Talk:Red meat/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Red or white?

I've moved the following statement here as it's not only poorly sourced but likely false:

The meat of young mammals such as veal and milk-fed lamb, and that of pork is usually considered "white"; while the meat of duck and goose is considered "red", though the demarcation line has been shifting.

The demarcation line shifted long ago! --Amit 02:58, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Not with traditional thinking or common knowledge! Pork, along with Chicken or Fish, has always been considered not red meat. It's part of common American and western culture and is supported in cookbooks and dictionaries.ParaGreen13 (talk) 06:58, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

See discussion in Talk:White meat. It's amusing that you consider OED 2 a poor source, and seem to think that 18 years ago is a long time. Are you basing your judgement on personal experience (i.e. original research)? What about a world perspective? Have you investigated European (not to mention Asian, etc.) positions? As a compromise, I will add the word "traditionally". --Macrakis 19:04, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

The Emu article lists that bird as a red meat, with sources (here and here). Are there other exceptions? Does anyone know enough to describe the distinction in more detail? Blurble 19:42, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Buffalo and Bison are a red meat. Can someone add more on them? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.80.179.151 (talk) 14:45, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

In my experience it has always been acceptable in casual usage to refer to mammal meat as "red meat." I have never heard goose referred to as red meat, nor would I (personally) ever refer to pork as white meat. I have just learned however that for meat to be certified Glatt kosher it must first be red meat, and second, it must meet specific requirements. In that discussion, I was surprised to learn that lamb is not considered red meat; I have not been able to determine why. The current article hints at an answer, when it refers to meat that is "red when raw and not white when cooked." However, an ambiguity is introduced in a later paragraph which asserts, regarding the "red" label, "nor does it refer to its coloration after it has been cooked." This is inconsistent with the opening paragraph. K9gardner (talk) 21:58, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

The term "glatt" means that the lungs are free of adhesions, and that distinction is only useful when applied to the meat of large herd animals (e.g. beef, bison). So kosher beef might be glatt kosher or not. For other meats (e.g. lamb, chicken), meat that is not glatt is simply not kosher at all. And fish don't have lungs, so the glatt/non-glatt distinction is meaningless. --ABehrens (talk) 12:46, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

References

This page needs to be balanced out a lot

I'm surprised the obvious bias in this page has been tolerated. One editor has even gone so far as to add an absurd section on dietary habits in relation red meat, almost as if implying that there might be some chemical in the meat which stops people from eating vegies. The section on globins paints a false picture of total scientific agreement as to the deadly and dangerous potential of red meats, especially, we are told, because of a scary sounding process that red meat triggers off in the gut. This air of scientific certainty did not seem to be present in the BBC article that the entire section seems to be based off, I can only assume that it is deliberate.

Anyhoo, I'll try cleaning it up a bit.

---

Also, the Health Benefits section is ridiculous. ONE line on positive benefits, along with 25+ negative ones, under headings such as 'Cancer' etc. Not impartial whatsoever. Red Meat is not poisonous to humans as this article seems to suggest...

Health Effects? This section just seems to be all about how bad red meat is, like a vegetarian wrote it, I am pretty damn sure red meat has some affects which are benificial, since when did an effect mean a bad thing? Doesn't Red meat help brain development with proteins not found anywhere else? Have you seen how sickley vegetarians look compared with people whom eat red meat? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.101.156.88 (talk) 01:48, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm no vegetarian and would have no problem personally clubbing a baby seal, but red meat is a not good for optimal health. The article is balanced. Dann3131 (talk) 03:06, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I would like to point out something very general, and which has nothing to do with what I personally think about red meat, but which is relevant to your complaint: for an article to be impartial, this does NOT mean that there should be as much information in favour of the subject as there is against it. It's important to include as many properly sourced and salient facts as possible, but there may just not be as many out there for the one side. As a more extreme example, consider an article about some kind of highly toxic compound which is most commonly produced as industrial waste. There could certainly be a section about the damage it could cause to the environment and/or people, but it's clear that to achieve impartiality it isn't necessary to write a section about how it benefits the environment. Attention must be paid to sourcing and to language, however.

BradHD (talk) 11:11, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

The article is balanced as it only seems to take into account studies made in the US. There are a lot of studies made in US that seem to indicaate red meat having bad effects for human health, but then again studies made here in Finland have found nothing of the kind. It is likely that the production process is to blame. Erkki2000 (talk) 09:21, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

The following statement is 100% make believe, and the reference points to a site promoting quackery, so I have taken it off the page:

By the age of fifty, the average American has five pounds of undigested red meat in their bowels. [1]

Nova SS 03:05, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

And if you look at the site, it doesn't even make that claim: it's only a quotation from a movie. I removed the statement again after someone re-added it. Wmahan. 17:50, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Wow, a holistic quack site with a flaky quote. What a surprise. Nova SS 18:26, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Cleaned up

I did a PubMed and google scholar search for "red meat", and also searched for "red meat diabetes" and "red meat cardiovascular," and added the results here. They were all either showing negative or no effects of red meat, which leads me to believe that there was no bias in this article, that is just the current state of science. In any case, I hope that adding all these citations will remove any bias that had existed, so I would like to remove the NPOV in the next few days, unless someone has specific complaints that still need to be addressed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.126.183.222 (talk) 19:24, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

These were all done by me, but I forgot to log in. So the revisions from 99.126.183.222 were by Xodarap00 (talk) 19:26, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

I have removed the NPOV Xodarap00 (talk) 17:26, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

Questions

I read an article recently about a link between "red meat" and colon cancer. It's not clear to me, even after reading this article, what all constitutes "red meat" in that context. Beef? Pork? Turkey? Chicken? Lamb? Buffalo? Alligator? Frog? --TheCynic (talk) 18:56, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

The term is used loosely, as the article says. It almost certainly includes beef and excludes chicken, but you'll have to read the scientific research on which that article is based to see if it includes pork, for example. I suspect that there are few good studies on lamb and game simply because not that much is consumed in the countries (North America, Western Europe, etc.) where most epidemiological studies are performed. --Macrakis (talk) 03:59, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Irrelevant health effect comparison

Why are non meat-eaters being compared to people who eat red meat regularly in an article specifically about red meat?

The correlation is useless even with a comparison of vegetarians to general meat-eaters because there are so many variables likely to drastically influence the result. Comparing them to red meat eaters is even worse.

And even if it was a useful correlation, it belongs either in an article about vegetarians or about meat eating in general. Or ideally, on a pseudoscientific pro-vegetarian website outside of Wikipedia.

One study has determined that the death rate of non meat-eaters due to heart diseases is 0.72 compared to meat eaters, although the study stated that no firm conclusion as to the reason for this difference can be made based on the data.[16]

Overall, the relative risk of developing a fatal cancer in non meat-eaters is 0.61 compared to people who eat red meat regularly.[16]

--71.181.32.247 (talk) 09:33, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

It seems to me that the way to determine if there are health effects - both positive or negative - associated with a particular diet is to compare followers of that diet to a totally different diet. There may be statistics comparing people who eat lots of meat to those who eat little, but the variables would be even greater in that case. I think having these comparisons keeps articles balanced - otherwise each article would just be a fluff peice for its topic.Bob98133 (talk) 13:20, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

It's not about meat eaters, it's about red meat eaters. The way to determine if there are health effects associated with red meat is to isolate the variable in question: meat that comes from a mammal. Which a comparison between a vegetarian diet and a diet consisting of lots of red meat completely fails to do. You could also say that the risk of heart disease is low among red meat eaters compared to people who eat nothing but margarine, but that's not a useful comparison either. --71.181.32.247 (talk) 03:46, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Since you reverted the change (Unexplained removal? Really?), I'm adding tags. --71.181.32.247 (talk) 07:40, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Your tags are not appropriate. The cancer section clearly states that "that red meat could pose a notable increase in cancer risk." It doesn't suggest a causal relationship. It is well documented. The LCBA reference under cardiovascular diseases certianly is misleading. As I recall, the subjects in this study all had relatively high cholesterol levels which stayed the same whether they ate low fat red meat or white meat. While the beef producers would like this to mean that red meat has a place in a low fat diet, it could easily claim the same thing for low fat white meat. As well, one has to be somewhat suspect when a study performed by the LCBA shows how good red meat is for you. Please remove the tags or be specific about what your problem is with the article. Your rationale for scientifically detemrining things differs with the references.Bob98133 (talk) 14:46, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

