this post was submitted on 05 Jul 2025
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[–] [email protected] 120 points 4 days ago (13 children)

Habitual consumption of even small amounts of processed meat, sugary drinks, and trans fatty acids...

Followed by

The data showed that people who ate as little as one hot dog a day ...

As little as one hot dog a day? I eat like one every few months. How many hot dogs is the average American eating daily?

[–] [email protected] 22 points 4 days ago (2 children)

I think "hot dog" was used as an example here. A hot dog has around 50 grams of meat (1.8 oz).

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[–] [email protected] 40 points 4 days ago (1 children)

You don't have a daily dog? What else would you eat after dinner?

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

What an insane headline.

First meta data analysis.

Second, “This current research has shown, yet again and consistent with prior research … that to achieve health gains it is best to avoid or minimize the habitual consumption of each of processed meat, sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) and industrially produced trans fatty acids (TFAs),”

So don't eat a ton of shit every day. Got it. The CNN version of super size me propaganda rage bait.

You're shitty at science and spreading propaganda. Feel bad about yourself.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 days ago (1 children)

You had me up until that last part

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

being shitty at science and spreading propaganda is pretty much ancel keyes, who played a big part in wrecking the country's dietary health decades ago

no amount of bad feelings could make up for the damage he did

edit: further reading https://academic.oup.com/jhmas/article/63/2/139/772615?login=false

see also: antivaxxers. shitty science. propaganda. irreparable damage

[–] [email protected] 59 points 4 days ago (10 children)

Like... is it written to excite anxiety?

Getting a colorectal cancer probability in a lifetime is about 0.04, eating hotdog adds 8% to it or ~0.003. I like how precisely we can measure it using regular statistics, but what does it tell to a human being? To me it tells nothing about hotdogs

[–] [email protected] 34 points 4 days ago (16 children)

I guess the point is that it shows the correlation between processed food and cancer is statistically significant. As in there is definitely a link, and this meta analysis shows good evidence this link exists. Even if the impact is small.

As for the day to day impact of this study, I'm not sure there is one. Processed food is already on WHOs list of things that definitely cause cancer.

Getting a colorectal cancer probability in a lifetime is about 0.04, eating hotdog adds 8% to it or ~0.003.

Depending on the average amount of processed meats eaten, it could also show not eating a hot dog every day will reduce your risk of cancer by about that much. It's probably only important in the cumulative though. When we have studies like this for many foods, you could put together a diet that reduces your chance of cancer by 20 or 30%, say. But one food's impact like this is probably only important to scientists.

So getting back to your original question:

Like... is it written to excite anxiety?

Yes. Anxiety drives clicks which drives revenue.

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