Ultraprocessed Foods Now Comprise 2/3 of Calories in Children and Teen Diets

https://now.tufts.edu/news-releases/ultraprocessed-foods-now-comprise-23-calories-children-and-teen-diets?__s=mh97lz5rmmrv9zzlf0zp&utm_source=drip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=15+Podcasts+We+Love

by prostoalex • 5 years ago

71 82 5 years ago

now.tufts.edu

qnsi• 5 years ago

This is a very bad news. According to one obesity expert I follow, the best variable that explains growth in obesity epidemic is processed food consumption.

Everyone that struggles with weight can tell you, this foods are just to addictive.

For a good overview of how food industry makes it more addictive read a book Hooked by Michael Moss

wonnage• 5 years ago

Also a person's relationship to food gets set in childhood, it's hard to grow up on processed food and change in adulthood.

balfirevic• 5 years ago

Also a person's relationship to food gets set in childhood

How do you know?

meiraleal2• 5 years ago

It does get set just because of the linearity of time, there is nothing preventing it to change in adulthood as you learn and proper understand about your body and nutrition.

Clubber• 5 years ago

Not only is it addictive with the added sugars, it's hard to find food that doesn't have some form of sugar in it outside the fresh fruit/vegetable/meat section.

criticaltinker• 5 years ago

Previous discussion from 7 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28132873

elil17• 5 years ago

As discussed previously, this research defines ultra processed foods in a way that doesn’t necessarily make sense, at least to a layman. For instance, sliced bread, including whole wheat bread, would count as ultra processed due to the slicing and bagging process.

09bjb• 5 years ago

Not because of the highly processed and refined wheat (and sometimes sugar) that usually constitute its main ingredients?

routerl• 5 years ago

Most people forget that nearly all flour is bleached. This process is highly industrial, using benzoyl peroxide to change the flour from its naturally yellowish color to the white we all associate with "clean" flour.

The industrial processes that make grocery store flour are not just the same old milling and sifting we've been doing for centuries, but a qualitatively different way to treat food.

Further, in the USA, several states still allow the use of bromate to speed up the flour aging process. Any industrial bread in those states will have this rather unhealthy chemical in it.

I'm not remotely surprised to see sliced bread count as "ultra processed".

AdmiralAsshat2• 5 years ago

It is frustrating that they seem weary of clarifying what's "processed" versus "ultra-processed".

Some level of processing is unavoidable if your dinner is anything other than a foraged or garden salad. Many of our "processing" methods were once rudimentary preservation methods: pickling, curing, fermenting, etc.

The image of the greasy Costco-style pizza slice is usually held up as the poster-child for "ultra-processed" food, but they never go into great detail about which elements are particularly harmful. What if I make my pizza from scratch? Is natural-casing pepperoni still an "ultra-processed" ingredient simply by being cured? Or only if it's cured by nitrites and pumped full of preservatives? Is there any cheese that qualifies as minimally-processed versus ultra-processed?

The message gets muddled by being vague, because it always seems to come across as just "Eat healthier!", which is not terribly helpful.

jeffbee5• 5 years ago

The only thing that's not clear is whether you've read these articles or not. It's quite explicit in their method that pizza made from scratch is not "ultra-processed" because by their definitions, ultra-processed foods are made in industrial processes at industrial scale, from fractionated ingredients of "no or rare culinary use".

"""Food substances not used in kitchens appear in the beginning or in the middle of the lists of ingredients of ultra-processed foods. These include hydrolysed proteins, soya protein isolate, gluten, casein, whey protein, ‘mechanically separated meat’, fructose, high-fructose corn syrup, ‘fruit juice concentrate’, invert sugar, maltodextrin, dextrose, lactose, soluble or insoluble fibre, hydrogenated or interesterified oil; and also other sources of protein, carbohydrate or fat which are neither foods from NOVA group 1 or group 3, nor culinary ingredients from NOVA group 2. The presence in the list of ingredients of one or more of these food substances identifies a product as ultra-processed."""

PragmaticPulp5• 5 years ago

The image of the greasy Costco-style pizza slice is usually held up as the poster-child for "ultra-processed" food, but they never go into great detail about which elements are particularly harmful.

