As soon as summer arrives, Snacks at night all over the country began to get lively, The same is true of Jinan, a city famous for its barbecue. However, a news article in Chutian Metropolis Daily on May 19, 2014 will probably make people who love barbecue uncomfortable. The news said that Xiaoding, a 22-year-old female college student, suffered from advanced gastric cancer, which the doctor said [has a lot to do with staying up late for a long time and eating a lot of barbecue food].
So does barbecue really lead to gastric cancer? The answer is yes, And whether it’s meat or fish, Is it lean meat or fat meat, Can cause cancer. Lean meat has a lot of amino acids and creatinine, When barbecued at high temperatures, the two can react to produce heterocyclic amines, while fat meat produces polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons when barbecued. Both substances destroy our DNA, thus starting a dangerous journey of cancer evolution. People who eat barbecue regularly have a much higher incidence of colon cancer and gastric cancer than people who do not eat barbecue.
But specifically for this female college student, is eating barbecue for a long time (four years) really the culprit of her gastric cancer? I’m afraid I have to analyze the specific problems. Although the harmful substances produced by barbecue can lead to gastric cancer, gastric cancer is also related to many other factors. For example, Helicobacter pylori, smoking, hormones, heredity, diet factors, in addition to the above two substances produced by barbecue, high salt, nitrosamines, iodine deficiency may be related to gastric cancer.
The medical profession has long discovered that Although both are gastric cancer, But it varies greatly from patient to patient, There appear to be two different types of stomach cancer, One is more common in the elderly, One is more common in young people, and the growth sites in the stomach are also different, and the probability of recurrence after surgery is also different. In the 1960s, pathologist Lauren pointed out that there are two types of gastric cancer, one is called intestinal type and the other is called diffuse type. The former is more common in the elderly, grows in gastric antrum, with lower malignant degree and lower recurrence rate after surgery. The latter is more common in young people and can appear in any part of the stomach with a high degree of malignancy. Many of them have already metastasized from the whole body when they are found and cannot be operated on. The recurrence rate after operation is also very high.
Regardless of what’s type of gastric cancer, The cause is a DNA problem, Causing unlimited cell growth. The difference is that, Intestinal gastric cancer often requires long-term chronic stimulation, Gradually from chronic inflammation, intestinal metaplasia to gastric cancer, This is also why intestinal gastric cancer occurs mostly in the elderly. In this cumulative process, There are also repair mechanisms at all levels of the human body fighting, It takes decades or even decades for visible cancer to appear. However, diffuse gastric cancer is mostly because patients carry the genes for gastric cancer. Gastric cancer is like a time bomb installed on them from birth. Whether you eat barbecue or not, it will happen at that time.
The girl in the news is only 22 years old, The time for barbecue is only four years, As soon as it was discovered, it was late. It shows that the malignant degree of cancer foci is very high, So it is likely to be diffuse gastric cancer. It is far-fetched to link her illness with barbecue. As for the long-term staying up late mentioned in the report, This is also a topic that many media like to stir up, especially when some people die of illness at a young age, there are always various exclamations about [life overdraft], [punishment for violating the laws of nature] and so on. However, there is no definite evidence for the relationship between staying up late and gastric cancer, which is not rigorous to say that the girl’s gastric cancer is related to staying up late.
Perhaps everyone will say, Since eating barbecue increases the risk of gastric cancer, Even if it’s not necessarily the cause of this girl, There is nothing wrong with such publicity, At least it can make people realize the harm of barbecue. From the perspective of public health, Of course, there is nothing wrong with publicizing the harm of barbecue, but taking such imprecise cases as propaganda means may affect the propaganda effect instead. For example, some people who do not stay up late and do not eat barbecue also have gastric cancer at a young age, which may make people doubt the previous propaganda, plus the temptation of barbecue food, and rejoin the barbecue army.