Why aren’t all ultra-processed foods bad for you?
They’ve been called “poison,” “addictive,” and “junk food,” but no matter how you describe ultra-processed foods (UPFs), they’re clearly the nutritional bogeyman of the day. This fear is reasonable, given that their consumption is linked to a bewildering array of health effects, from obesity and type 2 diabetes, to anxiety and depression.
Its dominance has changed diets so rapidly that much of what we eat today would not even be recognizable to our recent ancestors. We certainly weren’t evolutionarily adapted to it.
Not surprisingly, these foods are the main target of strategies to address diet-related chronic diseases in the United Kingdom and the United States. However, we believe that the overall UPF panic needs to give way to a more nuanced conversation. It’s a mistake to paint flavored yogurt and whole-grain bread with the same brush of horror as cakes and sugary cereals. Just because a food is highly processed doesn’t mean it’s unhealthy. Our approach to dealing with it should reflect what the science says so far.
When people consume more UPFs, their intake of saturated fat, sodium, and sugar goes up, and they get less fiber, protein, and beneficial micronutrients — the opposite of healthy eating. But when it comes to how UPFs cause weight gain, Kevin’s recent research has found that they tend to be overconsumed when they are energy dense (more calories per bite) or overly palatable (contain pairings of nutrients that aren’t normally found naturally — such as high salt and fat, carbohydrates and salt, or sugar and fat).
On the other hand, when people eat meals with a lot of UPFs that are neither energy-dense nor overly palatable, Kevin’s work has revealed that they don’t gain weight. They can even lose weight when they do not necessarily intend to do so on such diets.
These findings have huge implications not only for our personal choices, but also for nutrition policy and regulation. Instead of targeting all types of UPFs, we should focus on those that fail to meet nutritional standards for healthy foods. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is moving in this direction, having recently issued a definition of what constitutes a “healthy” food. It is similar to the UK’s nutritional classification system and takes into account ingredients from food categories that people need to eat more of, such as vegetables, fruit and whole grains, while also limiting sugar, sodium and saturated fat. By targeting UPFs that are also high in caloric density or contain combinations of highly palatable nutrients, we can focus on the products that appear to be the biggest culprits in promoting obesity and other diet-related conditions.
To address these specific foods, we must implement a set of public health policies similar to those that reduce tobacco consumption: marketing restrictions, mandatory labeling, and stringent taxes. We must also introduce policies that make healthy food more convenient, affordable and widely available, as well as incentivize companies to make their UV products healthier – think whole-grain frozen pizza topped with vegetables.
Some UPFs are actually considered healthy by FDA standards (again, think whole grain bread or yogurt). None of which will be the subject of such policies or regulations. Many of us also rely on the likes of UPF pasta sauces, hummus, frozen dinners, canned beans, broth, and bread, which can be an easy and affordable part of a healthy diet. That’s why it’s important to be specific about the types of UPFs that are most likely to cause damage.
UPFs are currently no longer effective, and the story of their science is still being written. So, let’s move beyond panic towards healthy coexistence by understanding how some cause harm and acting accordingly.
Julia Bellows and Kevin Hall are the co-authors of Nutritional Intelligence: The science of how food nourishes and harms us
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