Eating Red Meat May Shorten Life Span

· In a recent study published in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine, researchers found that people who routinely ate red meat had a higher risk of dying prematurely.

· The study included more than 500,000 men and women and compared death rates to dietary meat intake. Researchers found that routinely eating red meat was associated with a higher risk of death due to heart disease as well as cancer.

· Study authors compared dietary habits over a ten year period. Study participants were 51 to 70 years of age. They concluded that eating approximately four ounces of red meat per day gave men a 27 percent higher risk of dying from heart disease and a 22 percent higher risk of dying from cancer compared with those who ate the least amount of red meat. The study showed that women who ate large amounts of red meat had a 50 percent higher risk of dying of heart disease and a 20 percent higher risk of dying of cancer than women who ate less red meat.

This questionnaire-based study is important given its large size of almost a half a million people. The relationship drawn between eating red meat and cancer death is likely related to carcinogens (cancer-causing chemicals) found in cooked meat. The increased risk of cardiovascular events are explained by higher blood pressure and cholesterol levels associated with diets high in red meat.

Reference
Meat Intake and Mortality, Arch Intern Med. 2009;169(6):562-571.

Posted on March 25, 2009

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