13 ms·

The Latest Study on Red Meat and Heart Disease: A Red Herring

129 points by RelaxedTree 4y ago

erokar 4y ago
It's far from one study that has found a link between red meat and heart disease. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=meat+heart+disease https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=meat+heart+disease
- azalemeth 4y ago
  Indeed. The original article comes across as really quite biased too. Longitudinal cohort studies can never nail causality but they are quite good at providing measures of apparent risk. In cardiology, an odds ratio of about 1.2, called tiny by the article, can actually be considered quite large in some circumstances. Very roughly speaking, it's about equivalent to your risk per ten years of age of developing heart failure, or per 20 mmHg of systolic blood pressure [1]. [1] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10557-022-07355-7 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10557-022-07355-7
  - radford-neal 4y ago
    The point isn't that an odds ratio of 1.2 is too small to be important. It is that if the estimated odds ratio from the study, with all its biases, is 1.2, then one can't be at all sure that the actual odds ratio is even greater than 1. (An odds ratio less than 1 would indicate that red meat was protective, rather than a risk factor.)
- Macha 4y ago
  It's possible for a paper to concur with the majority (or even objectively correct) consensus and still have issues with it's methodology. Imagine a paper that proved 2+2=4 by surveying preschoolers and going with the majority vote. Correct conclusion, questionable methodology.
  - erokar 4y ago
    For sure. Conflicts of interest are too common in nutrition research, and I think the criticism of this particular paper is laudable. I simply wanted to point out that there is significant indications from other studies that red meat, and in particular processed red meat, is correlated with heart disease (and cancer).
RappingBoomer 4y ago
I think the reason why academia is trying so hard to demonize meat is because they have pushed grains so hard for so many decades and now the truth about grains and blood sugar is coming out...which makes them look bad
- HidyBush 4y ago
  an excessive consuption of refined grains is bad, eating the right amount of whole grains is solely beneficial
  - nikita2206 4y ago
    I wish that we stopped saying things like ‘eating this and that is beneficial’ or ‘good for your health’. You know, consuming calories is immensely beneficial and good for your body if you haven’t had a meal for a day. Doesn’t really matter if it’s refined grains or whatever. Consuming some vitamin-rich whatever is healthy for you if you’re low on those vitamins, otherwise it’s calories and a bunch of work for your liver. There’s stuff that is objectively bad for your health, almost no matter the circumstances. Like some fried sugar-rich dessert, unless you’ve been starving for a few days it’s probably going to be bad for you on all accounts.
  - Fargren 4y ago
    That's a vacuous argument. It's true for literally anything. an excessive consumption of water is bad, drinking the right amount of clean water is solely beneficial an excessive consumption of eggs is bad, eating the right amount of eggs is solely beneficial an excessive consumption of toxic sludge is bad, eating the right amount (0) of sludge is solely beneficial The question, of course, is what is the right amount and is it more or less than what most people eat.
    - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
      > true for literally anything Pedantic: no. It’s true for everything that is safe or beneficial to consume. There is no “right amount” of lead or plutonium in your diet.
OrvalWintermute 4y ago
I have often wondered: A - Are meats unhealthy, or, is it the food fed (grains on a foodlot) to the animal that negatively influences the health profile? [1] B - If meats are so unhealthy, why are the bushmen superfit and incredibly healthy into old age despite having a significant amount of meat ~25% in their diet? [2] & [3] I recognize that some animals raised on healthy grass-fed diets may have health profiles more similar to healthy fish than conventional grain fed red meat [4] & [5] [1] https://chriskresser.com/why-grass-fed-trumps-grain-fed-and-why-you-should-try-it/ https://chriskresser.com/why-grass-fed-trumps-grain-fed-and-... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWUlrTJoE70 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWUlrTJoE70 [3] https://www.exploring-africa.com/en/botswana/san-or-bushmen/san-people https://www.exploring-africa.com/en/botswana/san-or-bushmen/... [4] https://www.fda.gov/food/metals-and-your-food/mercury-levels-commercial-fish-and-shellfish-1990-2012 https://www.fda.gov/food/metals-and-your-food/mercury-levels... [5] https://blog.dana-farber.org/insight/2016/02/are-grass-fed-beef-and-wild-fish-healthier/ https://blog.dana-farber.org/insight/2016/02/are-grass-fed-b...
- WA 4y ago
  10% reach 60. No numbers above that. They are healthy while alive, but don’t live longer than people from developed nations. Look, the discussions around bad health effects of meat consumption all resolve around heart disease and cancer. The numbers are pretty irrelevant for people below 60 or so. We are essentially optimizing lifespan and are wondering what causes diseases in old age, like 70+. It makes zero sense to look at bushmen or ask the paleo fairy, because most of them die earlier than most people in developed nations. If we talk about health and well-being, yes, the average bushman alive is probably healthier than the average 60 year old westerner, because the sick people died in the bush but not here and because they move around a lot more. It is literally comparing the fittest 10% against a society that includes also the sick-but-still-alive.
  - tomp 4y ago
    > They are healthy while alive If that's true, it would imply that they don't die of ill health (disease) but of accidents (eaten by lion) or incredibly curable stuff (e.g. bacterial infection). So their lifestyle is definitely something to mimick / learn from, as we can easily prevent the healthy person dying causes of death in the first world.
anonimo37 4y ago
I wonder how many of these studies become self-fulfilling prophecies. Imagine the following scenario. A study claiming red meat is harmful is widely reported in the mainstream media. After reading about this study, health conscious people cut back on red meat while people who don't look after their health continue to eat the same quantity red meat. As a result of these changes, studies conducted years later find a stronger correlation between red meat and unhealthy people.
- mypastself 4y ago
  I’m having trouble locating it at the moment, but an article was shared here a few months ago that suggested something similar happened with health and dietary fat, back when it was still considered harmful. The correlation gradually disappeared after enough studies debunked the causality hypothesis.
  - copperx 4y ago
    Debunked the causality hypothesis meaning that probably saturated fat intake, after going down on average, no longer correlates with coronary disease? Could you ELI5 that? I'm not familiar with the research or the claims.
    - mypastself 4y ago
      Debunking the idea that fat intake causes high cholesterol and other health issues. There seemed to be some correlation, but causality was spurious.
Gatsky 4y ago
Unfortunately meat is clearly bad for you in at least one but probably many ways. The most compelling evidence to me is that carnivorous animals have higher rates of death from cancer, see fig 2 of this fascinating study: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04224-5 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04224-5
- germi55 4y ago
  "Carnivorous animals have higher rates of death from cancer" Say hello to Crocodiles :) https://www.cell.com/heliyon/fulltext/S2405-8440(21)02697-9 https://www.cell.com/heliyon/fulltext/S2405-8440(21)02697-9
