对世界卫生组织将红肉和肉制品列为致癌物报告的质疑

A Doubt on the World Health Organization's Report Linking Red and Processed Meat to Cancer

针对近日世界卫生组织将加工肉制品列为1类致癌物,将红肉列为2A类致癌物,本文在对400余篇密切相关的论文进行详细分析的基础上,对加工肉制品和红肉中可能存在的致癌风险因子进行了分析和研判。现有研究表明,加工肉制品中亚硝胺、杂环胺及多环芳烃等有害物的含量极低,在正常摄入量条件下远低于致癌剂量;红肉中富含人体必需的铁、锌、硒、VB_(11)和VB_(12)等营养物质,正常摄入对保持机体健康具有重要意义。但由于经济、饮食文化、生活习惯等因素的影响,长期过量摄入任何食物,包括加工肉制品和红肉,都可能会对健康造成不良影响。世界卫生组织所依据的流行病学研究结果缺乏严谨的人体量效关系研究,且研究结果并不一致;也没有足够动物实验表明红肉和加工肉制品致癌。因此,我们认为世界卫生组织将加工肉制品列为1类致癌物缺乏充分证据、以偏概全,将"红肉"列为2A类致癌物缺乏证据、不负责任,建议撤销。

Recently, the World Health Organization（WHO）＇s International Agency for Research on Cancer（IARC） listed processed meat as Group I carcinogen and red meat as Group IIA carcinogen. In the present investigation, we have reviewed more than 400 recent publications regarding the link between processed and red meat consumption and increased cancer risk. Previous studies indicated that processed meats, in some cases, may contain N-nitroso compounds, hetercyclic amines, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons that are formed during processing. However, the amounts of these compounds in processed meats at the recommended intake level are far below the minimum concentrations carcinogenic to humans. Red meat is an excellent source of high quality nutrients essential for the human body, especially heme iron, zinc, selenium, vitamins B_（11） and B_（12）. However, long-term excessive intake of any food, including processed and red meat, under different economic, cultural, and lifestyle backgrounds, could have adverse impacts on health. Epidemiological studies that IARC referenced to were performed without strict human dose-effect experiments and the results were inconsistent. In fact, there are not adequate animal studies that demonstrated the carcinogenicity of processed and red meat. Due to the lack of convincing evidence, it is unscientific, premature, and irresponsible for IARC to issue such a report that stated processed meat and red meat are carcinogenic. Therefore, we recommend that the report should be retracted.