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Does meat cause diabetes?

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Joyce2730

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Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
I am really confused about diet? Just watching a documentary on Netflix about food and they are saying diabetes is not caused by sugar or carbs but meat? Any thoughts?
 
Was it What The Health or Forks Over Knives @Joyce2730 ? It’s the animal fat they say causes Type 2 diabetes, if so.
 
I am really confused about diet? Just watching a documentary on Netflix about food and they are saying diabetes is not caused by sugar or carbs but meat? Any thoughts?
If that was the case why would people who are vegetarian or vegan get diabetes, either Type 1 or Type 2.
I would get my information from reliable sources, that is not to say that vegetarian or vegan approaches won't be successful in managing the condition.
 
People who are vegetarian or vegan do have a lower risk of Type 2 diabetes @Leadinglights

Eg here:

“Research to date has looked at both the prevention of and treating of diabetes using a vegetarian diet. Many observational studies for this area of focus have followed Seventh-Day Adventists [4, 10], as they have had rates of any type of vegetarianism of about 50% and refrain from tobacco, caffeine, and alcohol, making their diet habits easier to isolate [11]. This population has only 45% the rate of diabetes of the general population [11]. Even small amounts of meat consumption have been shown to increase the risk of developing diabetes among this population. A study that examined 8401 adult Seventh-Day Adventists without diabetes at baseline found that at after 17 years of follow-up, those who consumed meat just once per week had a 29% higher risk of developing diabetes than those who refrained, and this risk increased to 38% if the meat was processed [5]. Lifelong adherence to a vegetarian diet in this population was associated with a 74% reduced risk of developing diabetes compared to a diet that included weekly meat consumption [5].”
 
What the health - it leads me to think give up meat and carry on eating carbs!

A whole food low fat plant-based diet is one option. You should choose what works for you as an individual. If you’re interested in low-fat plant-based eating, then look at Forks Over Knives, Michael Greger (How Not to Die) and the Esselstyn family amongst others.

Not all carbs are equal. You’d need to eat a low fat, whole food diet based on plants not any old carbs, as I’m sure you’ve gathered.
 
No. (Imo and according to the quality science I’ve seen and the way my body responds). The science and evidence around diet is rarely as clear cut as any “side” likes to present it as.

Some points to consider

Sources need to be looked at closely when assessing the impartiality, funding, morality, quality of the data they rely on and if any cherry picking of data has been used etc. View critiques of any videos/movies/reports etc as well as the seemingly impressive reviews to get a more balanced view and see what criticism there is of the methods conclusions drawn. For things like forks over knives there’s plenty to be found on the net and YouTube etc. Now they may be as flawed as the thing they criticise but at least you avoid bias confirmation somewhat if you at least hear both sides

Consider if the pool of participants reflect both yourself and a realistic representation of the public it’s being applied to. Highly motivated, well educated on the topic people are likely to get different results than an average “Joe” will.

Many food based conclusions are based on self reporting of diet a long time after the fact. People aren’t always honest and don’t always remember. It’s guard to do it any other way but it’s also not high quality data as a result. Also consider what else they were eating alongside the food in question and what other factors may be in play and if that was accounted for in the results.

Prevention of a condition is different to managing an existing one with an already compromised body
 
People who are vegetarian or vegan do have a lower risk of Type 2 diabetes @Leadinglights

Eg here:

“Research to date has looked at both the prevention of and treating of diabetes using a vegetarian diet. Many observational studies for this area of focus have followed Seventh-Day Adventists [4, 10], as they have had rates of any type of vegetarianism of about 50% and refrain from tobacco, caffeine, and alcohol, making their diet habits easier to isolate [11]. This population has only 45% the rate of diabetes of the general population [11]. Even small amounts of meat consumption have been shown to increase the risk of developing diabetes among this population. A study that examined 8401 adult Seventh-Day Adventists without diabetes at baseline found that at after 17 years of follow-up, those who consumed meat just once per week had a 29% higher risk of developing diabetes than those who refrained, and this risk increased to 38% if the meat was processed [5]. Lifelong adherence to a vegetarian diet in this population was associated with a 74% reduced risk of developing diabetes compared to a diet that included weekly meat consumption [5].”
Guess my Dad was just unlucky, lifelong vegetarian but still got Type 2. Passed away at 53 from a heart attack.
 
Yes, prevention of a condition is different to managing a pre-existing one @Dragonheart However, a low fat whole food plant-based diet can also help people who already have diabetes. Here’s one of many examples:


It’s one of the diet options recommended by the ADA. It reduces insulin resistance and can also help high blood pressure and high cholesterol. I’m particularly impressed by the latter as I did my own experiment with it and reduced my cholesterol by 1mmol. I was astounded by that as I was expecting to improve it by a couple of decimal points or so.

