How cheering it would be to hear for once that good is bad, that over-eating broccoli leads to heart disease or that muesli contains carcinogens. Alas it is never so. With disheartening predictability, it is only that which comforts and delights that is ever found to endanger health. Sugar, salt, fat – there are no surprises there. We know to reduce our intake, and it is probably sensible to do so. But when the warnings extend to manufactured foods, as they have recently with processed meats – ham, bacon, salami, pie fillings and such like – there is a danger of blanketing our choices with fear without identifying the exact causes. Findings published in the journal BMC Medicine claim that eating processed meats will increase the risk of death from heart disease by 72 per