The Study
Cardiovascular disease risk and the balance between animal-based and plant-based foods, nutritional quality, and food processing level in the French NutriNet-Santé cohort: a longitudinal observational study
This study watched what people ate over many years and noticed that those who ate more whole foods like fruits and veggies had fewer heart problems, while those who ate more packaged snacks had more. But it didn’t make people change their diets — so we can’t say the food itself caused the difference.
Analysis score
Maximum 72 for a cohort study.
Where the score came from
Not all plant-based diets are healthy—what matters is whether the plants are fresh or packed with chemicals and sugar.
Where does this study sit?
Reviews of RCTs (Meta-analyses)
Max 100Randomized Trials
Max 90Reviews of Cohort Studies
Max 85Cohort Studies
Max 72Reviews of Case-Control Studies
Max 63Case-Control Studies
Max 58Cross-Sectional & Case Series
Max 50Expert Opinion
Max 560 / 100
Quality score
Groups of people are followed over time to see who develops an outcome. Strong for identifying risk factors and associations, but cannot prove causation as firmly as RCTs.
Key takeaways
Summary
Based on the study abstract and findings.
- 1Yes—switching just 10% of your packaged foods for fresh plants could lower your heart disease risk by about 10%, which is as impactful as quitting smoking.
- 2Eating mostly fresh plants (like whole grains, fruits, veggies) cut heart disease risk by 44%.
- 3Eating packaged plant foods (like sugary cereals or vegan nuggets) raised heart disease risk by 46%.
- 4Even healthy plants lost their benefit if they were ultra-processed.
Score breakdown, methodology, conflicts of interest, evidence analysis & raw study data
Publication
Journal
The Lancet Regional Health - Europe
Year
2025
Authors
C. Prioux, E. Kesse‐Guyot, B. Srour, L. Fezeu, J. Baudry, S. Wagner, Serge Hercberg, M. Touvier, B. Allès
Related Content
Claims (6)
Middle-aged adults who eat a diet rich in healthy, unprocessed plant foods have a 44% lower rate of coronary heart disease and a 32% lower risk of overall cardiovascular disease compared to those who do not.
People who eat a lot of nutritionally poor, highly processed plant-based foods have a 46% higher rate of coronary heart disease and a 38% higher risk of overall cardiovascular disease compared to those who do not.
People who increase their intake of minimally processed plant foods by 10% have a 10% lower risk of cardiovascular disease and an 11% lower risk of coronary heart disease.
Eating plant-based diets that are healthy in composition but contain a lot of ultra-processed foods does not lower the risk of cardiovascular disease.
People who eat more ultra-processed animal-based foods have a 24% higher rate of cardiovascular disease and a 25% higher rate of coronary heart disease compared to those who eat less.
People who consume large amounts of animal protein and ultra-processed foods have higher levels of systemic inflammation and a higher incidence of autoimmune diseases and cardiovascular disease.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a qualified healthcare professional before making health decisions.