MODERATION IS KEY
Eating a diet heavy in processed meats like hot dogs and salami can increase people’s risk of developing colorectal cancer, according to a statement from the International Agency for Research on Cancer, part of the World Health Organization.
After considering the results of more than 800 studies, the committee classified processed meats as a Group 1 carcinogen, which is known to cause cancer in humans—other agents in that group include alcohol, smoking, and various chemical compounds. Red meat, such as beef or pork, was categorized as a Group 2A possible carcinogen.
But having a diet filled with bacon and sausage doesn’t mean that a person is likely to develop cancer as much as a smoker is likely to. Three out of every 10,000 cases of colorectal cancer is caused by processed meats, a nutritional and gastrointestinal health expert told The Guardian—that’s about 40 cases in the U.S. per year. Smoking, on the other hand, is responsible for 30 percent of all cancer deaths (and many more cases), which is almost 177,000 deaths per year in the U.S. alone.
So although the evidence supporting the link between red and processed meats and an elevated cancer risk is strong, eating those foods isn’t the biggest cancer risk—smoking, obesity, and alcohol consumption are still responsible for millions more deaths worldwide.
"For an individual, the risk of developing colorectal (bowel) cancer because of their consumption of processed meat remains small, but this risk increases with the amount of meat consumed," said Kurt Straif, the head of the IARC program, in a press release.
As Cancer Research UK points out, a little meat isn’t bad for you, as long as it’s in moderation.
I believe this is a huge discovery. Knowing what foods might or might not cause cancer could eventually lead us to a cure. This could also prevent cancer, and lower the risk. Knowing how we can prevent cancers will stop the outbreak and should save many lives. I think personally this is a huge discovery. Besides the obvious things that cause cancer such as: smoking, obesity, alcohol, ect. scientists are now finding other things that we should stop doing. This is very important.
ReplyDeleteI think this is really important for us to know because people all over the world consume so much processed food. Now instead of worrying about it affecting our weight we too have the chance of cancer to think about. Plus if your someone that does smoke, drink, is obese, ect. your risks are being increased by the food you eat. Hopefully this discovery will help lessen the number of cases of cancer.
ReplyDeleteSo, the fact that every time I turn around I hear about something else giving humans cancer, this is a hypothesis that needs to be known to all humans. I know people who's whole diet is based on meats and nothing else, and if they know that may be a cause in cancer, I'm sure they would slow down and take a chill pill with it. Being told when I was younger that meat is something we need a lot of, and now finding this out, I think this is what should be taught in elementary school instead of "ALWAYS EAT MEAT." Smoking, and the others listed is and always will be dangerous to the person doing it, the people around it, and the people who almost get pressured into smoking on it, but every day there's something else for us humans for look out for, since our body system is so complex.
ReplyDeleteSo, as a Bacon lover, upon reading the title, I was heartbroken. However, seeing reading this I realized that it's not a large cause of cancer. I still think this should be told to many people given how many people eat these meats and even though it's not the worse thing for you, it isn't really good for you either. However, I don't think it will stop people form eating these meats.
ReplyDeleteI think its important to learn about the food we eat and how it affects our bodies. This for example can help reduce the chance of cancer. Just by not eating as much proccesed meat you can slightly reduce the chance of cancer. This does not mean you have to quit it cold turkey though; everything in moderation.
ReplyDeleteBefore reading how many cases red meat causes, I was skeptical about how we are just finding this out. Humans have been eating meat for thousands of years, since the creation of fire. Given the time span, I wonder how much natural selection has played a part in this, if the rates were higher.
ReplyDeleteWhen I first started reading I was a little worried. I eat a lot of beef and bacon, but as I continued to read I settled down because I found I wasn't really at risk. I believe though that this discovery will fall on death ears because of this country's love of BACON.
