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Meta-Analysis
. 2021 Feb 20;13(2):676.
doi: 10.3390/nu13020676.

White Meat Consumption, All-Cause Mortality, and Cardiovascular Events: A Meta-Analysis of Prospective Cohort Studies

Roberta Lupoli  1 , Marilena Vitale  1 , Ilaria Calabrese  1 , Annalisa Giosuè  1 , Gabriele Riccardi  1 , Olga Vaccaro  2
Affiliations
Meta-Analysis

White Meat Consumption, All-Cause Mortality, and Cardiovascular Events: A Meta-Analysis of Prospective Cohort Studies

Roberta Lupoli et al. Nutrients. .

Abstract

The association of meat consumption with mortality and morbidity for non-communicable diseases has been extensively studied. However, the relation of white meat consumption with health outcomes remains controversial. The present meta-analysis was conducted to comprehensively analyze the available evidence on the consistency and strength of the association between the consumption of white meat, death from any cause and incidence of fatal and non-fatal cardiovascular (CV) events. PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus and Embase databases were searched for articles published up to April 30, 2020. We included prospective cohort studies reporting relative risks and pertinent 95% confidence intervals (CI) for all-cause mortality and/or CV events (fatal or non-fatal). A total of 22 studies were included in the meta-analysis. Eleven studies (14 data sets) reported data on all-cause mortality, 10 studies (15 datasets) on cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality and 10 studies (11 datasets) on non-fatal CV events. When comparing the highest versus the lowest consumption of white meat, the pooled OR and pertinent 95% CI were 0.94 (0.90, 0.97, p < 0.001) for all-cause mortality, 0.95 (0.89, 1.01, p = 0.13) for CV mortality, and 0.99 (0.95, 1.02, p = 0.48) for non-fatal CV events. In conclusion, the study shows for the first time a robust and inverse association between white meat consumption and all-cause mortality and a neutral association with CV mortality and morbidity. This highlights the importance of differentiating the meat types for what concerns their health effects and suggests that white meat might be a healthier alternative to read and processed meat consumption.

Keywords: all-cause mortality; cardiovascular disease; cohort studies; coronary heart disease; meta-analysis; poultry; stroke; white meat.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) flow diagram.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Association between white meat consumption (highest vs. lowest) and all-cause mortality. PWD: processed white meat; UWM: unprocessed white meat; F: females; M: males; DM: diabetes mellitus.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Association between white meat consumption (highest vs. lowest) and CVD mortality. PWD-IHD: processed white meat-ischemic heart disease; PWD-S: processed white meat-stroke; UWM-IHD: unprocessed white meat-ischemic heart disease; UWM-S: unprocessed white meat-stroke; F: females; M: males.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Association between white meat consumption (highest vs. lowest) and non-fatal CV events. F: females; M: males.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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