Overnight vegetables, bacon, pickles, hot dogs …… see these foods, the first time your mind is estimated to think of nitrite. Especially leftovers, where nitrite has always been the focus of public attention, and news about its causing people to get sick and poisoned are endless. What exactly is nitrite? Is it really that scary? 1, there is no research to confirm that nitrites cause cancer Nitrite, is a general term for a class of inorganic compounds. In food processing, they are widely used as preservatives. The idea that nitrite causes cancer originated from a study in the 1970s, in which scientists confirmed the carcinogenic effect of nitrite through experiments on mice. But because the study was essentially a blanket statement, it was not accepted by the industry, and the leading scientists were soon discredited. Since then, no studies have shown a link between nitrites or nitrates and cancer. Even the National Academy of Sciences, the American Cancer Society, and other authorities agree that there is no evidence of cancer risk from consumption of nitrites. In fact, adding nitrites and nitrates to your food reduces the risk of foodborne illnesses, such as botulism, which is truly deadly. In addition, nitrites are found in foods other than processed meats. Basically, 93% of the nitrites you consume from your diet come from vegetables. Does that surprise you? Because vegetables absorb the nitrogen fertilizer in the soil, it is easy to put nitrogen in the form of nitrates in vegetables, and then synthesize amino acids and proteins. Among the various vegetables, and dark green leafy vegetables contain the highest nitrates. And no dietitian warns you not to eat vegetables. Marianne Smith-Edge, senior advisor to the International Food Information Council (IFIC), points out that consumers need to be more concerned about avoiding food-borne illnesses or eating too few vegetables than about the lack of evidence of carcinogenicity. “After all, the U.S. National Toxicology Program Service has not found any link between nitrites and cancer.” It’s also important to be clear that when meat products are labeled “no nitrites/nitrates added,” it doesn’t mean they’re preservative-free. Instead, manufacturers often use celery juice or table salt instead, both of which are sources of sodium nitrate. When exposed to saliva, sodium nitrate is also converted to nitrite. In other words, you basically can’t get rid of nitrites and nitrates no matter what. And many companies are seizing on consumers’ fears and putting on some unnecessary labels with the aim of making you spend more money. 2, the amount of nitrite in food is basically safe According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) study, the amount of nitrite in food is safe up to 200 ppm. What is this concept? In layman’s terms, an adult weighing 135 pounds is safe as long as the daily intake of nitrite does not exceed 1500 mg. In other words, if you like to eat hot dogs, lunch meat and other processed meats, as long as you eat meat is not black-hearted workshops factory, in the process of strict compliance with the amount added, even if you eat 16 or 17 pounds a day, there is no problem. Theoretically, manufacturers in the production process will not be used in excess, one because, the content of the food in 100ppm has a fairly good antiseptic ability, two, if you add too much instead of increasing production costs (unless manufacturers plan to sell this food for ten years). As for the widespread concern about the problem of overnight vegetables, the normal consumption of overnight vegetables is not too large, and the intake of nitrite from it is even less. Fujian Provincial Quality Supervision Bureau of Product Quality Inspection Institute of Food Inspection Institute of researchers, has been out of the pot in the fresh box refrigerated vegetables, roast meat, roast fish, rice were kept for half an hour, 4 hours, 9 hours, 24 hours of testing. The results showed that these meals contained less than 1 mg/kg of nitrite. The meat kept at room temperature for 4 hours also contained less than 1 mg/kg of nitrite. The national limit for nitrite content is 4 mg/kg for vegetables, 3 mg/kg for fresh meat, and 3 mg/kg for rice. This shows that nitrite is not terrible. To reach the amount of poisoning, unless it is eaten as a meal. The human nitrite poisoning dose is 0.3 to 0.5g, and it takes 56kg of overnight fried vegetables to get poisoned. The WHO ADI (Acceptable Daily Intake) for nitrite is 0-0.07mg/kgbw, which means that an adult weighing 60kg who consumes no more than 60 x 0.07 = 4.2mg of nitrite per day is not at risk. . That means eating nearly 1 kilogram of overnight greens (or the kind of overnight greens that have to be eaten 24 hours apart), that much every day for N years, is likely to cause cancer. But if you’re still cautious about it, just remember moderation. The best thing you can do is to eat a balanced diet and limit your weekly intake of processed meats, including bacon. If you’re afraid that overnight food is toxic, try to make fewer meals at a time and eat fresh at every meal. See, the answer is so simple.