ReplyDeleteI think this is something important for us to know, but I wouldn't worry to much about it if you eat a little red meat. Since only 3 out of 10,000 are affected, that isn't really going to affect the human population. I do think people need to be aware of the affects of dieting only on meat.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't really too worried about this as I don't like red meat and bacon. However, this could be a growing issue for many Americans because our country consumes so much processed food. Even though the risk is small of getting this type of cancer, if people continue to increase their consumption of processed foods, they can be more at risk of getting it. In addition to bowel cancer, people who smoke or drink could have additional problems and other types of cancer which could be even more life threatening to them.
ReplyDeleteThat is really interesting and cool that they have found a new cause to cancer. I do not think that people should really worry about eating red or processed meat too much because people rarely get cancer because of that. This is sort of scary at the same time though because this could mean that there are other reasons for cancer
ReplyDeleteYou can not take away my bacon. You touch my bacon, your losing a finger. I don't care if it causes me to develop cancer. I'm going to die from something, at least let it be something I did on my own. Let me go out in a blaze of grease filled glory. Viva La Bacon.
ReplyDeleteDang. That's tragic too bad I don't like bacon. But I'm sure no matter what people will still keep eating bacon. At this point everything and anything can give you cancer. But it is a great discovery and I'm sure will help people not get cancer as much.
ReplyDeleteI think research like this needs to be done on more foods. We figured out that some meats have a small chance of giving you cancer, but what if another food causes millions of people to get cancer? If we continue this research, and find out foods that cause cancer, it could be very beneficial in decreasing the number of cancer patients each year.
ReplyDeleteI think that doing these kinds of researches are very helpful for people. For example this research because without this being done people would've never found out. This way people can know what is good and what is bad for them.
ReplyDeleteI think that research on food should be done more. I think this because people now a days like to make things out of anything and put things your not suppose or is harmful for us without others knowing it.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad I don't eat processed meat like this! I believe this information should be more popular. As a society who is all about trying to minimize every chance of cancer there is, more people should know about this. Hot dogs and other processed meats like this are cheap, easy to make, and eaten fairly often by a lot of people. Information like this would probably help a lot of people and maybe even prevent a couple cases from occurring.
ReplyDeleteI feel like by the time I'm 20 everything will give humans cancer. Every time I turn on the news they say something else is causing cancer. I don't really believe this because I eat a lot of processed meat and don't have cancer. I think this is very helpful but I will still eat these things.
ReplyDeleteI believe as much as we don't want to we need to stop eating so many processed food and fast food. People should know bout this though b/c this will show people why it's important to take care of out bodies. Personally I don't eat very health but I try and limit how much of certain things I eat. I believe to much everything isn't healthy. We need to take a portion of everything and equal out everything. We should watch what we eat b/c we want our bodies to function correctly. But also consuming too much fat and food high in calories will make our bodies worker harder than it needs to for it to function correctly. I think we can still eat what we like we just have to limit how much of it we eat. Reading this I wonder what other things that we eat could cause other diseases or cancer.
ReplyDeleteEven as ridiculous as it sounds things like these cause cancer and I think we need to be more aware of things like these because I knew red meat like that was bad for you but I didn't know it caused cancer. I don't/can't eat these types of foods either way so I guess the risk is lower? But I'm not in the clear and can say that if it's known to cause things as bad as cancer, why is it still in stores and how can we access these so easily? So, when it comes to stuff like this being discovered, people really need to know.
ReplyDeleteOk, first of all I am glad I don't like the processed meat shown in the picture because it's gross in general and it could possiblly give me cancer. This study is kind of questionable to me because I have never heard of this causing cancer before. I mean sure this is great because we are taking all precausions in the study of cancer and making sure we make known of everything that could cause it but, we need to make sure our reasurch is correct and it isn't just false conclusions. In other words I would like to see the evidence as always.
ReplyDeleteI think that research on our diets should be continued because it is good to know that things we eat every day may possibly give us cancer. But then again almost everything supposedly causes cancer. Also i think that it is also sad to see how us Americans have eaten proccessed meat for years and we just now discover this, i think that before us Americans have a mass consumption of something, we should know more about it.
ReplyDeleteI believe that this is a major discovery. It is very important to have the knowledge of these things. Knowing what causes cancer will help lead to a cure. This discovery will help people to make healthier decisions. Cancer could be prevented in many cases.
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