  - Gatsky 4y ago
    The study I cited was of mammals. We aren't going to learn anything useful from the lifestyle of cold-blooded reptiles. For one, their metabolic rate is much lower.
    - galangalalgol 4y ago
      Likewise comparing ourselves to obligate carnivores, or obligate herbivores is also less useful. Ideally you'd want omnivores that for one reason or another excluded meat from the diet, or did not. Right?
      - Gatsky 4y ago
        Not really. The key question is whether meat is carcinogenic or not. If you eat less of it, sure it will be less carcinogenic, but it won't be suddenly good for you. There seems to be a lot of people who want to eat meat and also deny that it has various adverse health effects. The evidence is pretty clear, that's all I'm saying. What one does with that information is up to the individual. I don't do anything with it.
        galangalalgol 4y ago
pfdietz 4y ago
"If TMAO is their answer, however, they should really be warning against fish, not meat. Cod yields 65+ times more TMAO than beef, and halibut, at least 100 times more, according to a 1999 study that examined the effects of 46 foods on TMAO excreted in human urine. Carrots, cauliflower, peas, peanuts and potatoes also lead to far more TMAO than beef."
- mark_l_watson 4y ago
  I agree, be careful what kind of fish you consume. I really like sardines (tasty!) and they have much less heavy metals, etc. than larger fish that are higher up the food chain.
  - copperx 4y ago
    Fish should come with CoAs. No ifs or buts about it.
oifjsidjf 4y ago
>> Mozaffarian discloses in the ATVB paper that he receives funding from Barilla, the world’s largest pasta company—which clearly stands to benefit if meat is sidelined off the dinner plate. (Barilla has invested heavily in nutrition researchers and in promoting the idea that meat as bad for the climate). Follow the money.
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  Big Pasta are in on the climate change hoax too? You cant trust anyone. I was going to quote this exact section, as I felt it was one of the few areas where they let their "we just want real science" mask slip and revealed their consistent "pro-meat" stance.
  - charlieflowers 4y ago
    > Big Pasta are in on the climate change hoax too? You cant trust anyone Not just “big”. Those Angel hair bastards are in on it too.
  - denton-scratch 4y ago
    What's this got to do with climate change? I thought it was about diet and CVD.
    - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
      The blog is a front for the meat industry. They try to stick to the areas where they can have vaguely plausible deniability that they're not just attacking everything that would impact meat sales and agriculture subsidies, with the cover that they're "wanting to look at the evidence". But the comment I replied to quotes them having a swipe at a challenge to meat from a non-nutrition angle, which tips their hand a little. The whole, "we just want the science to be certain" thing is a popular tactic, see for example the Heartland Institute's attempt to have a "Red Team" of scientists pick holes in climate science: https://climateinvestigations.org/heartland-institute-climate-red-team/ https://climateinvestigations.org/heartland-institute-climat... Wouldn't surprise me if you could trace this group back to them too. Ha, didn't think it would be that easy: https://www.heartland.org/news-opinion/news/follow-the-science-at-least-on-nutrition https://www.heartland.org/news-opinion/news/follow-the-scien... For those that prefer Youtube videos: Is Nina Teicholz right about saturated fat or is she a lobbyist for the meat industry? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VK5ApjZdPEo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VK5ApjZdPEo lots of links in the description too.
ZeroGravitas 4y ago
- drewcon 4y ago
  Don’t tell that to the lions.
- xnx 4y ago
  Sugar is more likely to be the next tobbacco.
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    The pro-meat lobby has a weird obsession with sugar. It's like the nuclear fans or anti-recycling groups that keep talking about how bad coal is. We know. We can eat less sugar and less meat. But the same places that published climate denial will attack any attempt to eat less meat or less sugar, probably pointing to the other one as the real villain. Note that a current controversy is about reducing the sugar limit from 10% to 6% to better follow the science. Which side does this evidence-based nutrition campaigner take? They don't mention it at all? Probably not relevant for their pro-meat interests except as an occasional scapegoat.
    - Ensorceled 4y ago
      > It's like the nuclear fans or anti-recycling groups that keep talking about how bad coal is. I'm confused, are you implying nuclear is bad and coal is good?
      - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
        It's a False Dichotomy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma If you can't argue well for your point, you talk about how bad something else is, with the implication that those are the only two options. Coal is bad, worse than nuclear. But those are not the only two options. And when comparing something that uses energy, like recycling, it's not a fair assumption for electric powered things to assume they are using the least efficient method possible, it's just deceptive. Like judging EVs as if the grid was 100% coal. Because even if it was, which it isn't, it won't be for long. Similarly, added sugar is worse than meat in pretty much every way. Doesn't logically follow that people should eat more meat. It's a type of pass-the-buck whatabout-ism.
the_omegist 4y ago
Aren't most studies contradictory ? For one study claiming A you can find another claiming the opposite. In the 80s/90s there was this constant fear about cholesterol and eggs (perhaps promoted by the cereals lobby?) : did people's habits change? If yes, it was probably because of the monopoly of TV as the main source of "information". Nowadays with internet, every one follows his own little bubble of information.
- em500 4y ago
  Yup, according to studies, everything we eat both causes and prevents cancer[1]. AFAICT it's almost impossible to conduct convincing nutrition science. Even if the signs of the effect in observational studies are all in the same direction (usually they're not, see the reference), you still can't rule out many confounding effects. To demonstrate causality, you'd need to force a large number of people on specific diets for a long time in a proper randomized controlled trial, or show very specific bio-chemical reactions to particular food components, or (easier but still very hard) dream up some convincing "natural experiment" or "instrumental variable" to workaround the fact that people mostly choose their own diet. [1] https://www.sciencealert.com/everything-we-eat-both-causes-and-prevents-cancer https://www.sciencealert.com/everything-we-eat-both-causes-a...
  - AlbertCory 4y ago
    There was a study on "gluten intolerance" (which unfortunately I deleted) where they did in fact control people's diets in a double-blind way, and check the validity of their symptoms. Maybe someone can find it, but even with all that rigor, it was somewhat inconclusive.
  - phpisthebest 4y ago
    I think most nutrition science can be boiled down to 4 rules that most people should follow, and ignore the rest 1. Avoid processed Foods, Learn to cook your own meals 2. Eat a variety of foods 3. Control your portions (especially carbs) 4. Drink more water Everything else is mostly irrelevant to the normal person. Are eggs good or bad, is Red meat worse than Chicken, etc etc... Who Cares. Eat it all in moderation, while mixing in fruits and veggies all in proper portion I think it was Food Theory Channel or somewhere that had a video on the amount of influence various industries have had over the "recommendation" by "nutrition science" experts and / or the government, the end result is most "nutrition science" is really marketing not science
