3 ms·

Nobody in the UK would care about that, unless your Jewish/Muslim or Vegan/Vegetarian.

mschuster91 4y ago
About 4-5% of the UK's population are Muslims, 2% are Jews and 1.5% are Hindus which means they are forbidden to eat beef-based gelatine. The problem is that food declarations do not have to specify from which animal(s) the gelatine was sourced, and many manufacturers don't bother with halal/kosher certifications due to the extra work involved (the certifications usually have to meet strict ultra-orthodox standards, whereas many people don't care about the specifics but only about the kind of animal). As for the number of vegetarians and vegans, the UK reports 11% who live at least vegetarian or stricter per [1]. Unfortunately I haven't been able to find vegetarianism and religion correlations for the UK, but in any case it's safe to assume that anything between 11 and 19% of the UK's population are in one way or another following ethics that refuse gelatine-based products. That is not "nobody" at all. [1] https://www.food.gov.uk/sites/default/files/media/document/food-and-you-wave-5-secondary-analysis-current-food-landscape.pdf https://www.food.gov.uk/sites/default/files/media/document/f...
- synu 4y ago
  They way I read it, they aren’t saying there are no religious people or vegans. Just that nobody cares except them.
  - gadders 4y ago
    Yes, exactly that. It is unlikely to be a concern outside of the groups I mentioned.
- idleproc 4y ago
  That 11% figure included 'partly vegetarian'. A more useful study "puts the size of the vegan population at about 2-3% and the vegetarian population at about 5-7%" [1]. From the article, it appears that only 2% of vegans, and 3% of vegetarians surveyed did so for religious reasons. [1] https://yougov.co.uk/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2022/01/20/meet-britains-vegans-and-vegetarians https://yougov.co.uk/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2022/...
- thaumasiotes 4y ago
  > but in any case it's safe to assume that anything between 11 and 19% of the UK's population are in one way or another following ethics that refuse gelatine-based products. That is not "nobody" at all. That doesn't even come close to being a safe assumption; it's wildly overoptimistic. Kind of like claiming that, since Buddhists are forbidden to kill insects, and almost everyone in Thailand is Buddhist, killing insects is rare in Thailand. We already know that most vegetarians are happy to eat meat. Compare https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/78/3/626S/4690004 https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/78/3/626S/4690004 , finding that two out of three self-described vegetarians had eaten meat within the past one day. They are even less likely to be worried about incidental animal products in candy.

About 4-5% of the UK's population are Muslims, 2% are Jews and 1.5% are Hindus which means they are forbidden to eat beef-based gelatine. The problem is that food declarations do not have to specify from which animal(s) the gelatine was sourced, and many manufacturers don't bother with halal/kosher certifications due to the extra work involved (the certifications usually have to meet strict ultra-orthodox standards, whereas many people don't care about the specifics but only about the kind of animal). As for the number of vegetarians and vegans, the UK reports 11% who live at least vegetarian or stricter per [1]. Unfortunately I haven't been able to find vegetarianism and religion correlations for the UK, but in any case it's safe to assume that anything between 11 and 19% of the UK's population are in one way or another following ethics that refuse gelatine-based products. That is not "nobody" at all. [1] https://www.food.gov.uk/sites/default/files/media/document/food-and-you-wave-5-secondary-analysis-current-food-landscape.pdf https://www.food.gov.uk/sites/default/files/media/document/f...

synu 4y ago
They way I read it, they aren’t saying there are no religious people or vegans. Just that nobody cares except them.
- gadders 4y ago
  Yes, exactly that. It is unlikely to be a concern outside of the groups I mentioned.
idleproc 4y ago
That 11% figure included 'partly vegetarian'. A more useful study "puts the size of the vegan population at about 2-3% and the vegetarian population at about 5-7%" [1]. From the article, it appears that only 2% of vegans, and 3% of vegetarians surveyed did so for religious reasons. [1] https://yougov.co.uk/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2022/01/20/meet-britains-vegans-and-vegetarians https://yougov.co.uk/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2022/...
thaumasiotes 4y ago
> but in any case it's safe to assume that anything between 11 and 19% of the UK's population are in one way or another following ethics that refuse gelatine-based products. That is not "nobody" at all. That doesn't even come close to being a safe assumption; it's wildly overoptimistic. Kind of like claiming that, since Buddhists are forbidden to kill insects, and almost everyone in Thailand is Buddhist, killing insects is rare in Thailand. We already know that most vegetarians are happy to eat meat. Compare https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/78/3/626S/4690004 https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/78/3/626S/4690004 , finding that two out of three self-described vegetarians had eaten meat within the past one day. They are even less likely to be worried about incidental animal products in candy.