Why the Link Between Fake Meat & Depression?

A study examining the health data of 3,342 British vegetarians found that those who ate fake meat had a 42 percent increased risk of depression compared with those who didn’t. The fake-meat cohort also had higher markers for inflammation and immune activation.

Why?

Study author Nophar Geifman couldn’t quite put her finger on it. The biggest difference in the diets of the two groups was that those who ate fake meat also ate more ultra-processed foods overall. That made sense, because a diet high in ultra-processed foods is also linked to depression.

But, she was confounded by the fact that vegetarians who ate fake meat and vegetarians who didn’t eat fake meat both ate roughly the same amount of sodium, sugar, and saturated fats, so it wasn’t the high levels of these ingredients in the ultra-processed foods that made the difference.

So, what is it about ultra-processed foods, and fake meat in particular, that could cause depression?

To answer that question, we have to look at the specific fake meats the people Geifman studied were eating. 

The data was collected between 2009 and 2012 in the United Kingdom. The plant-based meat alternatives available at the time included soy- and wheat-gluten-based vegetarian sausages and burgers, but the U.K.’s top-selling fake meat was Quorn, launched by Britain’s Marlow Foods in 1985.

Quorn is a so-called “mycoprotein” excreted by the mold Fusarium venenatum. Venenatum, inauspiciously, is Latin for “filled with venom.”

Since it’s made from mold, unsurprisingly, Quorn triggers mold allergies.

This proved fatal for eleven-year-old Miles Bengco, who had a severe mold allergy. He died of a mold-induced asthma attack that started immediately after eating Quorn for dinner. Quorn also triggered a fatal asthma attack in Elin Wahlgren, 16, who was known to be allergic to nuts. Some people react the first time they eat Quorn, while some react only after building up a sensitivity. 

Thousands of adverse reactions to Quorn have been reported. Some people report allergic reactions, like hives and anaphylaxis, while others have gastrointestinal symptoms, including vomiting and diarrhea.

All of the Quorn reactions documented in the scientific literature are acute, coming on within four hours for allergic reactions or eight for gastrointestinal distress.

What about sub-acute reactions? It has yet to be studied, but it is possible that a less severe reaction to mold toxicity could explain both the depression and the inflammation and immune activation that Geifman observed in the vegetarians who ate fake meat.

One out of four people are vulnerable to mold toxicity, and it is known to cause depression. A 2007 study found that the risk of depression was up to 44 percent higher in people who lived in visibly damp, moldy households than residents of mold-free dwellings.

A later experiment on mice demonstrated how symptoms like pain, fatigue, increased anxiety, depression, and cognitive deficits, could stem from mold exposure. The researchers learned that it was innate-immune activation:

“The innate immune response to mold in the periphery leads to immune activation in the brain, triggering neural cytokine release and loss of newly-formed hippocampal neurons with resulting impairment of hippocampal-dependent learning and memory as well as emotional dysfunction.”

The above data and research applies to the inhalation of mold spores, but there is another route of exposure to mold that produces similar symptoms. A woman whose breast implants were contaminated with mold experienced severe joint pain, depression, and inflammation until she had them removed. 

Less information is available on what happens when mold is ingested, but the available research suggests that, whether inhaled or ingested, mold-exposure can cause intestinal infections that can manifest as depression and inflammation as well as abdominal pain and diarrhea.

Quorn claims that its fake meat doesn’t contain mycotoxins that would cause such reactions, but the Quorn mold does produce mycotoxins in the lab and mycotoxins have been found in Quorn products by independent researchers.

One study determined that soy-based meat alternatives are the highest risk food products, when it comes to mycotoxins in plant-based meat alternatives, but another study that actually looked at mycotoxins in the urine and serum of vegans found more evidence of Ochratoxin A (OTA), a mycotoxin found in Quorn. OTA is carcinogenic, teratogenic, neurotoxic, and nephrotoxic.

There still isn’t enough information to conclusively answer the question of why eating more fake meat can increase the risk of depression, but mold allergies, mold toxicity, and mold toxins should be investigated, not just for products like Quorn, made from mold, but from all grain-based, ultra-processed fake meats that could be contaminated with mold.

Ban Quorn

The Food & Drug Administration never safety-tested Quorn. It exempted it from the food additives law as “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS) even though no one had ever eaten the mold it’s made from.

On the market since 2001, the fake meat brand has been linked to one U.S. death, thousands of acute adverse reactions, and the chronic health problems of inflammation, immune activation, and depression.

Sec. Kennedy has vowed to close the GRAS loophole. That should mean Quorn is off the market unless or until it’s proven safe.

TAKE ACTION: Tell Sec. Kennedy to Ban Quorn!

How Quorn Evaded Food Safety Laws

How did novel Frankenfoods produced from mold (like Quorn), genetic engineering, and nanotechnology escape the Food & Drug Administration’s food safety law enforcement?

That story is told in the 2008 documentary film, and 2012 book, The World According to Monsanto by Marie-Monique Robin of M2R Films.

In 1987, Vice President George H.W. Bush told Monsanto, “Call me, we’re in the dereg [deregulation] business.”

In 1992, President Bush made it FDA policy to allow corporations to evade the 1958 food additives law by widening the “generally recognized as safe” loophole to cover literally everything.

The World According to Monsanto has the fascinating details of this criminal plot to break the food safety laws.