September 19, 2024 – Frequent red meat consumption is bad for both human and planetary health.
That’s the word from experts quoted in a September 15, 2024, NPR article. They noted that given the particularly high carbon footprint of beef production, getting more people to shift to different sources of protein could make a significant impact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Achieving this shift will require improving nutrition messaging to men, who typically eat more beef than women and have often grown up with messages from advertising and other sources linking beef consumption with strength, vitality, and “manliness,” researchers said. Debunking misinformation is a key step.
“It is a common myth that you don’t get enough protein without eating meat,” Frank Hu, Fredrick J. Stare Professor of Nutrition and Epidemiology and chair of the Department of Nutrition, said in the article. “Many plant-based foods are rich in protein and they can be combined to meet your nutrition needs—even for athletes who typically need to eat more protein and also for elderly who may want to have relatively high protein intake to maintain muscle mass.”
Encouraging men to eat more climate-friendly diets may also benefit their own health. Research by Hu and others at Harvard Chan School has linked frequent red meat consumption with increased risk of some types of cancer, heart disease, and diabetes.
Read the NPR article: Eating less beef is a climate solution. Here’s why that’s hard for some American men
Photo: iStock / Serhii Hryshchyshen