Do we need meat to be healthy?

The objection

“Humans evolved eating meat, and it delivers complete protein, iron, zinc and B12 in forms the body absorbs easily. Cutting out a whole food group is a gamble, and a large British study found more strokes and more broken hips among people who ate no meat. A diet that needs supplements can’t be the one we’re built for.”

The answer

The professional bodies for dietitians in the UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia and, for adults, the US all say a well-planned diet without meat can meet your nutritional needs [1][2][3][4][5]. The British Dietetic Association (BDA) says plant-based diets built on beans, nuts, seeds, fruit, vegetables and wholegrains “can provide all the nutrients needed for good health”, the exception being vitamin B12, which has to come from fortified foods or a supplement [1]. The long-running studies of people who eat no meat largely bear that out, and they also show where the planning matters.

The objection also leaves out the risks that come with meat. In 2015 the WHO’s cancer agency, IARC, classed processed meat as carcinogenic to humans (Group 1), on sufficient evidence that it causes bowel cancer, and red meat as probably carcinogenic (Group 2A), on limited evidence in people backed by strong mechanistic evidence [6][7]. Citing an analysis of 10 studies, it put the rise in the relative risk of bowel cancer at about 18% for each 50 g of processed meat eaten daily [6][7]. IARC says its groups describe the strength of the evidence that something causes cancer and do not assess the level of risk, and that for one person the risk from processed meat stays small, though it rises with the amount eaten [6][7]. IARC’s Q&A also says eating meat has known health benefits and declines to tell anyone to go vegetarian, saying vegetarian diets and diets with meat “have different advantages and disadvantages for health” [6], and its director said red meat has nutritional value [7].

What do dietitians’ bodies say?

The national dietitians’ bodies of the UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia and the US agree that a well-planned diet without meat can meet nutritional needs, but they differ on which ages they cover.

Body	What it says	Who it covers
British Dietetic Association, UK (2021, under review) [1]	“Carefully planned plant-based diets can support healthy living at every age and life stage”	Every age and life stage
Irish Nutrition and Dietetic Institute (2022) [2]	A well-planned plant-based diet “can be nutritionally adequate for all stages of life”	All stages of life
Dietitians of Canada (2020) [3]	“Anyone can follow a vegan diet”	Children to older adults, including pregnancy and breastfeeding
Dietitians Australia (2020) [4]	“A vegan diet can provide all the nutrients you need for good health”	Not stated
Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, US (2025) [5]	Appropriately planned vegetarian and vegan diets “can be nutritionally adequate and can offer long-term health benefits”	Adults who are not pregnant or breastfeeding

The first four are short public guides, two of them written by special-interest groups within the body, while the Academy’s is a formal position paper that stays in effect until the end of 2032 [5]. Its 2016 position, now replaced, had called such diets appropriate for “all stages of the life cycle” [8]. Not every expert body goes that far. The German Nutrition Society (DGE) said in 2024 that a vegan diet, like other diets, can be health-promoting for the general population, provided it is well planned and B12 is supplemented, but that the data are too limited for it to recommend for or against one for children, teenagers, pregnant or breastfeeding women and older people, and it strongly recommends advice from qualified specialists for those groups [9]. The US government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2025 to 2030, published in January 2026, list beans, peas, lentils, nuts, seeds and soy among protein foods alongside eggs, poultry, seafood and red meat, and tell vegetarians and vegans to watch for nutrient gaps and check their iron, B12, vitamin D, calcium and iodine from time to time [22].

Can you get every nutrient without meat?

You can get every essential nutrient from plant foods, says the BDA, though vegans need a reliable source of B12, and protein, omega-3 fats, vitamin D, calcium, iron, zinc and iodine all need attention [1]. It says protein needs are easily met from lentils, beans, chickpeas, nuts, seeds, tofu and tempeh, and it counts soya burgers and sausages, mycoprotein and seitan as high-quality protein, though often high in salt and fat [1]. The objection is right that iron and zinc from plants are absorbed less well than from meat [1], and a 2018 meta-analysis of 24 cross-sectional studies found that adult vegetarians had lower iron stores than non-vegetarians, measured as serum ferritin. Its authors point out that high iron stores carry risks of their own, type 2 diabetes among them, and advise meat-eaters and vegetarians alike to keep a check on their iron status [10]. The BDA’s advice is to eat iron-rich plants with foods rich in vitamin C, and to soak beans, sprout grains and seeds, and choose tempeh or miso to absorb more zinc [1].

B12 is made only by certain bacteria and archaea, never by plants or animals, and cattle and sheep get theirs from the microbes in their stomachs (Watanabe and Bito, 2018) [11]. Those microbes need cobalt, and a 2025 review notes that forage and many feeds typically hold too little of it, so dairy cattle need it added to their diet [12]. For vegans, the BDA passes on advice from the Vegan Society, a vegan charity: fortified foods at least twice a day, aiming for 3 micrograms of B12, or a supplement of at least 10 micrograms a day or 2,000 micrograms a week [1]. For a child, or in pregnancy or breastfeeding, ask a dietitian or pharmacist which dose to use. The NHS lists a vegan diet without B12 supplements or fortified foods as one cause of deficiency, which can lead to anaemia and, less commonly, to problems with the nervous system that are sometimes permanent [21]. Needing a supplement is no mark against a diet in any case, since the NHS advises adults and children over 4 in the UK to consider a daily 10 micrograms of vitamin D through autumn and winter, whatever they eat [13]. Ireland’s INDI notes that some vitamin D supplements are not suitable for vegans, though vitamin D2 and lichen-derived vitamin D3 are [2].

