{"id":252106,"date":"2025-12-26T09:39:17","date_gmt":"2025-12-26T09:39:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/252106\/"},"modified":"2025-12-26T09:39:17","modified_gmt":"2025-12-26T09:39:17","slug":"study-finds-link-between-eating-cheese-and-lower-dementia-risk-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/252106\/","title":{"rendered":"Study finds link between eating cheese and lower dementia risk \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a large new published study, researchers found that eating high-fat cheese or cream was associated with a lower risk of developing dementia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Cheese lovers may cheer. But be careful about celebrating with an entire block of your favourite cheddar.<\/p>\n

Cheese and cream are high in saturated fats, and nutrition guidelines have long recommended that people limit their consumption of such fats based on substantial evidence that they raise LDL, or \u201cbad,\u201d cholesterol and the risk of heart attack or stroke.<\/p>\n

Recently, however, federal health officials \u2013 particularly in the US \u2013 have questioned this recommendation. Robert F Kennedy Jr<\/a>, the American health secretary, has said that the next edition of the federal dietary guidelines, expected in early 2026, will overturn the long-standing advice to limit the fats and \u201cstress the need to eat\u201d them. Many experts are concerned that such a change could lead to an uptick in cardiovascular disease.<\/p>\n

That said, there is some debate among scientists about whether full-fat dairy products increase health risks. The latest study adds to certain evidence that the foods may be neutral or even beneficial for health, including for dementia or cardiovascular disease. Such findings do not mean that saturated fats are healthy, but rather that other aspects of some dairy products may offset the potential harms of the fats, said Emily Sonestedt, a nutritional epidemiologist at Lund University in Sweden, who led the new study.<\/p>\n

But the new research was limited, experts said, and showed only associations between high-fat dairy and dementia, not cause and effect.<\/p>\n

We asked experts to help us unpack the findings.<\/p>\n

What did the new research find?<\/p>\n

The research, published in the journal Neurology, was one of the largest and longest studies to look at links between the consumption of dairy products and the risk of developing dementia, said Dr Patricia Chocano-Bedoya, a physician and a nutritional epidemiologist at the University of Bern in Switzerland, who was not involved in the study.<\/p>\n

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In the 1990s, researchers recruited about 28,000 adults, ages 45 to 73, in Sweden and collected information about their diets. Participants wrote down everything that they ate and drank for seven days, and completed a written questionnaire and an in-person interview.<\/p>\n

Then, in 2014 and in 2020, the researchers looked at how many of the participants had developed dementia, based on medical information collected in a national registry in Sweden. And they looked at whether the participants\u2019 consumption of different dairy products at the start of the study was related to their likelihood of developing dementia years later. In their analyses, the researchers controlled for other aspects of people\u2019s health, such as whether they smoked or consumed alcohol or had high blood pressure or a family history of cardiovascular disease.<\/p>\n

\"RobertRobert F. Kennedy Jr. Photograph: Olivier Touron \/AFP via Getty Images <\/p>\n

By 2020, about 10 per cent of people who reported consuming at least 50g daily of high-fat cheese, such as cheddar, Brie or Gouda, had developed dementia, compared with 13 per cent of people who consumed less than 15g daily. <\/p>\n

The HSE<\/a> recommends that adults have three servings per day from the food group of milk, yoghurt and cheese. One portion is equal to 25g of cheese. <\/p>\n

People who consumed at least 20g of high-fat cream (equivalent to about 1.3 tablespoons of heavy cream) daily were also less likely to develop dementia compared with people who did not consume cream at all, according to the study.<\/p>\n

The researchers found no link between how much butter, milk, fermented milk, low-fat cheese or low-fat cream participants consumed and their likelihood of developing dementia.<\/p>\n

\"PeoplePeople shouldn\u2019t necessarily eat more cheese because of the results of this study, Dr Sonestedt said. Photograph: Getty Images\/iStockphoto <\/p>\n

The study had several limitations and should be \u201cinterpreted with caution,\u201d said Dr Tian-Shin Yeh, a physician and nutritional epidemiologist at Taipei Medical University in Taiwan, who wrote an editorial published alongside the new study. For one thing, the researchers assessed the participants\u2019 diets just once, at the start of the study. People may have changed how they ate in the decades that followed.<\/p>\n

The researchers conducted a \u201csubstitution analysis\u201d to understand how swapping in more of one food (high-fat cheese, for example) in place of another affected participants\u2019 risk for dementia. The results of this analysis showed that eating cheese instead of high-fat red meat or processed meat was associated with a lower risk of disease, Dr Yeh said. That suggests that cheese may be a better option than those less healthy foods, but the study can\u2019t show that it is \u201cinherently neuroprotective,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The study did not examine the effects of substituting cheese for foods rich in healthy unsaturated fats, like fish, olive oil, nuts or seeds, Dr Yeh said.<\/p>\n

Is there something special about cheese?<\/p>\n

Dr Sonestedt acknowledged the limitations of the study. But, she said, it\u2019s possible that certain healthful components of cheese, such as vitamins K or B12, or minerals like calcium, may confer benefits.<\/p>\n

The findings shouldn\u2019t be interpreted as giving saturated fats a pass, said Deirdre Tobias, an epidemiologist at Brigham and Women\u2019s Hospital in Boston. Research consistently suggests that saturated fats are associated with long-term health risks, including for dementia, whereas unsaturated fats, such as those found in olive oil, canola oil, fish, nuts and seeds, are associated with a reduced risk.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0\u2018I was finally given a diagnosis at 42 for decades of mysterious and relentless pain I had\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

And many of the studies that show full-fat dairy products are beneficial or neutral for health, including this latest one, fail to fully account for other aspects of participants\u2019 diets, Dr Tobias said.<\/p>\n

Relative to many other foods in people\u2019s diets \u2013 like those high in refined carbohydrates, for example \u2013 full-fat dairy products may appear to be better, or at least not worse, for health, she said. But when researchers have compared full-fat dairy products to foods like whole grains, olive oil, legumes or nuts, those foods are consistently associated with better health, she said.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the bottom line?<\/p>\n

People shouldn\u2019t necessarily eat more cheese because of the results of this study, Dr Sonestedt said. But it does suggest that, in moderation, cheese can be a part of a healthy diet.<\/p>\n

Still, there are better foods for brain health, Dr Yeh said.<\/p>\n

Research consistently suggests that following a plant-rich diet, such as the Mediterranean or MIND diets, can reduce your risk of cognitive decline. That means consuming lots of fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, nuts and seeds, and healthy fats like those found in olive oil and fish, she said. \u2013 This article originally appeared in the New York Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a large new published study, researchers found that eating high-fat cheese or cream was associated with a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252107,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[105884,868,18,135,60,19,17,14162],"class_list":{"0":"post-252106","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-alzheimer-s-disease","9":"tag-dementia","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-health","12":"tag-hse","13":"tag-ie","14":"tag-ireland","15":"tag-robert-f-kennedy-jr"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115785209209482393","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252106"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252106\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}