Soon, Dissident MD will relocate from Substack to its own Dissident MD domain: dissidentmd.com. This will provide Dissident MD with full independence as a stand-alone publishing platform, as well as greater integration with its cousin publication, the Informed Dissent podcast.

Little will change for you. Your membership, whether free or paid, will remain the same. All member info, including subscription payment information, will be transferred automatically. You will continue to receive all posts in your email as usual.

One important change is that your login webpage will no longer be Substack but dissidentmd.com. This is where you will go to make changes to your subscription or to post comments on any published articles.

Once Dissident MD has officially moved, you will receive a confirmation email. Be sure to monitor your spam folder and approve all email from the dissidentmd.com domain. This will happen soon!

Mark McDonald
Dissident MD

The transgender movement is targeting all children in America today.

In this video of my full talk from the April 13, 2024 Save Our Children conference in Florida, I explain how and why.

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“If you really loved me, you’d send me a goodnight text every night.” Young women are now making this demand of their boyfriends in increasing numbers. Not only is sending nightly text messages to a lover unnecessary—it’s unhealthy, for both partners. The psychological mechanism that drives the demand stems from insecurity, narcissism, and entitlement. Its effect is toxic and can only lead to psychological damage.

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In this video clip from the April 13, 2024 Save Our Children conference in Florida, I explain why.

More research has been published that shows “gender-affirming care,” meaning chemical castration and genital mutilation, harms children. The transgender movement’s mantra, “Do you prefer a transgender son or a dead daughter?” has been exposed as nothing more than coercive fraud; meanwhile, actual evidence proves that simply leaving kids alone produces better outcomes and protects them from irreversible harm.

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It started with Kooth, a UK-based phone app marketed as a “free, safe and anonymous online mental wellbeing community” for young people. In 2022, the Pennsylvania state Department of Human Services funded a $3 million grant to Kooth to pilot the app in 30 school districts throughout the state for children in the 6^th to 12^th grades. The goal was to replace in-person therapy with coaching and counseling through a phone app. For more detail, watch Jamie Walsh’s documentary on Youtube.

None of these coaches or counselors were licensed, though. And the “support” they offered seemed to come with a hidden agenda: No parental consent was required to use the service, and one of the stated objectives was to address gender identity issues. Children who enrolled were required on signup to complete a checkbox indicating which of the following groups they identified with: male, female, agender, or genderfluid. Then they were offered gender identity articles written by Kooth team members and invited to participate in “gender identity circles” where they could share their experiences and enter private chat rooms with the coaches. Kooth appeared to be acting not as a true mental health service but rather as an online grooming forum hosted by the public school system, funded by taxpayer money.

California has now signed a contract with Kooth. Perhaps due to the backlash by parents in Pennsylvania, the company is called Soluna locally. It receives funding from the California Department of Health Services for children age 13 and up. California has a dismal record of respecting parental notification on transgender issues in schools, and California is now an official sanctuary state for transgender youth, after Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law Senate Bill 107 on January 1, 2023. So there are very few existing protections parents can rely on to shield their children from predation by the transgender movement. Worse, unlike in Pennsylvania, where Kooth app use was restricted to the public school system, Soluna is being offered to any children age 13 or older through the CalHOPE program.

Younger children in California aren’t safe, either. In concert with Soluna, the BrightLife Kids program goes after the little ones by offering “behavioral health coaching for parents, caregivers, and kids 0–12.” This program is funded by Newsom’s $4.7 billion Child and Youth behavioral Health Initiative. For children as young as six, BrightLife provides “BIPOC and LGBTQ+ identity-focused coaching programs,” because “you can’t address emotions and behavior without addressing identity.” Not surprisingly, the coaches have experience “working with LGBTQ+, BIPOC, and gender-diverse populations.”

The transgender activist movement has learned that when parents become aware their children are being targeted for grooming and abuse, they revolt. It has now found a way to reach children surreptitiously, through a cell phone, without the parents ever knowing about it. In fact, these same parents are sponsoring the indoctrination of their children through their tax dollars funneled to private companies by way of state mental health services departments. This new development is a particularly insidious and dangerous new inroad to capture children and groom them for transgender conversions, first socially and then medically.

The only way to stop this scourge is to expose it, so that taxpayers and parents demand that government immediately end its sponsorship of any transgender-driven organization that targets children. Everyone should be outraged by this and hold their elected representatives accountable.

