The Cancer Diet – Diets That Cause Cancer
Much has been talked about cancer diet meaning the diet that prevents and mitigates cancer. This includes a diet full of vegetables, fruits, antioxidants, vitamins, green tea, turmeric etc. Now let us focus our attention on another type of cancer diet – the diet that causes cancer. While the former has to be adopted on a daily basis the latter should avoided like the plague.
Our modern day food habit involves a wide range of processed food, fast food and packaged food. These contain a wide range of additives, condiments, flavoring gents, flavor enhancers, sweeteners, preservatives, coloring agents, emulsifiers, solvents, stabilizers, bulking gents, antifoaming agents and others. All these of course are tested for safety in short term. Nothing will happen to you immediately or even days after taking it. But the long term carcinogenic effect is far less understood. More importantly what has never been studied is the harmful effects these additives cause by acting on one another.
A food contaminant aspergillums flavus that grows on damp grains and nuts is a carcinogen. It is a common contaminant in peanuts. Sodium Nitrite is used as a preservative, coloring and flavoring in bacon, ham, hot dogs, luncheon meats, corned beef, smoked fish and other processed meats. This can lead to the formation of cancer-causing chemicals called nitrosamines. Aspartame is a popular natural sweetener found in Equal and NutraSweet, diet sodas and other low-cal diet foods.
This sweetener has been found to cause brain tumors in rats as far back as the 1970s, however a more recent study in 2005 found that even small doses increase the incidence of lymphomas and leukemia in rats, along with brain tumors. Nitrosamine produced by overcooking or smoking of animal protein was found to be a cause of cancer in humans.
There are also reports of stomach cancer being caused by food that is very spicy, highly acidic foodstuff like pickles, nitrates in water and irritants like alcohol can lead to stomach cancer. High intake of fat can lead to cancer in humans. United States National Research council has advised way back in 1980 that intake of fat should be reduced and that of fiber be increased. Minimize or totally avoid such cancer causing diets and you can lead a long and healthy life.