I have been specific. I'm not debating that red meat could pose a notable risk for cancer or heart disease. I'm debating that two statistics provided are not relevant to the article because they don't properly isolate the role of specifically red meat enough. Again, you could also say that the risk of heart disease is low among red meat eaters compared to people who eat nothing but margarine (also a non meat-eating diet, by the way), but that wouldn't be a useful or relevant study either. --71.181.32.247 (talk) 20:24, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't particularly disagree with you - it's just that using your criteria no "scientific" evidence could be used for most topics. For example, saying that smoking cigarettes increases your risk of lung cancer. There is no way to isolate all human behaviors so that you only have people who smoke and people who don't smoke, since people do all sorts of other things that could affect getting lung cancer. However, whoever did these studies had sufficient evidence to suggest that there could be a relationship, and since these were serious studies I think that it is acceptible to include that info - as long as it says "could pose a threat" and not "poses a threat." Bob98133 (talk) 20:42, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Actually, that is a problem with a lot of drug studies. (Cannabis comes to mind, where cannabis users may be likely to take other drugs as well.) But in the case of smoking studies, theres not a lot else that the average person will take into his lungs, unlike no meat versus frequent red meat where there's a lot of potential variation in diet.

In fact, the article as it is now even agrees with me on that: "the study stated that no firm conclusion as to the reason for this difference can be made based on the data."

And in smoking studies, they modify the appropriate variable: whether the person smokes tobacco. In this article though, you have non meat eaters compared to general meat eaters, which is like comparing non drug users to general drug users in a tobacco article. It would rather belong in an article about drugs, just as that tidbit belongs in an article about vegetarianism or meat. --71.181.32.247 (talk) 23:35, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Actually, skimming the source cited, I don't see any mention of red meat at all. It's about non-meat eaters vs meat eaters, does not mention red meat at all, and even lists all the nonrelated reasons for the results. This means that the results are inconclusive (as I've been saying) and irrelevant to this article (as I've also been saying.) --71.181.32.247 (talk) 23:41, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Saturated fat

The source for the claim that saturated fat is associated with cardiovascular diseases have no sources for this claim besides referring loosely to 'basic research'. The study also seems to have a focus on vegetarian versus non-vegetarian diets, and does not go deeply into the issue of saturared fat. The study also admits that some of the health effects may be due to vegetarians having a lower incidence of obesity. I think a better source for this claim should be used (if this claim is at all correct, something newer research has cast doubt about) 80.202.132.148 (talk) 18:01, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

I think that it's pretty clear, from the cited reference, or this page in the reference [[2]], that there is an association between saturated fat and cardiovascular diseases. However, it is leass clear if that is due to meat's high saturated fat levels or some other factor. I have changed the text slightly to try to reflect this. Please revise if it can be put more clearly. Thanks Bob98133 (talk) 19:12, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I think the new wording better reflects our current knowledge and the findings in the cited study. 80.202.132.148 (talk) 23:27, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Mammals

The use of mammal "status" as a criterion for determining red/white meat status is very misleading and I would argue it should be removed. Rabbits are mammals, but the article currently makes them sound like non-mammals, especially in the Gastronomy section. Also, veal, lamb, pork, duck, and goose are all shown to be exceptions to this "rule," even though the article doesn't explicitly state this. In fact, more exceptions are listed than animals that follow the "rule." 142.103.207.10 (talk) 21:53, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Pros and cons

It is unfair to blame vegetarian factions for bias, to an extent. It is generally agreed that meat is a valuable source of high-class protein, and also of zinc.But in promoting their product, Meat Marketing Boards ignore these pros and concentrate on iron."Iron is essential" has become "more is better"; and "Iron is essential" tends towards "Iron is a health food".Factors militating against these slogans are: Most males over 35 have an unhealthy excess of blood iron. No reputable doctor prescribes iron without a serum test. It is,as these boards promote,true that haem iron is much more easily absorbed than plant origin non-haem iron. However, this is now considered a disadvantage, since haem iron is stored and can produce iron overload. The anaemia scare initiated by meat boards is nonsense, since anaemia means lack of blood, not iron (that is hypoferraemia, a rare condition).This has prompted many food manufacturers to 'fortify' foods with added mineral iron, a very undesirable idea. In the early 20th century, anaemia (which is often iron-loading) was treasted only with arsenic.Leaflets on iron ("The body's gold") are often composed by meat marketing boards, and supplied to doctors and hospitals; the content is usually highly questionable. ACI (acute myocardial infarct) incidence has been linked to unsaturated fats, and colorectal cancer to haemoglobin in haem flesh, but the issue is not really one of vegetarians versus carnivores so much as quantity and proportion in a well-balanced diet. Though no doubt commercial issues are at stake, they are more to do with the rivalry between producers of red and white meat.222.153.87.77 (talk) 08:16, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

True and its not like there aren't vegetarian foods that are just as dangerous. Spinach is one of the few foods where its actually possible in extreme cases to get iron poisoning. Its one the foods doctors tell parents to monitor around very young child. Each year a handful of mild cases actually get reported and severe cases every few years. Granted most people aren't likely to eat 3-5 pounds of spinach in day...but there is always someone. In comparison actual iron poisoning from common meats is nearly impossible. So as mentioned the overall point is a roughly balanced diet over the a span of several days. In excess meat has its downsides as do many vegetarian items.

And of course reflection on truly ancient diets of uncivilized man effecting DNA suggests that a diet that is balanced every day is NOT healthy. If you think about it the livers ability to store and later deliver nutrients should probably be exercised rather than set up to stagnate. That is, a diet based on primitive man should probably have periods of fast and famine with respect to many nutrients as ancients would gorge on "windfalls" of certain foods one day and circumstances and travel would make a different food or even no food available another. 72.182.8.122 (talk)

Overall I suspect the political correctness campaign against meat has a US-UN government origin and is not motivated as much by improving personal health as by world overpopulation and third world foreign relation concerns which started in the early 1960s. Its quite true that eating lower on the food pyramid is more efficient use of agricultural land.

Unfortunately VEGAN does NOT solve World Hunger. Its merely a delaying tactic. which will actually will make the starvation crash worse in the end (after all when meat eaters run out of meat they can fall back to vegetable sources & still benefit from the wake up call on world population). Nor vegetarianism make timely transportation of food to overburdened areas more practical or economic -- one of the biggest factors in the inequalities of third world starvation. Lots of fossil fuels burned taking food to remote marginally inhabitable locations on the earth. 72.182.8.122 (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 17:23, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Cited articles don't really say about red meat what the article alleges they say.

Of the three cited studies under the subheading, "Other Health Issues," none of them deal directly or exclusively with red meat.

The abstract of the first study stated, "'Excess'" dietary protein from either animal or plant proteins may be detrimental to bone health, Italic textbut its effect will be modified by other nutrients in the food and total diet. (emphasis mine)[25].

The second study compared the entirety of the Western lifestyle (including inactivity, high-fat foods, refined grains, french fries and other fried foods) with a 'prudent' lifestyle (with more exercise, whole grains, low-fat foods)[26].

Lastly, the third compared the lifestyle of 7th-day Adventists who abstained from meat with those who did not, but those who abstained from meat also typically abstained from alcohol, cigarettes, and other unhealthy food and practices [14].69.143.187.166 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 16:28, 6 October 2009 (UTC).

All good points. I removed the first two studies. I don't have the time to tackle 7th-day studies yet. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gregwebs (talk • contribs) 07:13, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Regarding "Red meat consumption is associated with cardiovascular diseases" - a recent Harvard metaanalysis did not find this association (http://harvardscience.harvard.edu/medicine-health/articles/processed-meats-come-increased-risk-heart-disease-diabetes - can't find a link to the full study). I think the page should at least note that the conclusion is disputed. In addition, I looked at the 7th Day Adventist study, and I can't find any association between red meat and CV disease (unless the page is just referring to association between meat generally and CV disease, which I think is a bit misleading). In addition, both red meat and white meat increased the risk of colon cancer. I'm no expert, but it even looks like someone who ate little white meat but a lot of red meat had a lower risk of colon cancer than someone who ate a little red meat but a lot of white meat. Again, the page seems misleading. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 143.58.160.6 (talk) 18:49, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Citation Quality (of Nutrition section)

I have been working gradually to increase the citation quality of this and other articles. Recently, one of my revisions to increase the citation quality and provide a balanced viewpoint was reverted, so I want to talk about the citation quality we should expect in the nutrition section of an article.