Marvelous Meat

I remain an unabashed meat lover and make my apologies for my disdain for the vegetarian—or worse, vegan—diet. Some religions require practitioners to eat vegetarian meals, but the practice comes with significant health risks. Veganism is nothing more than a scam. When I see adults forcing the practice on children, I feel compelled to call social services. It ranks up with masking, experimental mRNA injections, and transgender chemical castration and genital mutilation in the realm of child abuse with a likely outcome of lifelong injury.

One of the primary reasons meat is so helpful for attaining optimal health is that it is the most nutrient-rich food one can eat. And the most nutrient-rich type is organ meat.

Organ meat was commonly eaten by most Americans until the turn of the century. Its decline in popularity has coincided with a rise in a plethora of physical ailments. One is gastrointestinal disease—inflammatory bowel disease, irritable bowel disease, ulcerative colitis, and Crohn’s disease. The gut microbiome is involved in all of these pathologic processes, and it becomes unbalanced or collapses entirely when certain nutrients are deficient or missing from the diet: vitamin A, vitamin B2, vitamin B9, vitamin B12, and choline. All these vitamins and nutrients are plentiful in beef liver.

Raw liver retains the maximum amount of nutrients. Surprisingly, it has less taste than cooked liver, which some people dislike. It must come from a trusted source, though, as with most raw meat it can carry salmonella, E. coli, or campylobacter. Cooking liver reduces this risk, but the longer liver is cooked, the stronger the flavor becomes. When it’s overcooked, it also develops a tough, rubbery texture that most people dislike. One way of incorporating liver into the diet without making it the centerpiece of a meal is by grinding it and mixing with ground beef. This supercharges the nutritional content of the hamburger, chili, or spaghetti sauce while masking the flavor of the liver.

Don’t care for liver (raw or cooked)? High-quality supplements made from liver and other organ meat are available. They provide nutritional content that most closely matches whole meat. They come in capsule form, are easily consumed, and require no meat handling!

Below is a link to my meat supplement plan I provide my patients. I am now sharing it with my Substack subscribers. To access the plan, you must first create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary

Marvelous Meat

This Easter Joe Biden used the transgender club to attack Christianity and Christians. The attack backfired miserably, leaving the entire administration with Easter egg on its face. The fiasco exposed the depravity that defines the Biden presidency. It also revealed the growing strength of an America that has overcome its fear of denouncing a movement that seeks to destroy the foundation of the nation.

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Part of an ongoing series on how to use supplement and behavior-based plans to treat common maladies. To read the detailed plan, order supplements, or download the patient resource sheets, go here to create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary

Depression Plan

By now, most people are aware of, if not familiar with, the health benefits of cold plunges. Various studies have found immersion in cold water to improve energy, focus, mood, and metabolism. Some have even shown a reduction in the recurrence of some cancers.

They’re not for everyone, though. The idea of ending the evening in a frigid tub does not capture the heart of the average person. Sometimes the barrier to entry for a healthy habit is just too high.

Good news: Heat treats depression, too. A wealth of evidence supports a link between body temperature and depression, specifically that an increase in the severity of depression is correlated with a higher increase in body temperature. More surprising, though, is that heating the body can produce rebound cooling that improves depression. A new study published in Scientific Reports followed 20,000 people from 106 countries over seven months through wearable sensors. Following an intervention involving heat—hot yoga, heated springs, hyperthermic baths, and infrared light—body temperatures dropped below baseline and stayed low for a longer period of time than cooling the body directly, such as through an ice bath or cold plunge. Even sweating from exercise produced a similar rebound hypo-thermic state that persisted.

Like most disease states (or unhealthy states), inflammation appears to be involved with depression, although it’s unclear whether inflammation drives depression or vice versa. Lowering body temperature, though, treats both states. For example, hot yoga has been shown to reduce depression symptoms. For those unable or unwilling to tolerate intense exercise, something as simple as two 20-minute baths per week in 104 F water reduces symptoms of depression.

If you struggle with depression, take a hot bath regularly. You may see your mood improve.

Supplements can assist as well. Below is a link to my depression supplement plan I provide my patients. I am now sharing it with my Substack subscribers. To access the plan, you must first create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary Watch a one-minute video on how to create an account here.