Yes they do. They put a short quote in the linked article and they expand on it further in the study:

We found that ultraprocessed foods contain a substantially higher percent of calories from carbohydrates and added sugars, and higher levels of sodium, but also had less fiber and a lower percentage of calories from protein

This study was targeted toward food science, not the general public, but in my opinion they did a decent job of explaining the difference.

Really though, the defining line between processed and ultra-processed isn't a single ingredient that will make or break your health. It's a spectrum, and this study shows that the average dietary composition is shifting further to one end of the spectrum.

If you're trying to split hairs over the dividing line between processed and ultra-processed, you might miss the point. This isn't meant to be a guidebook about which ingredients are and aren't acceptable.

smnrchrds• 5 years ago

Also, isn't processed food higher in calories? 2/3 of calories does not mean 2/3 of food quantity.

vimota• 5 years ago

That's part of the point though.

inpdx• 5 years ago

I had sliced ezekiel bread today. It's rather absurd to lump that in the same category as junk food.

javagram2• 5 years ago

Sliced bread you buy in the store seems different from the bread you make at home, even whole wheat bread, based on the ingredient list.

Not sure “slicing and bagging” is actually what would qualify it as ultraprocessed, but also not sure if those additional ingredients added actually are unhealthy.

lumost• 5 years ago

Probably not unhealthy but also not great compared to the alternative.

In practice I find that white bread seems to lack whatever it is that makes me feel full. I can easily eat 2-4x the calories in white bread than I could eat from standard whole wheat baked bread.

PragmaticPulp5• 5 years ago

Is it really a stretch to consider sliced and bagged bread from the grocery store shelves to be ultra-processed? It definitely doesn't resemble any unprocessed food.

The sliced and bagged bread on the shelves is also more processed than the bread you might make at home or even buy from the bakery section of the grocery store. There's a reason it maintains perceived freshness much longer than bread you might make yourself.

I don't think their definition is a reason to discard the study. Drop the word "ultra" and it's still true that more than 2/3 of calories being consumed are from processed foods.

EDIT: The term "ultra-processed" isn't meant to be a perfect ordering of all foods' nutritional properties. That said, they didn't come up with arbitrary designations. They confirmed that the nutritional value of the foods deemed "ultra-processed" by their methodology was, on average, lower:

“In additional analyses, we compared the composition of ultraprocessed foods to non-ultra processed foods using data from the 2017-2018 period. We found that ultraprocessed foods contain a substantially higher percent of calories from carbohydrates and added sugars, and higher levels of sodium, but also had less fiber and a lower percentage of calories from protein,” said the study’s first author, Lu Wang, a postdoctoral fellow at the Friedman School.

Trying to identify edge cases where their designation might fail doesn't invalidate the study. The foods in their ultra-processed category were confirmed to be, on average, nutritionally worse.

Dylan168075• 5 years ago

The sliced and bagged bread on the shelves is also more processed than the bread you might make at home or even buy from the bakery section of the grocery store. There's a reason it maintains perceived freshness much longer than bread you might make yourself.

The bakery section bread is sometimes sliced too.

Using slicing and bagging to distinguish ultra-processing is not a good idea, even if it sometimes correlates.

I don't think their definition is a reason to discard the study. Drop the word "ultra" and it's still true that more than 2/3 of calories being consumed are from processed foods.

Processing can also mean so many different things. Sliced up raw ingredients to make a salad? Now it's processed.

skeeter20204• 5 years ago

Where the processing takes place is really important though, and can completely change the context: sliced & bagged whole-wheat bread made in a factory is not the same thing as a twinkie, but both would be classified as ultra-processed. What about a white baguette from my local bakery that's no more nutrious than a donut? What about a bag of fresh brocolli that's been washed and trimmed? The problem is "ultra-processed" !== bad for you.