First of all, the absolute worse citation is to cite a news article about a study (that contains no scientific citations). It doesn't matter if it comes from the BBC. Using these second-hand sources just leads to passing on inaccuracies created by journalists and their editors. The best sources are scientific peer-reviewed journal articles. The next best source would be a web page or something without scientific peer review but that has scientific citations. If the author(s) of that source is in the field, than that source would be even better. A bad source would be any web page without scientific citations. Gregwebs (talk) 23:49, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

See WP:SOURCES. I agree that scientific citations are ideal, however a blog by a PhD candidate is not reliable. Blogs are not peer reviewed and not verifiable nor reliable. The blog entry should be replaced with a real ref as per your comments above. Replacing a fact tag with a blog is not acceptable. Bob98133 (talk) 13:00, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

I do understand that a blog post is a lower quality citation do to the lack of scientific peer review. My main problem with the undo was that it was restoring newspaper article citations. Back to the blog post- here is the problem- for almost all studies, it will be impossible to find a peer-reviewed criticism of the study. That is simply not how scientific journals work. So to me the next best thing is a detailed, well-referenced crtticism by someone in the field. And that brings up the problem with applying this Wikipedia guideline to nutritional studies- it does not distinguish between zero-referenced and well-referenced sources.

With the current form of the sentence, it is a *fact* that it has been criticized by the referenced source. To remove the source, the sentence would have to be changed: "The study used inaccurate food-frequency questionarires...". However, without citing a source of criticism, I think we would be doing original research on Wikipedia. Gregwebs (talk) 13:56, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

I would replace the current blog reference with "a blogger suggested that..." since that is all that ref is good for. That's where media are sometimes good sources since reporters will often seek out knowledgeable experts in a field for their points of view which can then be carefully cited and frequently are. I'm not objecting to the content and I appreciate your adding refs to the article, it's just using the blog as a ref without stating that it is a blog gives the impression that the source meets WP:SOURCES criteria which is not at all certain. There is no real reason to even believe that the blogger is who he says he is as the entire site could have been put up by a third or even fictitious party. I know it's being a little fussy, but I think there is a good reason not to cite blogs. If you're that determined to use this as a ref, I won't revert, but I still would think that there must be a better source or else the objection to the study probably shouldn't be cited at all. Bob98133 (talk) 15:50, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

There has been at least 1 published [criticism http://archinte.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/extract/169/16/1538] of the study. I am now using that as the source. Unfortunately since I have only read the opening few sentences I can only point to one of the critiques and use the other citations to back it up- this could be interpreted as original research. Gregwebs (talk) 19:39, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

I love this article. Reference battles between pushy vegetarians and vested cattle ranchers being touted in tandem as "facts." See, I despise Wikipedia. It's a stir-fry of propaganda that results in a mess of pop culture vomit. Get a clue: ANYONE who funds a study on whether meat, red or not, is good for you, WILL have an agenda. This subject isn't one of curiosity. So in the midst of this appeal to authority fencing, a liberal encyclopaedia would reference every anti-meat study done, while a conservative encyclopaedia would refer to every pro-meat study, and a truly objective encyclopaedia would throw out any source for which bias could be assumed. Study funded by a ranchers union? Nope. Study funded by PETA? Nope. Study performed at a university? Let's examine the exit polls of that city on average and try to suss out whether this is a bunch of hippies or teabaggers running the lab. Wikipedia entirely fails all three versions and the results do not resemble a deterministic truth in any way. I want to thank you all for this article. It gives me something to point at when I explain to people why wikipedia is full of shit. 166.205.9.254 (talk) 23:35, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Aggressiveness

Can someone provide the article with some info on whether red meat makes one more aggressive or not? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.119.152.45 (talk) 16:32, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Culinary

Since red meat is a first a culinary term and secondarily a nutritional term one would expect this article to be about its culinary properties. While in fact this article seems to be taken over by the nutritional concerns. A section discussing the culinary practices specific to red meat would be useful. For example. cooking methods (i.e. roasting preferred for most red meats). Wine parings (i.e. red wine with red meat). The muscular groups that are red vs white on an animal ie dark meat vs white meat on chicken. A discussion on the culinary reasons duck is treated as red, while chicken white. (12.168.6.143 (talk) 20:44, 23 December 2009 (UTC))

You would need to supply a reference that red meat is in fact a culinary term, since it is treated as a nutritional term. When heath studies report about the effects of red meat, they rarely describe how it was cooked, except in the case of smoking or grilling where the cooking process apparently introduces other heath factors. 67.167.31.55 (talk) 01:36, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

"Red meat" has been a culinary term for a long time; the article already cites the Oxford English Dictionary and Larousse Gastronomique on the topic. Yes, of course the term has also been used in nutrition for quite a while. --macrakis (talk) 01:53, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

One has to only look up the word in the dictionary "Meats such as beef that are dark red in colour when uncooked".12.168.6.143 (talk) 20:25, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, why did this culinary article turn into a biased nutritional article? 198.151.130.66 (talk) 01:00, 16 February 2013 (UTC)

On "convincing"

I did not realize that the word "convincing" has been edited over before my most recent edit. If you want to use the word "convincing" in relation to the evidence because the reference uses that word, then say that the ref considers it convincing. Because alone it is pretty much just PoV. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.196.87.83 (talk) 21:37, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Isn't "red meat" just...beef?

Clearly, the phrase includes beef. Beyond beef, what do we have? Is pork "red meat"? Lamb? Horse? For a term so common, it seems that people rarely have a clear idea of what it means. Hmmm... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.235.56.24 (talk) 09:53, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Try reading the first sentence of the lead. Bob98133 (talk) 13:15, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

"studies were disassembled"

Whatever does "However, these studies were disassembled in 2007" mean? This sentence appears at the end of the Health Risks / Cancer section. All the references to "studies were disassembled" that I can find on the Web lead back to this very article. I'm inclined to think that the sentence is a long-lived piece of vandalism. However, I would like to offer the opportunity to teach me the import and customary usage of this fascinating phrase before I go ahead and remove it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Larrykoen (talk • contribs) 04:55, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Nutrition section and overall bias due to large health risk section

The size of the health risks section compared to the nutritional information seems quite biased to me, and implies that red meat is unhealthy to eat in any amount. (even if the actual information given doesn't) I suggest expanding the nutrition information; to make this article both more informative, and better balanced.Rody1990 (talk) 03:15, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

~Health risks

This website:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17349943

reports on a recent study which highlights the health risks of a diet high in red meat - perhaps it could go in the article, as it is a recent study which mentions health risks. ACEOREVIVED (talk) 00:34, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Did PETA write this article?

This is one of the most un-balanced articles I have seen on wikipedia, it's almost up there with a conservapedia article about the Democrats! 5% about what red meat is, 95% about 'red meat will give you cancer'. It seems the 'author' has trawled the web for every single study that could possibly indicate a health risk regarding red meat, pulled everything out of context and listed every single one. Whoever wrote it clearly has an agenda. Considering that most of the developed world eats red meat on a regular basis, I don't see us all droping dead from cancer like this 'article' would have you beleive.

