Popular works

Part 1. In the pink: how your bacon ended up full of nitrate and nitrite --
1. Miracle additives --
2. The truth behind the Golden Legend --
3. The triumph of meatpacking --
4. Rapid curing takes over the world --
5. A chemical success story --
6. Pure food versus nitro-meat --
7. Wonder product of the 20th century: sodium nitrates --
8. Nitrite in the United Kingdom and in France --
9. The nitroso surprise --
Part 2. How to make cancer acceptable: bring on botulism --
10. Botulism, the 'blood sausage poison' --
11. The botulism prextext --
12. A case study: sodium nitrite and smoked fish --
13. Warnings and denials --
14. The 'no alternative' lie --
15. Contesting the health argument --
16. After the war --
17. Alice in Nitroland --
18. Bluff, subterfuge, hogwash: the art of nitro-poker --
Conclusion.

"A powerful exploration of the use of carcinogenic nitro-additives in the meat millions of people eat every week. The result of more than five years of detailed research, documentary filmmaker Guillaume Coudray's book demonstrates why many in the media are now comparing the processed meat industry with Big Tobacco. The first part of the book explores why nitro-additives came to be used systematically in meat processing. The second explains why, since the 1950s, meat-packing companies across the West have, it is alleged, repeatedly denied the links between the chemicals used in making bacon and ham, and the onset of bowel cancer - among many other health problems. As Cochonneries (La Decouverte, 2017), the original book led to widespread coverage in France and a hard-hitting documentary on French television. This completely updated English translation is set to have a major impact on the debate in the UK and US and create significant levels of media coverage. The story it unearths - of the investigations into big business flying in the face of countless scientific health warnings - is one that too few of us have yet heard"--Publisher's description