What you need to know about a new study on processed meats and dementia

At this point, it can be easy to ignore headlines about the latest studies claiming that a particular food is ‘bad’ for you – or, conversely, is canonized as a ‘superfood’. Most articles on research demonizing a particular type of food typically follow a pattern: identifying a particular condition that everyone fears, looking at preexisting sets of self-reported data (courtesy of a biobank or other long-term observational study), noting a possible link between the food in question and the disease, and concluding by pointing out that correlation does not always equate to causation, and people still adopt healthier eating habits

Good, another one of those studies was published today, and it addresses the classic question of whether to eat meat – especially that meat those are highest processed – can increase our risk of dementia.

What this study found

The latest research on the hot dog brain connection comes from the University of Leeds Nutritional Epidemiology Group in the UK, and was published today in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition

Using data collected between 2006 and 2010 from nearly 500,000 people ages 40 to 69 who are part of the British Biobankthe researchers looked at whether there is a possible link between meat consumption and the development of dementia.

While this is not a new research question, the authors believe their study is the first large-scale study of participants over time to explore a link between specific types and amounts of meat consumed, and the risk of developing the disease.

The researchers found that people who ate 25 grams of processed meat per day (the equivalent of about one slice of thick-cut bacon) had a 44% increased risk of developing dementia.

What you need to know about the findings

Of course, like the results of similar studies, these should be taken with a grain of salt. First, the findings do not provide direct evidence that eating processed meat causes dementia – only that a certain pattern emerged in the data. Moreover, this wasa observational study using self-reported data from a biobank – not a controlled experiment.

Of the nearly half million participants, 2,896 cases of dementia were diagnosed over an average observation period of eight years – with men being diagnosed more often than women. Based on the other available data Through the biobank, the researchers also noted that the people who developed dementia were generally older, less financially secure, less educated, smoked more, were less physically active, had a stroke and family history of dementia, and were more likely to be carriers. of a gene strongly associated with dementia.

Meanwhile, the researchers also noted that the people who ate more processed meat were also male, less educated, smokers, overweight or obese, ate fewer fruits and vegetables, and had a higher intake of protein and fat (including saturated fat).

The takeaway

According to the principal investigator of the study, Huifeng Zhang, a PhD candidate from the School of Food Science and Nutrition at the University of Leeds:

Further confirmation is needed, but the direction of the effect is linked to current healthy eating guidelines, suggesting that a lower intake of unprocessed red meat could be beneficial to health.

In other words, to claim that “processed meats cause dementia” requires additional, more targeted research. And in the meantime, we should probably cut back on eating foods we already knoww we should be enjoying moderation.