This is my Weekly Memo with few points on health and personal development. Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.
Meat Increases Life Expectancy
This 2022 study finds that meat is universally associated with increased life expectancy. The more meat people eat, the longer they statistically live.
Meat provides the human body not only with energy, but also with complete nutrition.
From an evolutionary perspective, meat has arguably been an essential part of the human diet for millions of years, as evidenced genetically by meat digestive enzymes and the anatomy of the digestive tract.
The complete nutritional profile of meat and the human adaptation to eating meat has given humans many physical benefits, including increased life expectancy.
Interestingly, the same relationship holds true in Mediterranean countries.
This suggests that, independent of the beneficial health effects of the Mediterranean diet, a higher total meat intake may have a positive effect on life expectancy in people who follow this diet.
Meat has advantages over plant-based foods in that it contains complete protein with all the essential amino acids, is rich in vitamins (B12, B6, K, choline, niacin, riboflavin) and all the essential minerals (iron, phosphorus, selenium and zinc). Not only does it play an important role in maintaining health, development and proper growth, but it has also played an important evolutionary role in ancestral hominins for about 2.6 million years.
Simply put – a human animal that eats the body of another animal gets virtually all the components of its own body.
The researchers comment that: “Well-planned vegetarian diets, including vegan diets, are nutritionally adequate and are appropriate for various individuals during all stages of life, but it is only because their nutritional composition adequately imitates and replaces what is commonly provided by meat.”
Do We Sleep Less Than 50 Years Ago?
The widespread debate about modern people not getting enough sleep has escalated to what's often termed an 'epidemic of insufficient sleep'.
The prevailing argument attributes this to our fast-paced, 24/7 society, where the excessive use of artificial light, electronic devices, and internet access often leads to a devaluation of a good night's sleep in favor of other activities. The consequences of insufficient sleep are well-documented in scientific literature, pointing to worsened performance and serious health deterioration.
It's commonly assumed that we sleep less now than we did 50 years ago.
However, a 2016 review study, analyzing papers from 1960 to 2013 on objective sleep duration, challenges this view.
Researchers found that our sleeping patterns haven't significantly changed, and the average sleep duration has remained consistent over the last 50 years. A similar percentage of people slept less than 6 hours a night then as they do today, and the same goes for getting the recommended 7-9 hours.
Importantly, the study doesn't ignore the fact that certain groups still struggle with getting adequate, high-quality sleep. It simply indicates that this issue hasn't worsened in the last 50 years.
So, what fuels the narrative of a current sleep insufficiency epidemic?
Scientists point to several factors:
Increased public awareness about sleep and the dangers of inadequate sleep.
The emergence of sleep medicine and a rise in the diagnosis of sleep disorders.
The perception of not having enough time to rest in our fast-paced and stressful world, with sleep seen as a key contributor to being well-rested.
A higher prevalence of conditions like depression, which is associated with poor and inadequate sleep.
Bias in self-reported sleep duration data due to social norms. As the sleep insufficiency epidemic narrative became mainstream, it influenced how we report our sleep perceptions.
If you want to receive more weekly information on health, nutrition and personal development, subscribe for free.