LamaOfRuin• 5 years ago

I buy sliced and bagged bread at the grocery store that has exactly the same ingredients as I use to bake bread. I'll admit it actually surprised me that this was possible.

fjgcugdfgff2• 5 years ago

We found that ultraprocessed foods contain a substantially higher percent of calories from carbohydrates and added sugars, and higher levels of sodium, but also had less fiber and a lower percentage of calories from protein

Considering the vast majority of Americans get enough protein, I'm not sure why this specific observation is considered bad. Calories from carbohydrates (including sugar) aren't intrinsically worse than calories from protein. That's not to say most ultraprocessed foods are healthy, just that the observation doesn't imply they aren't.

For comparison, here's what the CDC has to say about added sugar[1]:

Added sugars contribute calories to your diet, but no essential nutrients. Eating and drinking too many added sugars makes it difficult to achieve a healthy eating pattern without taking in too many calories.

The important thing is that ultraprocessed foods tend to have less micronutrients and encourage eating too many calories.

[1] https://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/healthy_eating/sugar.html

ayngg• 5 years ago

Not all bread is made equal though, I would suspect that something like Wonderbread that is shipped in from some factory would be closer to ultra processed than bread baked in house at the supermarket for example.

ChuckMcM• 5 years ago

Exactly this. Manufactured outrage is rather annoying. By their standard home churned butter would be 'ultra processed' if you used a machine to churn the milk.

I'm still looking for a good non-meta study on "processed" meats to see if anyone can identify a theory on the interaction between gut biomes and various food preparations. That could be some useful science for me.

[*] https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/articles/what_is_ultra-processed_...

jeffbee5• 5 years ago

By their standard home churned butter would be 'ultra processed' if you used a machine to churn the milk.

No. Stop making up lies about how ultra-processed has been defined.

notshift3• 5 years ago

From the reading I've done, whole wheat bread isn't much healthier than regular white bread. Humans are supposed to be eating nutrient dense foods - bread has hardly any, and carbs break down into sugar. Classifying both as processed and thus unhealthy makes sense to me.

For longevity, the best you can do is the right vegetables with meats and fruits in moderation.

solumos• 5 years ago

Totally agree. I've had a lot of GI issues, but eating more greens/veggies and less bready/sugary stuff has helped me more than anything else.

umvi2• 5 years ago

Well what do you expect when the closest grocery store is a 10 minute drive to Safeway/Kroger/Walmart? People don't want to be driving to Safeway every single day for fresh bread and produce. They want to buy a weeks' worth of groceries at a time to save the hassle which means buying processed stuff that'll last a whole week instead of unprocessed stuff like fresh produce that only lasts a few days.

Compare to i.e. Europe where it is more common to have bakeries and such on nearly every neighborhood corner so you can walk over to buy fresh food every morning.

jeffbee5• 5 years ago

Interesting that the trends are pretty much the same at poverty level and 3x poverty level income groups. If it were only a matter of having a decent built environment where you walk past a green grocer on your way home, I'd think there would be a difference between rich and poor.

tyleo• 5 years ago

I shop once a week and eat extremely healthy. I’ve done this for as long as I can remember even while at college. I don’t think it requires shops on every corner.

To be fair, some produce like bananas and cucumbers can go bad in less than a week. But it’s easy to avoid and if you want them fresh, picking up a handful of items mid week isn’t too much of a chore.

vorpalhex• 5 years ago

I shop once a week too, but most of what I get would count as ultra-processed here.

+ Dave's killer wholegrain english muffins

+ Bacon

+ Icelandic yogurt

And several other items count as processed:

+ Pickles

+ Lunch meat

+ Deli cheese

There are also things which sit in a weird spot that isn't clear to me, eg frozen hash browns. This is literally just potatoes and salt but has had mechanical processes and extrusion.

Unless you are eating a raw diet, a lot of your items count as ultra processed under these guidelines.

vosper• 5 years ago

Many fresh vegetables will last at least 5 days in the fridge if you put them in tupperware.

PragmaticPulp5• 5 years ago

They want to buy a weeks' worth of groceries at a time to save the hassle which means buying processed stuff that'll last a whole week instead of unprocessed stuff like fresh produce that only lasts a few days.

This isn't true, though. Most fruits, meats, and vegetables don't spoil in only a few days. Modern flash freezing technology also makes frozen vegetables very nutritious and flavorful.

I shop once per week and my grocery list is mostly fresh vegetables, fruits, and meats. It really doesn't take much effort. If I do pick something up that spoils quickly, I simply cook it in a meal at the beginning of the week instead of toward the end.

