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	Strangely, since going vegetarian my underarms do not produce any odour"          – Heather, Veggie Challenge participant

Never mind reducing cancer, heart disease, diabetes, sparing animals from suffering, or helping the environment, here is a really enticing reason to try a veggie diet: you will smell more attractive!

Eating meat affects how you smell

A study at Charles University in the Czech Republic, found that women preferred men who ate a vegetarian diet because they had a "significantly more attractive, more pleasant, and less intense" body odor than the male participants who ate meat.

From the study write up: "Seventeen male odor donors were on a 'meat' or 'non meat' diet for 2 weeks wearing auxiliary pads to collect body odor... Fresh odor samples were assessed for their pleasantness, attractiveness, masculinity, and intensity by 30 women not using hormonal contraceptives. We repeated the same procedure a month later with the same odor donors, each on the opposite diet than before. Results of repeated measures analysis of variance showed that the odor of donors when on the non meat diet was judged as significantly more attractive, more pleasant, and less intense."

An article from NaturalNews.com titled "Body odor can be eliminated through a change in diet" agrees:  "Red meat is the number one cause of body odor. Red meat causes stagnation in the body; it putrefies in the digestive tract and releases all sorts of toxins into the bloodstream through the large intestine. ... a plant-based diet is an internal deodorizer ... the chlorophyll and other phytonutrients will cleanse you from the inside out."

According to Dean Ornish, M.D. "When you eat a lot of meat, it takes a long time for it to make its way through your digestive tract. As it putrefies and decays, your breath smells bad, your sweat smells bad, and your bowels smell bad." (from the Forward of his book Eat More, Weigh Less)

Further steps to a better smelling body

It may not be enough just to go vegetarian. If you eliminate meat and find that your underarms still smell strong, you are likely eating something that is not digesting well such as processed foods, refined foods, sugary foods, dairy or eggs. It is best to eat a super healthy diet with lots of whole grains, leafy greens, vegetables, fresh fruits plus some beans, lentils, nuts or seeds that are ideally soaked or sprouted. 

LiveStrong.com has an good article on foods that cause body odour. In addition to meat you may want to cut back on garlic and onions (especially eaten raw), curry spice, alcohol and caffeine, and if you have a rare condition called trimethylaminuria, you may have trouble digesting eggs, milk, legumes, peanuts, and vegetables from the cabbage family.

Also see Vegetarians make better lovers at www.sheknows.com

Underarm deoderants can be a health risk

The NaturalNews.com article also points out that commercial deoderants and antiperspirants contain chemical ingredients that absorb into the skin and can lead to liver disease and other disorders. Also sweating is a natural and important way to eliminate toxins. "The real cause of armpit odor is the intentional excretion of horrible toxins that your body is trying to get rid of. And by using deodorant products, you block the exit door and force those toxins to stay in your system!"

Tip: if are worried about giving up the security of deodorant, consider that you can always rinse your underarms with soap and water during the day as needed.  

Thought experiment

Heat up your oven to body temperature (98.6 degrees F) and place a tomato and piece of meat inside. Check back in several hours to compare the rate of decay and the resulting smells. If the meat smells horrible, do you think it will smell any better inside your body?

The above thought is from an article by Maneka Gandhi on smelling good. She is a respected Indian politician, animal rights activist, and environmentalist and writes: "I cannot bear the smell of the person who eats [meat]. The smell oozes through the pores and becomes a rich rancid sweat which fouls the air ... as soon as the temperature rises. I suppose people who do not eat garlic and onions feel the same way about the odour of people who do."