Is it okay to eat a lot of sausages during Tet (Vietnamese New Year)?

Sausage is a popular dish, especially during Tet (Vietnamese Lunar New Year), but doctors advise against eating too much of it over a long period to avoid health problems.

The main ingredients for making Chinese sausage are pork, pig intestines, salt, and spices. The meat is finely chopped, diced, and marinated with various spices. After being tightly stuffed with the marinated meat and fat, the sausages are dried outdoors in the sun and wind for about 3-4 days or air-dried in the kitchen attic.

In the old days, people only slaughtered pigs to celebrate the Lunar New Year in the twelfth lunar month. Sausage was a way to preserve meat for later consumption, allowing it to be stored for a long time and adding flavor to the New Year's feast.

According to Dr. Bui Thi Yen Nhi, from the University Medical Center of Ho Chi Minh City - Branch 3, although a popular delicacy in many regions, Chinese sausage can affect health if consumed in large quantities over a long period. During the preservation process, a large amount of salt is often added, so eating too much can lead to an excess of sodium ions in the body, easily causing water and sodium retention. This can worsen hypertension.

If the salt content in sausages exceeds the permissible standard, long-term consumption will increase the risk of hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, gallstones, and fatty liver disease. At the same time, it harms the gastric mucosa and digestive tract, leading to chronic gastroenteritis, stomach ulcers, and other diseases.

In addition, sausages contain high levels of saturated fat and cholesterol, and eating too much can affect cardiovascular health or worsen the symptoms of existing cardiovascular diseases.

During the sausage-making process, many spices such as chili, salt, preservatives, and coloring agents are added, which can irritate the digestive tract.

Furthermore, processing methods such as smoking can produce harmful substances like benzopyrene and N-nitroso compounds (nitrosamine, nitrosamide). Pediatricians say that eating sausage occasionally isn't a problem, but consuming large quantities over a long period can increase the risk of cancer of the nasopharynx, esophagus, liver, and digestive tract. However, the onset and causes of cancer are complex; besides carcinogens, gene mutations are also very important.

The doctor also noted that sausages are considered a type of food similar to raw cured meat, so they need to be heated and cooked thoroughly before eating to ensure safety. Consumption of sausages should be moderated within a balanced diet.

Certain groups of people should be mindful when consuming this dish:

- Consuming large amounts over a long period can cause problems such as hyperlipidemia, indigestion, heartburn, and negatively affect patients with cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases.

- Patients with hypertension, dyslipidemia, fatty liver disease, and impaired kidney function should limit their intake.

- The elderly and children should eat less sausage; pregnant women should try to avoid it because it contains a lot of salt and unhealthy fats.

People with intestinal or pancreatic diseases should eat less sausage because its high fat content can worsen gastrointestinal symptoms.

- People whose parents, siblings, or relatives have stomach cancer or esophageal cancer, or who have first-degree relatives with gastrointestinal tumors, should also avoid eating too much sausage.

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