These days, we often hear people saying `going vegetarianism`. What does this mean?

This actually means bidding goodbye to all kinds of animal foods like poultry, meat and fish etc and consuming plant based foods. Various foods vegetarians consume are nuts, fruits, vegetables, grains, seeds etc. There are some vegetarians who also consume dairy and eggs etc but vegans totally avoid animal products also.

It is noteworthy that the Pescetarian diet is close to vegetarian plus fish. Foods like meat and poultry are avoided by pescetarians but they eat seafood for the sake of protein.

Benefits of vegetarianism:

One important advantage of being vegetarian is that heart health would get better. The reason is vegetarian foods like fruits, vegetables, nuts, legumes and whole grains etc are full of fibres in them plus antioxidants and minerals etc. These would keep the heart health in good shape. Another benefit is that vegetarians would be able to manage their weight well as they eat low calorie, fibre rich foods. It is believed that vegetarians have low chances of getting chronic diseases like type 2 diabetes, hypertension etc.

Benefits of pescetarianism:

Being a pescetarian would help in boosting both heart and brain health. This is due to the fact that pescetarians who include fishes like salmon etc in their diet would get omega 3 fatty acids. This would help in heart and brain health. Pescetarians would get all amino acids that are needed for the body as eating sea food would provide them. In addition, consuming eggs and dairy would increase protein intake. Another important health benefit of being pescetarian is that fish and seafood would have minerals like selenium plus vitamins like vitamin D and vitamin B12 that are not usually present in the vegetarian diet.

Potential drawbacks:

Vegetarianism – Vegetarians who consume plant based foods might not get nutrients such as vitamin B12, iron, zinc, calcium etc as these are not present in plant foods. It must be taken into account that Vegetarians might also have challenges in the social and cultural etc where meat plays a huge part.

Pescetarianism – It must be noted that pescetarians must select their foods with great care. The reason is that some fishes might contain high levels of mercury and environmental toxins etc. Secondly, the environmental benefits of consuming seafood would get reduced due to over fishing or by some aquaculture practices.

Important Note:

We must focus on the whole minimally processed foods (in whatever foods we choose) and this would help us to have a healthier and more ethically conscious way of living. It must be noted that both vegetarian as well as pescetarian foods would provide us with many health benefits and are more kind to the environment than meat based foods.