‍A story by Bebe Raupe on Chris Christensen. This article is also featured in the January 1, 2024, issue of The Ripple.

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Food is life.

Unfortunately, the typical American diet—rife with preservatives, fats, sugar, and salt, but not enough fiber and often too much animal proteins—emphasizes convenience and corporate profits over optimal human health, says Chris Christensen, who volunteers tirelessly to educate people about the benefits of plant-based nutrition.

A founding member of Plant-Based Healthy Cincinnati (PBHC)

Chris has promoted the benefits of meat-free living for over a decade, organizing classes and events throughout Greater Cincinnati. Through this outreach, as well as PBHC’s Facebook page, she has helped bring the group’s membership to nearly 1,000.

“One of the most impactful things anyone can do to protect their health and the environment is to eat less meat, eggs, and dairy,” she says.

Environmental and Health Benefits of Plant-Based Eating

According to research published in Nature Food, animal agriculture is responsible for nearly 60% of the greenhouse gas resulting from food production; globally, animal agriculture accounts for 14.5% of all greenhouse gas emissions. The researchers estimate that if every American ate no meat or cheese just one day a week, it would have the same yearly environmental impact as taking 7.6 million cars off the road.

In addition to shrinking your environmental footprint, adopting a plant-based diet yields many positive health impacts, says Chris, like reducing the risk of heart disease, cancer, and diabetes. She has seen the positive health impacts with her own eyes: her father adopted a plant-based diet after a cancer diagnosis and experienced a dramatic turnaround in his health.

Making this menu shift can be challenging, says Chris, a certified wellness nutrition educator, who works to help people transition to a plant-based diet. “It can be daunting to change your eating habits, especially when your palate is used to a meat and animal-product based diet,” she says.