January 2001

Happy New Year, and welcome to the beginning of the MARVelous Times' seventh year of continual publication. (!!) If any turn-of-the-year stocktaking is in order, Chuck and I are pretty satisfied with how MARV has grown since the group first started: we have not gotten really big really fast, but we have become a group of enough caring, committed people to truly fulfill the original intention of being able to do things to make a vegetarian presence felt in our community, to be available as a vegetarian resource for our area, and to furnish a venue for vegetarians and other people interested in plant-based diets to meet and enjoy each other's company and cooking.

Have I mentioned yet in these pages that Chuck found out on the internet that the European Vegetarian Union is holding its annual conference in Istanbul this coming Fall (Sept. 29 through Oct. 4), and that he and I are thinking of attending it? I have wanted to travel to Istanbul (which in medieval times was the fabled city of Constantinople) for many years, so this would be an opportunity to combine tourism with the chance to help cross-fertilize the European and U.S. vegetarian movements. We'll let you know how this possiblity goes.

Closer to home in both time and place, we just have ordinary potlucks for the next couple of months – but we should start planning this Spring's Great American MeatOut now. MARV has had excellent exposure and success doing MeatOut activities at the Outposts; should we keep this tradition or do something else this year, or do our regular Outpost event plus something else as well?

Sunday, Jan. 7, 6 PM, regular potluck at Paul and Sandy Forgach's, 8362 N. 49th St., Brown Deer. From Brown Deer Rd. and 51st go south a couple of blocks, then east to 49th, turn south, and it's the house on the left. (414) 355-4089

Sunday, Feb. 4, 6 PM, regular potluck at the Quigley place.

Sunday, March 4, 6 PM, regular potluck – this one needs a host! (It's fun!)

Great American MeatOut: ??? event on the Saturday before the first day of Spring (which is March 17, St. Patrick's Day), or the following Saturday, March 24?

Sunday, Jan. 21, 5 PM, Frank and Mary Nager's 7760 S. 51st St., #44, 423-8176

Sunday, ?Feb. 18??, at Roger Warner's, 8668 N. 51st St., Brown Deer, 365-1987

"A Dec. 5 letter writer discusses the suffering of animals used for food and says the spread of mad cow disease presents the 'perfect opportunity to go vegetarian.' [But] the unconscionable aspect of meat-eating is the amount of arable land that is needed to fatten up livestock and poultry." -- Keen James, Letter to the Editor, NY Times, 12/11/00

One big news item this month was the release of the final USDA national organic standard, and it looks like the news is good. After years of effort and wrangling and hundreds of thousands of irate letters, the final rules (all 800 or so pages of fine print) do apparently conform to what real organic producers and consumers have always understood by the term. Initial responses from organic industry spokespeople were happy, and although I have not seen all the details I did hear that the final rule bans use of the term organic from being applied to products from animals fed antibiotics (essentially eliminating factory farming from the organic label), and also requires "access to pasture" for such animals. This is at the least a big step forward. Everyone who wrote letters on this issue can pat yourselves on the back now.

On quite a different note, mad cow disease in Europe was front page news this past month, even here in the U.S. of A. We noted in November how new discoveries of mad cow disease in France had caused a flap there, as well as the discovery that British ground-up animal parts intended for animal feed had continued to be exported to and used on the European Continent even after being banned for use in Britain. The December news was the spread of the uproar to other parts of Europe, including Spain and especially Germany where new testing turned up those nations' first known cases of mad cow disease. The Dec. 1 NY Times reported a sudden 50% drop in beef sales all over Europe and bans by various governments on the importing of meat from other countries, as well as new efforts to safeguard their own meat supplies, concurrent frantic (and vain) efforts by government officials to calm people's fears, and despair in the European beef industry. Responses across Europe included new and stricter measures to keep animal parts (especially British ones) out of feed intended for still-healthy (they hope) animals, and there was speculation that this might require European farmers to buy more soybeans – although they probably do not want U.S. soy since much of it is genetically engineered and Europeans generally reject bioengineered food. None of these moves appear to have placated the public: people feel that their governments have failed to protect them and are not now in a listening mood. The NY Times ran a late December article on the holiday woes of Germans who are now afraid to eat their beloved sausages, while Thailand banned imports of European beef.

Other meat-is-bad news included the conviction of three British men of selling poultry unfit for human consumption to restaurants, butchers, and supermarkets, and the recall of a million pounds of meat by a Green Bay, WI packer after it sickened about 30 people with the dangerous form of e. coli. According to the Organic Consumers Association, the Center for Disease Control admits that there are at least 76 million cases of food poisoning in the U.S.each year, mostly due to the filthy slaughterhouses, contaminated feed, and diseased animals that are part of the industrialized agriculture scene. The only bright note here is that an alliance of environmental groups and law firms, anticipting a Bush presidency, have decided that their only hope lies in class-action lawsuits such as that against the tobacco industry, and filed such a suit against Smithfield Foods of North Carolina, demanding real and punitive damages for the harm done by factory-farming of hogs. At the same time, the EPA and the state of Maryland are beginning to move towards requiring some accountability from huge animal-raising operations. And there are moves too in the direction of decreasing the number of antibiotics fed to food animals; this would also work against cruel factory farming. Stay tuned.