Depression Plan

When I entered medical school in 2003, I asked if I could opt out of the group plan and buy my own health insurance. I discovered I could save several thousand dollars a year by shopping around and signing up for a high-deductible catastrophic care plan, which is all I needed or wanted. The dean of the college refused. He said that if too many healthy students opted out, the cost of the group plan would go up.

“So you’re taking away my choice to buy my own insurance and forcing me to pay more for a plan I don’t want or need, because I’m in better health than the average student?” I’ll never forget his answer. “We have a student starting in next year’s class who’s diabetic. His medication is expensive. All of us should be helping with that—it’s the right thing to do.” That belief, and the inevitable consequences of it, is what has destroyed American healthcare.

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Since 2020 American media has, in general, served the role of the Soviet Union’s Pravda: mouthpiece of the state. Its function is now to censor truth and disseminate lies that further a political end. That end is to ensure the existing governing oligarchy maintains its grip on power.

The most egregious examples of American media propaganda involve attacks on Donald Trump. He has been credited with praising Nazis, mocking a disabled reporter’s handicap, fomenting an insurrection at the Capital, and advocating that women be raped, if not raping them himself. All are lies, and all were generated to prevent him from being re-elected. As the nation approaches yet another presidential election, the American media propaganda machine has begun its attacks once again. This time, though, the response to the propaganda has been swift and devastating, hinting that the future of American media’s role in propaganda may be quite different than we imagine.

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Part of an ongoing series on how to use supplement and behavior-based plans to treat common maladies. To read the detailed plan, order supplements, or download the patient resource sheets, go here to create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary

Inflammation Supplement Plan

Today the American Heart Association made a shocking announcement: An observational study just found that those who practice intermittent fasting (restricting eating to a specific period of time, such as eight hours per day) have a 91% increased risk of death from cardiovascular disease. Wow! [Here is the research poster, for those who wish to look it over.]

Yet no one need stop fasting.

Behind the terrifying headline, there is little reason to reconsider the practice of skipping breakfast every day.

First, the research study design is observational. Despite following 20,000 people for over a decade, the study relied on self-report through dietary surveys provided by the participants themselves. Self-report of anything, especially what one eats, is notoriously unreliable, if for no other reason than people have poor memories when it comes to what they ate the day before.

Second, there are no real controls in the study. The two groups compared are those who reported practicing intermittent fasting and those who did not. No one was randomly assigned to a group. Diet information was obtained from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), a survey given to 5,000 people a year about eating and dietary habits. Were those who reported practicing intermittent fasting more likely to be overweight and diabetic, or less likely to exercise regularly than those who reported not fasting at all? No one knows.

Third, even the study’s authors noted no causation could be proven between the increased risk of cardiovascular disease in one group and the practice of intermittent fasting. “The long-term health effects of time-restricted eating, including risk of death from any cause or cardiovascular disease, are unknown.” The correlation is certainly striking, but, without causation, it means very little.

I have written about the proven benefits of intermittent fasting. They include weight loss, blood sugar regulation, and improved concentration and energy. I have practiced it for nearly two years and can attest to those benefits. No one diet is for everyone, but intermittent fasting is one of the easiest and most effective dietary methods of improving general health that I am aware of.

Cardiovascular disease, like nearly all disease, is caused by inflammation. Managing inflammation is key to protecting one’s health and reducing the risk of disease and injury. Reducing stress, improving sleep quality, and exercising regularly are all practices that minimize inflammatory processes. Diet is also essential—eliminating added sugars, limiting simple carbohydrates and seed oils, and avoiding processed or artificial foods is a practice everyone should follow.

Supplements can assist as well. They do a much better job than prescription drugs in reducing inflammatory processes safely. Below is a link to my inflammation supplement plan I provide my patients. I am now sharing it with my Substack subscribers. To access the plan, you must first create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary Watch a one-minute video on how to create an account here.

Inflammation Supplement Plan

In 2021 I pointed out in my first book, United States of Fear: How America Fell Victim to a Mass Delusional Psychosis, that American women were becoming markedly unwell psychologically. It was obvious to me in my clinical practice, where I observed a growing increase in anxiety disorders specifically in young women, which was reflected in a nationwide Pew Research study that showed American women were reporting levels of anxiety and depression never seen before.

It has only gotten worse: As of 2023, nearly 50% of young American adult women report high levels of psychological distress. And I believe I know why.

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Inflammation Supplement Plan

Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) can be difficult to treat. Humira, a drug commonly prescribed for IBD, costs $7,000 per month and has serious side effects. What if there was something safer and cheaper that worked just as well, if not better?