funstuff007 4y ago
> low-quality type of data that, on the whole, can only show associations, not cause-and-effect relationships. I have yet to see anyone pull off a long term double-blind experiment on humans--other than the Nazis.
denton-scratch 4y ago
I presume "red herring" is a joke?
- SnowHill9902 4y ago
  A pun.
mark_l_watson 4y ago
Even though I try to make almost all of my meals vegan, I eat two small portions (3 ounces) of non-feed lot organically raised beef a month. I have no scientific basis for my opinion but I think a small amount of beef is good for me. My other occasional meat source is quality sardines, usually sourced from Norway or Spain. Sardines: the “you either love them or hate them” food :-)
sudden_dystopia 4y ago
I am so sick of nutrition science.
- FredPret 4y ago
  Maybe in a couple of centuries it will deserve that description. In the meantime, it seems mostly to be data-illiterate or financially biased spreadsheet monkeys trying to prove things with n=10 and a host of confounding factors. It’s worse than psychology!
- amusedcyclist 4y ago
  She's a shill for the meat industry. Stop believing everything you read
FredPret 4y ago
There never has and never will be a good stats-based study on human diet. We are the most complex things we know of in the universe. Confounding factors abound. Isolating one is impossible, unless researchers have access to a million identical twins separated at birth and forced to eat a certain diet all their lives, in which case there’s probably a huge human rights crisis going on… and the study would still be invalid because identical twins and authoritarian diet regimes are not the norm. The only way is to map out the entire chemical pathway in the human body and figure out what is good and bad that way. That will take a very long time; in the meantime, I will eat red meat, butter, animal fat, and eggs like my very-long-lived and exceedingly robust ancestors all did. One other approach might be to personally try a diet and get regular blood panels and heart scans done. I believe this is the best way.
- copperx 4y ago
  I don't think handwaving away an entire field of study is going to benefit you in any way, flawed as that field might be. Living is easy with eyes closed. Dying is too.
  - FredPret 4y ago
    Studies with n=10 aren't opening any eyes. They are adding garbage to a crowded information landscape. Even in the larger studies, there are so many issues. Take the first one about fat and heart disease. Riddled with errors you'll find warnings about in most data science for beginners tutorials. Or the one about the Mediterranean diet - zero thought given to confounding effects regarding many possible factors. People who eat the Mediterranean diet also live near the sea, and share genetic, cultural, linguistic, political, and economic factors. Sure, maybe it's the fish and olives, but maybe it's another one of the billion things they have in common versus other Europeans or Americans. This style of studying human metabolism is net-negative. Ignoring it is indeed a benefit. On the other hand, tell me that sugar metabolizes into known toxins, and that's a very different story.
julkali 4y ago
This may be only tangentially relevant, but the author is known to be a pro-meat lobbyist (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz).
- pessimizer 4y ago
  Could you pull the quote out that says she's a lobbyist? I can't find it, and without it I can't figure out if you're misusing lobbyist to mean "is known to have had this opinion before."
  - amusedcyclist 4y ago
    "She was also criticized for being an ally of the meat and dairy industry. ". She's not a scientist (did an "American Studies" degree in college,) just a dirtbag who makes her money shilling for a murderous industry
    - noSyncCloud 4y ago
      What on earth is an "American Studies" degree?
      - amusedcyclist 4y ago
        Great question
  - eduction 4y ago
    Strong agree. “Lobbyist” has a precise legal meaning and they are required to register with the House and Senate if they are a federal lobbyist and each state has its own registration process if they are lobbyists at that level. It does not appear this person is a lobbyist. Holding an opinion is not enough to make you a lobbyist, nor is expressing that opinion in a published work.
    - amusedcyclist 4y ago
Metacelsus 4y ago
About TMAO: this is produced when intestinal bacteria consume choline. They release trimethylamine as a byproduct, which is then oxidized in the liver to TMAO. If the liver enzymes are mutated you wind up with "fish malodor syndrome" due to smelling like trimethylamine. Anyway, any food high in choline will elevate TMAO. As an undergrad I was briefly involved in an effort to develop an inhibitor of the bacterial enzymes that degrade choline.
123409871234 4y ago
The author of this post is not a scientist, but rather a journalist with no scientific credentials, who has a long history of being a promoter and propagandist for the meat industry: "Meat lobby peddles doubt to undermine dietary guidelines The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, updated every five years, never fails to cause a stir. For the current revision, released in February, a federally appointed scientific committee — after a two-year review of the latest research and numerous public hearings — has recommended (PDF) lowering consumption of red meat and processed meat. Despite being fairly tepid, this advice set off a media firestorm, driven by a defensive meat industry and others who have been muddying the waters for some time on the role of meat in the diet. The meat lobby is taking full advantage of the current “debate.” Adding to the confusion is Nina Teicholz, the best-selling author of “The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet,” whose recent attempts to discredit the committee’s recommendations on meat have been published in The New York Times, alongside meat industry trade publications such as Beef Magazine and Cattle Network." http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/5/meat-lobby-peddles-doubt-to-undermine-dietary-guidelines.html http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/5/meat-lobby-pedd...
- origin_path 4y ago
  The field of nutrition is self-undermining given how frequently it's inverted its advice, and the prevalence of pseudo-scientific studies. As COVID has shown, "scientists" are incredibly powerful in our society to the extent that they can shut down civilization overnight, force billions of people to take experimental substances, repeatedly lie to both population and politicians in order to generate compliance with no consequences, eliminate all criticism of themselves anywhere except individual blogs and all this with no accountability mechanisms whatsoever. So, good for Nina? We need journalists investigating and undermining pseudo-scientists, just as it's widely recognized that a healthy democracy needs journalists to investigate and undermine corrupt/lying politicians.
- JeremyNT 4y ago
  We've reached the point where, if "substack" is in the URL and it's not a person who I am already familiar with, I ignore it completely. Maybe these bloggers are right, maybe they're not, but I don't have enough cycles to actually vet them all myself. Nutrition research is complicated, but the odds of a nutrition blogger on substack unlocking some "secret" that won't eventually make it into more mainstream science publications seems relatively low to me.
Eleison23 4y ago
- geraldyo 4y ago
