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Risk of developing cancer from eating red meats and processed meats is small.
The World Health Organization, or WHO for short, published a new study in which they state that the recent ban on meat is premature. Lately there were a lot of rumors concerning the fact that red meats and processed meats found in products like hot dogs, ham or bacon could be directly linked to colorectal cancer or stomach cancer.
Furthermore, being the foremost authority in public health issues, WHO along with an associated research branch named the Association for Research on Cancer, published another paper on Monday. Research points out that although consuming processed meats in large quantities every day could ultimately lead to colon cancer or stomach cancer, the link between seems to be rather fragile.
Ban on meat is premature as research demonstrates that the risk of actually getting cancer is very small.
Processed meats is traditionally referred to as any meat that underwent any preservation or fermentation process. Usually these kind of cuts are cured, salted, smoked and then stacked with chemical preservatives. Moreover, doctors tend to recommend parents not to give their children processed meats. They should rather substitute them with fish, lean poultry or even cheese with a reduced fat percentage.
On the other hand, it seems that red meat could increase the risk of developing other forms of cancer including bowel cancer. Most physicians and nutritionists recommend a decrease intake of red meat per day. An adult must consume no more than 500 g of cooked red meat in a week.
Although somewhat convincing evidence has resurfaced during the last couple of weeks, not all researchers take the results for granted. Many of them view the outcome of latter studies as being inconclusive, vague and even conjectural.
They agree that consuming processed and red meats in large quantities can lead to different forms of cancer, but the risk is very small compared to that of smoking. According to recent statistics, approximately one million people die each year due to tobacco smoking and another 600,000 people succumb because of alcohol consumption.
Diets that include large quantities of processed food only accounts for 34,000 cancer deaths each year.
Although there is sufficient evidence, doctors agreed that it is safe to assume that there is only a vague link between ingesting processed or red meats and the development of cancer. They say that they don’t wish to terrorize people into totally rejecting red meats.
The paper was reviewed an approver by 22 scientists from over 10 countries and it took into consideration about 800 cancer-related studies.
Image source: flickr.com
