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Food

17th Apr 2019

The more rashers you eat increases risk of bowel cancer, study finds

Rudi Kinsella

Not rashers. Anything but rashers.

Rashers may be a mainstay of the Irish breakfast, but a recent report reckons that you should probably cut down on your intake of the meat.

A recent study by Oxford University and funded by Cancer Research UK (CRUK), adds to already existing evidence, including from the World Health Organization, that eating red meat can be harmful.

The study, which was conducted over a period of six years, analysed data from almost half a million people involved in the UK.

According to BBC, it found that eating three rashers of bacon a day rather than just one could increase the risk of bowel cancer by 20 percent.

It also found that for every 10,000 people in the study who ate 21g a day of red and processed meat, 40 were diagnosed with bowel cancer.

The World Cancer Research also said that there is strong evidence that eating processed meat is a cause of bowel cancer, while eating a lot of red meat also increases the risk.

According to Emma Shields, information manager at CRUK, “This study shows the more meat you eat, the higher your risk of getting cancer and obviously the reverse is true – the less you eat the less likely you are to get bowel cancer.”