  I'm able to differentiate any vegan product from a non-vegan one in under 5 seconds of checking. There is ALWAYS an ingredient list, which is always going to tell you very clearly what you're buying. It is also a good idea to do that to other products you're buying. The "food industry" doesn't really exist, but the meat industry is heavily lobbying for strict regulations, as well as producing more and more ads ("eat REAL meat"). On the other hand, the "vegan products" industry is infinitely smaller, but also lobbying for their products to be less regulated and also putting out more ads. There is no anti-meat jihad, there are people fighting each other with the same arguments for like 10-20 years. What you're noticing is in an increase in adoption because (1) it actually really works for a lot of people, and people have been uneducated about veganism until recently (which ties back to the meat lobbying and ad campaigns admonishing veganism) and (2) it's accepted by quite a few people that the climate impact of the meat industry is outweighing the benefit of eating meat, and so a lot of those people are starting to go vegan too. E: and (3) the main piece: the hyper-focus on the bottom line turned the meat we're eating into hormone bombs. If everyone could eat locally grown ethically sourced meat, there would be no need for veganism, but there wouldn't be enough meat for everyone either. So it's a losing proposition either way, until we have lab grown meat at scale.
  - Eleison23 4y ago
    - geraldyo 4y ago
      Theres is more demand. Thus, stores looking for customers sell more of those products. Thus, there are more plant based products. (1) they may or may not have removed other meat/dairy products, but they may have removed other products, because meat and dairy are still excellent sellers and (2) that wasn't your point, you were saying they are hard to identify and heavily implied that it's maliciously done. The demand side isn't being attacked anymore than in any other industry. "Buy our product because it doesn't include chemical X" is the same thing as plant-based meats saying meat is bad for you. Also, "Studies" aren't even in the top 5 reasons why people at scale make life-changing decisions... there are studies that say almost anything about diet, people are influenced by media. In the media, I've seen more ads and articles about how soy is bad, milk is good, meat is good. Why do you not have any issue with that, but you do have issues with studies being published that say the opposite? The supply side doesn't need to be demonized, because it did a great job itself. All of those industries have made insane amounts of money through lobbying for deregulation in their respective countries and then lowering costs while increasing profits by using that de-regulated environment. That deregulated environment just needs to be filmed in its reality to be "demonic". If that didn't exist, again, there would be no need for the veganism movement and you'd likely never hear about "plant based", since most people follow plant based diets because the supply side has made itself terrible.
dataangel 4y ago
It's difficult for me to take this blogger seriously when they want to give red meat credit for containing heme iron, which is suspected to be a cause for worse health outcomes.
- copperx 4y ago
  Yeah, you don't want heme iron if you're an adult, especially if you're male. At least multivitamin manufacturers get that right (that surprises me). No adult multivitamin contains iron.
benjaminmaccini 4y ago
These thoughts are not entirely my own and I encourage you, along with every one of the commenters here, to read "Food Politics" by Marion Nestle. The dietary advice is generally sound, but the overall message of the book holds true; diet is a political issue. It's a particularly polarizing one too, due to the intimate role that food plays in our cultures, identities, livelihoods and health. It makes sense that this article (along with a hoard of others), is so opinionated and lacks the context to have a well-rounded analysis. I didn't read all the studies, and I'm not going to tell you what to eat, but here my thoughts after reading the article and comments; - The article mentions data collection issues in nutritional research. My understanding is that, generally, most of this data is collected at an aggregate level (economic I/O, based on overall production and consumption), or via the FFQs mentioned. Self reporting can be unreliable and is heavily subject to biases and the placebo effect. - The studies linked about TMAO[0] seem to follow a couple trends in nutritional research that food companies rely on to sell more food. First is; diet is holistic, but applying pharmaceutical methodologies to individual nutrients while ignoring the overall dietary habits (again, data collection is hard) can lead to opportunities for companies to market unhealthy food as "healthy". I see that red heart[1] on some of the most sugary cereals, still. Second is; heightening the focus of specific nutrients over food sources in general as a method of dietary confusion. It is more confusing, and more favorable to industry, to say "avoid foods containing cholesterol and saturated fats," than it is to say "avoid meat". Studies that focus on nutrients reinforce these claims and make sound dietary advice inaccessible. - The article fails to disclose the author's own biases[2] while calling out the "conflicts of interest" that the other studies' authors have with P&G. Commenters are quick to say "follow the money." However, a disclosed conflict-of-interest is not necessarily a bad thing, nutritional professionals need to work and the food industry is a, well... industry that hires food professionals. Do the conglomerates that fund nutrition-research often times leverage studies in bad-faith in order to sell more product? Yes, absolutely. Should you discredit all nutrition research backed by a corporation, probably not. - Dietary advice is intended for populations, not individuals. If I were to say something like; "avoid having more than 24g of sugar a day"[3], I'm saying that targeting 97% of a population. This advice is also influenced by the goals of the organization/administration[4] releasing the advice and overall health concerns for the population. Most of the leading causes of death, in the United States, are linked with overconsumption. As an individual, genetics and lifestyle play a role and shift your needs. A person will probably need more than the recommended amount of salt on the day-to-day than average if they exercise. On a separate note: @dang I'm tired of reading political op-ed pieces that quote bad studies as proof of... whatever, especially those related to health. Is there a blocklist and can (unsettledscience.substack.com)[5] be added to that list? Also, out of curiosity and possibly related to this submission, what sort of mechanisms does HN employ in order to moderate submissions from suspect users? Thanks for all you do by the way. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trimethylamine_N-oxide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trimethylamine_N-oxide [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Heart_Association https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Heart_Association [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz [3] https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/carbohydrates/added-sugar-in-the-diet/ https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/carbohydrates/a... [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietary_Guidelines_for_Americans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietary_Guidelines_for_America... [5] https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=unsettledscience.substack.com https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=unsettledscience.subs...
viktorcode 4y ago
Still, there are meta-analysis of studies with interesting conclusions. One example: https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/nutrit/nuac017/6563767?redirectedFrom=fulltext&login=false https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/advance-article-ab...
jononomo 4y ago
I ate no plant-based calories at all for the entirety of 2021 and I ended the year in fantastic shape. Then I relaxed my rule in 2022 and now I'm 20 pounds heavier and don't feel quite as good physically. So I'm just going to resume the strict version of my diet, which seems to work so well for me: 90% beef, 10% eggs and fish -- with no fiber or plant-based calories of any kind.

