Featured Image Credit: Turner Twins
Topics: Health, Vegan, Food and Drink
Gerrard Kaonga
The healthy diet debate continues to rage on and people are still left with questions on whether to eat meat or go vegan.
If you check any food or health post... well anywhere on social media, people will quickly get into an argument about whether it is better to eat meat or to go vegan.
Beyond that, there might be people promoting going vegetarian or pescatarian but overall people are still concerned about what counts as healthy living and what doesn't.
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It is understandable, there are a lot of foods out there, ways to prepare it and to be honest, in the modern world we really are spoiled for choice.
So, two identical twins attempted to try and find out which is the superior diet once and for all.
Since explorers Hugo and Ross Turner share the same genetic material, they decided to try two different diets to see what kind of differences it made to their bodies.
In a 12-week study conducted with Kings College London, Hugo took on a vegan diet while Ross stuck to a diet that included meat, dairy and fish.
Obviously, there are a lot of factors that go into a person's health and weight so the study attempted to address these concerns.
The pair would both eat the same amount of calories and did the same workout routine to make sure any of the impacts they saw were tied directly to their eating habits.
Speaking to the BBC, which also documented the twins' journey, the pair explained some of the pros and cons of both diets.
Hugo, who was on the vegan diet, said one of the downsides was that his gut bacteria dropped ‘severely’ while his brother’s stayed the same, meaning he was more likely to pick up illnesses.
On the positives, he said he ‘felt like he had more energy’ and his sugar levels were a lot satiated during the day as he was having more fruits, nuts and alternatives.
This diet also proved to be more effective for losing body fat as Hugo dropped four pounds and lost one percent of his body fat.
Ross, who was on a diet that included meat, dairy and fish said one of the downsides was that his gym performance was ‘up and down a little bit more’ compared to his brother.
While he felt 'very energetic' on some days, there were others where he'd experience 'huge lulls'.
In comparison to his brother Ross put on 10 pounds of muscle but also gained fat, bringing his end body fat percentage up from 13 to 15 percent.
All in all, the men found that there wasn’t ‘a huge difference, if any’ between the two diets, though Hugo did see his cholesterol levels drop ‘off the scale’, while also losing weight and boosting his resistance to type two diabetes.
So, if you were looking for a definitive answer on which is better you may be out of luck as the pair didn’t find that there wasn’t a huge difference.
I suppose the debate rages on...