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"This is really consistent with a larger body of science that tells us that diets that are lower in fat, lower in sugar, higher in vegetables overall, are what's really better for our brain health," said one expert.
Replacing one serving of processed red meat per day with healthier foods was linked to a 20% drop in dementia risk, preliminary research presented Wednesday at the Alzheimer's Association International Conference in Philadelphia revealed.
The research, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, tracked more than 130,000 participants in a pair of related medical studies for more than 40 years. It found that people who consumed more than two weekly servings of processed red meats—which include bacon, lunch meats, sausages, and other cured, salted, smoked, or preserved meats—had a 14% increased risk of dementia compared with those who ate less than three servings per month.
"We found that eating processed red meat could be a significant risk factor for dementia."
The study also linked each additional daily serving of processed red meat to more than 1.6 years of cognitive aging for overall cognitive function and nearly 1.7 years for verbal memory.
"Study results have been mixed on whether there is a relationship between cognitive decline and meat consumption in general, so we took a closer look at how eating different amounts of both processed and unprocessed meat affects cognitive risk and function," lead researcher Yuhan Li, an assistant professor at the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, said in a statement.
"By studying people over a long period of time, we found that eating processed red meat could be a significant risk factor for dementia," she added.
Heather Snyder, the Alzheimer's Association vice president of medical and scientific relations, told NBC News that "this is really consistent with a larger body of science that tells us that diets that are lower in fat, lower in sugar, higher in vegetables overall, are what's really better for our brain health."
Li recommends including recommendations to limit processed red meat consumption in official dietary guidelines.
"Processed red meat has also been shown to raise the risk of cancer, heart disease, and diabetes," she said. "It may affect the brain because it has high levels of harmful substances such as nitrites and sodium."
The good news is that the researchers found that replacing one daily serving of processed red meat with foods including beans, nuts, and tofu could result in a 20% lower risk of dementia.
Furthermore, some experts said that while the new study showed more people who consumed processed red meat developed dementia, the research does not show cause and effect.
"It's important to remember that this doesn't mean that eating processed red meat is directly related to developing dementia," Richard Oakley of the U.K. Alzheimer's Association told The Guardian. "It may be that people who avoid processed red meat are generally more health conscious and avoid other unhealthy habits that increase dementia risk."
In addition to the health risks of eating both processed and unprocessed meats, animal agriculture also exacerbates the climate emergency. A 2020 study by researchers at the University of Michigan and Tulane University commissioned by the Center for Biological Diversity, a conservation group, found that if Americans halved their consumption of animal products, it could prevent 1.6 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions within a decade.
"It is imperative to rapidly reduce methane emissions to reduce the accelerating climate damages so many people around the world are suffering," one study author said.
Methane emissions are rising faster than expected, a new study has warned, and the surge is putting global climate goals at risk.
The study, published Monday in Frontiers in Science, found that methane emissions have risen quickly since 2006, with the growth rates for atmospheric methane seeing an "abrupt and rapid increase" in the early 2020s.
"The growth rate of methane is accelerating, which is worrisome," lead study author and Duke University climate scientist Drew Shindell, told The Guardian. "It was quite flat until around 20 years ago, and just in the last few years we've had this huge dump of methane. It's made the job of tackling anthropogenic warming all the more challenging."
"Reducing CO2 will protect our grandchildren—reducing methane will protect us now."
Methane is the second leading greenhouse gas heating the atmosphere and contributing to the climate crisis. It is 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide during the first 20 years after being emitted, but it also fades from the atmosphere much more quickly—in around 12 years rather than centuries. Methane emissions released between the industrial era and 2019 have caused 65% as much global heating as carbon dioxide, according to the new paper.
Methane emissions have spiked in recent years, reaching record levels in 2021 and 2022. The increase in atmospheric methane concentrations in 2021 was also the highest ever recorded. The growth rates in the early 2020s "far exceeded" predictions, and the situation is not expected to improve on its own.
"This study shows that emissions are expected to continue to increase over the remainder of the 2020s if no greater action is taken and that increases in atmospheric methane are thus far outpacing projected growth rates," the authors wrote.
Methane is emitted primarily by leaks and flaring during fossil fuel production, animal and rice agriculture, and the decaying of organic matter. The authors considered what had caused methane production to spike in the early 2020s specifically, and concluded that the two main drivers were fossil fuels—primarily oil and gas production—and an increase in decomposition rates from wetlands as higher temperatures interacted with La Niña conditions in the tropics.
Despite the significant role that methane plays in accelerating the climate emergency, only around 2% of climate finance is dedicated to targeting it, and current policies only respond to around 13% of total methane emissions. Given the rising rates of methane growth, the authors argued that this must change.
"It is imperative to rapidly reduce methane emissions to reduce the accelerating climate damages so many people around the world are suffering," Shindell said in a statement.
Why has the world dragged its feet on methane so far?
"The world has been rightly focused on carbon dioxide, which is the largest driver of climate change to date," Shindell explained. "Methane seemed like something we could leave for later, but the world has warmed very rapidly over the past couple of decades, while we've failed to reduce our CO2 emissions. So that leaves us more desperate for ways to reduce the rate of warming rapidly, which methane [cuts] can do."
