Recently I learned that only those with over-active immune systems survived the 14th century plagues. Therefore, inflammation is to be taken seriously, or at least understood in this historical context, depending on your ancestry.

As for the article, the findings come as no surprise given what we know about the risk factors in the post-smoking world. Nowadays nutrition, specifically saturated fats in combination with lots of sugar and salt, as found in today's artificial foods is showing up in the research (not paid for by 'big beef').

There is no need to over-think it, just stay off the corporate 'food' and cook from fresh ingredients, where you don't get 'HFSS' (UK government term for high fat/salt/sugar) held together with weird chemicals. Sure, nobody has time for that, but this is the frontier of public health, a.k.a. the 'obesity crisis', with a simple solution - actually bother to cook!