points by wonder_er 1 day ago | 0 comments
maybe it's meat overall, and not exclusively processed meat? i was vegetarian for many years though and don't trust myself to make guesses anymore on this. I do think there's gotta be a bunch of bad stuff that comes from eating all the unhappy animals/eggs from them/milk from them.
[–] tpm 19 hours ago
There is certainly a bunch of bad stuff in meat (and in industrially produced vegetables too) but that is separate from the established carcinogens contained in processed meat, which is AFAIK mostly nitrates from curing salts reacting with the heme from blood (vegetables often contain nitrates too but they don't contain blood). Which is why the use of curing salts is heavily restricted (and antioxidants added) but OTOH still needed to restrict the growth of Clostridium botulinum.
The other one would be carcinogens from frying.
Feed lots for cattle are very disgusting places and have been linked to a variety of illness in humans who live downwind(specifically airborne illness). Chicken farms have similar problems.