The Trouble With Red Meat: It’s Not The Fat

Yes, researchers have determined, red meat is bad for your heart. But no, they have found, it’s not that fat that is the problem. Science Daily reports on research conducted at the Cleveland Clinic, which blames elevated rates of heart disease in meat eaters on a chemical released by bacteria in the intestines after people eat red meat. That chemical, according to Gina Kolata in the New York Times, is converted into another little-studied chemical called TMAO, that gets into the blood and increases the risk of heart disease. Kolata reports that to determine whether people with high blood carnitine or TMAO levels were at higher heart disease risk, the researchers analyzed blood from more than 2,500 people, asking if carnitine or TMAO levels predicted heart attacks independently of traditional risk factors like smoking, high cholesterol and blood pressure. The researchers found both carnitine and TMAO did, and later study revealed that TMAO was the sole culprit.