Kings College of London published a study earlier this year that showed talk therapy treats IBD. In a meta-analysis of 28 randomized controlled trials with over 1,700 total participants, the investigators found that mood interventions can be just as effective as medication. In fact, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and mindfulness proved better at reducing inflammation than antidepressants and exercise.

As a clinical psychiatrist, I’ve seen many physical illnesses remit in patients who receive talk therapy. The mind and body are closely connected, with one influencing the other. Inflammation is a consequence of stress, either physical or emotional. Talk therapy reduces emotional stress, so it doesn’t surprise me to see that CBT treats IBD. I recommend all my patients, even those not in therapy, consider practicing somatic meditation, a form of mindfulness training. There is a benefit to training one’s awareness that goes beyond improving psychological functioning. It improves physical health as well.

Today, the challenge in making good use of talk therapy is finding a good therapist. I estimate that 80% of therapists are incompetent. Seeing one of them will make the patient worse. Unfortunately, there is no straightforward or clear way to know whether the therapist one is considering seeing is part of that group or one of the remaining 20%. Credentials and training offer little guidance—nearly all training programs have been infected by the woke virus that replaced education with ideological indoctrination. A trainee is no longer assessed on his clinical skills and treatment acumen but rather on his consistency in requesting every patient’s preferred pronouns before beginning the first session. Any therapist who expresses hesitation in “affirming” a transgender identity is unlikely to graduate. Those already in practice risk losing their license if they insist on confronting a patient’s irrationality or delusions, when the insanity aligns with the precepts of woke culture. The odds of finding someone competent today are not in your favor.

If you are lucky enough to have a competent therapist available to see you, know that therapy is not just for solving problems or developing insight. It also serves to improve physical health through the reduction of stress.

If you are not so lucky, you will need to learn self-management. This includes mindfulness training, such as somatic medication. An anti-inflammatory diet low in processed foods, seed oils, and sugar is also critical. Finally, including supplements that reduce inflammation can vastly improve inflammatory markers.

Below is a link to my inflammation supplement plan I provide my patients. I am now sharing it with my Substack subscribers. To access the plan, you must first create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary

Inflammation Supplement Plan

A food delivery order I recently placed to my office arrived without utensils, sauce leaking into the bag, left on the floor in a public hallway outside the main door to my practice. The instructions printed on the order (and stapled to the bag) read, “Leave on table in waiting room inside suite. Utensils requested.” Is the delivery worker illiterate?

He may well be. But widespread illiteracy is a separate problem born of the disappearance of grammar, books, and handwriting in the American school system, coupled with the rise of cell phones and thumb-typing as the sole method of receiving and transmitting information among the under-30 crowd. I suspect the reason for the piss-poor performance of this worker is much simpler: bad character.

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Part of an ongoing series on how to use supplement and behavior-based plans to treat common maladies. To read the detailed plan, order supplements, or download the patient resource sheets, go here to create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary

Marvelous Meat Supplement Plan

“I’m cutting back on red meat to stay healthy.” I hear this nearly every day, both inside and outside the office. I always respond the same way. “Why?”

Most of the time, the answer I get is “to lower my cholesterol.” Again, I ask, “Why?”

It’s now clear that cholesterol does not cause heart disease, that it is a necessary nutrient, and that in some cases high cholesterol is associated with a lower—not higher—risk of cardiovascular disease. But perhaps there are other reasons to limit red meat intake to improve health.

Or perhaps not. A recently published study that involved nearly two million people ruled out not just association with but causation of heart disease from eating red meat. The association with beef intake and heart disease was negative: Eating steak is cardio-protective.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise to those who keep up with honest nutrition science. Heart disease is caused by inflammation, not dietary fat. Healthy meat (grass-fed cattle, for example) is both anti-inflammatory and packed with nutrients not found in any fruit or vegetable.

Every patient I know who switches to a low-carb, meat-focused diet loses weight, gains focus and energy, and shows improvement in blood tests, including anti-inflammatory markers, blood sugar levels, and vitamin and mineral concentration.

For those who find it difficult to obtain or eat high-quality meat, I suggest the next best thing: meat supplements. A few capsules provide a full day’s supply of bioavailable nutrients without the need to seek out a local rancher. They are also excellent in treating iron deficiency, with a much higher rate of absorption than pure iron supplements.

