There’s ‘No Safe Amount’ of Hot Dogs to Eat, New Study Finds
Grilling up hot dogs is a Fourth of July tradition across the country, but regularly eating processed meat could contribute to a range of health problems
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NEED TO KNOW
- New research links regularly eating processed meat to a higher risk of type 2 diabetes and colorectal cancer
- The research was published in Nature Medicine on Monday, June 30
- The authors wrote that type 2 diabetes “disease risk increased with increased intake” of processed meats
Grilling up hot dogs over the Fourth of July weekend is a tradition across the country, but regularly eating processed meat could contribute to a range of health problems, a new study suggests.
The research, published in Nature Medicine on Monday, June 30, studied associations between consuming processed meats, sugary drinks and trans fatty acids with developing chronic diseases like type 2 diabetes, ischemic heart disease and colorectal cancer.
Though their weight can vary, a typical hot dog hovers around 50 grams. The new research, which crunched numbers from earlier studies, found that eating about that much processed meat per day, “compared with consuming no processed meat, was associated on average with at least an 11% higher risk of type 2 diabetes.”
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Eating roughly that amount of processed meat daily, “compared with consuming no processed meat—was associated with at least a 7% higher risk, on average, of colorectal cancer,” researchers also found.
“We observed a statistically significant…increase in type 2 diabetes risk associated with higher processed meat consumption; that is, disease risk increased with increased intake,” the authors wrote.