not just cooking at home if you're eating processed red meats, especially you're looking forward to having colorectal cancer. That is widespread cancer.

If you don't die from a heart attack you will probably die from colorectal cancer from excessive red meat consumption. I have people in my family with these problems. They all come from a part of Turkey where they don't have any seafood, they hate chicken and all they eat is red meat. You will see that people rarely see their 50s before they have a heart attack.

My father had a stent, my uncle had a heart attack when he was 45, pretty much everybody in my family has some heart disease. That's not necessarily just genetics but the whole town composed of two million people has significant heart problems. I am not saying red meat causes heart problems directly, but they just eat so much red meat that they don't have anything else to eat.

They just refuse vegetables and fruits. They refuse the fish, and they never get the polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats. They live on a saturated fat diet. You not only need to reduce your enemies but also you need to have friends. Your friends in your diet that protect you from heart disease are your polyunsaturated fat monounsaturated fat, your olive oil.

Your vegetables or your vegetable oils, the plant sterols, plant-based foods, and the fish. The fatty fish especially is good. So if you do not have these right foods, you're not having any protection at all. Your body will make a lot of fat, especially from carbohydrate consumption if you eat, for example, potatoes with your steak. And if you're not careful if you're having a lot of carbs, you will become diabetic, and your cholesterol will go high. That's another path for having a heart attack.

4. How often to eat red meat as a diabetic?

Back to red meat, red meat is delicious. I love red meat too. I have no problem with it. But I'm trying to reduce my red meat to once a week, and I think that's the wise thing to do for any diabetic who wants to eat red meat. You need to enjoy your vegetables and your fruits and your plants to be able to have an overall healthy diet.

Plant-based diets and Mediterranean diets basically reduce your inflammation overall, so you feel better. If you are eating a lot of red meat and very little vegetables and fruits, you will not feel good. Your taste buds may enjoy it. But your overall system will be under inflammation. That's why those people just don't feel as good.

One last thing! What you eat also reflects on your character! If you are a red meat eater I can tell who these people are. They're generally aggressive looking. They're very you know snappy! I go sometimes like "you must be eating a lot of red meat dude you know calm down" What you eat really changes your personality and what we put into our body becomes us! So you have to think about that too! I hope you enjoyed this blog! For more information: Subscribe to our youtube channel:

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Written By Dr. Ergin

425 total articles

Meet Dr. Ahmet Ergin a highly skilled and dedicated endocrinologist with a passion for diabetes care. Dr. Ergin earned his medical degree with honors from Marmara University in Istanbul. He completed internal medicine residency and endocrinology fellowship at Cleveland Clinic. Dr. Ergin is board-certified in Internal Medicine, Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism due to his vast medical expertise. He's a certified diabetes educator, author of “The Ultimate Diabetes Book,” and founder of “the SugarMD YouTube channel.” Dr. Ergin offers exceptional diabetes care to his patients in Port Saint Lucie, FL, helping them manage effectively. Disclaimer: These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. Information on this website isn't intended to treat, cure or prevent any disease. Discuss with your doctor and do not self-treat”

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