They chuckled a little, and moved nimbly to another topic. It turns out I brought up an uncomfortable topic. I had told administrators and supervisors of a metropolitan hospital in a lecture that they had to make all the food in their hospital vegetarian if they really wanted to take their sustainability ambitions seriously. From catering for admitted patients to the staff restaurant and the public lunch café in the central hall. No one said it out loud, but that suggestion seemed like a bridge too far.
I noticed that my proposal was considered too radical. We further discussed reducing medication waste and a more extensive cycling plan for doctors and nurses. But after the meeting I still felt that it had not quite arrived. The board was stuck with images of electric ambulances and less plastic foil around the medicines. A meat-free hospital was too far outside the box comfort zone. And therein perhaps lies the argument for doing it anyway.
With an exclusively vegetarian offering you take many people outside their comfort zone. Those who have completed at most primary school, pre-vocational secondary education or MBO 1 are much more likely to be admitted to hospital in the Netherlands than those who have completed a higher professional or university education. The latter are approx three times more often vegetarian, and even of that group only 10 percent are completely vegetarian. A meatless meal is certainly not what the average hospital patient is used to. An exclusively vegetarian offering is quite confrontational. And this is precisely how you, as a hospital, give your sustainable impact an extra boost. If you don’t buy meat, you not only avoid the direct negative consequences of meat production on the climate, landscape, environment and animal welfare. You excite, stimulate and also set a good example.
It is surprising that virtually no hospital is meat-free anymore. Medical care in the Netherlands covers all treatment evidence-basedbased on evidence obtained with scientific methods. Clinical practice is recorded in hundreds of guidelinessupported by the scientific literature. For example, what kind of X-rays should be taken in the event of a suspected ankle fracture (one side view and one front view of a 15 degree rotated ankle), whether a cast or operation should subsequently be performed, and which follow-up treatment will improve the chances of recovery. These guidelines are drawn up in a cycle of drawing up, randomized experimenting, reporting and tightening. This approach is limited to clinical practice. This approach does not answer what a hospital should do based on its social role. But there is plenty of scientific support for a meat-free hospital, on at least three levels at which you can look at health.
Industrial poultry farming is seen as a ticking time bomb
First, personal health. Meat consumption is associated with diabetes increased risk on stroke, type 2 diabetes, cancer and certain cardiovascular diseases. The Health Council already came up with this at the end of last year further tightening of the meat guideline: no more than 200 grams of unprocessed red meat per person per week. This will be taken over in the Nutrition Center’s five-tier group in a few weeks, it is now still 300 grams. There is not even a safe recommended amount for processed meat (think salami, hamburgers, bacon). You better do that completely as little as possible to eat.
Then the influence of factory farming on public health. We all know Q fever as a good example of a bacterium from factory farming that makes people quite ill. Highly pathogenic bird flu has also emerged in industrial poultry farming. It is therefore widely seen as a huge ticking time bomb of which the question is not if, but when, it will cause the next global virus pandemic.
Finally, the Health Council’s move towards less meat is motivated by broader planetary health. On the way to more sustainable food production, the global diet must 60 to 40 percent animal protein. This is necessary to reduce pressure on the climate, environment and soil. A transition to more plant-based eating can provide… three quarters (!) less agricultural land required, half the greenhouse gas emissions and half the leaching of fertilizers into surface water. There is also no need to choose between planetary and individual health: both can coexist. You can sustainable eating with a maximum of 250 grams of pork and chicken every week, reducing your impact on the planet by a factor of seven and extending the time in which you are healthy by 25 days for every year that you follow that diet. There is a growing understanding that a healthy planet is a prerequisite for a healthier person.
In short, rationally speaking, meat in a hospital is the same as a cigarette machine next to the revolving door at the entrance, or a beer tap in the emergency room. It is mainly administrative hesitation that is still standing in the way of the switch to the vegetarian hospital. Stay off my plate, you often hear people say about encouraged vegetarianism. But if anyone can sit at your plate, it’s your hospital. You introduce your patients to something they are not used to, set a good example and can inspire them. In a hospital everyone comes over. This gives a hospital an almost unique position to demonstrate vegetarianism to a broad cross-section of society.
The journalistic principles of NRC
