Does Pork Belong in a Gout Diet?

In this post will go into greater detail on the subject of eating pork and if it should be part of a gout diet. The truth is no matter how you think about it, pigs are a dirty animal. This has nothing to do with anybody’s spiritual beliefs by the way. The fact is that pig is a scavenger. What does that mean? It means that they are considered the scavengers of the farm, so in essence they help eliminate all the waste on the farm, eating anything they can find, even their own feces or the dead carcasses of sick animals. Yet it is one of the most consumed meats in the world and is loaded with toxins, more so compared to beef and chicken.

If we dig in a little deeper, you’ll learn that the pig’s digestive system works rather quickly, digesting whatever it has eaten in about four hours. A cow on the other hand takes up to twenty-four hours to digest. What happens during the digestive process in animals as well as humans; is that it rids the body of any dangerous toxins and since a pig’s digestive system works rather quickly, it can’t rid itself of these toxins and so they remain in their system. The toxins are then stored in the fatty tissues of the pig and ready for your consumption. Yummy!

Did you also know that the pig doesn’t have any sweat glands unlike other animals? That’s why they roll in mud or water in order to cool off. Sweat glands allow the removal of toxins by sweating them out, so this leaves more toxins inside the pig’s body. It’s only common sense to realize by you consuming pork meat that you are also consuming these toxins as well. It’s not a coincidence that the Center for Disease Control and Prevention declares that more than 100 viruses come from pigs each year, the most deadliest one being H1N1 or “swine flu” as they call it.

Furthermore, pork meat carries various parasites which are hard to kill while cooking pork meat that is the reason there are so many warnings out there about cooking pork meat properly. You don’t want to end up with an infection like trichinellosis or trichinosis which contains the larvae of the trichinella worm. This worm is commonly found in pork. Common symptoms of trichinellosis include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, fever, chills, heart problems, breathing issues and aching joints. What’s worse is that these symptoms can last for weeks and sometimes months!

If you eat ham, sausage, bacon, salami, mortadella or other cold cuts then you should also know that they are loaded with saturated fats and cholesterol which will end up increasing your waistline. Pork is also high in purines since it is a protein food and remember we gout sufferers should limit our daily meat intake anyway to about 10% of daily calories.

Tart Cherry Extract for Gout

Pork and Contamination

There’s even more evidence! According to a 2009 Consumer Reports investigation, tested about 200 samples of pork and found that 69% were contaminated with a dangerous bacteria called Yersinia enterocolitica which can cause fever, diarrhea and other gastrointestinal illnesses. About 20% of the samples were contaminated with the drug ractopamine which is actually banned in many countries and is used to increase the growth of the pig while leaving the meat lean. About 11% of the samples were contaminated with enterococcus which can indicate fecal contamination and can cause you serious health issues particularly urinary-tract infections. And people think that pig is a clean animal! Sure it is…

You should also know that pork meat contains more fat compared to other meats and you’ll notice people who are fond of pork are usually more obese than others. Many of you will say “but it tastes so good”. I’m sure if you ever tried dog meat, cat meat or pigeon meat and if cooked properly, you would say the same thing. Meat is meat. There are good meats from clean animals that eat grass or hay and unclean animals (scavengers) that eat the garbage of the earth.

There also seems to be a link between pork and cirrhosis of the liver and some say can even be worse than alcohol according to some studies. Other studies show an association between pork consumption and liver cancer as well as multiple sclerosis. We all know how important a healthy liver is for a gout sufferer to be able to metabolize uric acid properly.

At the end of the day I ask you to consciously avoid pork whenever possible. Personally, I eat pork many two times a year, I like to remind myself of the taste of bacon or somebody will offer me a sausage at a friend’s BBQ. That’s it! Other than that, I strictly avoid this deadly food and so should you. It doesn’t belong in a gout diet and may have also been the cause of you getting gout in the first place.

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