An international team of experts has called for data behind a study linking red meat to a range of illnesses, to be made available for scrutiny by academics.
The Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries and Risk Factors study (known as GBD), has shown a dramatic increase in the causal link estimates for red meat and illnesses and deaths.
The GBD study, undertaken in 2019 estimates deaths attributable to unprocessed red-meat consumption some 36 times higher than a similar GBD study, undertaken in 2017.
The GBD 2019 study also estimated of impact of disease, attributable to unprocessed red meat consumption, 18-times higher than the similar 2017 study.
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However an international team of experts, including Prof Alice Stanton, of RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences, has now called on the authors of the GBD studies to publish the evidence behind its most recent report linking the consumption of unprocessed red meat to certain diseases.
In a letter published in The Lancet, Prof Staunton and other leading academics raise concerns about the dramatic differences in estimates of disease burden attributable to unprocessed red meat cited in GBD 2019 compared to 2017.
The academics said they were seeking to emphasise the importance of making research data publicly available so that guidelines and policies can be developed, based on a full understanding of the evidence.
The six academics said based on its findings, the GBD 2019 reported that red-meat intake contributes to the causation of a range of diseases including heart disease, breast cancer and stroke, in addition to diabetes and colon cancer, and as such the data should be made available.
The co-authors are: Prof Chris Elliott (Queen’s University Belfast); Prof Frederic Lerory (Vrije Universiteit Brussels); Prof Neil Mann (University of Melbourne); Prof Patrick Wall (University College Dublin); and Prof Stefaan De Smet (Ghent University).
‘Obvious concerns’
Prof Stanton said “it is of considerable concern that the GBD 2019 study provides little or no evidence regarding the scientific basis for the assumption that moderate consumption of red meat results in sharp increases in risk of cancers, heart attacks and strokes”.
“Given the substantial influence of GBD reports on worldwide, nutritional-policy decision making, it is of considerable importance that the GBD estimates are subject to critical scrutiny, and that they continue to be rigorously and transparently evidence-based.
“If the current public-health message advising moderate consumption of red meat as part of a healthy balanced diet is replaced by the message that any intake of red meat is harmful, then childhood malnutrition, iron-deficiency anaemia in women of child-bearing age and elderly fragility will greatly increase,” she said.
The letter further recommends that the GBD 2019 dietary-risk estimates are not used in any national or international policy documents until comprehensive independent peer reviews have been conducted of the evidence underpinning the revised estimates.
Responding, IFA president Tim Cullinan said the intervention by a group of international scientists, published in The Lancet, questioning data used to analyse the health impacts of red meat, is very significant.
“Based on what was published in the letter in The Lancet, it’s clear that the original data has not been subjected to rigorous peer review. To a lay person, the points made by the scientists raise very serious and obvious concerns, which must be addressed immediately,” he said.
“These scientists have been fighting a battle for the last two years to have their concerns addressed by The Lancet, which published the original Global Burden of Disease Data,” he said.
Bord Bia was asked for comment but this had not been received at the time of writing.