For iodine, the BDA notes that the main sources in the UK diet are dairy products and seafood, so people who eat only plants may be at risk of deficiency. It suggests iodine-fortified plant milks, sea vegetables no more than once a week and, if you take a supplement, a word with a dietitian, because too much iodine is also unhealthy [1]. For calcium, it puts an adult’s needs at about 700 mg a day, from fortified plant milks, calcium-set tofu, tempeh, sesame seeds, kale and almonds [1].

Are people who don’t eat meat less healthy?

Not overall: in two Oxford cohorts with a large share of non-meat-eaters, vegetarians and vegans died at about the same rate as regular meat-eaters, and pooled analyses of cohort studies find less heart disease but more hip fractures in people who eat no meat, while the evidence on stroke is mixed. The larger, EPIC-Oxford, began recruiting across the UK in 1993 [14][15]. Pooled with the earlier Oxford Vegetarian Study, 60,310 people in all, it found no significant difference in deaths before the age of 90 between vegetarians, vegans included, and regular meat-eaters (hazard ratio 1.02, 95% confidence interval 0.94 to 1.10; Appleby et al., 2016) [14].

EPIC-Oxford’s analysis of heart disease and stroke (Tong et al., 2019) followed 48,188 adults with no history of heart disease, stroke or angina for 18 years, 16,254 of them vegetarian or vegan. They had a 22% lower rate of ischaemic heart disease than meat-eaters, about 10 fewer cases per 1,000 people over ten years, but a 20% higher rate of stroke, about 3 more per 1,000, mostly haemorrhagic strokes [15]. The heart gap narrowed to 10% (hazard ratio 0.90, 0.81 to 1.00) once self-reported high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes and body mass index were taken into account, while the stroke gap did not narrow [15]. The researchers point to the lower LDL cholesterol of people who eat no meat, which some studies have linked to a higher risk of haemorrhagic stroke, and to lower blood levels of some nutrients, B12 and vitamin D among them, as possible contributors, and say more research is needed [15]. A 2023 meta-analysis of 13 cohort studies (Dybvik et al.) found that vegetarians had 15% less cardiovascular disease than non-vegetarians (relative risk 0.85, 0.79 to 0.92) and 21% less ischaemic heart disease (0.79, 0.71 to 0.88), each from eight studies, links the authors judged probably causal [19]. For vegetarians it found no clear difference in total stroke (0.90, 0.77 to 1.05, from 12 studies), and in the fewer studies of vegans alone an ischaemic heart disease estimate of 0.82 (0.68 to 1.00, from six), on the edge of significance, and no clear difference in total stroke (1.17, 0.69 to 1.99, from five) [19]. The authors rated the studies’ risk of bias moderate to serious and called for more research on stroke [19].

Bones are the clearest warning. In EPIC-Oxford (Tong et al., 2020), vegetarians had a 25% higher risk of hip fracture than meat-eaters and vegans 2.31 times the risk, equal to 2.9 and 14.9 extra hip fractures per 1,000 people over ten years, and vegans had a 43% higher risk of fractures overall [16]. The gaps were larger before body weight was taken into account and narrowed only slightly once calcium and protein intakes were, and the authors concluded that bone health in vegans needs more research [16]. A 2026 meta-analysis of four cohort studies and 529,672 people (Ballarin et al.) found the same pattern after adjusting for other factors, with a 25% higher risk of hip fracture in vegetarians (hazard ratio 1.25, 1.11 to 1.39) and 75% higher in vegans (1.75, 1.17 to 2.63), though it rated the certainty of the evidence low and very low [20]. Calcium, vitamin D and enough protein belong in the plan from the start [1].

The North American picture is brighter on deaths but carries the same stroke signal. The Adventist Health Study-2 followed 88,400 Seventh-day Adventists to 2015 (Abris et al., 2024), and its vegetarians, a group that also counts fish-eaters and people who ate meat less than once a week, had an 11% lower death rate than non-vegetarians when estimated at age 65 (hazard ratio 0.89, 0.83 to 0.95), narrowing to no clear difference by age 85 (0.98, 0.91 to 1.04) [18]. At 85 they had higher death rates from stroke (1.17, 1.02 to 1.33) and possibly dementia (1.13, 1.00 to 1.27) [18]. The advantage looked larger in men and in younger people, and an earlier analysis of the cohort (Orlich et al., 2013) had also found it larger in men, though in 2024 the gap between the sexes was not statistically significant [17][18]. That earlier analysis found that people who ate fish but no other meat had the lowest death rate of its groups (0.81, 0.69 to 0.94) [17]. All of these are observational studies, which show associations rather than proof, and the EPIC-Oxford authors note that residual confounding is possible and that their participants were predominantly white Europeans [15].

If you are pregnant or breastfeeding, feeding a baby or child, older, or living with a long-term health condition, talk to your GP or a registered dietitian before cutting out meat, as Dietitians of Canada advises anyone planning a vegan diet to do and the German Nutrition Society strongly recommends for those groups [3][9]. If you take medicine for a long-term condition, such as diabetes or high blood pressure, tell your GP before you change your diet, and don’t change or stop any medicine without their advice. If cutting out foods has become a way of eating less, or your periods have stopped, eating-disorder charities can help: Beat in the UK, Bodywhys in Ireland, ANAD in the US, NEDIC in Canada, Butterfly Foundation in Australia and EDANZ in New Zealand.