Abstract
A flexitarian or semi-vegetarian diet (SVD) is one that is primarily vegetarian with the occasional inclusion of meat or fish. Of late, there appears to be an increasing movement toward this practice. There has not been a recent update on these diets from a health perspective. Using the National Centre for Biotechnology Information PubMed database, a search was made for all studies published between 2000 and 2016 that met defined inclusion criteria. A total of 25 studies were located with 12 focusing on body weight and diet quality. There was emerging evidence suggestive of benefits for body weight, improved markers of metabolic health, blood pressure, and reduced risk of type 2 diabetes. SVD may also have a role to play in the treatment of inflammatory bowel diseases, such as Crohn’s disease. Given that there is a higher tendency for females to be flexitarian yet males are more likely to overconsume meat, there is a clear need to communicate the potential health benefits of these diets to males.
Highlights
A flexitarian or semi-vegetarian diet (SVD) is one that is primarily vegetarian with the occasional inclusion of meat or fish
The aim of the present paper was to review the evidence looking at the flexitarian diets (FDs)/SVDs and health, using defined inclusion criteria
The National Centre for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) search engine (PubMed) was used to extract relevant Englishlanguage papers published between January 2000 and June 2016
Summary
A flexitarian or semi-vegetarian diet (SVD) is one that is primarily vegetarian with the occasional inclusion of meat or fish. There was emerging evidence suggestive of benefits for body weight, improved markers of metabolic health, blood pressure, and reduced risk of type 2 diabetes. The trend toward flexitarian diets (FDs) appears to reflect consumers who are “meat-reducers,” eating meat within meals on some but not every day of the week (3), as with typical “meat-eaters”. This definition is most closely in line with that of semi- or demi-vegetarianism. In one publication semi-vegetarian diets (SVDs) are defined as those significantly reducing meat intake on at least 3 days of the week (4). The International Agency for Research on Cancer classified red meat as probably carcinogenic and processed meat carcinogenic to humans (8)
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