Below is a link to my Marvelous Meat supplement plan I provide my patients (sounds horrible but is exceptionally healthy). I am now sharing it with my Substack subscribers. To access the plan, you must first create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary

Marvelous Meat Supplement Plan

From Liberty Justice Center

(Chicago, IL | February 29, 2024)—On February 29, the Liberty Justice Center announced the close of McDonald v. Lawson, its case challenging California’s blatant violation of the First Amendment through its physician censorship law, Assembly Bill 2098 (AB 2098).

When enacted, AB 2098 empowered bureaucrats to revoke doctors’ medical licenses if they shared opinions with their patients that disagreed with the State of California’s official beliefs about COVID-19—in clear violation of the First Amendment. The Liberty Justice Center challenged the censorship law on behalf of plaintiffs Dr. Mark McDonald and Dr. Jeff Barke, two California physicians who argued that the law infringed upon their right to free speech and hindered their ability to care for their patients.

The Liberty Justice Center filed the first federal lawsuit challenging AB 2098, McDonald v. Lawson, in October 2022. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit heard arguments in the case in July 2023. After a year of litigation, the Liberty Justice Center announced a victory for free speech when Governor Gavin Newsom recognized the inevitable and signed the law’s repeal.

The repeal went into effect January 1, 2024. Because the state is no longer able to enforce AB 2098, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit dismissed McDonald v. Lawson as moot on February 29, 2024.

“We are thrilled to have won this victory for the right to free speech in California, and stand ready to fight this battle in any other states that attempt to censor doctors or other professionals,” said Jacob Huebert, President of the Liberty Justice Center. “We regret that the courts were unable to hold the state accountable for its flagrant violation of the First Amendment, but we’re pleased that our case led to the law’s repeal and that California’s doctors are again free to give patients their best, honest advice.”

The Liberty Justice Center’s filings in McDonald v. Lawson are available here.

The Liberty Justice Center is a nonprofit, public-interest litigation center that fights to protect fundamental constitutional rights. The Liberty Justice Center is best known for its 2018 U.S. Supreme Court victory in Janus v. AFSCME. Learn more about the Liberty Justice Center at LibertyJusticeCenter.org.

Last week illegal alien Jose Ibarra from Venezuela murdered nursing student Laken Riley at the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia. Ibarra attacked her as she went for a jog on campus. She apparently fought back—forcefully—before he crushed her skull and dragged her body into the woods nearby to conceal her murder. Her death, and the polarized reactions to it, frame the irreconcilable split in our nation today and explain the surging popularity of comeback kid Donald Trump, who is rapidly becoming the most likely next President of the United States.

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Part of an ongoing series on how to use supplement and behavior-based plans to treat common maladies. To read the detailed supplement plans, order supplements, or download the patient resource sheets, go here to create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary

Smidge Natural Vitamins

I advocate for the use of supplements to fill nutritional deficiencies in our diet, but an often overlooked downside of many supplements is their poor absorption. Mega-dosing vitamins that can’t be properly absorbed into our bodies is worth than useless—it some cases that prevents absorption of other essential nutrients. Zinc is one example. High levels of zinc supplementation reduce the aborption of copper and can, in some cases, cause copper deficiency. For that reason, I often recommend dried beef liver capsules for essential mineral supplementation, as they provides a massive amount of bioavailable iron, magnesium, calcium, phosphorus, zinc, copper, manganese, selenium, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, and folate.

What about vitamins?

Most fat soluble vitamins (vitamins A, E, D, K) must be obtained through either sunlight conversion or animal products. This is largely true for water-soluble vitamins as well, with the exception of vitamin C, which only comes from vegetables and fruit, primarily citrus. Mega-dosing vitamin C has been properly for many years, as some believe vitamin C prevents or treats infections. Unfortunately, most vitamin C sold in supplement form is made from ascorbic acid, which is a derivative of genetically modified corn. Taking large amounts of ascorbic acid has been shown to reduce circulating levels of antioxidants, increase cancer risk, and lead to arterial wall thickening.

If you take daily vitamin C supplements, how can you continue to receive the health benefit while mitigating these risks? The answer is natural vitamin C, obtained directly from whole foods rich in that vitamin. And no, that doesn’t mean eating a sack of oranges every day.

