Beware of the potato

Whether it is  potato or ‘potatoe’, the correct spelling is a moot point because this tuber is considered healthy and now it turns out it is not so healthy.

The

RESEARCH ARTICLE
Potato consumption and the risk of overall and cause specific mortality in the NIH-AARP study

has some really unsettling results. In particular the French variety (left out are percentage numbers and hazard ratio figures). Here are the peeled results of the research paper:

Eating baked, boiled, or mashed potatoes, French fries or potato salad seven or more times per week was associated with higher risk of overall mortality, ... Potato consumption was not associated with risk of mortality caused by cancer (...), heart disease (...), respiratory disease (...), or diabetes (...). We tested for an association with different preparation methods and found limited evidence for differences by preparation method. The only statistically significant association was that for French fry consumption with cancer-related mortality ...

Results

During the 15.6 years of follow up, 76,921 participants were reported to have died (48,830 men and 28,091 women). The baseline characteristics of these participants by potato consumption categories are provided in Table 1. Overall, potato consumption was associated with a host of other variables, many of which may confer higher risk of death. Specifically, individuals with higher potato consumption were more likely to be current smokers, to be non-Hispanic whites, to drink more alcohol, to have a history of diabetes, and to report poor or fair health. They were also less likely to have attended college or to use vitamin-mineral supplements. Potato consumption was associated with higher energy intake; higher red meat, white meat, whole grain, fruit and vegetable intake; and a higher BMI. ...

Table 2 presents the age- and sex-adjusted and fully adjusted HRs for overall and cause-specific mortality for increasing categories of potato consumption. The age- and sex-adjusted models suggested that participants who ate potatoes seven or more times per week had higher risk of overall and cause-specific mortality in comparison with those who ate potatoes less than one time per week, ...

We also investigated associations of several different types of potato preparations with mortality. Increasing consumption of “baked, boiled or mashed potatoes” or “potato salad” was not significantly associated with overall or cause specific mortality. 

Now get this!

However, French fry consumption was directly associated with cancer related mortality...

The authors would like to add:

Conflicts of interest: None declared.

Don't say you have not been warned.