Ad gives hot dogs a bum rap, experts say

Some think commercial overstates the mystery meat's link to colon cancer

CHICAGO - A new TV commercial shows kids eating hot dogs in a school cafeteria and one little boy’s haunting lament: “I was dumbfounded when the doctor told me I have late-stage colon cancer.”

It’s a startling moment in an ad that vilifies one of America’s most beloved, if maligned, foods, while stoking fears about a dreaded disease.

But the boy doesn’t have cancer. Neither do two other kids in the ad who claim to be afflicted.

The commercial’s pro-vegetarian sponsors say it’s a dramatization that highlights research linking processed meats, including hot dogs, with higher odds of getting colon cancer.

But that connection is based on studies of adults, not children, and the increased risk is slight, even if you ate a hot dog a day. While compelling, it isn’t conclusive.

The truth about the mystery meat
So what exactly is the truth about hot dogs?

The 33-second ad launched last month in several U.S. cities provides the perfect opportunity to separate fact from fiction about this mysterious yet so familiar meat. It is set to run in September in Chicago and Denver.

The bottom line from several nutritionists familiar with the ad is this: Hot dogs aren’t exactly a “health food,” but eating one every now and then probably won’t hurt you.

“My concern about this campaign is it’s giving the indication that the occasional hot dog in the school lunch is going to increase cancer risk,” said Colleen Doyle, the American Cancer Society’s nutrition director. “An occasional hot dog isn’t going to increase that risk.”

Americans as a whole eat hot dogs more than occasionally. According to the National Hot Dog & Sausage Council, U.S. consumers spent more than $4 billion on hot dogs and sausages last year. That includes more than 1.5 billion pounds of hot dogs and sausages bought at retail stores alone.

The health concerns primarily come from their high fat and salt content and sodium nitrate and nitrite, commonly added preservatives and color-enhancers. Nitrate-related substances have been reported to cause cancer in animals, but there’s no proof they do that in people.

Anatomy of a hot dog
Hot dogs typically contain muscle meat trimmings from pork or beef. Contrary to legend, they do not contain animal eyeballs, hooves or genitals, according to the Hot Dog Council’s Janet Riley. But the government does allow them to contain pig snouts and stomachs, cow lips and livers, goat gullets and lamb spleens. If they have these byproducts, the label should spell out which ones, a U.S. Department of Agriculture spokeswoman said.

Some also are made with leaner meats, including turkey, as well as tofu or soy protein.

Check the label of a name-brand hot dog, and chances are fat provides around 80 percent of total calories, more than double what’s often advised. What’s more, saturated fat and trans fat — the fats most strongly linked with artery-clogging — are common ingredients, in some cases providing at least half the fat content.

The hot dog council called the new ad an alarmist scare tactic, but the promoters, a group called The Cancer Project, defend their campaign.

Dr. Neal Barnard, president of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, called the ad “a way to raise appropriate concern about a deadly concern.” Barnard also heads The Cancer Project, an offshoot of his anti-meat advocacy group.

Hot dogs may be considered as American as apple pie, but Barnard said it’s time to change that tradition.

“Children are born with no traditions whatsoever,” he said. “You or I might think a hot dog, that just goes with baseball ... We can always change our traditions to be healthful.”

The new ad is based on an analysis of five studies in adults by scientists working with cancer research groups not affiliated with Barnard’s.

Cancer connection?
Their report last November said eating 50 grams a day of processed meats for several years increases colorectal cancer risk by 21 percent. That equals about one hot dog a day or two deli slices of bologna or five slices of bacon.

The duration of daily consumption linked with that higher risk is uncertain. Colorectal cancer was diagnosed between three and 19 years after the studies began, but participants could have been eating processed meats for years before that, said dietitian Karen Collins, nutrition adviser with the American Institute for Cancer Research, a group that analyzed the studies.

For a U.S. adult, eating one hot dog daily for several years would increase the average risk of getting colorectal cancer, which is 5.8 percent, to 7 percent. On a population level, it would increase the number of people nationwide who get colorectal cancer each year from 58 per 100,000 people to 70 per 100,000, Collins said.

“It’s not the kind of impact on risk that, say, tobacco smoking has on lung cancer. But on the other hand, colon cancer is one of our most common cancers, so small changes still affect a lot of people,” Collins said.