The page makes cigarettes look healthy by comparison! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 120.151.126.216 (talk) 21:55, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Yes, definitely some undue weight going on here. 72.208.211.248 (talk) 00:49, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

Looking at it, I've tagged the article as being unbalanced. I welcome improvement from any editors interested. 24.7.226.40 (talk) 07:35, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

The article has excellent sourcing. What viewpoints in particular do you view as being neglected? --hydrox (talk) 01:34, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

NPOV

User:Alexbrn's edits have altered the POV of the article towards the thesis that red meat poses few health risks. My impression is the current scientific consensus is that red meat is unhealthy, and that there is not currently enough evidence to pronounce unprocessed red meat as safe, especially since some studies suggest even unprocessed red meat is unhealthy. (As evidence for the consensus, the Mayo Clinic, Aug 19, 2014, recommends avoiding red meat: [3]). Are there any objections to changing the article to reflect that consensus? Rolf H Nelson (talk) 04:26, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

The only POV that matters is that of high-quality (in this case WP:MEDRS) sources, which we must faithfully reflect. So far as I see, the Mayo clinic page mentions red meat once in relation to a 2009 study which our article already references. Are there newer/better sources for for effect of red meat consumption on mortality? Maybe PMID 24148709 ... Alexbrn ^{talk|contribs|COI} 04:38, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Surely you agree that "medical guidelines or position statements from nationally or internationally recognised expert bodies" are MEDRS, even if they choose not to explicitly mention the latest research. (Otherwise they'd have to put out a new guideline every week stating that homeopathy is still nonsense, despite the latest claim of the week!) I'm welcome to other suggestions on how to resolve the issue; as usual, there are an unlimited number of studies that find evidence and an unlimited number of studies that find no evidence. Part of the disconnect may be that I'm not clear on this edit: [4], where one anti-unprocessed-red-meat HSPH study with a DOI link is "weakly sourced" but a pro-unprocessed-red-meat HSPH study with only a press release remains in the paragraph. Rolf H Nelson (talk) 04:59, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Probably because we already had good sources for cancer in place; less so for mortality. Looking again, this page is still a disaster area and we shouldn't be using press releases, primary sources, etc. at all. I trimmed what I thought were the worst of these. The meta-analysis I mentioned may be a good basis for some better material here on mortality, but unfortunately I don't have access. Alexbrn ^{talk|contribs|COI} 05:26, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Given resource constraints, we can get rid of most of the health section if it's a disaster area and just state that organizations X, Y, and Z advise limiting red meat consumption, and remove the health content that doesn't have MEDRS secondary sources. IMHO meta-analyses are primary sources when they data-mine and come to novel conclusions, but I'm fine either way as long as we're consistent. Anyone have any objections to the section being drastically trimmed like that? Rolf H Nelson (talk) 04:35, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

I'd not object to removing all non-MEDRS-sourced content (but meta-analyses should stay, or at least be discussed, as they *are* MEDRS in general). I had a go at improving the referencing a while ago, so some sourcing/content is okay ... Alexbrn ^{talk|contribs|COI} 06:11, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

PMID 24148709 is great, because it reviews other meta-analyses and meets WP:SECONDARY solidly. I'm not sure what you mean by "don't have access" though; can't we just cite the [advance access version, which is peer-reviewed but not copyedited? Rolf H Nelson (talk) 06:39, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Hah! it's freely available! Silly me. (Add: but oh that's not the final version of the article; I'm a little uneasy using it in case something changed ... I don't have access to the version of reference.) Alexbrn ^{talk|contribs|COI} 06:58, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Stop with the mambo jambo

The "gastronomical" definition of red meet keeps itself on top of all the other more accurate ones. It is ridiculous that an Encyclopedia such as wikipedia places on top of a definition the least sound one and the one based on a 1989(!!!!!!!!!!!!!) quote and the more recent, accurate ones are sent downstair day after day. The meat lobby is strong over here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.196.202.87 (talk) 00:55, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

First learn how to speek english "Mumbo Jumbo" not "Mambo Jambo". Second, not with traditional thinking or common knowledge! Pork, along with Chicken or Fish, has always been considered not red meat. It's part of common American and western culture and is supported in cookbooks and dictionaries. See discussion in Talk:White meat. It's amusing that you consider OED 2 a poor source, and seem to think that 18 years ago is a long time. Are you basing your judgement on personal experience (i.e. original research)? What about a world perspective? Have you investigated European (not to mention Asian, etc.) positions? "Red meat" has been a culinary term for a long time; the article already cites the Oxford English Dictionary and Larousse Gastronomique on the topic. One has to only look up the word in the dictionary "Meats such as beef that are dark red in color when uncooked". The real question is why did this culinary article turn into a nutritional article?144.188.128.4 (talk) 14:43, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Processed meat consumption Vs Red meat consumption Vs Vegetarianism

This article is about Red meat, not meat in general, not processed meat. Weight gain (or other issues) due to general meat eating habits (not specifically red meat) are not relevant, and the danger of processed foods are only relevant discussing the theoretical statistical correlation of red meet consumption and processed meat consumption, and how this may impact past studies.144.188.128.6 (talk) 13:32, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

Commentary

Please stop adding commentary [5] and unsourced material. [6] --NeilN ^{talk to me} 17:30, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

First, it was all sourced, no commentary, second, use user talk pages for rants like these in the future. I removed some commentary, and tried to clear up an issue that was confusing with sourced material from the beef article. All i wonder is who is paying you? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 144.188.128.3 (talk) 21:22, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

My diffs clearly show your commentary and the text you added having a citation needed tag. Also, please read WP:AGF. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 16:28, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

Your diffs show exactly what i described. Stop protecting a horrifyingly bad page from changes that make it more understandable, with or without citations. Citations are only required for things that people question. Place your Citation needed tag and wait for someone else to fix it. Remove it if the tag lasts for too long. THE MOST IMPORTANT POLICY IS TO IGNORE ALL POLICY'S IF THEY MAKE THINGS HARDER TO FIX. 144.188.128.1 (talk) 16:12, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Consensus on the role of red meat consumption to increased risk of cardiovascular diseases

(A) Is there no consensus on the role of red meat consumption (non processed) to increased risk of cardiovascular diseases? (B) Is there no significant verifiable threat as the red meat section suggests? (C) Is there significant verifiable threat as the cardiovascular diseases section implies by giving mechanisms for the disease that is present in all meat? If (A) is true then we should weaken the wording of both sections and combine them in the red meat section. If (B) is true then we should remove the cardiovascular diseases section. If (C) is true then we should replace the claims of safety in the red meat section with the text in the cardiovascular diseases section and remove the cardiovascular diseases section.104.2.168.238 (talk) 20:19, 28 October 2015 (UTC)

Red meat: concern.

Seems an ip editor is concerned about a "section" in the "Red meat" article (see below) - Comments Welcome - in any case - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 21:06, 31 October 2015 (UTC)

Copied from "User talk:Drbogdan#Red meat: concern.":

-Red meat: concern. -

Hi I had previously seperated this into red meat and processed to make it more understandable. The bottom section is where i left all the content where the studies did not distinguish between red meat and processed red meat. When things are not controlled for the effects could be muddeled. This is basic science. THe only reason i left the text is as a note of what kind of content is left in this section. If you think i wrote it in a way that requires a cytation, please clean it up so that it does not require one otherwise the note will be most likely removed promptly. Citations are only needed for where there is controversy, this is a section heading saying what kind of content follows below, not a assertion of fact. Please fix as you wish and remove the tag as the comment will be soon removed otherwise. 108.237.220.82 (talk) 18:48, 31 October 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments - you may be right about this of course - however, seems the "section" would be improved if the section had a citation(s) from a "WP:Reliable source" to support your viewpoint - otherwise the text may be considered "WP:NOR", which is discouraged - nonetheless, comments from other editors on the "talk page" of the "Red meat" article about this would be welcome of course - in any case - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 21:06, 31 October 2015 (UTC)

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Red meat article is almost entirely about its health concerns, is this truly balanced?

Comparing to the other meat/food articles, this article seems to place excessive weight on the health concerns, which is not present in other meat/food articles. (white meat, fully doesn't have such a section, and the main meat article is large enough that the section doesn't give undue weight) Heck, even the Tobacco smoking article doesn't seem to place as much weight on the health concerns. Rody1990 (talk) 21:28, 24 March 2016 (UTC)

• First page of https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&q=red+meat is all about health risks; same for first page of Google news or web searches I just did (excepting hits where "red meat" was used as a metaphor or title). There is a lot to say culturally and historically about tobacco use; it's a subjective call, IMHO there's not much else to be said about "red meat" nor "white meat" in general, except what wines they traditionally go with. (You can say a lot about the culture and history of *specific kinds* of red meat, like hamburgers, but IMHO that should be dealt with solely in those specific articles, though that's a subjective call.) That said, if you have some well-sourced facts about "red meat" in general, they can certainly be added. Rolf H Nelson (talk) 06:34, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

Dark meat ?

