Is red meat bad for your heart? It may depend on who funded the study

How do industry-linked studies shape the way people understand, and potentially misunderstand, the health consequences of what they eat? Photo / 123rf

A new analysis found that overseas red meat studies with industry links were more likely to report favourable results than those without them.

In a review published last week in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, scientists came to a concerning conclusion. Red meat appeared healthier in studies that were funded by the red meat industry.

Of course, this is not surprising to anyone familiar with nutrition research, which often has conflicts of interest because of a lack of federal funding. But it is yet another example of how industry-linked studies might shape the way people understand, and potentially misunderstand, the health consequences of what they eat.

Past research funded by the sugar industry, for instance, has downplayed the relationship between sugar and health conditions like obesity and heart disease. And studies funded by the alcohol industry have suggested that moderate drinking could be part of a healthy diet.

Miguel López Moreno, a researcher at Francisco de Vitoria University in Spain who led the new analysis, said in an email that he wanted to know if similar issues were happening with the research on unprocessed red meat. Processed meats like bacon and sausage have consistently been linked with heart disease risk, he said, but the evidence for unprocessed red meats like steaks and pork chops has been “far more mixed”.

The question is timely, as influential people like the US health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and podcasters like Joe Rogan and Lex Fridman have spoken favourably about meat-heavy diets and downplayed the health risks of saturated fats – to public health experts’ concern.

We’ve long known that eating saturated fats, which are abundant in red meat, has been associated with cardiovascular disease. So what does this new finding tell us about how financial interests can shape how people understand what’s good for them?

Here’s what experts say.

What the new review found

Moreno and his team from research institutions in Spain analysed 44 clinical trials published between 1980 and 2023. The studies looked into how eating unprocessed red meat might influence participants’ risk for developing cardiovascular disease, including by measuring their cholesterol, blood pressure and triglyceride levels.

The 44 studies, half of which were conducted in the United States, included adults who ate either unprocessed red meat or a comparison diet for several weeks or months. Some of the studies included healthy adults, while others focused on those with risk factors for cardiovascular disease, like high cholesterol or obesity.

Of the 44 studies the scientists analysed, 29 received funding from red-meat-related industry groups like the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and the National Pork Board. The remaining 15 trials were funded by government grants, academic institutions or nonprofit foundations with no industry links.

Moreno and his colleagues found that the trials with funding from the red meat industry were nearly four times as likely to report favourable or neutral cardiovascular results after eating unprocessed red meat when compared with the studies with no such links. All of the independently funded studies reported either worsened or neutral cardiovascular outcomes, and those with industry funding reported either favourable or neutral outcomes.

The authors of the new review reported no conflicts of interest or food industry links for themselves.

A confusing picture for consumers

When the average person sees a bunch of trials studying one thing but getting different results, it can be challenging to know what to believe, said Deirdre Tobias, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. This can “undermine nutrition science,” she said.

These differing results may have stemmed from how the studies were set up in the first place, Tobias wrote in an editorial for the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition that accompanied the new study.

Individual nutrition studies can be good at showing how the health effects of certain foods compare with those of other specific foods. But to demonstrate whether a particular food, or food group like red meat, is good or bad for health in general, scientists must look at the results from many different studies that compare it to all possible food groups and diets.

The new review showed that, on the whole, the industry-funded red meat studies neglected to compare red meat to the full range of foods people might eat – including food we know to be good for the heart like whole grains or plant-based protein sources such as tofu, nuts or legumes. Instead, many of the studies compared unprocessed red meat to other types of animal protein like chicken or fish, or to carbohydrates like bagels, pasta or rice.

The independently funded studies, on the other hand, compared red meat to “the full spectrum” of different diets – including other types of meat, whole grains and heart-healthy plant foods like soy products, nuts and beans – Tobias said. This more comprehensive look offers a fuller picture of red meat’s risks or benefits, she said.

Of course, we can’t prove that the scientists who designed the industry-funded studies omitted certain comparisons to purposefully make red meat look good, said Dr Walter C. Willett, a professor of epidemiology and nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. But the trend is pretty damning, he said.

A spokeswoman for the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association said in an email that “beef farmers and ranchers support gold standard scientific research,” and that both animal and plant sources of protein can be part of a heart-healthy diet.

It’s true that there can be room for both sources of protein in a healthy diet, nutrition experts say. And while we could use more – and larger, longer – studies comparing high-quality plant protein sources to unprocessed red meat, Willett said, the evidence so far suggests that plant proteins are better for heart health than animal proteins high in saturated fats.

What this means for future nutrition research

When any food industry group – including one unrelated to the meat industry, like a soy or nut group – pays for research, the goal is often to promote and sell more of their product, said Dr John Ioannidis, a professor of medicine, epidemiology and population health at Stanford University.

That’s one reason nutrition experts worry about the Trump administration’s proposed US$18 billion ($30.5b) in cuts to the National Institutes of Health, which could result in more industry-sponsored research.

This does not “bode well” for the future credibility of nutrition science, said Marion Nestle, an emerita professor of nutrition, food studies and public health at New York University.

When food industry groups pay for nutrition research, she said, it’s good for marketing their product, but not for science.

During a webinar last week, Dr Jay Bhattacharya, the new director of the NIH, told members of the American Society for Nutrition that the agency was going to “focus” on nutrition under his leadership, though he did not get into any specifics on funding.

The experts we spoke with were not so optimistic. Nutrition research has already been under-resourced in the United States; less than 5% of the NIH’s budget was allocated to nutrition research in 2023, for instance. That’s a “minuscule” amount, Tobias said.

The red meat study is “an excellent example” of why the NIH should be investing in nutrition research in the United States, Tobias added. “Otherwise, we depend on industry to lead the way, with little assurance it acts in the pure interest of public health.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Written by: Caroline Hopkins Legaspi

Photographs by: Jim Wilson

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