Methane, Shindell told The Guardian, "is the strongest lever we can quickly pull to reduce warming between now and 2050."
"There's just such a rapid response to cutting it," Shindell continued. "We've already seen the planet warm so much that if we are to avoid worse impacts we have to reduce methane. Reducing CO2 will protect our grandchildren—reducing methane will protect us now."
Refusing to curb methane could also undermine efforts to reduce CO2: for every 50 megatons of methane that are not eliminated in keeping with low-warming projections, the remaining carbon dioxide budget is reduced by 150 gigatons.
The scientists outlined three "imperatives" for tackling methane:
To that end, the study authors developed an online tool that policymakers and other interested parties can use to gauge the effectiveness and economic benefits of different technologies and strategies.
"The benefits of methane mitigation nearly always outweigh the net costs," Shindell said in a statement.
Each ton of methane emitted in 2020 caused between $470 and $1,700 in damages, without considering methane's contribution to deadly air pollution. If that is taken into account, the true cost per ton could be $7,000 or more.
The most effective action a stakeholder can take to reduce emissions will depend on where they live and their position in society. For governments in countries with large fossil fuel industries, for example, the most important tools would be regulating production, offering incentives for companies to capture any methane, or charging the companies for emitting methane, the study authors argue.
For individuals, the most effective actions may be altering their consumption patterns or taking political action.
"People can make sure they avoid overconsumption of beef and dairy, and compost their organic waste whenever possible," said Shindell in a statement.
"If it's not possible where they live, they can vote for those who'll create programs for composting in their towns. They can also vote for those who will make polluters pay for methane emissions rather than letting them profit while society picks up the tab for the damages they're inflicting."
"This is truly frightening news," the author of a new study said. "Lacing pesticides with forever chemicals is likely burdening the next generation with more chronic diseases and impossible cleanup responsibilities."
Pesticides used on crops in the United States are increasingly laced with "forever chemicals," making it likely that they are being spread in common foods and waterways, according to a study published Wednesday.
The peer-reviewed study, published in Environmental Health Perspectives, is the first full review of the presence of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in pesticides. The authors, from three nonprofit groups, found that 14% of the active ingredients in U.S. pesticides were PFAS—including 30% of the active ingredients approved by regulators in the last 10 years—as were an unquantified amount of the inert ingredients.
"This is truly frightening news because pesticides are some of the most widely dispersed pollutants in the world," said Nathan Donley, environmental health science director at the Center for Biological Diversity. "Lacing pesticides with forever chemicals is likely burdening the next generation with more chronic diseases and impossible cleanup responsibilities."
"This is a multigenerational threat," he wrote on social media after the study's release. "The true harm won't be realized in my lifetime, but in my children's and grandchildren's lifetimes. Our shortcomings should not be their burden to bear."
New research from PEER, @CenterForBioDiv, and @ewg published today in @EHPonline found that more and more toxic PFAS, known as “forever chemicals,” are being found in U.S. pesticide products, contaminating our food, our homes, our gardens, and our pets.https://t.co/fggGAYrafM
— PEER (@PEERorg) July 24, 2024
After being developed by chemical companies in the mid-20th century, PFAS were lightly regulated and little scrutinized for many decades, even as they gained widespread use in household products. However, they've drawn increasing scrutiny in recent years, as more and more studies have emerged about their potential dangers, including links to cancer and a host of other diseases and serious health issues.
The forever chemicals are now incredibly widespread and can be found in the blood of the overwhelming majority of Americans. A study published earlier this month found that certain common foods, such as white rice and eggs, were associated with a higher level of PFAS in the body.
Two types of PFAS thought to be among the most toxic, PFOA and PFOS, have been found in pesticide products, likely due to the leaching of fluorinated containers, the new study suggests. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) banned certain uses of fluorinated containers in December, but an industry legal challenge succeeded in federal court in March, weakening the regulatory effect.
The EPA announced new regulations on PFAS in drinking water in April but utility and chemical companies have filed several legal challenges. The chemicals industry, meanwhile, faces the prospect of its own momentous legal challenges, due to the way it concealed the dangers of its products for so long.
To coincide with the new study's publication, Emory University researchers, who weren't involved with the study, wrote a "perspective" for Environmental Health Perspectives that cited a need for much stronger federal regulation.
"The regulations surrounding pesticides are currently outdated and ineffective, so this discovery of PFAS presence in pesticide formulations represents a new opportunity for the EPA to improve the scientific validity of pesticide risk assessment to better capture real-world exposure scenarios," the Emory researchers wrote.
The study authors themselves have been critical of the EPA. Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), one of the three nonprofits that conducted the study, sued the EPA in February for failing to adequately disclose PFAS health and safety data.
Kyla Bennett, PEER's science policy director, attacked the agency, which uses a narrower definition of PFAS than the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and has often waived often immunotoxicity study requirements for pesticides, in a statement on Wednesday.
"I can think of no better way to poison people and the environment than to spray PFAS-laden pesticides on our crops and in our homes," Bennett said. "The blame for this contamination crisis lies squarely on EPA's shoulders."