There's some new information on the health effects of eating soy products, and it is basically good news. Some Mayo Clinic researchers looked at all available literature and determined that, given what is known so far, there is no evidence that soy has any harmful effects on people, that the isoflavones in some forms of soy do seem to help lower cholesterol, and that there are some signs that soy may be helpful in preventing osteoporosis. They found no good evidence, however, of soy helping prevent endometrial cancer or helping with memory and cognition problems, and felt that there is not enough research to tell yet whether soy can substitute for hormone replacement in menopausal women. They did decide, though, that soy flour and textured soy protein have the most complete array of helpful phytochemicals, and that these forms rather than soymilk or supplement pills are likeliest to be useful.

Another recent development came from the American Heart Association, which has now revised its dietary guidelines to recommend five fruit-and-vegetable servings per day as well as six servings of grains [make them whole grains]; the new AHA dicta also emphasize weight control yet cast doubt on the effectiveness of high-protein diets in either weight loss or improved health. The value of combining the eating of vegetables and fruits with controlling calories is also suggested by the large and careful Nurses Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study, which found that eating plenty of fruits and veggies does not help prevent colon cancer when this is part of a diet high in fat or meat-eating – even though it is now established that eating large amounts of vegetables and fruits is generally protective against cancer.

A subscriber sent me a flyer giving an update about Wisconsin's proposed hunting of mourning doves. It seems that State Representative Frank Boyle has introduced an amendment to prohibit such hunting, and the bill now needs citizens to contact their state reps asking for support of the measure. On the other hand, state rep DuWayne Johnsrud, who personally pushed the measure to allow the hunt, was re-elected, so people who dislike the idea need to contact Rep. Scott Jensen and tell him not to reappoint Johnsrud to the Assembly Natural Resource Committee. The legislative hotline is 800-362-9472. Time is of the essence here.

Wisconsin Citizens Concerned for Cranes and Doves is leading this fight. They're at P.O. Box 103, New London, WI 54961; email is wcccd@hotmail.com; website is http://nodovehunt.webjump.com

The Organic Consumers Association is pushing its "Food Agenda 2000-2010," which has three goals: a global moratorium on all genetically engineered foods and crops; a complete end to factory farming and phase-out of industrial-type agriculture; and a minimum of 30% organic agriculture in the U.S by 2010. Anyone who is a vegetarian because of concerns about the environment, food security for all people, their own health, and/or animal welfare should be interested in helping with this. OCA is at 6101 Cliff Estate Rd., Little Marais, MN 55614; phone (218) 226-4164; website http://www.purefood.org

Chuck found an excellent article on Vegan Outreach's web site, which finally convinced both of us that we should both be taking a vitamin B12 supplement.

"Vitamin B12: Are You Getting It?" was written by Jack Norris, who has a bachelor's degree in Nutrition Dietetics and is Vegan Outreach's director. It's extremely well documented with over 100 references to such very reputable publications as Lancet, and American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, etc.

Norris notes that some people try veganism and then go back to eating meat, often because they did not feel well on a vegan diet; he feels it is possible that these people may have suffered subclinical B12 deficiencies which deterred them from veganism. He posits that making all vegans and would-be vegans aware of the need for supplements might allow many more people to succeed at a vegan diet and could thus promote his cause.

The problem, as Norris explains it, is that people can have less-than-optimal B12 levels for many years, and be experiencing real yet not obvious problems from this. For example, homocysteine is a substance associated with heart attacks, strokes, and blood vessel blockages, and the body uses B12 to break it down into harmless methionine – so if there is inadequate B12, homocysteine builds up, potentially to dangerous levels. Norris also cites research on vegans which found lowered levels of B12 in the blood in association with early symptoms such as unusual fatigue, loss of menses and other fertility/ potency problems, appetite and digestion disorders, mild depression or other mood changes, and frequent colds – symptoms not automatically associated with B12 deficiency. He also points out that while long-term vegans and nearly-vegans (like me) do recycle their B12 very efficiently, their B12 levels still drop slowly year by year, and also it takes a while for their bodies to adjust to doing this recycling, so by the time it happens their levels of B12 may be lower than they should be.

Norris then considers why various vegan diets may require supplementation. He especially addresses the belief that vegetarianism is the natural primate diet and ought therefore to suffice; he points out that wild primates and probably primitive humans ate a lot of bacteria-containing dirt and insects (intentionally or not), both of which would have supplied dietary B12 that modern cleanliness prevents. He also cites recent research which found that raw-foodists' B12 levels were low, and that absorption of B12 from edible seaweeds and fermented foods are extremely unreliable, with some people who relied on these foods being in B12 deficit. Of special note is lots of research finding that pregnant and lactating vegan women and their vegan children must get B12 supplements or risk severe and sometimes permanent nerve and brain damage to these children.

The good news is that supplementation brings B12 levels back up very quickly and easily; it is only important to note that B12 tablets must be chewed or allowed to dissolve under the tongue to get good benefit from them.

Get the whole article from Vegan Outreach, 211 Indian Dr., Pittsburgh, PA 15238, (412) 968-0268, website http://www.veganoutreach.org