@Joyce2730 You might also want to watch the Forks Over Knives film, which I enjoyed as much as What The Health if not more.
 
According to this very site eating certain food can’t cause type 2 diabetes but there are some foods that increase your risk of developing type 2 diabetes, including sugary drinks, refined carbs like white bread, white rice and sugary breakfast cereal, red and processed meats like ham and sausages, salt, particularly in processed food, (increases blood pressure which increase risk of type 2 diabetes).
 
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Yes, prevention of a condition is different to managing a pre-existing one @Dragonheart However, a low fat whole food plant-based diet can also help people who already have diabetes. Here’s one of many examples:


It’s one of the diet options recommended by the ADA. It reduces insulin resistance and can also help high blood pressure and high cholesterol. I’m particularly impressed by the latter as I did my own experiment with it and reduced my cholesterol by 1mmol. I was astounded by that as I was expecting to improve it by a couple of decimal points or so.

@Joyce2730 You might also want to watch the Forks Over Knives film, which I enjoyed as much as What The Health if not more.
Ada also state that low carb (ie with normal or higher healthy fats) is one of the most effective methods and that doesn’t exclude real whole foods either and in fact encourages them (of which meat is part of too, not just plants).

As a type 2 controlled solely by diet I, and many many more, get identical and even more positive results eating meat and fish and dairy. Eg weight loss, increased insulin sensitivity, lowered blood pressure, improved cholesterol scores and ratios and better particle profiles. My total cholesterol (a pointless measure btw) after diagnosis and on keto dropped 2 points, HDL rose (good news) and triglycerides were massively reduced to 0.75 (brilliant news).

I’m not saying anyone should eat meat if they choose not to, but claiming the reverse that eating it is bad for diabetes simply isn’t true.
 
Big recent paper in Nature analysing data from several large, gold-standard nutritional studies and trials: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-024-03124-1

Replacing saturated fats (SFA) with unsaturated (MUFA and PUFA) is significantly associated with reduced risk for both CV disease and T2D.

In our study, we relate the lipidomics signature of replacing a high-dairy, SFA-rich diet with a diet rich in plant-based MUFAs and PUFAs to the risk of developing CVD and T2D. Our findings from the lipidomics-based integrated analysis of trial and cohort data on CVD risk are consistent with the current recommendation to replace dietary SFAs with MUFAs and PUFAs from plant sources, relating a specific dietary strategy consistent with the DIVAS intervention to quantitative CVD and T2D risk reduction estimates. Additionally, our results show that changes in dietary fat quality-related lipidomics scores over 10 years are significantly associated with a reduction in subsequent T2D risk.

I think the analysis leaves open the possibility that the T2D association is driven by other aspects of animal-sourced food besides just the greater porportion of SFA's compared to plant based - eg maybe something to do with animal-sourced versus plant protein, different trace elements, other confounders, whatever.

But satfat intake as a driver for CVD risk is established by a huge, consistent body of evidence. Denying it is up there with climate science denialism in terms of scientific validity.
 
I would have to say In regards to this subject the answer would be no it doesn't cause diabetes.
 
I give up on all that. Potatoes make you fat, Meat makes you fat then they say not then they say yes. Obesity causes type 2 diabetes but even thin people can have insulin resistance and get it. If you have it do what you can to change it.
We all want to be healthier and have as good a life as possible.
I think some of us who are fat get beaten too often. Are we fat because our bodies don't work so well so it's harder to be active and as we are hungry we are more likely to eat quick and easy meals?
I think it's all about not blaming and just trying to do what helps you. If you are happy someone is.
 
The answer to the question in the title of this thread is no, no, a thousand times no. If it were true then everybody who ate meat would be considered diabetic, and that is not the case.

If the question was.... Can somebody overblow highly selected information in order to cash in on all the media noise about diabetes by selling a book or TV advertising or TV subscriptions?.... then the answer is undoubtedly yes.

The way I look at it, generally, diabetes is not caused by anything. There are no doubt some cases, especially where the diabetes is due to damage to the pancreas, where a true cause can be identified. For the rest of us with this generic label type 2, all we can say is that our internal glucose control process is not as good as we would like it to be for some reason or other. There are well established routes for improving matters and as far as I know none involve removing or adding a particular narrow band of foodstuffs from ones diet. If it were that simple, then there would be no problem.
 
I found this paper:


Results from observational studies suggest an association of red meat intake with risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2D). However, results from randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have not clearly supported a mechanistic link between red meat intake and T2D risk factors. Therefore, a systematic review and meta-analysis were conducted on RCTs evaluating the effects of diets containing red meat (beef, pork, lamb, etc.), compared to diets with lower or no red meat, on markers of glucose homeostasis in adults.
 
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