October 19, 2022 — The second day of the epic meeting on obesity causes at the Royal Society in London came round to the subject that preoccupies almost everyone – food and physical activity. One thing is certain. This is a pair of subjects that evokes strong passions, but the strength of the data often does not match the […]
October 4, 2022 — Patterns. Much of what helps people form their ideas about the source of rising obesity around the world is the patterns they observe. Right now, patterns of ultra-processed food consumption over time – together with some impressive experimental evidence – leads many people to speculate that rising consumption of these foods might explain at least […]
September 26, 2022 — Something is up with our food supply that’s helping to drive the ever-rising prevalence of obesity. But the precise nature of the problem with the food supply is open for debate. People have many strong opinions. We’re too dependent on factory-farmed meat, say some people. Others are pushing for a food supply that promotes more […]
September 12, 2022 — In popular culture right now, it seems that ultra-processed foods are the bad boys. “Ultra-processed foods linked to heart disease, cancer, and death, studies show,” says one recent headline. Scary stuff, eh? Targeting ultra-processed foods for scorn wins approving nods. But even if it supports a favored narrative, looking closely at research on ultra-processed foods […]
August 22, 2022 — Believe it or not, the amount of energy we’re chewing up when we eat is both significant and important to understand. It’s significant because chewing can raise the rate at which our bodies burn energy by 10 to 15 percent. Just last week, Adam van Casteren published a paper quantifying this for the first time […]
June 15, 2022 — The ASN Nutrition Live 2022 virtual meeting started with a feisty debate yesterday. The architect of the NOVA system for identifying ultra-processed foods – Carlos Monteiro – made the case for his magnum opus. Then, in this debate he faced off with nutrition professor Arne Astrup, who made the case that relying on the NOVA […]
May 22, 2022 — Our food environment has changed to contribute to the rise in obesity over the last half century. People disagree about many things in the effort to find policies to reduce obesity. But this presumption is one that most of us can agree upon. The real question, though, is how to define these changes. Are ultra-processed […]
May 16, 2022 — ConscienHealth enjoys the good fortune of attracting readers who might disagree with some of the words we share here. So yesterday, when we suggested that food policy wonks might be “giving ‘big food’ a free pass,” it was not entirely surprising to hear from a notable persona in food policy – Marion Nestle. Ever so […]
April 15, 2022 — The drumbeat is growing louder. “Ultra-processed foods are trashing our health – and the planet,” say four nutrition scientists from Deakin University. It would be hard to find a clearer definition of these products as our enemy. Yet another set of distinguished nutrition scientists argue that ultra-processed alternatives to meat and dairy can offer valuable […]
March 23, 2022 — New research keeps popping up to remind us that ultra-processed food is a slippery boogeyman. Headlines about their addictive and toxic properties confront us everywhere. They’re “the worst” for your heart, say headlines quoting cardiologists. But the problem with this boogeyman classification is that it’s slippery. A new paper this week reveals that even experts […]
