Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has received representations on health warnings on bacon.

Department officials are not aware of any correspondence or meetings being held in relation to health warnings on bacon. Government advice is that people with relatively high intakes of red and processed meat, namely over 90 grams per day, should consider reducing their intakes. It was estimated that a reduction to the adult population average of 70 grams per day would not increase the proportion of the adult population with low iron intakes.

Government recommendations on red and processed meat intake, including bacon, are based on advice from the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN), a committee of independent scientific experts. SACN reviewed the evidence on red and processed meat intake and the risk of bowel cancer as part of their report on Iron and Health, published in 2010. SACN concluded that red and processed meat is probably associated with increased bowel cancer risk.