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processed meat
Study Links Processed Red Meat to Dementia Risk
"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.
Jul 31, 2024
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The research, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, tracked more than 130,000 participants in a pair of related medical studies for more than 40 years.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.
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World Health Organization Links Red Meat to Cancer - Time to Eat Less and Eat Better
Oct 26, 2015
Americans' love affair with meat - we already knew - has some supersized impacts on the environment, from its intensive use of water to the enormous carbon footprint, as well as our nutritional health.
And today we learned more about its supersized impact on public health. Eating processed meats like bacon and hot dogs causes bowel cancer, while eating red meat (including beef and veal, pork, goat and lamb) probably is carcinogenic to humans. That's the conclusion of the World Health Organization's authoritative International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), which classifies red meat as a Group 2a carcinogen. The findings were published in the journal Lancet Oncology.
Processed meat was classified as Group 1, carcinogenic to humans - the strongest possible designation, like tobacco and asbestos. The classifications describe the strength of the scientific evidence, not the potency of the carcinogen. WHO's analysis estimates that for every 50 gram portion of processed meat eaten daily, the risk of bowel cancer rises by about 18%.
A Group 2a classification means there is strong evidence from studies in animals to label red meat as probably cancer-causing, combined with limited evidence from human studies that also shows eating red meat to be positively associated with developing bowel cancer in the colon or rectum. There also is science linking red meat consumption with prostate cancer and pancreatic cancer. Cancers of the colon and rectum are the 2nd most common cause of cancer-related deaths in American men and women, with nearly 50,000 deaths expected in 2015.
These are WHO's two highest cancer classifications. The risk rises with the amount of meat consumed. It would not be good medicine to wait longer before strongly advising the public to eat less red meat, especially less processed meat. WHO recommendations also include eating diets higher in whole grains and vegetables and limiting red and processed meats because of evidence that dietary fiber protects against cancer.
Luckily, the WHO's ruling comes on the heels of a growing trend toward eating less and better meat in America. American red meat consumption has already dropped about 25% since the mid-1970s. But Americans, on average, still eat about 1.9 lbs of red meat per week - approaching double the E.U.-recommended amount of no more than 500 grams (1.1 lbs) of cooked red meat per week.
Yet, if history is any guide, Big Meat will likely resist the new IARC classification and try to undermine the well-considered opinions of nutrition and health experts.
Happily, Big Meat doesn't represent the entire industry, so when people eat red meat, they can also make better choices. Producers of better meat are meeting an increasing share of the red meat consumed today—meat from well-stewarded farms and ranches, from animals raised more humanely and with no or reduced hormones and antibiotics.
How red meat is produced is a major health issue for the animals, of course, but also for people. Recent announcements by meat and restaurant companies, including Subway, underscore what the CDC, NRDC, and others have long maintained - giving human antibiotics routinely to healthy animals has helped create a superbug problem. And that's a problem we can no longer ignore or tolerate.
Companies like Panera and Chipotle show that this approach to buying meat can be good for public health and business. While sales of conventional meat are flat or declining, sales of healthier, more sustainably-produced meats are up.
And because meat products can be some of the most resource intensive to produce, eating less - and more sustainably raised - meat can reduce the impact of the conventional meat industry on our land, water, air and climate.
The bottom line is to eat less and eat better meat. Better for you, better for the planet. With Thanksgiving approaching, that's a change for which we could all be thankful.
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Processed Meats Pose Severe Cancer Risk, Says WHO
Bacon, sausage, ham labeled "carcinogenic to humans" by World Health Organization's cancer research arm
Oct 26, 2015
Processed meats have been placed in the same health risk category as smoking and asbestos by the cancer research body of the World Health Organization (WHO) on Monday.
Products salted, cured, or otherwise processed to enhance flavor are "carcinogenic to humans," the Paris-based International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) found in its report, published in the Lancet Oncology. That puts processed meat in the Group 1 carcinogenic category alongside substances like tobacco, alcohol, and plutonium. And non-processed fresh meats like beef, pork, and lamb, among others, are "probably carcinogenic to humans," the agency said.
According to the IARC's report, Carcinogenicity of Consumption of Red and Processed Meat, each 50-gram portion of processed meat eaten daily—including bacon, sausages, and ham, as well as canned meat and meat-based sauces—increases the risk of colorectal cancer by 18 percent. The report was crafted by 22 international health experts for the IARC Monograph Program, which evaluates environmental causes of cancer in humans.
"For an individual, the risk of developing colorectal cancer because they consume processed meat remains small, but this risk increases with the amount of meat consumed," said Dr. Kurt Straif, head of the IARC Monograph Program. "In view of the large number of people who consume processed meat, the global impact on cancer incidence is of public health importance."
The IARC's findings (pdf) come just months after the top U.S. nutritional panel, the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, reported that Americans must reduce their meat intake and switch to sustainable, plant-based diets to curb greenhouse gas emissions and stave off the rise of preventable chronic diseases like diabetes and certain types of cancer.
President Obama responded to that report in February by vowing to consider the environment in the 2015 Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA), due later this year. However, heavy lobbying by the meat industry in the intervening months led the Obama administration to rescind its promise, a move that climate and public health advocates called "disappointing" and "politically motivated."
The IARC stated on Monday that meat consumption is increasing in low—and middle-income countries (pdf). Citing the Global Burden of Disease Project, an independent research organization, the IARC reported that diets with a heavy intake of processed meat can cause about 34,000 deaths per year.
"These findings further support current public health recommendations," said IARC director Dr. Christopher Wild. He added that global governments and regulatory agencies should also use them to provide the best dietary guidelines.
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