The kakadu plum, a native fruit of Northern Australia, has the highest concentration of naturally occurring vitamin C of any food in the world—over 3,000% of the Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) in 100g of fruit, compared to just under 60% in the equivalent size serving of oranges. Unfortunately, the kakadu plum doesn’t store well and loses much of its vitamin C potency once it’s been picked from the tree. Although it can be purchased in frozen form, I have never seen it for sale in any retail stores. In addition to containing massive amounts of natural vitamin C, it is also rich in copper, iron, dietary fiber, ellagic acid (an anti-inflammatory, anti-microbial, and anti-cancer agent), and anti-oxidants.

You can obtain kakadu plum in supplement form from Smidge, a small-batch supplement company that uses only whole foods in its products and never fortifies with synthetic vitamins. Although many of Smidge’s products are available for purchase through Fullscript, some, like its Kakadu plum supplement, can only be purchased from the Smidge website. If you use the code IDM at checkout, you’ll receive 10% off your order.

Supplements, as with food, are always healthier in their most natural form—unprocessed, with no additives or synthetic ingredients.

To access my supplement plans, you must first create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary Watch a one-minute video on how to create an account here.

Smidge Natural Vitamins

Part of an ongoing series on how to use supplement and behavior-based plans to treat common maladies. To read the detailed supplement plans, order supplements, or download the patient resource sheets, go here to create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary

Marvelous Meat Plan

What does it mean to eat healthy?

It certainly does not mean eating food labeled “organic” or “natural.” These words are little more than marketing inducements to encourage you to pay more for food that does not necessarily offer any nutritional advantage over the regular food sitting right beside it on the shelf (which may not be healthy, either). This is equally true for “cage-free eggs” and “free-range chicken.” They cost more. The eggs and chicken may be no different from any other. And who today has extra money to throw away on food virtue-signaling?

The best way, really the only way, to ensure that what you are eating is truly healthy is to buy it directly from a farmer, rancher, or supplier you know and trust. With meat, that’s where beef shares come in.

It is possible to purchase an eighth, quarter, half, or whole animal—something that was quite common throughout the nation before supermarkets. Families would buy directly from a local farmer, who would facilitate the butchering, aging, and packaging of the meat, which would then be stored in a freezer for use throughout the year. Not only was this more convenient and cost-effective than buying meat in small portions every few days—it also provided food security, something we should all be concerned about today.

The best quality beef is not found at Erewhon, Whole Foods, or Gelson’s. It’s found at the farm. True pasture-raised, grass fed cattle is one of the most nutritious protein sources available. Much of it is not “organic” or “USDA approved,” because those labels cost money and make selling the meat less competitive for small producers. Yet it’s far healthier than anything you can buy at the organic food aisle at Sprouts. And it costs much less. Depending on local prices, this high-quality meat can be had for around $10 per pound or less, conveniently packaged, frozen, and labeled by the cut. The same is true of hogs, bison, goats, lamb, chicken…just about any meat you can think of.

But where do you store all that meat?

A quarter beef yields up to 100 pounds of meat, far more than can fit in a standard upright freezer. That style of freezer would be a poor choice, anyway, because the temperature variability limits storage to six months or less before freshness and quality begin to suffer. A chest freezer, on the other hand, safely stores meat for up to two years. One with a capacity of 10 cubit feet can hold up to 250 pounds of meat—more than enough for a half beef. They are inexpensive, as well. The highly rated (by Consumer Reports) Insignia brand sold by Best Buy costs around $300. You would earn that back in savings within the first year. And if you can’t afford to purchase such a large quantity of meat all at once, you can split the purchase with a neighbor, friend, or family member. Everyone wins.

The best way to locate a quality supplier is by word of mouth.

Ask those you know if they’ve used a meat supplier that offers a high-quality product. Odds are someone in your circle has a source. The best suppliers, the ones who offer the best value, generally do not have a big online presence, so searching the internet should be option two.

Those who are truly serious about their health, the environment, and food security should consider a beef share.

If you’re not yet ready to stock a chest freezer with a whole cow, you can supplement your fresh meat protein with capsules of high-quality, dried meat, full of bioavailable nutrients.

Below is a link to my marvelous meat plan I provide my patients. I am now sharing it with my Substack subscribers. To access the plan, you must first create a free patient account at Fullscript by entering your name and email address: Dr. Mark McDonald’s Fullscript dispensary Watch a one-minute video on how to create an account here.

Marvelous Meat Plan