Gamba player publishes meat-free cookbook

Alexander says:

Is there any scientific evidence to suggest that excluding meat and grains from one’s diet can cure depression? I find it hard to believe that there is. Certainly during the period of nine years when I was treated for depression by three GPs, two psychiatrists, two psychotherapists, and two counsellors nobody suggested to me that a meat-free, grain-free diet was a possible cure. Moreover, meat and grains are two of the most important elements in almost all people’s diets, so it is hard to see how they could really be connected with any sort of illness, excluding, say, coeliac disease, where extreme exhaustion caused by malnutrition could appear to be similar to some symptoms of depression, or could indeed cause depression. Actually, I have even heard of people who claim to have felt less depressed after giving up a vegetarian diet, which they attribute to a higher level of iron in their diet. I suspect that the truth is that any correlation is simple coincidence, but that it’s possible to suggest to oneself that a change in diet, or any other change in behaviour, could be the cause of alleviation of symptoms. It’s definitely possible that somebody could change their diet as part of an effort to improve their quality of life and that that effort could also bring about an improvement in mental health that coincides with the change of diet but is not caused by it. But I really cannot believe that removing two important sources of nutrition from one’s diet could possibly improve mental health.