I wish it was more common knowledge that eating healthy isn't near as difficult or expensive as it sounds.

dolni4• 5 years ago

Most fruits, meats, and vegetables don't spoil in only a few days. Modern flash freezing technology also makes frozen vegetables very nutritious and flavorful.

But flash freezing is an industrial technology not found in your standard home kitchen. Does that not qualify that food for the processed or ultra-processed categories?

This is why these labels are silly. There are a ton of edge cases that get missed.

fermentation• 5 years ago

Part of this is just being able to buy things in small enough quantities. I can buy fresh bread every day nearby but I cannot possibly consume it all by myself before it goes bad. Sliced bread tossed into the fridge lasts long enough for me to actually eat it.

TaylorAlexander• 5 years ago

Right. I’ve been learning about “food deserts” and one of the factors that makes a place a food desert is how the residents transport themselves. Basically if a lot of the residents have to take the bus to get anywhere then even a short drive by car can be a very long trip for many people actually living in a given area.

MyHypatia• 5 years ago

I agree with you that having grocery stores nearby is helpful, but even in neighborhoods with grocery stores close by people prefer buying the unhealthy options because it's cheaper, easier, and tastier.

I think a lack of knowledge, interest, and time to plan and prepare healthy meals is the bigger issue. People don't need to go to the grocery store everyday to have fresh food at home. I only go shopping 2-3 times per month, and eat all home cooked meals with a heavy emphasis on fresh fruits and veggies.

Fresh lettuce, avocados, bananas, mushrooms, and berries last at least 1 week.

Bell peppers, tomatoes, zucchini, celery last at least 2 weeks in the fridge

Apples and carrots last 3 weeks.

Onions, garlic, sweet potatoes last 4 weeks not refrigerated.

Meat and fish: fresh can last 1 week, frozen for months.

Milk: 1 week for fresh or months if you get UHT milk.

Cheese: lasts 2-3 weeks.

Rice, beans, frozen fruits, frozen veggies: lasts months.

Eating fresh, healthy meals doesn't require a daily grocery trip. At most once a week, and with some planning every other week. I really think it's that people can't/won't handle the cognitive load of meal planning and preparation.

umvi2• 5 years ago

I really think it's that people can't/won't handle the cognitive load of meal planning and preparation.

Yes, that is a big factor too. Buying healthier raw ingredients is more (mentally) difficult than buying pre-made processed stuff like hot pockets because of the preparation and planning required.

skeeter20204• 5 years ago

I inherited a slow cooker after uni as a bachelor and still use it at least twice a week with my family of five. Easy, nutrious, delicious and obsolete-proof: pick all four!

quickthrower2• 5 years ago

Freezers - they are underrated and looked down upon. But the sourdough bread I toasted the other day from the freezer tasted great. Infact I often prefer the frozen then cooked variety of food and its cheaper. E.g. frozen salmon.

During a COVID lockdown, a once a week shop is ideal because of minimizing contact with other people. Also once a week could be delivered rather than shopped for.

You need to chill. Literally :-)

skeeter20204• 5 years ago

The difference is your typical composition/density and limited storage space. I live ~15min walk from an inner city Safeway and the prices are much higher than the box store or Costco where we do a weekly shop. Fresh veggies and fruit last at least a week, but because they're trimmed & packaged probably count as "ultra processed".

yupper32• 5 years ago

The title is a bit misleading.

The calories that children and adolescents consumed from ultraprocessed foods jumped from 61% to 67% of total caloric intake from 1999 to 2018

So about a 10% increase in 20 years.

Still troubling, of course, but the title is useless without context.

sonicggg• 5 years ago

Quite impressive that our diet and lifestyle habits seemingly get worse, and yet our lifespan keeps on climbing, when compared to previous generations.

One could say "Oh, they did not have modern medicine, and blah blah blah".

The way I see, ultraporcessed food, medicines, industrialised goods are all part of the same package. And yet we always see the cup half empty.

gilbetron• 5 years ago

In the US our lifespan isn't climbing anymore, in fact it dropped:

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsrr/VSRR10-508.pdf

(Note it doesn't really take into account covid at all, since it covers up to June 2020). In fact, it hasn't really increased since 2012ish.