129 points by RelaxedTree 4y ago

It's far from one study that has found a link between red meat and heart disease. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=meat+heart+disease https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=meat+heart+disease

azalemeth 4y ago
Indeed. The original article comes across as really quite biased too. Longitudinal cohort studies can never nail causality but they are quite good at providing measures of apparent risk. In cardiology, an odds ratio of about 1.2, called tiny by the article, can actually be considered quite large in some circumstances. Very roughly speaking, it's about equivalent to your risk per ten years of age of developing heart failure, or per 20 mmHg of systolic blood pressure [1]. [1] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10557-022-07355-7 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10557-022-07355-7
- radford-neal 4y ago
  The point isn't that an odds ratio of 1.2 is too small to be important. It is that if the estimated odds ratio from the study, with all its biases, is 1.2, then one can't be at all sure that the actual odds ratio is even greater than 1. (An odds ratio less than 1 would indicate that red meat was protective, rather than a risk factor.)
Macha 4y ago
It's possible for a paper to concur with the majority (or even objectively correct) consensus and still have issues with it's methodology. Imagine a paper that proved 2+2=4 by surveying preschoolers and going with the majority vote. Correct conclusion, questionable methodology.
- erokar 4y ago
  For sure. Conflicts of interest are too common in nutrition research, and I think the criticism of this particular paper is laudable. I simply wanted to point out that there is significant indications from other studies that red meat, and in particular processed red meat, is correlated with heart disease (and cancer).

RappingBoomer 4y ago

I think the reason why academia is trying so hard to demonize meat is because they have pushed grains so hard for so many decades and now the truth about grains and blood sugar is coming out...which makes them look bad

HidyBush 4y ago
an excessive consuption of refined grains is bad, eating the right amount of whole grains is solely beneficial
- nikita2206 4y ago
  I wish that we stopped saying things like ‘eating this and that is beneficial’ or ‘good for your health’. You know, consuming calories is immensely beneficial and good for your body if you haven’t had a meal for a day. Doesn’t really matter if it’s refined grains or whatever. Consuming some vitamin-rich whatever is healthy for you if you’re low on those vitamins, otherwise it’s calories and a bunch of work for your liver. There’s stuff that is objectively bad for your health, almost no matter the circumstances. Like some fried sugar-rich dessert, unless you’ve been starving for a few days it’s probably going to be bad for you on all accounts.
- Fargren 4y ago
  That's a vacuous argument. It's true for literally anything. an excessive consumption of water is bad, drinking the right amount of clean water is solely beneficial an excessive consumption of eggs is bad, eating the right amount of eggs is solely beneficial an excessive consumption of toxic sludge is bad, eating the right amount (0) of sludge is solely beneficial The question, of course, is what is the right amount and is it more or less than what most people eat.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > true for literally anything Pedantic: no. It’s true for everything that is safe or beneficial to consume. There is no “right amount” of lead or plutonium in your diet.

OrvalWintermute 4y ago

I have often wondered: A - Are meats unhealthy, or, is it the food fed (grains on a foodlot) to the animal that negatively influences the health profile? [1] B - If meats are so unhealthy, why are the bushmen superfit and incredibly healthy into old age despite having a significant amount of meat ~25% in their diet? [2] & [3] I recognize that some animals raised on healthy grass-fed diets may have health profiles more similar to healthy fish than conventional grain fed red meat [4] & [5] [1] https://chriskresser.com/why-grass-fed-trumps-grain-fed-and-why-you-should-try-it/ https://chriskresser.com/why-grass-fed-trumps-grain-fed-and-... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWUlrTJoE70 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWUlrTJoE70 [3] https://www.exploring-africa.com/en/botswana/san-or-bushmen/san-people https://www.exploring-africa.com/en/botswana/san-or-bushmen/... [4] https://www.fda.gov/food/metals-and-your-food/mercury-levels-commercial-fish-and-shellfish-1990-2012 https://www.fda.gov/food/metals-and-your-food/mercury-levels... [5] https://blog.dana-farber.org/insight/2016/02/are-grass-fed-beef-and-wild-fish-healthier/ https://blog.dana-farber.org/insight/2016/02/are-grass-fed-b...

WA 4y ago
10% reach 60. No numbers above that. They are healthy while alive, but don’t live longer than people from developed nations. Look, the discussions around bad health effects of meat consumption all resolve around heart disease and cancer. The numbers are pretty irrelevant for people below 60 or so. We are essentially optimizing lifespan and are wondering what causes diseases in old age, like 70+. It makes zero sense to look at bushmen or ask the paleo fairy, because most of them die earlier than most people in developed nations. If we talk about health and well-being, yes, the average bushman alive is probably healthier than the average 60 year old westerner, because the sick people died in the bush but not here and because they move around a lot more. It is literally comparing the fittest 10% against a society that includes also the sick-but-still-alive.
- tomp 4y ago
  > They are healthy while alive If that's true, it would imply that they don't die of ill health (disease) but of accidents (eaten by lion) or incredibly curable stuff (e.g. bacterial infection). So their lifestyle is definitely something to mimick / learn from, as we can easily prevent the healthy person dying causes of death in the first world.

anonimo37 4y ago

I wonder how many of these studies become self-fulfilling prophecies. Imagine the following scenario. A study claiming red meat is harmful is widely reported in the mainstream media. After reading about this study, health conscious people cut back on red meat while people who don't look after their health continue to eat the same quantity red meat. As a result of these changes, studies conducted years later find a stronger correlation between red meat and unhealthy people.

mypastself 4y ago
I’m having trouble locating it at the moment, but an article was shared here a few months ago that suggested something similar happened with health and dietary fat, back when it was still considered harmful. The correlation gradually disappeared after enough studies debunked the causality hypothesis.
- copperx 4y ago
  Debunked the causality hypothesis meaning that probably saturated fat intake, after going down on average, no longer correlates with coronary disease? Could you ELI5 that? I'm not familiar with the research or the claims.
  - mypastself 4y ago
    Debunking the idea that fat intake causes high cholesterol and other health issues. There seemed to be some correlation, but causality was spurious.