"Dark meat", in the context of chicken, redirects here.

However, it seems to me, "dark meat" in chickens, which seems to be mostly an American obsession, has nothing in common with meat like beef.

If there is a genuine difference between light and dark meat in chickens, it probably should be a separate topic.Lathamibird (talk) 02:56, 22 June 2016 (UTC)

Fixed, redirects now to White meat#Poultry. Rolf H Nelson (talk) 05:03, 22 June 2016 (UTC)

addition of 2011 ref cited by IARC

User:Tronvillain in this diff you added PMID 21674008 and content based on it, leveraging the referencing of that study in the Lancet Oncology paper. PMID 21674008 is actually an OK ref - a meta-analysis - and we could cite it is on its own, but a) it is right on the edge of being outdated per MEDDATE and b) it is already summarized in the Lancet Oncology paper. So on both counts we don't need to use it.

Also, the journal citation template has a "pmid" field that autoformats a link to the pubmed abstract in a a ref (just like the wiki software autoformats a link to the abstract if you just type (nowikified) PMID 21674008 as I did above. There is never a need to include the pubmed url in a ref; just adds clutter. Jytdog (talk) 17:28, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

also, the actual IRC monograph should publish next year -- IARC has about a two year lag between when they finish a monograph and announce it with a press release and a summary in Lancet Oncology, and when they publish it. Monographs are here and we should check from time to time so we can cite it when it publishes; this one is #114 and as of now they have posted 113, so this one is next. Jytdog (talk) 17:31, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

The article currently says finding that with each additional 100g of red meat consumed per day, the risk of colorectal cancer increased by 17%, while the IARC article says A meta-analysis of colorectal cancer in ten cohort studies reported a statistically significant dose–response relationship, with a 17% increased risk (95% CI 1·05–1·31) per 100 g per day of red meat", which is the meta-analysis I added. I understand wanting to summarize and avoid plagiarism, but doing so has made the text extremely misleading, implying that risk increases linearly indefinitely ("200 g per day must be a 34% increase in risk), when the meta-analysis the IARC are directly referring to says that the risk plateaus at ~140g/day. Our summary of their summary has distorted the original results. It is simply not true that "with each additional 100 g of red meat consumed per day, the risk of colorectal cancer increased by 17%", because going from 100 to 200 grams per day does not cause a seventeen percent increase in risk - the 17%/100g/day is just the slope of the linear portion of the graph.

As for the cite journal template, I add a url primarily because I like to be able to click on the article title for the link rather than the later PMID. So far, I don't see anything in the template documentation that says this shouldn't be done. In fact, both the useage and the examples sections show the inclusion of a URL along with a PMID, but perhaps I should be using the journal URL rather than the PMID PubMed URL.

And yes, the IARC monograph will be out before too long, but I still think we can make this small piece of the article less misleading in the meantime.--tronvillain (talk) 18:29, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

easy thing first - the doi link points to the abstract at the journal's website. adding a url would be duplicative. i wouldn't be opposed to the url to the journal instead of the doi; it is longer and more clutter and long refs make editing more difficult than it had to be. Compact-as-possible refs are good.  :) but this is all a style thing and hard to resolve.

hm. what you are saying about the risk plateauing is indeed important. thanks so much for making your reasoning clear. I reckon the same is true on the processed meat? in any case I will self revert (and yield on the ref thing as well). Thanks for talking! Jytdog (talk)!

Yes, it's purely a style thing - it just offends my eye to not have the title clickable. I wonder if they've considered having that happen automatically when an explicit URL isn't included but a DOI and/or PMID is? Probably, but perhaps I'll suggest it and see.

You are correct that the 140g/day applies to the processed meat as well - see the quote in my reference. And thank-you as well.--tronvillain (talk) 19:04, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Red Meat

In the section "Red Meat" under "human health" there is a reference to a 2010 study with an assertion of the harmlessness of the consumption of unprocessed red meats and its link to cardiovascular disease (CVD). There is a subsequent 2012 Harvard study which took an in-depth look at the eating habits of more than 100,000 Americans for a continuous period between 1986 and 2006 specifically studying the consumption of red meat (processed and unprocessed), and the resulting mortality from red meat related diseases. The findings of the study indicate no statistical significance in the difference between processed and unprocessed red meat as related to CVD mortality. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3712342/ The question was addressed earlier about a lack of consensus of which I agree, the reports are still widely disputed as to health benefits and risks of the consumption of red meat, however I believe that section is a little lopsided and the existence of the subsequent study indicating little difference in the risk factor relating to CVD ought to be addressed on the page.

I also find no links to other pages, or any mention of methane production that results as a byproduct of the raising of animals for harvesting red meat, which itself can definitely be translated as a human health concern in its wider effects on the environment. ExpresMan (talk) 01:43, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

Please quote here the part of the "human health" section you are discussing. Jytdog (talk) 01:45, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

Hard to read

Because of the heavy use of primary sources and the lack of summary of those sources this article is hard to get the jist of. One studies says x, another study says y, and the reader is not given the tools to determine which are more reliable. The article should speak to scientific consensus and add counter studies to indicate when the consensus is not complete or changing. If there are multiple non fringe opinions on the topic both should be addressed as alternatives. But this regurgitation of raw statics without any real analysis leads to the reader self confirming there original belief. In other words this article does nothing, absolutely nothing to inform the reader.2600:1008:B11F:101F:5D03:A7D9:F472:3A01 (talk) 13:57, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

Agreed. At the very least, I find the caption on the duck meat photograph too ambiguous and imprecise for anyone already confused by the overwhelming ambiguity about classifying white vs. red meat. Webavant (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 18:12, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

Processed meat

The paragraph about "Processed meat" as any relevance for the article? I imagine that the conclusions are the same if the processed meet was "red" or "white", then what this have to do specifically with "red meat"?--MiguelMadeira (talk) 15:31, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Good point. Perhaps it could be moved over to Meat, though the cancer section there already seems to do a pretty good job. --tronvillain (talk) 19:22, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

My sense is that it is relevant because processed meat includes red meat. Jytdog (talk) 21:38, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

The section is in there because it was segregated by me from the rest of the article. There are many studies about the dangers of processed meat and red meats as a larger group. The studies were done on the consumption of processed Meats and unprocessed red meat. The vast majority of studies work done this way therefore they cannot be excluded as they entail much of our knowledge of red meat.2600:1008:B109:2B03:B0DF:F25:2FB7:7797 (talk) 18:57, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

Red meat is, now, healthy?

Journalists all over the world are talking about this new review: https://annals.org/aim/fullarticle/2752328/unprocessed-red-meat-processed-meat-consumption-dietary-guideline-recommendations-from

Nytimes: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/30/health/red-meat-heart-cancer.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

I'm sure you can find other links.

This needs to be incorporated into the wiki. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.92.38.139 (talk) 13:58, 4 October 2019 (UTC)

I've made an edit just now. - Sridc (talk)

@Sridc: It is too soon, and too FRINGE, to include this study in the article now.

Wikipedia is not a newspaper. We don't report on every new study the minute it comes out, especially when it has extraordinary results that overturn dozens of studies over decades. Wikipedia policies like NOTNEWS and WP:RECENTISM exist for exactly this reason. One of the whole points of WP:NOTNEWS is to avoid whipsawing articles, as competing claims come out, day after day, in a 24-hour news cycle. Let the dust settle first; see what the preponderance of reliable sources are saying, then add the material. When it turns out that the primary researcher has been paid by the meat industry, the results are even more suspicious.

