Study: Red Meat Raises Risk Of Death

Could eating red meat be bad for your health? Scientists have recently discovered that people who eat a lot of red meat have the highest overall risk of death.

Researchers looked at data from The National Cancer Institute study, which is one of the largest studies linking red meat and health, and studied the records of more than 500,000 people aged 50 to 71.

They found that heavy meat eaters were at a higher risk of death over the next ten years than people who ate less meat.

The people in the study were divided into five groups, called quintiles. Looking at the data, 47,976 men and 23,276 women died within a ten-year period - 1995 to 2005. The quintile eating the most red meat had a higher overall risk of death – from heart disease and cancer – than the group that ate the least amount of red meat.

“Red and processed meat intakes were associated with modest increases in total mortality, cancer mortality, and cardiovascular disease mortality,” said Rashmi Sinha and his colleagues.

The researchers state that many deaths could be prevented if people ate less meat.

“For overall mortality, 11 percent of deaths in men and 16 percent of deaths in women could be prevented if people decreased their red meat consumption to the level of intake in the first quintile,” said Sinha and his team.

Studies show that people who eat less meat are healthier in a lot of ways and that meat also contains several cancer-causing chemicals.

(Image Credit)