Dietary exposure to food preservatives has raised concerns due to potential carcinogenic effects, yet human evidence remains limited. To address this gap, a study examined the association between preservative food additive intake and cancer risk using dietary and health data collected between 2009 and 2023, involving 105,260 participants.
Over a mean follow-up of 7.6 years, 4,226 incident cancers were identified, with higher intake of several preservatives linked to increased risk, including total non-antioxidants with overall cancer (HR 1.16) and breast cancer (HR 1.22), potassium sorbate with overall cancer (HR 1.14) and breast cancer (HR 1.26), sulfites with overall cancer (HR 1.12), sodium nitrite with prostate cancer (HR 1.32), potassium nitrate with overall cancer (HR 1.13) and breast cancer (HR 1.22), total acetates with overall cancer (15%) and breast cancer (25%), acetic acid…
