A Quest to Learn Why Ultra-Processed Foods Link to Poor Health

Why? This is the question that children learn to ask and repeat – sometimes maddeningly. But it is a key question for scientists who earnestly want to explain the oft-cited link between ultra-processed foods and poor health. Is it a futile quest? Or a noble scientific endeavor?

News reports offer starkly contrasting views this week.

The Scientific Endeavor

The New York Times has just published an unusually detailed report of a study in progress at NIH. Kevin Hall and colleagues are testing two different mechanisms that might explain the link between ultra-processed food and poor health. Is it hyper-palatability? Or is it caloric density?

Hall began his study of these questions in 2022 and expects to be done with it by late next year. He is testing four different diets in four one-week exposures under tightly controlled conditions.

Hall told the Times that by learning how some ultra-processed foods can cause harm, consumers, industry, and policymakers might find ways to reduce that harm. Carlos Monteiro, who came up with the concept of ultra-processed foods, is skeptical. Industry won’t cooperate, he presumes.

The Futile Quest

Reporting for the BBC, Philippa Roxby says we may never know the truth about the link between ultra-processed foods and health. She explains that there seems to be wide variations in the healthfulness of different ultra-processed foods. Further, she highlights the problems with demonizing such a wide assortment of very different foods. “We have to be mindful of the moralisation of food,” says Adrian Brown, a senior research fellow in nutrition.

Complexity Beyond the Food

We suspect that the problems linked to ultra-processed foods come from much more than just the physical characteristics of the food itself. Food weaves itself into the fabric of our lives. Ultra-processed foods are designed to be everywhere we go, to be priced attractively, and deliver experiences that lead us to buy them over and over again. The process of marketing ultra-processed foods assures this – and advertising is only one small part of the marketing mix.

It is fascinating to watch the cycles of demonizing different sorts of food. Fat, sugar, carbs, meat, and now ultra-processing have all taken turns as targets. Yet simple binary guidance – this is good, that is bad – keeps failing us. Because food is more than the sum of its ingredients, nutrients, and preparation.

Our relationship with it is infinitely complex.

Click here for reporting from the Times on Hall’s research and here for the BBC report.

Kraft Mac & Cheese, photograph by Ted Kyle / ConscienHealth

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August 2, 2024