 The types of meat that might speed up aging? Hold on. The truth is all meat speeds up aging. Yes, you heard me right. All meat speeds up aging. And there's actually three reasons for that. And I want to go through that for you today. First of all, animal protein has an amino acid called methionine that is much more common in animal protein than in plant protein. Methionine is one of the triggers for a receptor that causes aging in us called mTOR, the mammalian target of rapamycin. mTOR senses energy availability. And one of the things that mTOR looks for is methionine. So if there's lots of methionine, mTOR tells ourselves, hey, it's time to grow. It's time to make babies. It's time to do all sorts of things, including age. If mTOR doesn't sense methionine, it says, ooh, times will appear to be rough. This is not a good time to grow. This is a good time to look at every one of our cells and decide who's pulling their weight and who isn't. And the cells that aren't pulling their weight, we tell them to die. It's called autophagy. And we kind of clean up the mess. So as a general rule, a low methionine diet has been shown to extend lifespan dramatically in every animal tested, including pigs. Now there's one interesting little caveat, and I don't want you to focus on this, but there's another amino acid called glycine. And glycine appears to give a benefit of tolerating methionine in not activating mTOR, but adding several grams of glycine a day to your diet may help protect against a high methionine diet from animal protein. But that's number one, methionine in animal protein. Number two, you've heard me write and talk about a compound called TMAO, which is produced by bacteria from animal protein and animal fats in our diet. And according to research, particularly from the Cleveland Clinic, TMAO can damage blood vessels, can damage kidneys, and now there's evidence that it can damage the brain. We know that vegetarians and vegans have very little TMAO in their bloodstream. And I measure TMAO in all my patients. Interestingly, there are some species of fish and shellfish that have preformed TMAO in their flesh. And so TMAO from animal protein and fat can also be from fish, can in fact damage blood vessels. So that's number two reason to avoid animal protein and fat. Number three, red meat. By that, I mean beef, lamb, and pork have a sugar molecule in their flesh, in their blood vessels called Nu5GC. Humans have a sugar molecule lining our blood vessels called Nu5AC. Fish and chicken have Nu5AC. Now, these two compounds are very similar. But Nu5GC, we can make an antibody against it when we eat beef, lamb, and pork. And it can cause us to attack the linings of our blood vessels by mistake. And so one of the theories of why eating red meat increases the risk of heart disease is this Nu5GC. Now, the other thing that's scary to me is we know that tumors can avoid detection by the immune system, by wrapping themselves in Nu5GC. And since we don't have the ability to manufacture Nu5GC nor do our cancer cells, the Nu5GC has to come from our diet. And that may explain why most studies of red meat eaters show a higher incidence of cancer, particularly colon cancer, than in non red meat eaters. And it's this Nu5GC cloaking ability. Now, how strong are each of these? That's for you to decide. Does that mean we should never eat any animal product? I don't think so. I eat animal products. I personally consider myself a veg aquarium. That means I eat mostly vegetables and nuts. But I supplement my diet, particularly on the weekends, with wild shellfish and wild fish. And that, for me, works out very well. Do I ever have beef? Yes. I will have six ounce grass fed, grass finished filet, about once every three months, quite frankly. I almost never eat pork. Lamb is very rare. Do I have pastured chicken? Yes, I do have pastured chicken. But again, it's a treat rather than a staple in the diet. So all of these factors make up the reasons why animal protein should be not the king of your plate, but should be something way down the list. You know, as a society, we've become obsessed with protein. But the truth is, really, not only should we lessen our animal protein, but we actually need very little protein in our diet in general. Now, why is that? Well, we're actually very thrifty creatures. We're very efficient. And every day, we slough the lining of our intestines into the lumen of our intestines, and that lining is protein. So every day, 20 to 30 grams of protein is recycled. So when you see that, you know, you should be getting 100 grams of protein or 200 grams of protein, and I say you should be getting 70, 50 to 70 grams. Remember, these recommendations aren't compensating for the fact that you're actually reabsorbing quite a bit of protein every day from yourself. The other thing that's important to realize is that even my friend, Dr. Walter Longo, thinks that as we get older, we should add more protein into our diet because somehow, magically and mystically, we need more protein as we get older. Well, what I found from my research is that we don't need more protein in our diet. We need to repair the wall of our gut, and that way we will absorb the protein that's already in our diet. Most of us damage the wall of our gut progressively as we get older from the foods we eat, particularly from lectin-containing foods. And I've now had thousands of patients who have had low protein levels, low albumin levels, which is the most prevalent protein in our blood. When we put them on a limited protein diet, but on a lectin-free or lectin-light diet, miraculously, their protein levels go up in their bloodstream despite eating less protein. Why? Because now we've repaired the wall of the gut, and now we have a big, absorptive area to absorb protein. And I think that explains why Dr. Longo and others think we need more protein as we get older. But in fact, the fact that we need, apparently, more protein is actually scary that we're damaging the wall of our gut. And as you learned in the longevity paradox, our longevity is tied to the intactness of the wall of our gut. And the longer that wall is intact, the better shape it is, the longer we live and the healthier we live at all times. Lastly, I turned 72 this month, and I'm always reminded that Dr. Adkins, the father of the high protein diet, died at this age. And always remember that Dr. Adkins died an obese man. So protein is not the panacea for a long life. And just to remind you, there is no evidence of a long-lived society that eats a high protein diet. None. Almost all long-lived societies, one of the universal factors in their diet, is that they eat a remarkably low protein diet, low animal protein diet. So next time you're thinking, I need to get more protein in my diet, think again, and think about where you want to get your protein from. I think you're going to love this one. There's evidence that we should vary our food, and we should vary the amount of food and the types of food we eat from season to season.