
CHARBONNEAU: Meat is bad for you. Wait, it’s okay
CONTRARY TO DECADES OF WORK, researchers from Dalhousie and McMaster Universities recently found that red meat, including bacon, is not harmful. It wasn’t a new study but rather a “study of studies,” a meta-analysis of existing studies.
It was a perfectly flawed study. Perfect because it offered a veneer of the scientific method; flawed because of what it didn’t include.
It didn’t include studies that found the opposite of their conclusion. Those well-researched studies found a link between meat consumption and coronary heart disease, heart attack, Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular death and all-cause mortality. That’s quite an exclusion.
As well, the researcher’s conclusions were contrary to those of the World Health Organization, the Canadian Cancer Society, the American Institute for Cancer Research and the American Heart Association. Their findings also diverged from Canada’s new Food Guide which suggests eating less animal protein.