The Health Promotion Administration (HPA) yesterday urged people to say no to betel nuts, as they are listed as a Group 1 carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.
The HPA said that some people might have the misconception that it is safe to chew betel nuts without lime and tobacco paste, but the agency has shown that chewing the nut itself can cause cancer.
Betel nuts contain arecoline and arecaidene, which with frequent exposure can damage periodontal tissue, increasing the risk of cancer, the HPA said, adding that chewing betel nuts can also cause bleeding gums, bad breath, difficulty swallowing and injury to the oral mucosa.
Tsai Kuo-yang (蔡國陽), a physician at Changhua Christian Hospital’s Division of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, said that the fibers of betel nuts can damage gums and cause gastric ulcers.
“Chewing on the rough betel nut fibers can easily injure the oral mucosa, and repeated injury can cause oral mucosal lesions and oral submucous fibrosis,” or inflammation and progressive fibrosis of submucosal tissue, Tsai said.
An HPA survey in 2017 that asked why respondents first tried betel nuts showed that 43 percent did so out of curiosity, 26.9 percent did so to make friends, 13.2 percent said it was for work, 9.2 percent said it was for refreshment and 6.4 percent said it was to keep warm.
HPA acting director-general and Chronic Disease Control Division official Chia Shu-li (賈淑麗) said that some people chew betel nuts to keep themselves awake or warm, but they could replace the nuts with healthy alternatives.
More than 7,000 men were diagnosed with oral cancer in 2018 and more than 3,000 died of oral cancer in 2019, Chia said, adding that chewing betel nuts is one of the main risk factors of oral cancer.
An oral mucosa examination is offered once every two years to people aged 30 or older who chew betel nuts or smoke, and to people aged 18 to 29 who chew betel nuts to help prevent oral cancer, the HPA said.
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