How Processed Foods Increase Your Chances of Getting Cancer

Well, it’s finally happened. A full 50% of Canadians will get cancer at some point in their lifetime. This is truly an astounding statistic considering that only 117 years ago the cancer death rate was only 6.2/100,000 —today, it’s 200/100,000 (Canadian Cancer Statistics, 2019). That’s an incredible 3,225% increase! These rising rates cannot be attributed to a longer life expectancy (we only live about six years longer, and that is mostly due to better sanitation). It’s also not genetic, as that is statistically impossible. So it has to be environmental, or, in other words, what we eat. 

Our current diet of processed foods is radically different from that of our predecessors. The biggest difference is how the oils used in food products today are manufactured. Look at the label of any food item on the shelf: the top oils in it are canola, soy, corn, or cottonseed. Why do we use these oils? Because they never rot, they cannot be destroyed, and they last forever, so the food that contains them will look just as fresh a year from now as they do today. Sounds great, right? So why are processed foods so bad for you? 

Let’s take a look at canola oil (click here for an in-depth look at how it’s processed). It has been heated many times. Then it must be cleansed of all the toxic byproducts of that process (which is then fed to cattle, very unwise) to make it look and taste like a cooking oil, but it is now radically different than fresh, unprocessed oil. The key to vegetable oils is they contain a high proportion of unsaturated fats. They are unstable and breakdown easily, and when exposed to heat and/or oxygen, they become oxidized or rancid. They smell like rotting fish, which is why they must be cleansed from the processed product.

These unsaturated fats play a vital role in your health. They are incorporated directly into your cell membranes and are responsible for oxygen transport across that membrane. If you are putting processed oils in your cell membrane (essentially a type of liquid plastic), you impair your cells ability to get the oxygen it needs for producing energy, which causes multiple side effects.

When cells can’t get the energy they need, they start releasing inflammatory factors (a cry for help) resulting in fatigue, joint pain, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, and, yes, cancer. Now the cancer effect of oxygen depletion of cells was shown by Otto Warburg in the 1950s and 60s (called the Warburg Effect), yet you see almost no research into this very obvious and well documented cause. Let’s help prevent cancer by staying away from unhealthy, processed oils. Pure Form Omega is wholly unprocessed and is probably the closest you can get to the raw, organic product itself. Independent testing has confirmed this as shown here in our purity report. Feel the difference today and let’s help prevent future disease. 

REFERENCES

Steps in Oil and Meal Processing. (2017). Retrieved from https://www.canolacouncil.org/oil-and-meal/what-is-canola/how-canola-is-processed/steps-in-oil-and-meal-processing/

Canadian Cancer Statistics publication. (2019). Retrieved from http://www.cancer.ca/en/cancer-information/cancer-101/canadian-cancer-statistics-publication/?region=on