‘It doesn’t mean you will get cancer’: carcinogen-free food is not easy to come by, experts say. How worried should Hong Kong consumers be?
- Do not eat or drink same things every day and consume less of certain products, experts suggest
- Consumers can protect themselves by keeping heat low when cooking with oil, according to associate professor
Laboratory tests commissioned by the Post have found several types of potentially cancer-causing chemicals in several popular snacks, and while experts say the risk to consumers is limited, they should pay close attention to their cooking methods, watch how much they eat of such products and consider diversifying their diets.
Ensuring food was completely free of carcinogens would prove difficult, some academics acknowledged, as the chemicals were often the result of high heat used during manufacturing or cooking. But consumers could take steps to minimise the risks, they said.
The checks, carried out by an established food testing laboratory, found 10 out of 18 samples of cooking oil, soy sauce, biscuits and crisps readily available on supermarket shelves contained types of cancer-causing substances.
But the tests all found lower levels of these harmful substances, namely glycidol, 3-MCPD (3-monochloropropane-1, 2-diol), acrylamide, arsenic and 4-methylimidazole, than what the Consumer Council recorded in its screenings carried out between 2016 and 2021.
Traces of glycidol, an organic compound, were detected in Quaker Oat Cookies with Raisins and Chips Ahoy Chocolate Chip Cookies Original, and a sample of cooking oil, Yuwanjia Peanut Oil.