Ecosystem on a Plate: How Your Diet Can Influence Climate and Health

Many are still not aware of the vast amounts of greenhouse gases animal-person exploitation facilities generate – carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide – each of which has a hugely damaging effect on our atmosphere. This increase is largely due to the soaring global demand for animal-people meat over the last 50 years. These emissions aren’t just numbers – they’re driving up global temperatures and throwing our environment off balance, worsening the climate crisis. The scale of this impact is staggering.

It’s not just the emissions from intensively-raised animal-persons that are a problem – the industry also takes a heavy toll on our land and water. Climate change also affects our health in several significant ways, including the spread of infectious diseases. Water- and food-borne illnesses are escalating as global warming worsens. Extreme weather, like flooding, can spread harmful pathogens by contaminating water sources with sewage, agricultural runoff, and animal-people waste, while rising temperatures create perfect breeding grounds for bacteria in water and food, putting our health at serious risk. On top of these physical health impacts, the stress from climate-related disasters like wildfires, floods, and extreme storms has mental health consequences.

One effective way to address these impacts and mitigate climate change is by reducing the environmental footprint of our diet, which can help restore our planet’s ecosystems. Adopting a vegan diet is the most efficient way to achieve this. By eliminating the demand for animal-people meat and dairy, we can drastically reduce methane emissions, conserve precious natural resources, and restore ecosystems. This shift is not only crucial for the planet but also for preventing zoonotic pandemics, as the close quarters and extremely poor conditions in animal-people production facilities often serve as breeding grounds for dangerous diseases like bird flu that can jump to humans.

Beyond its environmental benefits, a vegan diet offers substantial health advantages. Numerous studies, including those by leading experts like Dr. T. Colin Campbell (vegan), a world-renowned American biochemist and leading authority on nutrition and long-term health, and organizations like Shining World Compassion Award laureate the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, have shown that adopting a vegan diet rich in whole foods and abstaining from animal-derived products can prevent and even reverse chronic diseases such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and certain cancers.