We get these disturbing posts on our phones these days. I think of them as "horror clickbait," stories that are so disturbing we have to read more. I can't do anything about many of the stories, but I can help a little with the ones to do with our health.
The clickbait story was that processed food will shorten your life. By how much? Oh, about 14%. That sounds terrible until you take a step back and do a little math. 14% of a human life... that's...round to 70 years, round down to 10%... and you have at least seven years of your life lost to processed food. That's pretty dramatic. For comparison, smoking like a chimney your whole life will drop your expected span by about ten years. Are we really saying eating processed food is as bad as chain smoking?
Then I went looking for the study. It's not a great format. A survey of English eaters. And a fairly arbitrary splitting up of food into minimally processed, processed, and ultra-processed food. By arbitrary, I mean arbitrary. Pity the poor infant who is fed bottled formula. That poor little beggar has had nothing but ultra-processed food his entire life. So much better to feed him unprocessed fruit juices, which are in the minimally processed category. (Please don't, that's a recipe for malnutrition and tooth decay. I'm just making a point about arbitrary categories).
You can also drink unlimited milk and be healthy, add in butter and sugar and still be healthy. But don't you dare combine them into ice cream, because that's an ultra-processed no-no. So much better to consume high fructose corn syrup, which is only processed, not ultra-processed. I'm joking.
My point is that the arbitrary way they divided up food led to some very strange results. You'd expect people eating minimally processed food would be healthier, but only those eating the most processed food (not ultra-processed) had lower body weights. So the framework they set up, that processing leads to less health, doesn't really hold up. The study also found no connection between eating ultra-processed foods and wealth, which really doesn't hold up when we think about all the assumptions we have about fast food being cheaper and easier to get if you have less money.
In the end, do I think eating ultra-processed foods is good or bad? Neither. Not if you're going to put canned vegetables, canned fish, and baby food in the ultra-processed category.
Should we avoid eating processed food? No. We should eat more real food, because it results in a better life with greater balance. To eat real food you have to cook and interact with others. But I also recognize that processed food is part of our busy lives. I think there are good choices and bad choices within every food category.
The clickbait story was that processed food will shorten your life. By how much? Oh, about 14%. That sounds terrible until you take a step back and do a little math. 14% of a human life... that's...round to 70 years, round down to 10%... and you have at least seven years of your life lost to processed food. That's pretty dramatic. For comparison, smoking like a chimney your whole life will drop your expected span by about ten years. Are we really saying eating processed food is as bad as chain smoking?
Then I went looking for the study. It's not a great format. A survey of English eaters. And a fairly arbitrary splitting up of food into minimally processed, processed, and ultra-processed food. By arbitrary, I mean arbitrary. Pity the poor infant who is fed bottled formula. That poor little beggar has had nothing but ultra-processed food his entire life. So much better to feed him unprocessed fruit juices, which are in the minimally processed category. (Please don't, that's a recipe for malnutrition and tooth decay. I'm just making a point about arbitrary categories).
You can also drink unlimited milk and be healthy, add in butter and sugar and still be healthy. But don't you dare combine them into ice cream, because that's an ultra-processed no-no. So much better to consume high fructose corn syrup, which is only processed, not ultra-processed. I'm joking.
My point is that the arbitrary way they divided up food led to some very strange results. You'd expect people eating minimally processed food would be healthier, but only those eating the most processed food (not ultra-processed) had lower body weights. So the framework they set up, that processing leads to less health, doesn't really hold up. The study also found no connection between eating ultra-processed foods and wealth, which really doesn't hold up when we think about all the assumptions we have about fast food being cheaper and easier to get if you have less money.
In the end, do I think eating ultra-processed foods is good or bad? Neither. Not if you're going to put canned vegetables, canned fish, and baby food in the ultra-processed category.
Should we avoid eating processed food? No. We should eat more real food, because it results in a better life with greater balance. To eat real food you have to cook and interact with others. But I also recognize that processed food is part of our busy lives. I think there are good choices and bad choices within every food category.
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