The World Health Organization has announced that processed meats such as sausages, bacon and pepperoni are associated with cancer. So what are we to make of this study? How real is the threat?
According to the authors, eating 50 grams of processed meat a day increases the lifetime risk of bowel cancer by 18 per cent.
The study also found that over-consumption of red meats such as beef, pork and lamb might pose a risk of cancer, though the evidence is weaker. Most nutritionists recommend limiting red meat to three portions a week, and not overcooking it.
Predictably, industry groups are upset. They accuse the WHO of manipulating its numbers, and point to other studies that found no risk in eating red meat.
And they鈥檝e received support from some unexpected sources. A leading scientist at Britain鈥檚 Institute of Food Research downplayed the suggestion that red meat represents a significant danger.
An 18 per cent increase in the risk of cancer sounds serious, yet statistics like these need a context.
According to the U.S. National Cancer Institute, the lifetime probability of contracting bowel cancer is 4.5 per cent 鈥� a fairly low baseline to start from. An 18 per cent increase would lift that to just 5.3 per cent, still a low figure.
Put another way, if you eat a hotdog every day for life, your risk of contracting bowel cancer goes up by just under one percentage point.
In contrast, smokers who go through a pack of cigarettes a day increase their lifetime risk of contracting lung cancer by about 2,300 per cent.
That brings up an additional point of contention. The WHO groups carcinogenic substances into just three categories: Class 1, which pose a definite threat, Class 2A, which pose a probable threat, and Class 2B, which pose a possible threat. Processed meat has been placed in the first of these categories and red meat in the second.
But this blurs an important distinction. Some Class 1 substances entail only the tiniest of risks. The WHO considers sunlight a Class 1 risk. But is it really a health threat to sit at a sun-filled window?
At the opposite end of the scale, other Class 1 substances are enormously dangerous. Radiation-emitting elements such as plutonium and radium are also Class 1, as are asbestos, diesel exhaust fumes and industrial chemicals that require hazmat suits to handle.
Lumping together materials with such widely disparate risk factors is at best misleading, and arguably alarmist. There is no comparison between the dangers associated with eating processed meat and handling plutonium or asbestos.
International health organizations have a vital role to play. The scientists who prepared this report are all well-regarded. There is no suggestion they botched their work.
However, a sense of proportion is needed when presenting findings like these. That appears lacking in this instance.
There is also the reality that nutritional science is something of a minefield. Warnings about cholesterol-laden foods such as eggs, cheese and shrimp, for example, have been walked back in recent years.
That doesn鈥檛 mean we should ignore dietary advice. Moderation in all things is a common-sense rule, and probably one that applies here. It might well be wise to limit consumption of processed meats, and go easy on portions of red meat.
But there are much greater threats to well-being in various parts of the world, from malaria to unsafe drinking water, from poor sanitation to obesity. If the WHO is to be heard on these matters, it cannot afford a credibility gap.
And that is the danger here. Overhyping relatively small risks might garner headlines, but how many minds does it change?
