As bacon’s popularity increases across the nation, doctors are becoming increasingly alarmed over the ever-growing risks this product presents to the population. When McDonald’s fast food chain introduced a bacon menu last January, that triggered doctor members of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine to organize protests at hospitals and medical centers offering McDonald’s products. The doctors’ signs read, “Bacon Doesn’t Love You Back,” “I’m Riskin’ It,” and “Break Up with Bacon…colorectal cancer.”

It is known that consuming processed meats [bacon, turkey bacon, sausages, ham, hot dogs, and deli meats] increases the risk of colorectal cancer. These products have been classified as “carcinogenic to humans” by the World Health Organization. After reviewing more than 800 studies, WHO determined that each 2 oz. serving of any processed meat, eaten daily, increases the risk of colorectal cancer by 18%.

Moreover, processed meats are linked to cancers of the breast, prostate, pancreas, and overall mortality. One study reported an increased risk of breast cancer by 21% among women who ate only about an ounce of processed meat daily.

As advocates of the US population, the American Medical Association and the American College of Cardiology have called on hospitals to remove processed meats from their menus, mindful that hospitals should be in the business of leading by example, and protecting patients, and their visitors, from unnecessary risks lurking in their food. In addition to the increased risks of cancers, processed meats are strongly associated with the world’s major killers, heart disease and stroke. If the stroke led to paralysis, those experienced stairlift professionals have some recommendations of the products that can be of great use.

Kudos to those doctors who are trying to educate our people, and send a message to the food industry that prevention of disease must come before profit.

Dateline: Latham, Albany County, New York