5. Wang Y, Beydoun MA. Meat consumption is associated with obesity and central obesity among US adults. Int J Obes 2009;33:621–8. doi: 10.3945/ajcn.110.007252.

We appreciate the interest of Chow in our article on the association between meat intake and prospective weight change in the EPIC (Eu-ropean Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition) cohort study (1). As addressed in the article (1), we did not find evidence that possible dietary modifications during follow-up and self-report of weight could have biased our results: the positive association between meat intake and weight gain persisted after exclusion of those likely to have modified the diet because of previous illness, as well as in normal-weight subjects, who are less likely to misreport their weight and energy intake (2, 3). Although there is evidence that self-reported weight tends to be underestimated, it has been shown that self-reported weight is highly correlated with measured weight, and hence its use is supported in large epidemiologic studies. More information about the correlation between self-reported and measured anthropo-metric variables in the EPIC as well as the construction and valida