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Now that processed meats have been deemed carcinogenic by the World Health Agency...

354 replies

Whoknewitcouldbeso · 23/10/2015 08:12

Can I ask if you will be allowing your kids to eat sausages, ham, burgers etc? They are also warming about red meat in general so I can no longer feel virtuous when I cook homemade lasagne or shepherds pie.

My son loves sausages, I tend to buy the 98% pork ones but again, now thinking that I'm hurting him by letting him have sausages at all.

What are other people giving their children for dinner? I feel like I'm royally fucking up nowadays although I did make fresh cod goujons in a tempura batter two nights ago and he thought they were great. I must get at least one brownie point for the fish!

OP posts:
Lemonfizzypop · 24/10/2015 17:47

Claig people who smoke 20 a day will also sometimes live to 90, doesn't mean smoking doesn't cause cancer.

BrandNewAndImproved · 24/10/2015 18:00

Have you been playing the illuminate card game claig Grin

AnyoneButAndre · 24/10/2015 18:27

This is not new news. I've been pointing out for years on various threads that ham sandwiches on brown bread with carrot sticks for 5 lunches a week are not the impeccably healthy option that some MNers seem to think. Processed meat demonstrably increases your relative risk of bowel cancer which is a big killer, so that's a noticeable increase in absolute risk (but does not increase it to an absolute risk of 100%, which explains why Claig's uncle Ernie lived to 90 despite smoking 80 a day).

The case on unprocessed red meat is much less clear because there's not a lot of data on people who do eat red meat but not processed red meat.

claig · 24/10/2015 18:27

I have never played that card game, that is too complex, confusing and far out for me, I just try to keep it real! Wink

atticusclaw2 · 24/10/2015 18:39

You don't try to keep it real though claig, you ave a massive agenda which you push at every opportunity.

atticusclaw2 · 24/10/2015 18:39

have

claig · 24/10/2015 18:49

atticusclaw2, it's called the truth

HopefulAnxiety · 24/10/2015 18:59

Er, but most people promoting vegetarianism for environmental reasons are anti-GMOs and most wouldn't use aspartame? Vegetarian food is still healthy food you nutbag.

I am not a vegetarian and eat red/processed meat. I cannot eat pulses/Quorn etc because I am on a low fibre diet for medical reasons. I can still work out that meat production takes up more resources than arable crop production, and that vegetarian food is perfectly healthy food. I try to go for sustainable fish over meat when I can, which luckily I love anyway (and mushrooms/eggs etc).

HopefulAnxiety · 24/10/2015 19:01

Oh and I also struggle to digest sucralose type sweeteners, so for me the choice is sugar or aspartame. Not dead yet.

claig · 24/10/2015 19:11

'most people promoting vegetarianism for environmental reasons are anti-GMOs and most wouldn't use aspartame?'

But most people are not the WHO and most people don't understand their game. Meat is healthy which is why the agenda is to suppress it by using "campaigns" and "education" to steer people away from it.

'so for me the choice is sugar or aspartame. Not dead yet.'

Any adverse effects are not immediate, the rise in certain illnesses is due to what is in the food in many instances.

Greengardenpixie · 24/10/2015 20:20

I have 3 grown up children. I was young, poor when i brought them up. They had sausages etc. They are all healthy adults and are hardly at the doctors!

AnyoneButAndre · 24/10/2015 20:26

You do realise that bowel cancer rarely strikes people in their twenties pixie?

Greengardenpixie · 24/10/2015 20:28

Everyone dies at some point. . You can die of all sorts of different types of cancer. Nobody knows why most of the time. Live your life.

AnyoneButAndre · 24/10/2015 20:34

That's a fair enough argument, although arguably your children's choice to make not yours on their behalf. But don't argue that because your sample of 3 have reached adulthood without visible harm that risk isn't real.

expatinscotland · 24/10/2015 20:36

Eat right, exercise, die anyway. Life is for living.

Greengardenpixie · 24/10/2015 20:36

I did my best at the time. That's good enough for me.

Greengardenpixie · 24/10/2015 20:37

Eat right, exercise, die anyway. Life is for living. Well said.

DingbatsFur · 24/10/2015 20:37

If these reports were true there would be no one in Ireland older than 55.Hmm

AnyoneButAndre · 24/10/2015 20:38

Again fair enough. Everyone makes suboptimal choices constantly or you go mad. But you need to know what the choices are and not try and attack the scientists telling you.

Greengardenpixie · 24/10/2015 20:39

Results are skewed. You are a fool if you dont think they aren't in someones interests and rarely the public.

AnyoneButAndre · 24/10/2015 21:50

Naive of me to realise that these results from many studies over the world were the result of a sinister cabal of vegetable growers poisoning the hotdogs of research subjects.

MadeMan · 24/10/2015 21:58

Peperami and chips; the choice of champions.

bigkidsdidit · 24/10/2015 21:58

This has been known about for years. I don't know why people are surprised!

The difference now is people often eat processed meat daily or even twice a day. Almost no one would have done that in the 50s / 60s / 70s.

claig · 24/10/2015 22:10

bigkidsdidit, classic English breakfast? Before the jam, brown bread and cornflakes.

HopefulAnxiety · 24/10/2015 22:26

Claig I'm sure it's not worth responding but - you would have to be pretty dim not to realise that it's not only the health properties of meat (which obviously exist along with the health disadvantages of it, which all food has - all food is healthy in moderation and unhealthy in excess) that matter, but also the environmental impact. It's not hard to work out that a cow uses more resources than a plant. The health of the planet matters too. Meat is healthy but so is a vegetarian or vegan diet. Millions of people are vegetarian or vegan for cultural or religious reasons, nothing to do with the WHO. But I guess all those vegan Jains and Buddhists and Coptic Orthodox (vegan for a large portion of the year) should be told they're just puppets of the WHO who really just want to poison everyone Hmm Hmm Hmm

You also keep conflating the 'green agenda' with the WHO which is a bit...odd. The 'green agenda' are extremely anti-GMO yet you suggested that they are pro?

Also poor people frequently had bread and dripping or bread and jam, or maybe eggs and fried bread for breakfast in the 50s and 60s, or boiled eggs and soldiers, or kippers. Meat is more expensive than white carbs or tinned/preserved fish and that's always been the case.