Gatsky 4y ago

Unfortunately meat is clearly bad for you in at least one but probably many ways. The most compelling evidence to me is that carnivorous animals have higher rates of death from cancer, see fig 2 of this fascinating study: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04224-5 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04224-5

germi55 4y ago
"Carnivorous animals have higher rates of death from cancer" Say hello to Crocodiles :) https://www.cell.com/heliyon/fulltext/S2405-8440(21)02697-9 https://www.cell.com/heliyon/fulltext/S2405-8440(21)02697-9
- Gatsky 4y ago
  The study I cited was of mammals. We aren't going to learn anything useful from the lifestyle of cold-blooded reptiles. For one, their metabolic rate is much lower.
  - galangalalgol 4y ago
    Likewise comparing ourselves to obligate carnivores, or obligate herbivores is also less useful. Ideally you'd want omnivores that for one reason or another excluded meat from the diet, or did not. Right?
    - Gatsky 4y ago
      Not really. The key question is whether meat is carcinogenic or not. If you eat less of it, sure it will be less carcinogenic, but it won't be suddenly good for you. There seems to be a lot of people who want to eat meat and also deny that it has various adverse health effects. The evidence is pretty clear, that's all I'm saying. What one does with that information is up to the individual. I don't do anything with it.
      - galangalalgol 4y ago

pfdietz 4y ago

"If TMAO is their answer, however, they should really be warning against fish, not meat. Cod yields 65+ times more TMAO than beef, and halibut, at least 100 times more, according to a 1999 study that examined the effects of 46 foods on TMAO excreted in human urine. Carrots, cauliflower, peas, peanuts and potatoes also lead to far more TMAO than beef."

mark_l_watson 4y ago
I agree, be careful what kind of fish you consume. I really like sardines (tasty!) and they have much less heavy metals, etc. than larger fish that are higher up the food chain.
- copperx 4y ago
  Fish should come with CoAs. No ifs or buts about it.

oifjsidjf 4y ago

>> Mozaffarian discloses in the ATVB paper that he receives funding from Barilla, the world’s largest pasta company—which clearly stands to benefit if meat is sidelined off the dinner plate. (Barilla has invested heavily in nutrition researchers and in promoting the idea that meat as bad for the climate). Follow the money.

ZeroGravitas 4y ago
Big Pasta are in on the climate change hoax too? You cant trust anyone. I was going to quote this exact section, as I felt it was one of the few areas where they let their "we just want real science" mask slip and revealed their consistent "pro-meat" stance.
- charlieflowers 4y ago
  > Big Pasta are in on the climate change hoax too? You cant trust anyone Not just “big”. Those Angel hair bastards are in on it too.
- denton-scratch 4y ago
  What's this got to do with climate change? I thought it was about diet and CVD.
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    The blog is a front for the meat industry. They try to stick to the areas where they can have vaguely plausible deniability that they're not just attacking everything that would impact meat sales and agriculture subsidies, with the cover that they're "wanting to look at the evidence". But the comment I replied to quotes them having a swipe at a challenge to meat from a non-nutrition angle, which tips their hand a little. The whole, "we just want the science to be certain" thing is a popular tactic, see for example the Heartland Institute's attempt to have a "Red Team" of scientists pick holes in climate science: https://climateinvestigations.org/heartland-institute-climate-red-team/ https://climateinvestigations.org/heartland-institute-climat... Wouldn't surprise me if you could trace this group back to them too. Ha, didn't think it would be that easy: https://www.heartland.org/news-opinion/news/follow-the-science-at-least-on-nutrition https://www.heartland.org/news-opinion/news/follow-the-scien... For those that prefer Youtube videos: Is Nina Teicholz right about saturated fat or is she a lobbyist for the meat industry? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VK5ApjZdPEo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VK5ApjZdPEo lots of links in the description too.

ZeroGravitas 4y ago

drewcon 4y ago
Don’t tell that to the lions.
xnx 4y ago
Sugar is more likely to be the next tobbacco.
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  The pro-meat lobby has a weird obsession with sugar. It's like the nuclear fans or anti-recycling groups that keep talking about how bad coal is. We know. We can eat less sugar and less meat. But the same places that published climate denial will attack any attempt to eat less meat or less sugar, probably pointing to the other one as the real villain. Note that a current controversy is about reducing the sugar limit from 10% to 6% to better follow the science. Which side does this evidence-based nutrition campaigner take? They don't mention it at all? Probably not relevant for their pro-meat interests except as an occasional scapegoat.
  - Ensorceled 4y ago
    > It's like the nuclear fans or anti-recycling groups that keep talking about how bad coal is. I'm confused, are you implying nuclear is bad and coal is good?
    - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
      It's a False Dichotomy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma If you can't argue well for your point, you talk about how bad something else is, with the implication that those are the only two options. Coal is bad, worse than nuclear. But those are not the only two options. And when comparing something that uses energy, like recycling, it's not a fair assumption for electric powered things to assume they are using the least efficient method possible, it's just deceptive. Like judging EVs as if the grid was 100% coal. Because even if it was, which it isn't, it won't be for long. Similarly, added sugar is worse than meat in pretty much every way. Doesn't logically follow that people should eat more meat. It's a type of pass-the-buck whatabout-ism.

the_omegist 4y ago

Aren't most studies contradictory ? For one study claiming A you can find another claiming the opposite. In the 80s/90s there was this constant fear about cholesterol and eggs (perhaps promoted by the cereals lobby?) : did people's habits change? If yes, it was probably because of the monopoly of TV as the main source of "information". Nowadays with internet, every one follows his own little bubble of information.

em500 4y ago
Yup, according to studies, everything we eat both causes and prevents cancer[1]. AFAICT it's almost impossible to conduct convincing nutrition science. Even if the signs of the effect in observational studies are all in the same direction (usually they're not, see the reference), you still can't rule out many confounding effects. To demonstrate causality, you'd need to force a large number of people on specific diets for a long time in a proper randomized controlled trial, or show very specific bio-chemical reactions to particular food components, or (easier but still very hard) dream up some convincing "natural experiment" or "instrumental variable" to workaround the fact that people mostly choose their own diet. [1] https://www.sciencealert.com/everything-we-eat-both-causes-and-prevents-cancer https://www.sciencealert.com/everything-we-eat-both-causes-a...
- AlbertCory 4y ago
  There was a study on "gluten intolerance" (which unfortunately I deleted) where they did in fact control people's diets in a double-blind way, and check the validity of their symptoms. Maybe someone can find it, but even with all that rigor, it was somewhat inconclusive.
- phpisthebest 4y ago
  I think most nutrition science can be boiled down to 4 rules that most people should follow, and ignore the rest 1. Avoid processed Foods, Learn to cook your own meals 2. Eat a variety of foods 3. Control your portions (especially carbs) 4. Drink more water Everything else is mostly irrelevant to the normal person. Are eggs good or bad, is Red meat worse than Chicken, etc etc... Who Cares. Eat it all in moderation, while mixing in fruits and veggies all in proper portion I think it was Food Theory Channel or somewhere that had a video on the amount of influence various industries have had over the "recommendation" by "nutrition science" experts and / or the government, the end result is most "nutrition science" is really marketing not science

funstuff007 4y ago

> low-quality type of data that, on the whole, can only show associations, not cause-and-effect relationships. I have yet to see anyone pull off a long term double-blind experiment on humans--other than the Nazis.

denton-scratch 4y ago

I presume "red herring" is a joke?

