For the past few years, doctors and researchers have had a series of epiphanies that held the attention of the media for several days, with news anchors going on and on about their dramatic impact on people’s lives. Everyone went wild with this newfound knowledge, determined to make a lifestyle change, at least until the buzz dies down.

The most recent in these epiphanies: eating processed meats can cause cancer.

A hot dog eating contest? The prize: the winner gets cancer the fastest!

Who would want to turn that down?

A delicious meal from one of the millions of fast food restaurants that serve processed meat every day has turned into a carcinogen.

Would you like some fries with that cancer?

And another: did you know limiting the amount of sugar in children’s diets can make them healthier?

Does that mean no candy? How dare doctors destroy Halloween.  

Out of all of these exciting and fascinating revelations that no one ever realized before, all that was missing was “exercising can lower your risk for heart disease.”

Meaning the risk of getting the number one cause of death for all Americans can be lowered by a little movement? Thumbs better count. Texting is the new running.  

Besides, who needs exercise when you can just ask for extra lettuce with your quarter pound of cancer? Don’t bother. Iceberg lettuce has the nutritional content of the napkin you just used to wipe the mustard off your face.

Almost every week there seems to be a new “discovery” that the media blows up. Apparently, it takes spending all your young years cooped up in a university to get to a revelation of the obvious. Either that, or they’re a little slow with things.

Processed meat has been known to be dangerous, just based on the preservatives added. Excessive sugar, no matter who eats it, is always going to be bad for you.

Not to say that doctors aren’t speaking the truth.

But so does common sense.

Maybe these “breakthroughs” should come a little faster and implement themselves in people’s heads better. It seems these discoveries aren’t paid much attention to, which might be why they’re getting so much media buzz now. But then again, who listens to the news anymore?

About 208,000 Americans under age 20 are estimated to have diagnosed diabetes, according to diabetes.org.

Smoking, for example, has been around since 1000 BC, when people used the leaves of the tobacco plant for smoking and chewing. Only in the 1960s were people informed that smoking causes lung cancer and complications. Despite being de-glorified, lung cancer is still the second most common cancer and the leading cause of cancer death in men and women.

When first introduced, e-cigarettes were thought to be a better alternative, but now even that’s changing as the doctors discover their effects are no better than those of regular cigarettes.

Still thinking about buying that Marlboro?

Besides the obvious carcinogenic effect of cigarettes, decades of research also lead to the conclusion that everything in some way, shape or form causes cancer. Nothing is safe to eat, and don’t you dare play on that turf.

But isn’t living life in fear of everything just as worse?

Besides, doctor’s minds change faster than the weather in Texas. One day something like coffee is good for you, the next you’re told to avoid it like the plague.

So next time a “breakthrough” comes out, rethink the freakouts. Don’t point at a sausage, yell cancer, and run. Or maybe do run. It’ll lower your risk for heart disease. Also try and lay off a few of those supersized Hershey bars this Halloween and go for an apple instead. It doesn’t cause cancer. Yet.

Instead, make a lifestyle change that doesn’t necessarily involve embarking on a paleolithic diet, but one that makes you healthy and makes you feel good.

Because that’s the only thing that matters.