By Edward J. Thomas –
There is no shortage of red flags for munching red meat. Scientists have been warning for years that excessive consumption of these meats, particularly processed ones, opens a gateway to life-threatening dangers.
Chowing down on a red meat-heavy diet specifically raises the risk of heart disease, obesity and a string of cancers including breast, colorectal, uterine, hepatocellular and lung. Now there is another reason to ease up on this type of consumption.
Eating relatively high amounts of red meat, especially processed red meat like bacon, sausage and bologna, increases a person’s chances of experiencing cognitive decline and dementia by more than 10 percent compared to people who eat little to none of it, according to a study published in Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
“Red meat is high in saturated fat and has been shown in previous studies to increase the risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease, which are both linked to reduced brain health,” noted study author Dr. Dong Wang of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “Our study found processed red meat may increase the risk of cognitive decline and dementia, but the good news is that it also found that replacing it with healthier alternatives, like nuts, fish and poultry, may reduce a person’s risk.”
The research team identified the increased risk after studying more than 130,000 people over several decades. The participants had an average age of 49 and none had dementia when the study began.
The study tracks red meat consumption by having participants complete a food diary every two to four years, listing what they ate and how often. By the end of the research period, more than 11,000 had developed dementia.
The research team defined processed red meat as bacon, hot dogs, sausages, salami and bologna, among other meat products. Unprocessed red meat such as beef, pork, lamb and hamburger.
The approach allowed the researchers to calculate how much red meat participants ate on average per day, setting a serving size at three ounces. This setting combined with the participant consumption reports cleared the way for the team to group the individuals into three different segments based on how much red meat was eaten.
The low-consumption group for processed meat ate an average of fewer than 0.10 servings of meat per day. The medium group ate between 0.10 and 0.24 servings daily, while the high group consumed 0.25 or more servings per day.
After adjusting for factors such as age, sex and other risk factors for cognitive decline, researchers found that participants in the high group had a 13 percent higher risk of developing dementia compared to those in the low group.
The impact of unprocessed red meat differed somewhat. The researchers compared people who ate an average of less than one-half serving per day to people who ate one or more servings per day and did not find a difference in dementia risk.
There was, however, a substantial impact on subjective cognitive decline, which occurs when a person reports memory and thinking problems before any decline is large enough to show up on standard tests.
The team examined a different group of 43,966 participants with an average age of 78 to get a handle on subjective cognitive decline. After adjusting for factors such as age, sex and other risk factors for cognitive decline, researchers found that participants who ate an average of 0.25 servings or more per day of processed red meat had a 14 percent higher risk of subjective cognitive decline compared to those who ate an average of fewer than 0.10 servings per day.
They also found people who ate one or more servings of unprocessed red meat per day had a 16 percent higher risk of subjective cognitive decline compared to people who ate less than a half serving per day.
The study did deliver some helpful advice for reducing risk through diet alterations. It reported that replacing one serving per day of processed red meat with a serving per day of nuts and legumes was linked with a 19 percent lower risk of dementia and 1.37 fewer years of cognitive aging. Substituting fish for meat generated a 28 percent lower risk of dementia while replacing meat with chicken saw a 16 percent reduced risk of dementia.
“Reducing how much red meat a person eats and replacing it with other protein sources and plant-based options could be included in dietary guidelines to promote cognitive health,” said Wang. “More research is needed to assess our findings in more diverse groups.”