SnowHill9902 4y ago
A pun.

mark_l_watson 4y ago

Even though I try to make almost all of my meals vegan, I eat two small portions (3 ounces) of non-feed lot organically raised beef a month. I have no scientific basis for my opinion but I think a small amount of beef is good for me. My other occasional meat source is quality sardines, usually sourced from Norway or Spain. Sardines: the “you either love them or hate them” food :-)

sudden_dystopia 4y ago

I am so sick of nutrition science.

FredPret 4y ago
Maybe in a couple of centuries it will deserve that description. In the meantime, it seems mostly to be data-illiterate or financially biased spreadsheet monkeys trying to prove things with n=10 and a host of confounding factors. It’s worse than psychology!
amusedcyclist 4y ago
She's a shill for the meat industry. Stop believing everything you read

FredPret 4y ago

There never has and never will be a good stats-based study on human diet. We are the most complex things we know of in the universe. Confounding factors abound. Isolating one is impossible, unless researchers have access to a million identical twins separated at birth and forced to eat a certain diet all their lives, in which case there’s probably a huge human rights crisis going on… and the study would still be invalid because identical twins and authoritarian diet regimes are not the norm. The only way is to map out the entire chemical pathway in the human body and figure out what is good and bad that way. That will take a very long time; in the meantime, I will eat red meat, butter, animal fat, and eggs like my very-long-lived and exceedingly robust ancestors all did. One other approach might be to personally try a diet and get regular blood panels and heart scans done. I believe this is the best way.

copperx 4y ago
I don't think handwaving away an entire field of study is going to benefit you in any way, flawed as that field might be. Living is easy with eyes closed. Dying is too.
- FredPret 4y ago
  Studies with n=10 aren't opening any eyes. They are adding garbage to a crowded information landscape. Even in the larger studies, there are so many issues. Take the first one about fat and heart disease. Riddled with errors you'll find warnings about in most data science for beginners tutorials. Or the one about the Mediterranean diet - zero thought given to confounding effects regarding many possible factors. People who eat the Mediterranean diet also live near the sea, and share genetic, cultural, linguistic, political, and economic factors. Sure, maybe it's the fish and olives, but maybe it's another one of the billion things they have in common versus other Europeans or Americans. This style of studying human metabolism is net-negative. Ignoring it is indeed a benefit. On the other hand, tell me that sugar metabolizes into known toxins, and that's a very different story.

julkali 4y ago

This may be only tangentially relevant, but the author is known to be a pro-meat lobbyist (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz).

pessimizer 4y ago
Could you pull the quote out that says she's a lobbyist? I can't find it, and without it I can't figure out if you're misusing lobbyist to mean "is known to have had this opinion before."
- amusedcyclist 4y ago
  "She was also criticized for being an ally of the meat and dairy industry. ". She's not a scientist (did an "American Studies" degree in college,) just a dirtbag who makes her money shilling for a murderous industry
  - noSyncCloud 4y ago
    What on earth is an "American Studies" degree?
    - amusedcyclist 4y ago
      Great question
- eduction 4y ago
  Strong agree. “Lobbyist” has a precise legal meaning and they are required to register with the House and Senate if they are a federal lobbyist and each state has its own registration process if they are lobbyists at that level. It does not appear this person is a lobbyist. Holding an opinion is not enough to make you a lobbyist, nor is expressing that opinion in a published work.
  - amusedcyclist 4y ago

Metacelsus 4y ago

About TMAO: this is produced when intestinal bacteria consume choline. They release trimethylamine as a byproduct, which is then oxidized in the liver to TMAO. If the liver enzymes are mutated you wind up with "fish malodor syndrome" due to smelling like trimethylamine. Anyway, any food high in choline will elevate TMAO. As an undergrad I was briefly involved in an effort to develop an inhibitor of the bacterial enzymes that degrade choline.

123409871234 4y ago

The author of this post is not a scientist, but rather a journalist with no scientific credentials, who has a long history of being a promoter and propagandist for the meat industry: "Meat lobby peddles doubt to undermine dietary guidelines The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, updated every five years, never fails to cause a stir. For the current revision, released in February, a federally appointed scientific committee — after a two-year review of the latest research and numerous public hearings — has recommended (PDF) lowering consumption of red meat and processed meat. Despite being fairly tepid, this advice set off a media firestorm, driven by a defensive meat industry and others who have been muddying the waters for some time on the role of meat in the diet. The meat lobby is taking full advantage of the current “debate.” Adding to the confusion is Nina Teicholz, the best-selling author of “The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet,” whose recent attempts to discredit the committee’s recommendations on meat have been published in The New York Times, alongside meat industry trade publications such as Beef Magazine and Cattle Network." http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/5/meat-lobby-peddles-doubt-to-undermine-dietary-guidelines.html http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/5/meat-lobby-pedd...

origin_path 4y ago
The field of nutrition is self-undermining given how frequently it's inverted its advice, and the prevalence of pseudo-scientific studies. As COVID has shown, "scientists" are incredibly powerful in our society to the extent that they can shut down civilization overnight, force billions of people to take experimental substances, repeatedly lie to both population and politicians in order to generate compliance with no consequences, eliminate all criticism of themselves anywhere except individual blogs and all this with no accountability mechanisms whatsoever. So, good for Nina? We need journalists investigating and undermining pseudo-scientists, just as it's widely recognized that a healthy democracy needs journalists to investigate and undermine corrupt/lying politicians.
JeremyNT 4y ago
We've reached the point where, if "substack" is in the URL and it's not a person who I am already familiar with, I ignore it completely. Maybe these bloggers are right, maybe they're not, but I don't have enough cycles to actually vet them all myself. Nutrition research is complicated, but the odds of a nutrition blogger on substack unlocking some "secret" that won't eventually make it into more mainstream science publications seems relatively low to me.

