How ultra-processed foods are affecting our health

According to new data from CDC, Americans ages one and older got more than half of their daily calories from ultra-processed foods (UPFs) like hamburgers, pizza, and sweetened beverages between 2021 and 2023. Although Americans' consumption of UPFs actually declined between 2017 and 2023, consumption remains high overall across all age groups.

On average, 62% of children's calories came from UPFs, with those ages six to 11 having the highest percentage (64.8%). Among adults, roughly 53% of their calories came from UPFs. Older adults ages 60 and older had the lowest consumption of UPFs at 51.7%.

With UPFs making up so much of Americans' diets, the American Heart Association recently released a new report on the health impacts of these foods.

"The relationship between UPFs and health is complex and multifaceted," said Maya Vadiveloo, volunteer chair of the report's writing group. "We know that eating foods with too much saturated fat, added sugars and salt is unhealthy. What we don't know is if certain ingredients or processing techniques make a food unhealthy above and beyond their poor nutritional composition. And if certain additives and processing steps used to make healthier food like commercial whole grain breads have any health impact."

In the report, the American Heart Association assigned UPFs into three categories:

• Least healthy: This includes high fat red meat, processed meats, butter, sugar, honey, refined grain products (bread, rolls, tortillas), cookies, crackers, ice cream, and sugar-sweetened beverages.
• Moderately healthy: This includes white rice and pasta, full fat dairy, freshly made refined grain bread, egg replacements, salted nuts, and low-sodium, low-fat soups.
• Healthy: This includes fresh and frozen vegetables without added sugar, whole grains, unsalted seeds and nuts, low-fat plain milk or yogurt, lean meat, dairy, and unsweetened beverages.

Recommended changes

To counter the potential harms of UPFs, the American Heart Association made several research and policy recommendations, including:

• Helping individuals, food manufacturers, and the retail industry shift eating patterns away from the least healthy UPFs that are high in saturated fat, added sugars, and sodium (HFSS) toward those that are healthier, such as whole grains and low-fat, low-sugar dairy
• Implementing multipronged policy and systems-change strategies designed to reduce consumption of HFSS foods, such as front-of-package labels
• Increasing funding for research into UPFs to help answer questions about the impact of ultra-processing on nutrition and the root causes of UPF's link to poor health outcomes
• Enhancing efforts to improve food additive science, including streamlining the evaluation and regulation of food additives

However, Marion Nestle, the Paulette Goddard professor emerita of nutrition, food studies, and public health at New York University, said she was disappointed with the guidance.

"The emphasis on 'healthy' UPFs is not helpful for two reasons," Nestle said. "The small number of foods in that category (of healthy UPFs), and the recent research demonstrating that even 'healthy' UPFs induce people to eat more calories than they would if they were eating minimally processed foods."

In a recent U.K. study, people lost twice as much weight by eating meals typically made at home compared to eating store-bought UPFs that are considered healthy. According to CNN, the study, which attempted to create a healthy ultra-processed diet, is one of the largest and longest randomized controlled clinical trials of UPFs to date. Although the UPFs in the study include a recommended number of fruits, vegetables, and fiber, as well as lower salt, sugar, and saturated fat levels, whole foods cooked at home still led to greater weight loss.