Could this new study be accurate, and all the older ones wrong? Yes, it is possible. The way Wikipedia deals with that, is by being deliberate, and not reporting on something the day after it comes out, especially when the results are so surprising. "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof." We do not yet have extraordinary proof, which means multiple, corroborating studies of this extraordinary claim are necessary. The principle of WP:DUEWEIGHT governs here; the vast majority of reliable sources state the opposite, and according to the guideline: "Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority is as significant as the majority view. Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views (such as Flat Earth). " This latest study is a view held by a tiny minority (one), and should not be represented in this article at all. Just as with Flat Earth, it would be okay to represent the views of this tiny minority in its own article per WP:SUBPOV if it meets notability requirements which it probably does, but not in this article. So, feel free to create that article, if you wish.

The principle of DUEWEIGHT would be sufficient to remove this material, but the reasons are stronger than that. The very next day the New York Times came out with a story linking the lead scientist to the meat industry. For all of these reasons (namely: WP:DUEWEIGHT, WP:FRINGE, WP:NOTNEWS, and questions about the reliability of the study in question), this material should not be included in the article, until there is significant minority support for it, from other, independent, reliable, studies.

I have removed this material again. Until this content dispute is settled, per WP:DUEWEIGHT and WP:BRD, please leave the material out of the article, until a consensus is achieved to include it. Pinged 174.92.38.139 at their talk page. Adding Doc James. Mathglot (talk) 18:52, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

So this ref is good [7]

It basically found tentative evidence that meat may be safe or just a little unsafe or as we currently say in the article "The health effects of red meat are unclear as of 2019."

That is very different from saying it is "healthy". In fact the NYTs says "If there are health benefits from eating less beef and pork, they are small, the researchers concluded. Indeed, the advantages are so faint that they can be discerned only when looking at large populations, the scientists said, and are not sufficient to tell individuals to change their meat-eating habits."

So basically may be small to no health benefits but not "healthy". Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:02, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

That ref is currently in the article in two places, here, and here; substantiating the "unclear" description in the lead and the body. Mathglot (talk) 19:13, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

Re: 2nd nytimesd article - That's a bit of a disingenuous take. The article notes this study (performed by a dozen researchers) wasn't funded by an industry group, and he received no funds in the past 3 years. Gotta be careful with confirmation bias - looking for excuses to believe what one wishes to be true. - Sridc (talk)

The study is included within Wikipedia. Yes no funds in the past 3 years but funds before that supposedly. Published in a good journal though so still happy to include.

We are now discussing how the study should be summarized. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:35, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @Sridc: Can you explain your objection to the second NYT article, if you have one? Both articles were printed on successive days in the New York Times. If you are arguing in support of the first article, why would you think there is something wrong with the second one? Regarding your snide accusation of confirmation bias: I have no confirmation bias about this topic, and don't care which way this comes out. Whether the study is included, or not included in the article is of no concern to me, as long as it adheres to Wikipedia policies concerning WP:DUEWEIGHT. You could say that my bias is towards adhering to Wikipedia policies about article content. Now, about that confirmation bias you were talking about: does it apply to you, and what you wish to be true? Afaic, this is strictly a DUEWEIGHT issue, and the view is already represented, possibly overrepresented, with the two refs currently in the article. Where is the support from other studies?

More opinions needed; pinging top contribs to help arrive at consensus and wording: @Sandstein, Xodarap00, Twofingered Typist, Macrakis, Zefr, Bob98133, Alexbrn, I enjoy sandwiches, and Sijo Ripa: Mathglot (talk) 19:40, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

Let's not use the NYT when we have decent MEDRS. My impression is that the review is interesting but may be an outlier. It's worth a brief mention. Alexbrn (talk) 19:53, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for pinging me. My contributions to this article have been around the culinary definitions, and trying to make sure that the different meanings of "red" and "white" meat don't get confused. I don't really know much about the way medical and nutritional research works. The study certainly looks like it's serious, done by reputable people, and published in a reputable journal, but beyond that I don't know how to put it in context. --Macrakis (talk) 23:15, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks to you all for the discussion. I had erroneously assumed that the original editor (Mathglot) was biased against red meat (as are many vegans and vegetarians). It is good to assume good faith, I agree. Cheers. - Sridc (talk) 15:15, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for the tag, sorry for the late response. The discussion regarding red meat, carnivorism, colorectal/malignancy risk and nitroasmines is extremely nuanced and fraught with an incredible array of lobbying interests from various industries. I have struggled with this in editing for a long time, and am not sure where the final consensus will lie, though the preponderance of evidence does suggest that it is not as bad as previously thought, but probably worse than the carnivore camp hopes/believes. It seems that monetary interests have infiltrated peer reviewed literature at the highest levels, and there needs to be secondary and tertiary analysis of the results and methodology of any article on the subject, even if in a high impact peer reviewed journal. To be blunt, I'm not superimpressed at this point by this article. As it stands, I believe Zefr, Alexbrn and James have stated opinions that are in close accordance with how I would proceed on this subject. I enjoy sandwiches (talk) 21:20, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

Mammals

Whilst this is colloquial, 'red meat' in common english very often (if not most often) simply means mammals. If someone says "I don't eat red meat", near everyone knows that means they don't eat mammals, as opposed to red salmon or turkey leg. I think this should be reflected in the article. I refer to the Cambridge dictionary - https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/red-meat — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.138.34.227 (talk) 08:31, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

Usage may be changing, but at least at the time the content was written, red meat was primarily a gastronomical term, not one about health or nutrition. 198.151.8.4 (talk) 16:03, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Jswright15.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 07:55, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

2019 study in Annals of Internal Medicine: Unprocessed Red Meat and Processed Meat Consumption

I have again removed this controversial study. IT cannot be used to summarize the discussion.

• One of the main authors has ties to the meat industry. He failed to disclose this conflict of interest, but the journal later printed a correction (see link above). Also here.

• Here is an article with major criticism of the study.

Tischbeinahe (talk) 19:20, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

2021 umbrella review on red meat and cancer outcomes

A recent umbrella review was published that looked at data from 72 meta-analyses [8] Psychologist Guy (talk) 22:36, 1 January 2022 (UTC)

Tischbeinahe, Alexbrn do you have access to the paper in full? This is one of the few papers I cannot get access to sadly so I only read the abstract. Did the review really conclude the overall evidence base was of poor quality? From 72 meta-analyses? That is very interesting. I have not seen what meta-analyses they looked at but I am guessing mostly prospective studies not controlled trials. Psychologist Guy (talk) 16:54, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

From the paper:

... most studies included in this umbrella review were meta-analyses of observational studies, which are recognised as low quality in the grade of evidence. As a result, most evidence of outcomes was considered as very low or low quality with GRADE classification. Secondly, associations between red and processed meat consumption and cancer outcomes might be affected by several confounding factors ...

I guess the trouble with "umbrella reviews" is you get GIGO (much as with some of the v. poor COVID meta-analyses recently). High-quality reviews will filter out the junk. The 51% increased relative risk figure in the abstract turns out to be one paper for endometrial cancer. Still, the overall conclusion is of interest. Alexbrn (talk) 17:07, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying this, you are correct and they were looking at observational studies not controlled trials so it is not the highest evidence. But this is also a good example why entire papers should always be read and not just the abstract. I believe the authors made an incomplete abstract here which could be misleading (it certainly was to me). Usually GRADE evidence is mentioned in the abstract and if the evidence is graded low they mention this. For example this recent umbrella review on iron notes in the abstract "The quality of evidence for most outcomes was "low" or very low" [9]. Psychologist Guy (talk) 17:21, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

It's the usual problem unfortunately. Is it even possible to do a controlled trial of red meat consumption? Alexbrn (talk) 17:30, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Lol, funny photo but very true. There are a ethical concerns about doing controlled trials on specific foods but some have been done on red meat as comparison diets. Apparently the first meta-analysis of controlled trials was published in 2019 [10] and summarized here [11] they looked at 36 trials, I had a look through the trials, most were around 3-6 weeks but were diverse in what red meat was eaten. The result was not really that interesting, I am not sure if it is worth citing on the article. Psychologist Guy (talk) 17:57, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

To "properly" evaluate cancer risks, you'd need people to follow the diet strictly for ten years. A three-week study is basically useless for testing dietary cancer risks. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:41, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

Using GRADE is a problem when judging observational studies and can even be a tool to downplay observational findings (Ctrl-F for „GRADE“). In general cohort studies and RCTs yield the same results. EDIT: And that is, why we must explain that GRADE was used. Tischbeinahe (talk) 18:36, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

