is it healthier to eat no meat?

[arewethereyet]

Sesame seeds are the answer.

[FlatAssembler]

All vegetarians are at higher risk for iron deficiency, Flat. That's the main thing to weigh or manage in light of whatever benefit you hope to extract from a vegetarian diet. Semi vegetarians less so because of that semi bit. I do love the word semi vegetarian, though. A beef burrito with cheese is my favorite semi vegetarian dish.

Even if that's true, avoiding heme iron still seems like a good deal to me. People rarely die of anemia, but people commonly die of colon cancer. So having a slightly increased risk of anemia in order to have a slightly lower risk of colon cancer seems like a good thing.

By semi-vegetarians, I meant people who avoid red meat.

[arewethereyet]

All vegetarians are at higher risk for iron deficiency, Flat.  That's the main thing to weigh or manage in light of whatever benefit you hope to extract from a vegetarian diet.  Semi vegetarians less so because of that semi bit.  I do love the word semi vegetarian, though.  A beef burrito with cheese is my favorite semi vegetarian dish.

Even if that's true, avoiding heme iron still seems like a good deal to me. People rarely die of anemia, but people commonly die of colon cancer. So having a slightly increased risk of anemia in order to have a slightly lower risk of colon cancer seems like a good thing.

By semi-vegetarians, I meant people who avoid red meat.

Death is not the only issue with anemia you nitwit.

Having enough healthy red blood cells means that your organs get the oxygen they need.

Oxygen tends to be sort of important to your overall health.

[Anomalocaris]

All vegetarians are at higher risk for iron deficiency, Flat.  That's the main thing to weigh or manage in light of whatever benefit you hope to extract from a vegetarian diet.  Semi vegetarians less so because of that semi bit.  I do love the word semi vegetarian, though.  A beef burrito with cheese is my favorite semi vegetarian dish.

Even if that's true, avoiding heme iron still seems like a good deal to me. People rarely die of anemia, but people commonly die of colon cancer. So having a slightly increased risk of anemia in order to have a slightly lower risk of colon cancer seems like a good thing.

By semi-vegetarians, I meant people who avoid red meat.

If I only eat cows that avoids eating red meat, am I a quarter vegetarian?

[Jackalope]

I do love the word semi vegetarian, though.  A beef burrito with cheese is my favorite semi vegetarian dish.

Right? It seems to me we already have a word for people who avoid beef but not other meat. The word is "omnivore".

[FlatAssembler]

Even if that's true, avoiding heme iron still seems like a good deal to me. People rarely die of anemia, but people commonly die of colon cancer. So having a slightly increased risk of anemia in order to have a slightly lower risk of colon cancer seems like a good thing.

By semi-vegetarians, I meant people who avoid red meat.

Death is not the only issue with anemia you nitwit.

Having enough healthy red blood cells means that your organs get the oxygen they need.

Oxygen tends to be sort of important to your overall health.

Then we must have a very different definition of a healthy diet. By "healthy diet", I mean one that reduces overall mortality.

[arewethereyet]

Death is not the only issue with anemia you nitwit.

Having enough healthy red blood cells means that your organs get the oxygen they need.

Oxygen tends to be sort of important to your overall health.

Then we must have a very different definition of a healthy diet. By "healthy diet", I mean one that reduces overall mortality.

So you don't think the proper distribution of oxygen throughout the body is important?

[Anomalocaris]

Death is not the only issue with anemia you nitwit.

Having enough healthy red blood cells means that your organs get the oxygen they need.

Oxygen tends to be sort of important to your overall health.

Then we must have a very different definition of a healthy diet. By "healthy diet", I mean one that reduces overall mortality.

Overall mortality is, was, and willing likely always be 100% and can’t be reduced any diet.  

[FlatAssembler]

Then we must have a very different definition of a healthy diet. By "healthy diet", I mean one that reduces overall mortality.

So you don't think the proper distribution of oxygen throughout the body is important?

Look, anemia caused by lack of iron is rare and is almost never deadly. Attempting to decrease the chance of getting it with something that increases your chance of getting cancer by 7%, particularly the colon cancer which has only 50% survival rate, is irrational.

[FlatAssembler]

Then we must have a very different definition of a healthy diet. By "healthy diet", I mean one that reduces overall mortality.

Overall mortality is, was, and willing likely always be 100% and can’t be reduced any diet.  

Overall mortality in some time period, of course. How do you determine that smoking is overall unhealthy, in spite of the anti-inflammatory effects of nicotine?