My whiskers are twitching on this one. I recollect that Columbia Uni made its catering services go fully vegan in the last couple of years. Boston and Harvard have been associated strongly with the WFPB movement and has publishd some very biased reports. Several others of the Co author list are also possibly speaking with a similar agenda. The report feels like it has a bias or leaning and should be read twith this possibility in mind.
Note that they started with seniors and veterans, so most of the CVD damage will have already started before the study enrolled since atheroschlerotic damage is accrued over long term. Since the cereals they are talking about are general commercial products, most modern cereal foods eaten in SAD tend to be highly processed and sugar coated, and thus sadly lacking in fibre content, so maybe it is the lack of fibre that is the benign aspect and true outcome. The study did not precribe or measure fibre content, merely used food questionaires, so not really scientific. I know one study Harvard once did was to send the food questionaires to Jehovah witness congregations during Lent, and that study also concluded that cereals were the healthiest foods since most were eating unleavened bread and fasting at the time.