I am pretty sure GRADE is accepted across the medical community, it is also accepted by over 100 medical organizations [12], [13] and is considered important for evidence-based medicine and assists in clinical decision making. I am not convinced RCTs and cohort studies generally always yield the same results this is because RCTs look at highly selected subjects whilst observational studies often target large populations over much longer periods of time but does not control confounding factors. In clinical medical research, causality is often demonstrated with the best accuracy by randomized controlled trials but thanks for the second link I will read that paper with interest. Most RCTS are usually short-term, the cohort studies can go on for years and years, see Framingham Heart Study for example. I believe cohort studies and RCTs all have their place in clinical nutrition (RCTs are usually plagued by ethical and practical problems) and much of the data from this field is observational so it should not all be dismissed like the low-carb crowd do. The umbrella reviews are good evidence for me because although they are mostly looking at observational data which is not considered high on the GRADE scale when you have so many long-term studies (I am talking 100s from many meta-analyses) reporting similar results from different populations it becomes reasonable to assert causation. I am sure others disagree because they just mention confounding factors dismiss anything observational and not take into account the totality of evidence, but that is my opinion. My understanding is that Wikipedia supports the GRADE system so if a review notes weak GRADE evidence it should be mentioned and not ignored. Psychologist Guy (talk) 19:20, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

See below. I am not arguing against GRADE. It is a good tool to judge clinical trials. It‘s just not a good idea to use it to judge observational studies and doing so is criticized. Tischbeinahe (talk) 19:31, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

I read over the New York Times piece [14], it says "Dr. Johnston undercut sugar and meat recommendations by using a tool called GRADE that was mainly designed to rate clinical drug trials, not dietary studies." I see what point you are claiming, I just read over a few different umbrella reviews of observational studies some mention GRADE evidence, others do not. Here is another umbrella review that mention this "The recent evaluation of the literature for the health effects of red and processed meat consumption conducted by the NutriRECS consortium yielded very similar (to this umbrella review) positive associations for red/processed meat and CRC risk but graded the certainty of evidence as low, because they used the GRADE system to assess quality of evidence where evidence from observational studies is ranked lower compared to randomized controlled trials (RCTs)" [15]. According to the GRADE system, observational is always going to rank lower than RCTs so the guy in the article you cited was basically dismissing results from studies outright by just using the GRADE system. I can see what you are claiming and I personally believe you are right but as Alexbrn says we have to report what the source says accurately, it is not up to us as editors to challenge what is in the sources. The source mentions the GRADE classification of low to low-quality so if we want to summarize the paper for Wikipedia accurately we should include that. Psychologist Guy (talk) 19:50, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

And it's not as if the authors are using it to dismiss the data. They're say the data are of poor quality (which is in the nature of observation data in any case) but that it shows poorer cancer outcomes. It is what it is. Alexbrn (talk) 19:54, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

I believe we should use the source on the article, I don't object to mentioning the grade classification. I just noticed we do have a Wikipedia article on it The Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) approach which has an unnecessary long title. Psychologist Guy (talk) 19:57, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Alex, as you obviously have access to the full text can you give a bit of a more verbose quote on the discussion of data quality and evidence? A full quote of the conclusion would also be helpful. Tischbeinahe (talk) 20:00, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

You mean you cited the source without even seeing it!? WP:NOABSTRACT applies. I sincerely hope you have not done this with any other edits to medical content, or it's likely there's going to be a cleanup job needed. You can always ask for sources at WP:RX. Alexbrn (talk) 20:07, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Most umbrella reviews are free to get access to, this is the first one I could not get full access to so I think Tischbeinahe had the same problem. I agree we need to read entire papers not just abstracts or mistakes are made. I have just found another review of prospective studies published September 2021 [16] that reported a significant association between red meat intake and different cancers, another reported an association with breast cancer [17]. Do you think it is worth adding to the article? Contrary to that there is a review of RCTs from 2019 that concluded the evidence between meat intake and cancer are of very low quality [18]. The data obtained from observational studies are obviously very different than that of RCTs. The same thing happens with eggs, whole grains and many other foods. We do not need to discuss why on here but I would like to expand the article so let me know if you think any of those papers are worth adding. I have had a scan around and that is pretty much all the main papers that have been published to date on this subject. Psychologist Guy (talk) 21:24, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

PMID:31569236 looks valuable because it's on red meat specifically! Most studies glom together red meat and processed meat and I might even go so far as to say it is WP:SYNTH to use any of these in this article unless they make red meat-specific statements. So Yes to that source (I have not read it). Alexbrn (talk) 21:29, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Guys, read the NY Times article carefully, also read the other section of this talk page, and the linked Guardian article. Bradley C. Johnston is the guy with ties to the food and meat industry and his studies are highly criticized. Certainly nothing that can be included here. Tischbeinahe (talk) 23:06, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for the info I just looked up the paper. There is an expert opinion about it here with various criticisms [19] Psychologist Guy (talk) 00:00, 5 January 2022 (UTC)

Seems like a few dissenting voices mixed in there (as one might expect) but given that this Review is a golden-quality source for Wikipedia we need to reflect it. Perhaps we could use this overview to say that depending on the quality of evidence used, different health outcomes are apparent (old WHO approach vs more rigorous modern one). We're just here to reflect good sources, not WP:RGW. Alexbrn (talk) 06:23, 5 January 2022 (UTC)

There is actually 6 systematic reviews published all in the same journal that year in the Annals of Internal Medicine they are all part of the same project (I have only read two of them), I will try and find links for them all. You might be interested in looking at the other 5 that were published they were all on controlled trials that involve red meat intake. I am surprised these were not mentioned on the talk-page earlier. Psychologist Guy (talk) 13:53, 5 January 2022 (UTC)

Moved from article

So the latest version of the text is:

A 2021 umbrella review of 72 meta-analyses found that the overall evidence base was observational and thus of poor quality when measured against the quality of evidence that clinical trials yield. It found that overall cancer and poorer cancer outcomes were associated with red meat consumption.

References

This introduces OR (nothing about comparison with clinical trials in the source, which would be impossible for lifetime cancer risk), and has removed the material about confounders. If this source is to be used at all, the text needs to be a good summary. Alexbrn (talk) 19:17, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Please read the NYT article from above and have a look on what GRADE does. It is a tool that measures evidence against a conceptional ideal of what clinical trials can possible yield in a best case scenario. Clearly it is not designed to be used for observational studies. So if this study oddly uses it anyways we must mention it. The cofounding factory are given in any observational study (and always mentioned by the authors) but it is unusual to mention this in WP. It is just the way nutritional science works compared with medical science. Tischbeinahe (talk) 19:27, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

If you disagree with the authors' methodology take it up with them. Meanwhile, our job is to reflect the source faithfully, and if its says the data is generally poor we need to mirror that. Alexbrn (talk) 19:29, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

And we can say on what basis the data is judged as being poor, can we? If you want to hide that the authors measured observational studies against RCT (an unusual practice) I am against including this study into the article at all. BTW can you explain if the authors even carried forward the GRADE judgement? The quote you give above reads like a side note as the authors did not mention the low quality GRADE judgement in the abstract. Tischbeinahe (talk) 19:36, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

In fact there's a lot about limitations, and GRADE is a minor detail. Confounders, possible publication bias, heterogeneity etc. A fair summary of all this is that the data is of poor quality with possible confounders. Most readers won't have a clue what GRADE means in any case. Alexbrn (talk) 19:44, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

These are things every meta study of observational studies mentions. So basically they also mentioned that if you do a GRADE the quality would be low. But it doesn‘t carry over to the conclusion of the paper. Now what? Tischbeinahe (talk) 19:53, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

This should be raised at the WikiProject Medicine and get third opinion by other experienced users who know about this kind of thing. I appreciate you raising this topic, it's been very interesting for me personally. I would like to know what others think. Psychologist Guy (talk) 20:00, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

You may be asking the wrong bunch of people. Physicians will tell you that methods used in medicine, like GRADE, are great. We would rather need someone from nutritional science than medical science. Too often these disciplines are mixed up as they both deal with the human body. However, physicians most often don‘t have a clue when it comes to nutrition. Tischbeinahe (talk) 20:47, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

WPMED is not "physicians" and even any "physician" editors, one assumes, would know the requirements of Wikipedia and be able to edit without bias. One can also assume that people there will at least read sources before offering an opinion on how to cite them. I would support assistance from WPMED if this is not resolved here. Alexbrn (talk) 21:10, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

From what I gather, there is consensus here to include the 2021 review. The disagreement that I see, is whether only the conclusion should be included (which does not mention the GRADE system), or if the review should include a more thorough summary (to mention that the GRADE system were used which scrutinizes epidemiology as low quality). "Tischbeinahe"s argument is that the majority of nutritional research is epidemiological, including those referenced on this very same red meat article that have not scrutinized epidemiology. "Alexbrn" argues that since GRADE is used for this review and specifically points out that epidemiology is low quality evidence, it should be reflected. This can easily go both ways. I will share my view.