Eating a hot dog once or twice a month would mean up to about a 1.4 percent increased risk, she said. “The risk we get from things like lack of physical activity, excess body weight, lack of adequate vegetables and fruits, these are much more important to work on than to worry about” a 1.4 percent increased risk.

Scientists who analyzed the studies recommend avoiding processed meat — advice that makes sense, said Lilian Cheung, of the nutrition department at Harvard’s School of Public Health.

Cheung is not connected to Barnard’s group, but called its campaign “a good spark plug” to improve school foods and raise awareness.

The ad is part of a campaign to improve foods in schools and get the government to stop providing processed meats. The government provides some, such as ham and processed turkey. However hot dogs, pepperoni pizza, bacon and other popular processed meats are bought from local vendors, not the federal government, according to the USDA.

Cancer Project promoters want all processed meats off school menus. They recently issued a report analyzing menus from one month last spring at 28 large school districts. Half got failing grades for serving too much processed meat.

Many school districts are working to improve their menus, including Chicago’s, which is among those the Cancer Project “failed.”

However, Chicago schools’ hot dogs are zero-trans-fat turkey dogs, said spokesman Franklin Shuftan.

Understanding Cause Of Colon Cancer Takes Important Steps Forward

Scientists investigating a molecule known to play a key role in causing colon cancer have made a series of ground-breaking discoveries that could have major implications for future treatment of the disease, responsible for 655,000 deaths worldwide per year. Their findings are published in the journal Cancer Research, today (Wednesday 1 October 2008).

Led by Professor Janusz Jankowski the Sir James Black Professor of Gastrointestinal Biology and Trials at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry, researchers examined the cell adhesion molecule P-Cadherin. Having shown previously that this molecule is expressed in the mucous membrane of an inflamed intestine and colon, they wanted to better understand the mechanisms controlling its expression, and the biological effects of its unnatural presence in the intestine and colon. The P-Cadherin gene is important during early development, including in the formation of the foetus, but its actions are suppressed in the normal mature colon in adults. The repression of this gene in inflamed mucosa is lessened however, especially in stem cells, allowing the pockets of gut cells to form buds, enabling the damaged, inflamed mucosa to spread.

Now this latest research has revealed how the bowel becomes abnormal long before obvious changes are observable beneath the microscope, and how early pre cancer (10-15 years before it develops) expands within the bowel. The team have also highlighted the genetic and molecular mechanisms that switch on the gene, causing these processes to occur, and - in a model system - revealed how they are more likely to happen in an inflamed bowel than a non inflamed bowel. Their findings are a dramatic step forward in this field of cancer research and hold promise for future discoveries and therapies.

Colorectal cancer is the third most common form of cancer, and second only to lung cancer as the leading cause of cancer-related death in the Western world. Around 35,000 people a year are diagnosed with the disease in the UK, resulting in around 16,000 deaths.

Professor Jankowski said: "Understanding how a cancer develops so early in the disease gives great hope. If the changes in cell adhesion are understood and can then be identified so early in the disease then patients can be offered preventative therapy or even change of lifestyle to avert cancer developing at all."

Source: Alexandra Fernandes
Queen Mary, University of London

Breakthrough optical technology to assess colon cancer risk, accuracy

Researchers at NorthShore University HealthSystem (NorthShore) and Northwestern University have discovered that fiber optic technology can for the very first time effectively measure blood levels in the colonic lining (mucosa) in humans, thus having potential applications for analyzing risk of colon cancer.

The study appears in the October 2008 issue of Gastroenterology, the official journal of the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) Institute.

The study used fiber optic technology to map microvascular blood content in patients during colonoscopy. The results provide the first indication that the early increase in blood supply (EIBS) is detectable in humans and that a high blood level mirrors proximity to neoplasia (process of tumor formation). The findings also suggest that this technology could be a valuable screening tool for enhancing polyp detection and could lead to improvements in colon cancer prevention.

"Our premise is that since the lining of the large intestine -- rectum and colon -- is contiguous, if you see an abnormality in one part of the colon, then somewhere else in the colon you have a higher likelihood of harboring an adenoma [benign tumor] or carcinoma [malignant tumor]," said Hemant K. Roy, M.D., director of gastroenterology research at NorthShore University HealthSystem and the study's principal clinical researcher. "EIBS strengthens our premise thanks largely to the unique and accurate ability of Four Dimensional Elastic Light Scattering Fingerprinting (4D-ELF)."

