Starbucks coffee contains acrylamide and causes cancer? Don’t worry, you can relax with a cup of coffee

The California court once issued a judgment: California coffee sellers need to post a warning on the coffee label to let consumers know that coffee contains a "probably carcinogenic substance."

You may have seen the title "Starbucks Coffee Contains Acrylamide Causes Carcinoma" in your circle of friends-yes, that's it. It's just that acrylamide is far more than limited to coffee, it is widely found in various starchy baked foods; this is not a new discovery, people know that acrylamide will appear in these foods almost 20 Years.

Then why didn't anyone in your circle of friends talk about it before? Because this substance is not very dangerous. It is in a very embarrassing position: animal exposure to it will cause cancer, but in reality the amount that humans can eat by eating is less than one-thousandth of the carcinogenicity of animals. So far, no clear relationship between it and human cancer has been found. contact. What can you do with it in this position?

In this California case, the plaintiff sued 90 companies selling coffee (including companies like McDonald's and 711) in one go. Some companies have chosen to settle and agree to the mark, and some companies may choose to continue the appeal, so this ruling may still be overturned.

But leaving aside legal matters, let's talk about this acrylamide.

Acrylamide: a bit suspicious, no evidence
The acrylamide in coffee is produced during the roasting process. In fact, the American Cancer Society (ACS) pointed out that as long as a food contains starch and amino acids, it will produce trace amounts of acrylamide after high-temperature cooking, which is especially easy to produce in fried and baked foods. This covers a wide range of foods from French fries and potato chips to biscuits and breads.

Although the California court has issued such a ruling, scientifically, its relationship with cancer is not as either one or the other in the law. Animals who consume acrylamide in large amounts do increase the risk of cancer. However, in reality, no one will fill their stomachs with a bottle of acrylamide, and the amount of food eaten is too small and too small. Therefore, the original words of the American Cancer Society are: "There is currently no increased risk of any type of cancer that is clearly related to the intake of acrylamide." The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) listed acrylamide on the carcinogenic list, but it did not include foods containing acrylamide. They had listed coffee as a category 2B substance (possibly carcinogenic) many years ago, but because follow-up evidence did not support the earlier preliminary results, they kicked it out of the 2B list the year before. (But as a friendly reminder, this refers to cold or warm coffee. Any beverage above 65 degrees Celsius will increase the risk of esophageal cancer, whether it is coffee or yerba mate or plain water.)

Ideally, we should not wrong the good people, nor should we let the bad people go. However, this kind of something that is slightly suspicious but has no evidence seems to be inappropriate. In the past, some fast food restaurants posted such warnings on their French fries packaging. Some companies are studying how to reduce acrylamide in food. The FDA issued a guideline on it the year before, but no organization has given it in food. Mandatory standard for acrylamide.

However, California law does require warnings for substances that cause cancer risks, and these defendants failed to prove in court that this thing is absolutely harmless. Therefore, the current judgment is like this.

So I want to avoid acrylamide and stop drinking coffee?
It is quite difficult to avoid acrylamide completely, because it is indeed too widely distributed. Therefore, it is quite difficult to avoid starch fried and baked foods at all. Substances such as meat, eggs, milk and fish basically do not produce acrylamide during processing, but regardless of nutritional balance, red meat is definitely carcinogenic...

And what if you want to avoid coffee for this? Then there is another problem: except for acrylamide, the rest of coffee seems to be beneficial to health, and the evidence is stronger... The US government’s own dietary guidelines consider coffee to be part of a healthy lifestyle, and the evidence is Coffee may be related to reduced mortality from cardiovascular diseases, and may also prevent diseases such as Parkinson's and type 2 diabetes.

In short, acrylamide is something that is suspected of causing cancer but has no evidence. It is widespread in food and is not serious enough to be worthy of attention. Of course, you are willing to stop coffee consumption because of the "California Ruling", which is also a choice of your own.