In the "health effects" section of this red meat article it is like this: "A 2013 meta-analysis found a moderate positive association between processed meat consumption and mortality, mainly due to cardiovascular diseases and cancer.[22] A 2016 literature review found that for the each additional 50g per day of processed meat consumed, the risk increased 4% for total prostate cancer, 8% for cancer mortality, 9% for breast cancer, 18% for colorectal cancer, 19% for pancreatic cancer, 13% for stroke, 24% for cardiovascular mortality and 32% for diabetes.[23]"

The 2013 and 2016 reviews are based on epidemiological studies and since the 2021 review is based on epidemiological studies too, my view is that we should use consistency. That the same language should be continued: "This is reflected by a 2021 umbrella review that found an 11–51% increased risk for multiple cancers per 100g/d increment of red meat, and an 8-72% increased risk for multiple cancers per 50g/d increment of processed meat.[24]"

I think it gets messy if consistency is not used. e.g. if we go out of our way to mention that the GRADE system was used and that it scrutinized epidemiology as low quality, do we further quote the conclusion of that same review?: "In summary, red and processed meat consumption was harmfully associated with a range of cancer outcomes and seemed to be not associated with any benefit in this umbrella review. Given the wide range of evidence for red and processed meat intake and various cancer risks, we recommend limiting the consumption of red meat to less than 100 g per day and 500 g per week, and consuming as little processed meat as possible. Further large-scale, high-quality prospective studies are required to confirm our findings." (even though GRADE considers epidemiology as low quality, the authors still recommend limiting red meat, and eating no processed meat). RBut (talk) 00:41, 6 January 2022 (UTC)

But the paper doesn't use the GRADE system, it merely mentions as an aside that by GRADE the evidence would be considered poor (alongside many other reasons the authors list). Alexbrn (talk) 05:06, 6 January 2022 (UTC)

There is consensus between you and Tischbeinahe? RBut (talk) 13:24, 6 January 2022 (UTC)

Dunno, I was waiting for somebody to take this to WPMED for more eyes. But until then I agree, yes, simply not to use this source. I would rather focus on sources which are specific to red meat without the processed meat mixed-in. Alexbrn (talk) 13:28, 6 January 2022 (UTC)

Alright. Personally, I have no objection to this source.

As for your last point, my view is that if filtered and non filtered cigarettes were studied in a review, and both showed health risks. I would not be against including that review for the filtered cigarettes article as it still directly reviewed filtered cigarettes. I view it as the same scenario here, I do not see an issue that processed meats are included within the same review as red meat was also reviewed. RBut (talk) 14:43, 6 January 2022 (UTC)

It depends whether the sources tease out the two. It's the same reason we don't mix up "vegan" and "vegetarian" with sources which elide these topics. Alexbrn (talk) 15:39, 6 January 2022 (UTC)

Of course. Check out table 3 (they tease out the two). RBut (talk) 23:44, 6 January 2022 (UTC)

Red and processed meat are clearly separated by the authors and the studies they used as they could do a dose-response analysis that "revealed that 100 g/d increment of red meat and 50 g/d increment of processed meat consumption were associated with ..." BTW, dose-response findings are one of the most interesting findings in epidemiological studies, because they are a strong indicator of an underlying causation (and not only correlation). Just so you don't get me wrong: that's not what I personally find interesting, rather it's commonly agreed on that this is a major finding in any epidemiological study. Therfore the dose-response finding should be included in the summary for the article. Tischbeinahe (talk) 12:05, 7 January 2022 (UTC)

With epidemiology causation can be assumed with a high degree of certainty if the Bradford Hill criteria are fulfilled. RBut (talk) 12:44, 7 January 2022 (UTC)

Right, and the umbrella review delivers on one of these criteria. Tischbeinahe (talk) 13:42, 7 January 2022 (UTC)

I have just mentioned this on the WikiProject medicine [20] I would like to see the opinion of other editors. If there are about 7-10 editors looking at this, I think a consensus can be decided about what to do with this source. Psychologist Guy (talk) 19:08, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

Saw this at WP:MED. At least in my glance I think it's fair to say there's enough concern both in commentary and editor discussion that the umbrella review shouldn't be used, and the comments about red/processed meat being a confounded issue added to that for me too. In cases like this where there are potential issues with a review, it's better to just hold the status quo and let the scientific community comment further to avoid WP:RECENTISM issues (science can move slowly). If there are more concerns, those will come up in citations. If it's validated by mention in other reviews with in-depth commentary (as opposed to a passing mention citation), then that helps the case and could even be cited as a pair. If it doesn't get much discussion in the literature, then it's not really worth mentioning.

In short, we're supposed to be behind the ball on very recent science research, so there's no harm in waiting when there's legitimate question, especially if it's a niche use of an analysis usually used in different applications. KoA (talk) 20:22, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

agree with KoA--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 14:22, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

I think that we should use this. MEDRS warns editors against doing their own peer-review, and that includes things like trying to decide whether GRADE "should" have been used in this instance.

Also: Why is this such a big deal? As far as I know, none of us are working for the bacon industry, so why are we nitpicking this study? Here's what we've got:

• A peer-reviewed review article – MEDRS's ideal
• In one of the best academic journals in this field – top 5%!
• That says eating a lot of bacon raises the risk of developing many kinds of cancer – Does any editor here have any doubts about the veracity of this statement?
• That furthermore says that eating red meat does not prevent any kind of cancer – Does this surprise anyone? It doesn't surprise me.

And yet we have proposals here to omit the source, or to wrap it up in a bunch of verbiage that downplays it and spends more time emphasizing the technical evidence levels than reporting the the basic, widely accepted facts. This article should say something like "Eating red meat and processed meats increases the risk of many kinds of cancer". It should not go on about evidence levels and which year the article was published in. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:54, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

I agree, having looked at this further, the statements questioning the review do not all hold up and I have changed my mind about it. If you check the article, we already cite many reviews of observational studies which cite studies on processed and unprocessed red meat and we give a very quick summary of the results. We need to stay consistent, why are all of those acceptable but this one has been singled out? For example, the article cites this recent review [21] [22] which found "Higher consumption of unprocessed red meat was associated with a 9% (relative risk (RR) per 50 g/day higher intake, 1.09; 95% confidence intervals (CI), 1.06 to 1.12; nstudies = 12) and processed meat intake with an 18% higher risk of IHD (1.18; 95% CI, 1.12 to 1.25; nstudies = 10)." Four other reviews similar to this are cited on the article, there is no controversy here, the results are cited from the reviews no further commentary is added. When you read all these systematic review papers they are looking at both processed and unprocessed meat. Also these reviews are systematic reviews that were looking at 20-30 or so studies. The umbrella review looked at 72 meta-analyses. This is obviously a lot of data, the most ever published on this topic. Considering this is the biggest review to date on this topic published in a good journal, I do not object to citing it. Psychologist Guy (talk) 23:57, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

2022 umbrella review on stroke risk and food groups

„[T]he consumption of red meat increased the incidence of stroke with evidence of a non-linear dose-response relationships …“ [23]

The stroke issue is already presented pretty clear in the current article. But this newest review may still be used to swap it for an older one. CarlFromVienna (talk) 16:00, 30 May 2022 (UTC)