Why does Jordan Peterson only eat beef and is it healthy?

Jordan Peterson, the controversial Canadian psychologist known for denying climate change and writing questionable things on Twitter, also promotes a lifestyle that is a bit contentious - an all-beef diet.

Interestingly enough, he claims that his meat consumption has helped his mood and over health.

But is this really a healthy lifestyle?

According to SportsKeeda, Jordan was encouraged to start the diet, which they dubbed the "Lion Diet" by his daughter Mikhaila, who stumbled across the bizarre way of eating by chance.

The diet consists of three things: beef, water, and salt.

"I was dealing with an autoimmune disorder that was ridiculously horrible and neurological damage from prescribed medication that was even worse. My brain and gut were so damaged that an all-beef or ruminant meat (like lamb and bison) diet, what I call the Lion Diet, was all I could tolerate," Mikhaila wrote on her website.

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And Peterson echoed the sentiments noting that he doesn't "cheat" even a little with this diet.

"I eat beef and salt and water. That's it," Peterson told Joe Rogan during an interview in July 2018. "And I never cheat. Ever. Not even a little bit."

Despite the father and daughter's claims, this diet has raised some red flags from nutritionists and dieters.

Peterson said the benefits of this lifestyle for him were a bit of a slow burn, but still effective. He also said that his depression and anxiety had gotten better.

Peterson and Mikhaila also noted that they had rapid weight loss as part of the diet.

Peterson lost around 50 pounds in seven months.

And if someone doesn't stick to the diet, there are taxing results, as noted by Mikhaila.

Sprinkling a tiny bit of pepper on a steak caused her to have anxiety and illness for three weeks.

A diet that is only based on meat could prevent someone from gaining all the nutrients they need, which is essential for optimal health.

Jack Gilbert, a surgery professor and faculty director at the University of Chicago’s Microbiome Center, told The Atlantic that the body would start to undergo “severe dysregulation” from subscribing to an all-beef diet.

“Your body would start to have severe dysregulation, within six months, of the majority of the processes that deal with metabolism; you would have no short-chain fatty acids in your cells,” he told the outlet.

Gilbert also noted that the body wouldn’t be able to “regulate” its “hormone levels”, and would cause “cardiac issues.”

"You’d enter into cardiac issues due to alterations in cell receptors; your microbiota would just be devastated.”

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