It’s Official: Bacon, Hot Dogs, Other Processed Meat Cause Cancer



Source: It’s official: Bacon, hot dogs, other processed meat cause cancer

This news is all over the place, but I was really surprised that there’s no actual scientific fact.  All I get is there was a meta-study that amounts to “there’s a correlation”.   It’s all speculative, nothing about how the meat is prepared or cooked.  It was almost a year ago that an actual link was found – in the neu5Gc content

Sweet Potatoes Aren’t Inherently Healthier Than White Potatoes, and 4 Other Food Myths



Source: The Truth behind 5 Food Myths

Depends what you’re after – the potato and sweet potato each have their pros and cons. Sweet potatoes have more fiber and vitamin A, but white potatoes have iron, magnesium, and potassium in their corner.

Myth #3, about red meat causing cancer, is not a myth.  It’s fact, and we know specifically what compound is responsible and generally how much can be found in various foods if you’re concerned about managing your intake.

Study: Large Red Meat Consumption Triggers Immune Response, Leading to Cancer

It should be made clear that the research appears reputable. The research does not rely upon statistical analysis that can be potentially biased. It’s about the presence or absence of genetic mutations in different species, making the results extremely robust.  However, in this study the high Neu5Gc diet was 0.25 mg of Neu5Gc per gram of food. For comparison their estimated range of Neu5Gc content in beef is 0.023-0.231 mg per gram.  Effectively the mice were fed ~1,000 times more Neu5Gc in their food than what is found in a steak.  And the mice could only eat this pellet, whereas humans don’t only eat steak.

Red meat has been linked to cancer for decades, with research suggesting that eating large amounts of pork, beef or lamb raises the risk of deadly tumours. But for the first time scientists think they know what is causing the effect. The body, it seems, views red meat as a foreign invader and sparks a toxic immune response.

Source: Red meat triggers toxic immune reaction which causes cancer, scientists find

Red meat contains Neu5Gc. Pork has more Neu5Gc than beef, and dairy has it too. Fish contains trace amounts, and poultry has none.  Cooking didn’t have a significant effect on the Neu5Gc content – cooking reduced water weight, and therefore increased the µg/g value.  Here’s the chart from the paper:

Neu5Gc Content and Percentage of Various Food Groups

Neu5Gc Content and Percentage of Various Food Groups

When our ancestors evolutionary diverged from chimpanzees, we developed a mutation in an enzyme known as CMAH. CMAH catalyzes the addition of a hydroxyl group to sialic acid (NeuNAc) to produce Neu5Gc (NeuNAc w/ added -OH). One of the things that makes you uniquely human compared to almost all other mammals are the patterns of carbohydrates that cover the surface of your cells.  What makes you uniquely human is the striking lack of Neu5Gc on your cells compared to almost all other mammals.

Mutation of the CMAH enzymatic pathway may have promoted developmental brain complexity. This supports the view that human ancestors ate a primarily vegan diet.  With little rare meat consumption to result in accelerated aging, the effects of this reduced fitness was outweighed by increased brain complexity that may have provided a survival advantage for mutants.

Glycoscience is a new branch of science that will help us get closer to understanding the human body in the finest details. If this research is confirmed to be true, it will have great implications on how to make consumption of red meat safe (genetic modification?) and could shed more light on how the body prevents cancer from spreading out of control (not everyone dies from cancer).