It’s well-established that food processing and food additives can create health hazards, and processed meats are no exception. Processed meats are those preserved by smoking, curing, salting, or the addition of chemical preservatives.

This includes bacon, ham, pastrami, salami, pepperoni, hot dogs, some sausages, and hamburgers (if they have been preserved with salt or chemical additives) and more.

Previous studies have linked processed meats such as sausages, hot dogs, and sandwich meats to an increased risk of cancer, male infertility, and early death.

For example, a 2007 analysis1 by the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) found that eating just one sausage a day may raise your risk of bowel cancer. Specifically, 1.8 ounces of processed meat daily – about one sausage or three pieces of bacon – was found to raise your likelihood of the cancer by 20 percent.

The American Institute for Cancer Research² (AICR) has long recommended avoiding processed meats entirely for this reason.

The institute explicitly warns that that “there is no safe threshold” for eating processed meats. It also recommends limiting red meat to a maximum of 18 ounces per week, to avoid raising your risk for colorectal cancer.

Processed Meats Now Classified As Group 1 Carcinogen

After reviewing some 800 studies, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), which is part of the World Health Organization (WHO), also recently concluded that processed meat can cause colorectal cancer in humans,^{3,4,5,6,7,8,9} classifying it as a Group 1 carcinogen.

As reported by Reuters:¹⁰

“IARC classified processed meat as ‘carcinogenic to humans’ on its group one list along with tobacco and asbestos, for which there is ‘sufficient evidence’ of cancer links.

Each 50-gram (1.8-ounce) portion of processed meat eaten daily increases the risk of colorectal cancer by 18 percent, the agency estimated.

A 50-gram portion would be the equivalent of eating one hot dog or two slices of bacon. Americans eat about 21.7 grams of processed pork per day, according to a 2011 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.”

According to Dr Kurt Straif, a member of the IARC panel:

“For an individual, the risk of developing colorectal (bowel) cancer because of their consumption of processed meat remains small, but this risk increases with the amount of meat consumed.”