Anyone coping with significant health problems absolutely should revert to vegetarianism. The effects upon health are not small; they are monumental.

To list the things wrong with meat, in order or importance, first is the hormones found in red meat. They really alter human physiology.

Second is toxic substances, which accumulate more substantially in meat. In red meat, this means pesticides, PCBs, etc. In fish, the mercury level is so high that even small amounts damage nerve systems. Shellfish is lower but higher in other toxins such as PCBs.

Third is difficult digestion. Meat is digested so slowly that it interferes with the digestion of everything else.

There is no good reason not to revert to vegetarianism. It might sound kooky to persons who have always been meat eaters, but all it is is not eating meat. Vegetable protein is every bit as available and adequate as meat. It consists of nuts, seeds and beans.

One of the advantages of a vegetarian diet is that it allows flexibility, because food moves through the digestive system instead of being blocked by meat.

A person then learns how to adjust diet for improvements. Eating only fruit in the morning is often good, because it digest so easily. It digests differently than vegetables, so they should not be mixed.

A person can then think in terms of optimizing health. For vegetarians, this requires taking copper and zinc, because those minerals are not found in plant material, as they are in meat. But these metals are also toxic, until they get to the molecules which use them. So they should not be taken in large quantities.

Most people should be taking Vitamin D most of the year. Vitamin D carries around calcium, which does not dissolve in water well and tends to accumulate in the wrong places, when not attached to a carrier. White blood cells remove calcium which is not being carried by Vitamin D, and therefore, if a person is low in Vitamin D, most of the calcium being eaten might be removed by white blood cells creating a calcium deficiency. Plaques in arteries do the same thing, because they include white blood cells. So a shortage of Vitamin D could cause arterial plaques to get worse. During the summer, a person might get enough Vitamin D from sunshine.

Vegetarians must take Vitamin B12, because it is not found in plant material.

Anyone who is trying to optimize health should take the basic B Vitamins. Whether the exotic vitamins are needed is hard to say. The basic B Vitamins are toxic in large quantities. There have been persons who have died from taking large doses of them. From my own experience, I suggest not taking more than 25 milligrams per day of any B Vitamin, if you are a small person, and probably 50 milligram per day for large persons. To get this amount, I often have to cut some of them up on a breadboard and put them back in the container cut.

I think B vitamins can be taken every other day. But D should be taken every day, or twice a day, in small quantities. There is such a thing as too much D when in some forms. I find dry D to be safer than other forms.

Don't fall for the nonabsorption fraud as a pretext for taking large doses of vitamins. Absorption is never a problem unless there is some other problem which needs to be corrected. B Vitamins are extremely easy to absorb.

There is evidence that chromium is toxic due to the picolinate additive, and the rationale for its use is not credible.

Other vitamins (such as A, C, and E) can be taken but are usually quite adequately in a vegetarian diet. I'm skeptical of Vitamin E, because research shows some danger to the heart. A vegetarian diet would usually be quite high in natural Vitamin E.

There is a particular fatty acid which cannot be ignored. Fatty acids are used as structural material in the flexible cell walls of animals including humans. Fatty acids are simply long chains of carbon atoms with some minor bonding variations. Each of those variations create a different fatty acid.

Some of these fatty acids are so common in food that the body does not synthesize them, which is the same situation as with vitamins. Cooking usually damages fatty acids, so they need to be gotten in raw food. Vegetarians should get enough of most of them, but perhaps not one called Omega 3.

Omega 3 can be acquired from fish oil. But I find significant quantities of fish oil to be objectionable, even in capsule form. There is an alternative. There is a precursor molecule that is converted in the body, and it is called Alpha Linoleic Acid. This is available in green leafy food, walnuts or flax seeds. A vegetarian might not happen to be eating these foods if not aware of the need.

The importance of this fatty acid is that new cells cannot be created without it, and cell damage cannot be repaired, which is significant for nerve cells. For example, I developed shoulder pain from computer use, and it appeared to involve inflammation of a nerve. It was persistent and would not clear up. So I started eating about three walnuts per day, and it cleared up rapidly.

I do not suggest buying from health food stores. I find a degree of unreliability and specific probems going all the way back to processors which make them dangerous. Similarly, there is indirect evidence that a chemical creating hunger and obesity is being added to food from some providers, but probably not health food stores. Otherwise, there is no logical reason why obesity would be increasing. The safest food is that which is at grocery stores.