OpieCunningham• 5 years ago

Life span is increasing very marginally. You are probably referring to life expectancy, which has been increasing.

Life span is how old a human is capable of living. This number has not changed much in hundreds or thousands of years. Life expectancy is how many humans reach any specific age. Life expectancy increases are primarily driven by decreases in infant deaths (which bring down the averages), and secondarily by better diagnosis and treatments of disease in older humans.

In any case, the existence of better medicine is not predicated on the development or consumption of ultra processed foods. There is no “same package”.

sosuke• 5 years ago

I put this in the last article. This defines the meaning of Ultra-processed http://www.fao.org/3/ca5644en/ca5644en.pdf

  Industrial breads made only from wheat flour, water, salt and yeast are processed foods, while those whose lists of ingredients also include emulsifiers or colours are ultra-processed. Plain steel-cut oats, plain corn flakes and shredded wheat are minimally processed foods, while the same foods are processed when they also contain sugar, and ultra-processed if they also contain flavours or colours.

MikusR• 5 years ago

So if i add an egg (yolk is an emulsifier) when making bread it becomes ultra-processed?

maxk422• 5 years ago

No, but if you add whey protein isolate it becomes ultra-processed.

Unprocessed foods are the ones occurring in nature. In this case: Wheat, egg, salt, yeast. Once you grind the yeast, blend the ingredients together and bake it, it becomes processed.

Bread is always processed. Grains by themselves - wheat, quinoa, rye, etc. are not.

Similarly eggs are unprocessed. Extracting and filtering the protein so that it exists as an isolate (a form far from its naturally-occurring state) is processed.

mongol• 5 years ago

I did not know what distinguished ultraprocessed foods from processed foods. This link was helpful

https://world.openfoodfacts.org/nova

uses• 5 years ago

The processing doesn't really bother me much, because AFAIK, processing itself has no relevance to health. The problems with modern postindustrial diets are that calories are too cheap, available, and delicious. I think the best long term solution to this will be some kind of food science that adds "filler" to delicious foods that simply passes through the system and adds bulk without decreasing deliciousness or adding excessive calories. All the attention to healthy lifestyles is great but it will continue to only be practiced by the minority of people with the resources (mental, cultural, monetary, etc) to spend on those considerations. Meanwhile obesity, heart disease, etc is a major drag on our collective health and QOL.

meiraleal2• 5 years ago

the "fillings" and empty calories are what we call "salad". And the excess of processing by the digestive system also comes with a cost.

oliwarner• 5 years ago

processing itself has no relevance to health

My understanding is at odds with yours. Problems extend well beyond calorie density.

"Processing" covers a lot of things but is often performed for shelf-life reasons. Preservatives are introduced. Ingredients are cooked at very high temperatures to eliminate ambient storage issues. Processing also allows recipes to be precisely tweaked by committee, adding salt, artificial flavourings, and [often controversial] sweeteners. Colourants are dictated by marketing too.

Aside from probable direct chemical issues, these flavour- and sodium- hyperdense foods screw with our expectations from food. They're also digested too fast, exacerbating glycaemic swings, even illiciting a Pavlovian response.

Your "filler" ignores the cause of today's problems. The problems above are caused by a 70 year postwar food race. Capitalism. The way out isn't more of that, we need to recalibrate. Everyday food _should_ be boring, so that treats remain special. Reclaim a taste for the boiled veg our great grandparents had. Get away from this boomer-fuelled sugar fetish.

RappingBoomer• 5 years ago

i wonder whether third worlders ever read these threads and get nervous about westerners discussing the "evils" of ultraprocessed food...after all, most of the people in india and africa would die of starvation if the westerners ever do decide to outlaw ultraprocessed food...because most of those third worlders depend on cheap rice, corn meal and wheat flour to live...take away these ultraprocessed foods and...they starve...

nphard85• 5 years ago

You are joking right?

unixhero2• 5 years ago

The American dream

Ultraprocessed Foods Now Comprise 2/3 of Calories in Children and Teen Diets

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