Eleison23 4y ago

geraldyo 4y ago
I'm able to differentiate any vegan product from a non-vegan one in under 5 seconds of checking. There is ALWAYS an ingredient list, which is always going to tell you very clearly what you're buying. It is also a good idea to do that to other products you're buying. The "food industry" doesn't really exist, but the meat industry is heavily lobbying for strict regulations, as well as producing more and more ads ("eat REAL meat"). On the other hand, the "vegan products" industry is infinitely smaller, but also lobbying for their products to be less regulated and also putting out more ads. There is no anti-meat jihad, there are people fighting each other with the same arguments for like 10-20 years. What you're noticing is in an increase in adoption because (1) it actually really works for a lot of people, and people have been uneducated about veganism until recently (which ties back to the meat lobbying and ad campaigns admonishing veganism) and (2) it's accepted by quite a few people that the climate impact of the meat industry is outweighing the benefit of eating meat, and so a lot of those people are starting to go vegan too. E: and (3) the main piece: the hyper-focus on the bottom line turned the meat we're eating into hormone bombs. If everyone could eat locally grown ethically sourced meat, there would be no need for veganism, but there wouldn't be enough meat for everyone either. So it's a losing proposition either way, until we have lab grown meat at scale.
- Eleison23 4y ago
  - geraldyo 4y ago
    Theres is more demand. Thus, stores looking for customers sell more of those products. Thus, there are more plant based products. (1) they may or may not have removed other meat/dairy products, but they may have removed other products, because meat and dairy are still excellent sellers and (2) that wasn't your point, you were saying they are hard to identify and heavily implied that it's maliciously done. The demand side isn't being attacked anymore than in any other industry. "Buy our product because it doesn't include chemical X" is the same thing as plant-based meats saying meat is bad for you. Also, "Studies" aren't even in the top 5 reasons why people at scale make life-changing decisions... there are studies that say almost anything about diet, people are influenced by media. In the media, I've seen more ads and articles about how soy is bad, milk is good, meat is good. Why do you not have any issue with that, but you do have issues with studies being published that say the opposite? The supply side doesn't need to be demonized, because it did a great job itself. All of those industries have made insane amounts of money through lobbying for deregulation in their respective countries and then lowering costs while increasing profits by using that de-regulated environment. That deregulated environment just needs to be filmed in its reality to be "demonic". If that didn't exist, again, there would be no need for the veganism movement and you'd likely never hear about "plant based", since most people follow plant based diets because the supply side has made itself terrible.

dataangel 4y ago

It's difficult for me to take this blogger seriously when they want to give red meat credit for containing heme iron, which is suspected to be a cause for worse health outcomes.

copperx 4y ago
Yeah, you don't want heme iron if you're an adult, especially if you're male. At least multivitamin manufacturers get that right (that surprises me). No adult multivitamin contains iron.

benjaminmaccini 4y ago

These thoughts are not entirely my own and I encourage you, along with every one of the commenters here, to read "Food Politics" by Marion Nestle. The dietary advice is generally sound, but the overall message of the book holds true; diet is a political issue. It's a particularly polarizing one too, due to the intimate role that food plays in our cultures, identities, livelihoods and health. It makes sense that this article (along with a hoard of others), is so opinionated and lacks the context to have a well-rounded analysis. I didn't read all the studies, and I'm not going to tell you what to eat, but here my thoughts after reading the article and comments; - The article mentions data collection issues in nutritional research. My understanding is that, generally, most of this data is collected at an aggregate level (economic I/O, based on overall production and consumption), or via the FFQs mentioned. Self reporting can be unreliable and is heavily subject to biases and the placebo effect. - The studies linked about TMAO[0] seem to follow a couple trends in nutritional research that food companies rely on to sell more food. First is; diet is holistic, but applying pharmaceutical methodologies to individual nutrients while ignoring the overall dietary habits (again, data collection is hard) can lead to opportunities for companies to market unhealthy food as "healthy". I see that red heart[1] on some of the most sugary cereals, still. Second is; heightening the focus of specific nutrients over food sources in general as a method of dietary confusion. It is more confusing, and more favorable to industry, to say "avoid foods containing cholesterol and saturated fats," than it is to say "avoid meat". Studies that focus on nutrients reinforce these claims and make sound dietary advice inaccessible. - The article fails to disclose the author's own biases[2] while calling out the "conflicts of interest" that the other studies' authors have with P&G. Commenters are quick to say "follow the money." However, a disclosed conflict-of-interest is not necessarily a bad thing, nutritional professionals need to work and the food industry is a, well... industry that hires food professionals. Do the conglomerates that fund nutrition-research often times leverage studies in bad-faith in order to sell more product? Yes, absolutely. Should you discredit all nutrition research backed by a corporation, probably not. - Dietary advice is intended for populations, not individuals. If I were to say something like; "avoid having more than 24g of sugar a day"[3], I'm saying that targeting 97% of a population. This advice is also influenced by the goals of the organization/administration[4] releasing the advice and overall health concerns for the population. Most of the leading causes of death, in the United States, are linked with overconsumption. As an individual, genetics and lifestyle play a role and shift your needs. A person will probably need more than the recommended amount of salt on the day-to-day than average if they exercise. On a separate note: @dang I'm tired of reading political op-ed pieces that quote bad studies as proof of... whatever, especially those related to health. Is there a blocklist and can (unsettledscience.substack.com)[5] be added to that list? Also, out of curiosity and possibly related to this submission, what sort of mechanisms does HN employ in order to moderate submissions from suspect users? Thanks for all you do by the way. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trimethylamine_N-oxide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trimethylamine_N-oxide [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Heart_Association https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Heart_Association [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nina_Teicholz [3] https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/carbohydrates/added-sugar-in-the-diet/ https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/carbohydrates/a... [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietary_Guidelines_for_Americans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietary_Guidelines_for_America... [5] https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=unsettledscience.substack.com https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=unsettledscience.subs...

viktorcode 4y ago

Still, there are meta-analysis of studies with interesting conclusions. One example: https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/nutrit/nuac017/6563767?redirectedFrom=fulltext&login=false https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/advance-article-ab...

jononomo 4y ago

I ate no plant-based calories at all for the entirety of 2021 and I ended the year in fantastic shape. Then I relaxed my rule in 2022 and now I'm 20 pounds heavier and don't feel quite as good physically. So I'm just going to resume the strict version of my diet, which seems to work so well for me: 90% beef, 10% eggs and fish -- with no fiber or plant-based calories of any kind.