This state-of-the-art light probe was developed by Vadim Backman, professor of biomedical engineering at Northwestern University's McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science. It utilizes a revolutionary light scattering technology that can detect subtle abnormal changes in cells lining the colon long before those changes can be seen under a microscope, and even before polyps form.

"It's fascinating," said Roy, "to very precisely know that you're looking at the most superficial layer of tissue -- which is where all polyps and cancer start -- and the accuracy with which these things can be measured."

Researchers used the optic probe to measure oxygenated (Ohb) and deoxygenated (Dhb) hemoglobin (Hb) specifically in the colonic lining where small blood vessels circulate. At NorthShore's Evanston Hospital, 222 patients undergoing colonoscopy screening were recruited for the study in 2006 and 2007.

Of these patients, 175 had no adenomas detected, 35 had non-advanced adenomas and 12 had advanced adenomas (polyps larger than one centimeter). The mean age was 56.6 years and 40 percent were female. There were no significant differences in gender. The groups did not significantly differ in tobacco or alcohol history.

The study found that the total Hb concentration was elevated 75.3 percent above control levels (comparable region from patients with no adenomas) at the adenoma site and persisted in the uninvolved mucosa (microscopically normal) area. Moreover, tissue sites located within 10 and 30 centimeters away from an adenoma also manifested a highly statistically significant increase in total Hb, OHb and DHb concentration.

"We are not determining whether an abnormality is cancer or not cancer," said Roy. "What we are doing is using optical technology to determine if we can assess risk through looking at field carcinogenesis [cancer formation]. The potential clinical applications include enhanced polyp detection during colonoscopy."

"While the technology is still in the clinical trial phase," notes Michael Goldberg, M.D., head of gastroenterology at NorthShore University HealthSystem, "it could be available to patients at NorthShore in five years."

Colon cancer is the second-leading cause of cancer death in the United States, killing 55,000 Americans each year. The disease is 90 percent preventable if pre-cancerous polyps are detected early and removed.

"This partnership with Dr. Backman at Northwestern University has the potential of bringing a suite of technologies that is not meant to replace colonoscopy," said Roy, "but rather to more precisely determine risk and thereby help to individualize recommendations on the timing of colonoscopy for colon cancer screening. This improved efficiency and accuracy may aid in cancer prevention efforts."

Genetic link found to colon cancer in study

Last Updated: 2008-10-01 8:15:43 -0400 (Reuters Health)

By Andrew Stern

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A gene related to a hormone secreted by the body's fat cells may lower the risk of colon cancer, a discovery that could reassure people with a family history of the disease, researchers said on Tuesday.

The gene variation, shared by about half of all those in the study, likely helps control how much of the hormone adiponectin fat cells secrete, the researchers reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association.People with more of the hormone in their blood are known to have a lower risk of colon cancer, but the body's mechanism for controlling adiponectin secretion by cells is unclear.The hormone suppresses inflammation of blood vessels, can raise the body's metabolic rate, and is known to lower the risk of colon and breast cancer.Obese people, who have a higher risk of cancer, tend to have less of the hormone. People with more adiponectin have less risk of heart disease and diabetes.The researchers reported on two groups totaling 1,500 people.New Yorkers of Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry who had the gene were 28 percent less likely to have been diagnosed with colon cancer. The disease is more common in Ashkenazi Jews -- who originated in Europe -- than the general population.The other group, from Chicago, was diverse ethnically and those with the gene had a 52 percent lower risk."Is this the (genetic) snip that is the cause of the disease? Most likely not. It just gives us a region on the gene where we think the association to colorectal cancer risk stems from," said Dr. Boris Pasche of the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Pasche led the research, done primarily while he was at Northwestern University in Chicago.Colon cancer will be diagnosed in 149,000 Americans this year and will kill 50,000, according to the American Cancer Society. Globally, about 1.2 million cases of colorectal cancer are diagnosed annually and the disease kills about 630,000 people.Family history accounts for about one-third of colon cancer cases, and several other genes have been linked with colon cancer, but the genetic component is unknown for most.Other risk factors include a diet high in fat and calories and low in fiber; obesity; a sedentary lifestyle; heavy drinking and smoking.Tracing the genetic source of diseases such as cancer is in its infancy, but holds promise. If diagnosed early, colon cancer is highly treatable, Pasche said.

Copyright © 2008 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.

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