Successive governments criticised for doing ‘virtually nothing’ to reduce risk in the decade since cancer link found

Bacon and ham sold in the UK should carry cigarette-style labels warning that chemicals in them cause bowel cancer, scientists say.

Their demand comes as they criticise successive British governments for doing “virtually nothing” to reduce the risk from nitrites in the decade since they were found to definitely cause cancer.

Saturday marks a decade since the World Health Organization in October 2015 declared processed meat declared processed meat to be carcinogenic to humans, putting it in the same category as tobacco and asbestos.

    • piecat@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      4 hours ago

      It’s theoretically possible, some experts think no level of radiation is “safe”. Yet, it’s so improbable that the risk of developing cancer from a single banana is indistinguishable from background noise. You get a far higher dose of radiation just from living on earth.

      This fun infographic from xkcd shows a comparison of doses, and just how low a banana ranks. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose#/media/File:Radiation_Dose_Chart_by_Xkcd.png

      It would have to be the “perfect shot” of a particle hitting a cell to cause DNA damage that wasn’t repairable. And you would need to be extremely immunocompromised.

      If you were in such a position to get cancer from eating a single banana, you would likely already get it from living life.