Health: Red Alert on Red Meat

With each new dietary study, eating seems to become less of a joyful experience and more of a risky business. The latest word follows that depressing pattern: researchers announced that the chances of developing colon cancer appear to rise almost in direct proportion to the amount of red meat and animal fat that people consume. That left fearful Americans grappling with the question: Is it wise to eat any red meat at all?

Reporting in the New England Journal of Medicine, Harvard scientists found that women who had beef, lamb or pork as a daily main dish ran 2 1/2 times...