Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) drags the State of California to court for failing to add processed meat to the carcinogen list.
California is currently being ordered to respond to a lawsuit from the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) that requests California to add processed meat to the carcinogen list. A judge from the Superior Court of California ruled that the state is required to answer the lawsuit demanding that the government adhere to Proposition 65.
“We’ve spent years asking California to follow the law and add carcinogenic processed meat to the Proposition 65 list,” Vice President of legal affairs for PCRM Mark Kennedy said. “Now, the state must stop stalling and allow this case, which could help protect Californias from certain cancers, to proceed.”
The legislation mandates that California must include cancer-linked processed meat on a carcinogenic list to increase awareness of the cancer-causing effects of meat. Research claims that eating 50 grams of processed meat will increase a person’s risk of cancer, making the general risk for cancer-related deaths increase across the state. The demand includes hot dogs, deli meat, and bacon.
PCRM sued California last year, attempting to encourage the state to reconsider its previous “neglect” regarding processed meats. The court rejected the state’s request for judgment in its favor, making it so that California will bring consumer attention to the dangers of processed meats. “Tens of thousands of Californians are diagnosed or die from colorectal cancer every year,” Plaintiff and PCRM member Donald D. Forrester, MD. said. “Adding processed meat to Proposition 65 would provide first-line defense against this deadly disease.”
A study released earlier this year linked regular meat consumption to a range of deadly diseases. The study from the University of Oxford was published in BMC Medicine, finding that higher consumption of both processed meats and unprocessed red meat will likely lead to heart disease, diabetes, and pneumonia. The report claimed that 70g more red meat and processed meats daily make an individual 15 percent more likely to develop ischaemic heart disease, and 30 percent more at risk of developing diabetes.
“We’ve long known that unprocessed red meat and processed meat consumption is likely to be carcinogenic,” the study’s lead author Dr. Keren Papier, from Nuffield Department of Population Health said. “This research is the first to assess the risk of 25 non-cancerous health conditions in relation to meat intake in one study. Additional research is needed to evaluate whether the difference in risk we observed in relation to meat intake reflects causal relationships. And, if so, the extent to which these diseases could be prevented by decreasing meat consumption.
Original source: https://thebeet.com