There is no safe amount of processed meat to eat, according to new research | CNN
There is no safe amount of processed meat to eat, according to new research | CNN
A new study investigates the link between processed meat, sugar-sweetened beverages, and trans fatty acids, to diseases such as cancer, heart disease and type 2 diabetes.
The data showed that people who ate as little as one hot dog a day when it comes to processed meats had an 11% greater risk of type 2 diabetes and a 7% increased risk of colorectal cancer than those who didn’t eat any.
Now do the data for Iberian ham. Isn't there a confounding factor of income? Or health-conciousness at least
Who the fuck is eating "as little as one Hotdog per day"?
WHO IS EATING TUBE STEAK EVERY DAY?!?
So… if we eat an unrealistic amount of processed meat we will get sick?
Who knew?
Next they’ll tell us that swallowing even 1 mouthful of hydrogen peroxide mouthwash is unsafe.
Doesn't hydrogen peroxide just degrade into water and oxygen? How is it harmful?
Swallowing it can make you very sick, yet it’s a safe and effective mouthwash if you have gum disease, or any other infection.
Best to just play it safe and rinse with warm salt water.
when it spontaneously degrades, yes, it turns into tame water and healthy oxygen, but when it touches organic matter (your skin, tongue, mouth, etc) the oxygen directly reacts with the carbon atoms to make CO2, effectively "burning" away your tissues very slowly.
Usually, you don't notice that because you use store-bought 3% peroxide, but chemists regularly use the much more powerful 35% peroxide, which gives you nasty burns
peroxide burn
also, fun fact, some cells produce hydrogen peroxide as a waste product, so nature has evolved the catalase enzyme to break it down, and that's why you see bubbling when using it on a scar but not on skin, because that enzyme is only inside you and your blood
Looks unpleasant but generally not dangerous.
I think that's the point he was trying to make.
So if I eat 1 gram of processed meat, am I gonna die or something?
Eventually, yes
Habitual consumption of even small amounts of processed meat, sugary drinks, and trans fatty acids...
Followed by
The data showed that people who ate as little as one hot dog a day ...
As little as one hot dog a day? I eat like one every few months. How many hot dogs is the average American eating daily?
Obligatory Whitest Kids U Know plug
I talk about this one all of the time. Such a classic.
You don't have a daily dog? What else would you eat after dinner?
No hot dog surprise cereal either, apparently!
I would be really surprised if most people average one a week. But that doesn't mean it's not happening.
Yeah but does lunch meat count?
I ate some pepperoni on pizza, that surely is doing damage.
The Toddlers Union of America would like a word...
as little as one hot dog a day
That is a lot processed meat to be eating if its every single day. Who is buying more than a pack of sausages per person each week? Also hot dog sausages are surely some of the worst sausages for being highly processed. Don't forget about the strange bread used in hot dogs too. That must have a shitload of stuff added to it or it would be stale and mouldy. Bread shouldn't still be fresh days later.
also celery salt, or juice in those bougie organic hot dogs, in places like whole foods is all nitrates too. nitrate/nitrite salts have distinctive taste and smell. many orgnaic brands might have celery salt. your safe if the ingredients isnt mentioning any salts or celery.
when your heating up nitrates, it forms things like nitrosamine which have been implicated in lab studies of causing cancer in model organisms.
smoked and UNCURED meat might still have the same nitrates in them.
Like... is it written to excite anxiety?
Getting a colorectal cancer probability in a lifetime is about 0.04, eating hotdog adds 8% to it or ~0.003. I like how precisely we can measure it using regular statistics, but what does it tell to a human being? To me it tells nothing about hotdogs
I guess the point is that it shows the correlation between processed food and cancer is statistically significant. As in there is definitely a link, and this meta analysis shows good evidence this link exists. Even if the impact is small.
As for the day to day impact of this study, I'm not sure there is one. Processed food is already on WHOs list of things that definitely cause cancer.
Getting a colorectal cancer probability in a lifetime is about 0.04, eating hotdog adds 8% to it or ~0.003.
Depending on the average amount of processed meats eaten, it could also show not eating a hot dog every day will reduce your risk of cancer by about that much. It's probably only important in the cumulative though. When we have studies like this for many foods, you could put together a diet that reduces your chance of cancer by 20 or 30%, say. But one food's impact like this is probably only important to scientists.
So getting back to your original question:
Like... is it written to excite anxiety?
Yes. Anxiety drives clicks which drives revenue.
Like I said, it may be a scientifically interesting study, but the broader audience can't take anything from it but anxiety.
a diet that reduces your chance of cancer by 20 or 30%, say.
That would be significant, but probably not today. The lifetime risk of dying as a pedestrian in a car accident is around 1 in 100, so mitigating other risks is not an option for now
Histeria clickbait makes money. Extra points if some kind of agenda can be pushed so more people share.
Imagine using this argument with someone that gets cancer. Statistics mean nothing to the individual.
The title is also shit, leaving put sugars etc and only putting forward processed Meat.
Agreed and it should be mandatory to add in the headline who financed the study
Isn't big tobacco still the major investor in cancer epidemiology research? I mean, when it's not about cigarettes and nicotine
It would be more useful to correlate this with other common risks, like PFAS exposure, genetic factors, etc
What is the definition of “processed” here? blended meat? high salt %? specific preservatives? artificial casing?
Also what definition of "safe".
My grandpa eats at least one burger per week and he's turning 90 next year. So obviously "safe" isn't a measure of imminent and near term death?
As always, unsafe never means 100% chance to kill. Not wearing s seatbelt while driving is unsafe, but it doesn't mean that you will not be able to survive to 90 is you're lucky.
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Or
Similar research from around a year ago:
"Introduction Ultra-processed foods, as defined using the Nova food classification system, encompass a broad range of ready to eat products, including packaged snacks, carbonated soft drinks, instant noodles, and ready- made meals. 1 These products are characterised as industrial formulations primarily composed of chemically modified substances extracted from foods, along with additives to enhance taste, texture, appearance, and durability, with minimal to no inclusion of whole foods. 2 "
Only $209 per year for access to the content
Fuck academia and fuck publishers
Here's the full pdf, for free, for everyone
What a vague definition that totally misses the specifics that matter. There's an overwhelming variety of food additives.
Do you know where they eat some of the most processed food in the world? Japan. Some of the highest life expectancy in the world.
What are they doing differently? Without knowing what exactly the commonalities are, there is no value to this study.
im okay with not living to 100 at this point, life is short, and id like it to be shorter.
"I would never commit suicide, but I would like to die naturally soon." - Zoltan Kaszas
There are some very useful things you can do with this mindset
sorry, im canadian. and i talk a lot of shit about the president so its not like i can cross the border. but i respect the hustle.
You don’t want to stick around for the climate collapse, never be able to own anything or retire, and fascist death camps / genocide?
What do you man stick around for? Those things are already here.
you won’t live longer, it’ll just seem longer.
I'd like to be sealed in a sous vide bag, that way I can be perpetually protected from anything that tastes good and live forever.
But I only buy boars head so it obviously safe.
/s, although I did reluctantly buy some teriyaki chicken boars head that sounded amazing.
Seems particularly bad for the average USA fast food diet. People in the USA love soda, fried food and processed meat.
I feel like the word Safe is being stretched really far here.
Like at this level, getting out of bed isn't Safe.
Walking through a park isn't Safe.And that level of Unsafeness, is functionally meaningless.
"If we are indeed in the glitchiest of timelines, remember we have collective will. Collective authorship. We are not beholden to the nightmares of those men of old who envisioned the world in extraction and pain." - Zoe Todd