--- title: With All Those Nitrates, Is Hot Dog Healthy or Does It Cause Cancer? description: Hot dogs aren’t hot in the health world, say four of our experts. But one expert had the courage to stand up for the maligned meat tube canonical: https://time.com/3983197/hot-dog-nitrates/ author: Mandy Oaklander article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-08-06T15:51:16.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:02:11.502Z article:section: Health og:title: Should I Eat Hot Dogs? og:description: Hot dogs aren’t hot in the health world, say four of our experts. But one expert had the courage to stand up for the maligned meat tube og:url: https://time.com/3983197/hot-dog-nitrates/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdb923a5bc3b50b9e/69885e1f8e0601bebf461b9f/screen-shot-2015-08-05-at-6-21-56-pm.png?branch=production&width=1111&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1111 og:image:height: 625 og:image:alt: hot dogs og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Should I Eat Hot Dogs? twitter:description: Hot dogs aren’t hot in the health world, say four of our experts. But one expert had the courage to stand up for the maligned meat tube twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdb923a5bc3b50b9e/69885e1f8e0601bebf461b9f/screen-shot-2015-08-05-at-6-21-56-pm.png?branch=production&width=1111&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Should I Eat Hot Dogs? > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement.  by [Mandy Oaklander](https://time.com/author/mandy-oaklander/)  ## Mandy Oaklander Oaklander is a senior editor at TIME. Aug 6, 2015 3:51 PM UTC  Illustration by Lon Tweeten for TIME  by [Mandy Oaklander](https://time.com/author/mandy-oaklander/)  ## Mandy Oaklander Oaklander is a senior editor at TIME. Aug 6, 2015 3:51 PM UTC **4/5 experts say no.** Ballgame or no ballgame, hot dogs aren’t hot in the health world, according to four of our experts. Hot dogs deliver a nutritional assault in many ways: [one typical fast food dog](http://www.idq.com/NCPublic/ChoiceCalcResult.aspx?IdMenuItem=156&IdMenuGroup=27) with ketchup and mustard contains 290 calories and 910 mg of sodium. (On the plus side, you’re also getting 11 grams of protein.) The problem with hot dogs is how they’re processed. “While there is some debate about the health effects of pure meats, processed meats—and all hot dogs fall into that category, some more processed than others—are consistently associated with adverse health effects,” says **Dr. David** **Katz**, director of the Yale University Prevention Research Center. Diets high in processed meats have been linked with cancer, especially colorectal cancer. **Peter** **Clifton**, professor of nutrition at the University of South Australia, puts it this way: “All data says processed meat is bad: more diabetes, higher mortality, more cardiovascular disease,” he says. His March [paper published in the journal _Metabolism_](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25838035) found that processed foods are associated with an increased risk for type 2 diabetes compared to red meat, probably partly due to the way that iron interacts with the saturated fat, salt and nitrates—an added preservative—found in processed meats. Nitrates are of particular concern with cured meats like hot dogs, says **Mariana Stern,** a cancer epidemiologist at the University of Southern California. Nitrates are salts added from synthetic chemicals or natural sources (such as celery juice, which you may find on the labels of so-called “uncured” or “nitrate-free” hot dogs). “Regardless of where the nitrates come from,” says Stern, “they can be converted by oral bacteria intro nitrites, which in turn can react in the stomach … to form N-Nitroso compounds, which are well-established cancer-causing agents.” Antioxidants can halt this conversion, which is why most hot dogs contain vitamin C, Stern says. “However, the amounts in one hot dog may not be enough to prevent the accumulation of N-Nitroso compounds in people with diets high in meat overall, and in particular processed meats,” she says. “Studies show that the effects of processed meats might be more harmful in people with diets that are overall low in antioxidants.” Stern [analyzed](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ijc.28331/abstract) the diets of 1,660 people with bladder cancer and found that bladder cancer risk went up with processed meat consumption. In an April [study](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4383626/) looking at the effects of nitrites in mice, “we have shown that addition of nitrite had a neutral, and maybe even protective effect on intestinal tumor development when part of a low-fat diet,” says **Marianne Sødring**, a PhD student at the Department of Food Safety and Infection Biology at Norwegian University of Life Sciences. “This may suggest that other factors have to be present for nitrite-processed meat to have a cancer-causing effect.” There might be an easier way to lower the risks associated with processed meat—if you’re a rat, at least. Scientists, reporting [their findings](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3788046/) in the _International Journal of Cancer,_ fed rats hot dogs and watched a particular biomarker for colorectal cancer; the hot dog diet indeed increased signs of this marker, but adding calcium to their diet lessened this effect. “If a rat’s diet is loaded with calcium, a hotdog diet does not boost cancer anymore in rats,” says study author **Denis** **Corpet**, professor of food hygiene and human nutrition in the French National School of Veterinary Medicine in Toulouse. “In people, this would translate in having a yogurt each time we get a pair of sausages.” If you want to indulge in the occasional dog (plus or minus the yogurt), Sødring—the lone hot dog defender—has some parting words of encouragement. “As a bonus, from an environmental standpoint, one might say that hot dogs contribute to sustainable food production,” she says, “because a much larger part of the animal, not just the prime cuts, is utilized.”  Illustration by Lon Tweeten for TIME [_Read Next: Should I Eat Pretzels?_](http://time.com/3945998/pretzels-nutrition/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3983197/hot-dog-nitrates/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3983197/hot-dog-nitrates/"},"headline":"Should I Eat Hot Dogs?","datePublished":"2015-08-06T15:51:16.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:02:11.502Z","description":"Hot dogs aren’t hot in the health world, say four of our experts. 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