For decades, the consensus and widely held belief behind red meat was that it may be a main contributor to heart disease, diabetes and the likes. Recent studies, however, call out these old conclusions as “bad advice,” creating a lot of confusion in the health and safety world.
Researchers discovered little-to-no correlation between the food product and the subject’s overall health, believing the cause of prior scares to be due to simply how many Americans used to eat red meat, period.
“Omnivores are attached to meat and are unwilling to change this behavior when faced with potentially undesirable health effects,” noted one of the leading researchers behind the study, alluding to the overwhelming amount of red meat consumption.
The new study, outside of this one topic, creates a whole new way in which future studies will have to look at health risks regarding food. Right now, the same trials used to test for side effects and effectiveness of drugs is the same method used on food, and this can no longer be the case.
This is causing a bit of an uproar within public health circles, including the American Heart Association and the American Cancer Society. Both harshly criticizing the study for its potential “danger” to the already weak American diet.
Diets vary person to person, but at the end of the day, most people will be consuming the same food groups as everyone else, so how can it be possible to single out one thing and not the other?
Plant-based dietitians and researchers who back the previous claim can look to a lower number in cancer and diabetes related members for one. While it is next to impossible to eliminate all carcinogenic intake in one’s life, it has been tested time and time again that vegetarians have a lower risk than meat eaters.
Some of these aforementioned dietitians even went to call out a head researcher on this new study for having ties to the meat and packing industry. While not necessarily proving clear evidence or motive for the study, it does raise some red flags.
So, what does this mean? Should we all go grill up some bacon tomorrow morning? Perhaps not so fast.
Like with all things, moderation is key. It is important to consume all types of food groups in order to maintain a healthy diet, but a meat heavy diet still remains unhealthy for not only ones own personal health, but the earth’s ecosystem as well.
