No significant publication biases were detected between ARDS/ALI and IL-1β (P-value for Egger’s test (PEgger): 0.148; P-value for Begg’s test (PBegg): 0.283), IL‐6 (PEgger: 0.330; PBegg: 0.161), IL-10 (PEgger: 0.874; PEgger: 1.000), PAI‐1 (PEgger: 0.184; PBegg: 0.548), and TNF‐α (PEgger: 0.111; PBegg: 0.224). Here, IL6 is linked to acute respiratory distress syndrome.