The concept of ‘ultra-processed food’ is too broad to be workable: that well-known criticism seems to be confirmed by a study that appeared in the renowned journal The Lancet. Yet the concept is not yet ready for the ideas bin, says journalist Eva Kestemont .
Within a few days, several articles appeared that were very critical of the concept of ‘ultra-processed food’, or food that was produced industrially, often contains all kinds of additives and relies heavily on marketing for sales. The reason: a reliable and very extensive study The Lancetwho studied whether higher consumption of ultra-processed foods also increases the risk of multimorbidity, or suffering from two or more chronic diseases at the same time.
The researchers confirm a lot of previous research that has already established links between ultra-processed food and obesity, certain cancers and other chronic conditions. After all, they did see an increased risk of multimorbidity. This is an important finding, because multimorbidity is one of the greatest Western health challenges today. Yet it does not dominate the conclusion of the research and the reporting on it. The message making headlines is: ‘Not all ultra-processed foods are bad‘. Or even more succinctly: ‘Ultra-processed food appears to be less harmful than expected’ even ‘Some ultra-processed products are good for your health’.
It works like this: the researchers split ‘ultra-processed food’ into different subdivisions. They examined the effects of, for example, ready-made meals and compared them to the health impact of, for example, salty snacks. For example, they found that not all ultra-processed food is equally harmful. Even more: ultra-processed grain products and bread are even said to protect against multimorbidity. Ultra-processed sauces and spreads, animal products and sweet drinks turned out to be harmful. No significant impact was found for the other categories.
The controversial study gives critics of the concept of ‘ultra-processed food’ new ammunition. A frequently heard criticism is that the concept of ‘ultra-processed food’ throws everything together. According to researcher Guido Camps of Wageningen University, this would make people no longer able to distinguish between unhealthy and healthier food: ‘As if whole wheat bread from the supermarket is unhealthier than a homemade apple turnover.’ No one who is seriously concerned with (ultra-processed) food will think for a second that an apple turnover is healthier than bread, ultra-processed or not. You cannot compare apples and oranges. We must assess product by product, as this study intended.
Ironically, it doesn’t seem to have quite succeeded. Bread and cereal ended up in the same dome, while it is obviously a healthier choice to eat sandwiches in the morning than sweetened breakfast cereals. So do we want to take this debate seriously and make comparisons between similar products? Because that is what I want to know: do we digest the whole wheat bread from that sourdough baker differently than the whole wheat bread from the supermarket?
This question is still asked far too little today. In an article in Het Nieuwsblad Professor of Food Chemistry at Ghent University Bruno De Meulenaer says the following: “Bread is always a processed product, whether it comes from the bakery or the supermarket. So it is nonsense to make a distinction between them. Supermarket bread does contain additives to improve its shelf life. But those additives have nothing to do with the extent to which a product is processed.” That’s not quite right. Bread is always a processed product (it is always mixed, kneaded and baked), but not always an ultra-processed one. Additives are indeed added to extend the shelf life of supermarket bread, but also to speed up the baking process or to get a better taste or nicer color, something the bread might already have had if it had been done differently from the start. other ingredients were worked on. These have everything to do with the ultra processing itself.
In the article in de Volkskrant It is said that it is not (ultra) processing that causes us to eat too much and too quickly, but rather soft and creamy food. Agreed, but which foods are often soft and creamy? Right, yes. A little further on it says that the focus on ultra-processed food distracts from a larger problem, because “unhealthy food is available all around us” and that the food industry makes unsubstantiated health claims. Agreed, but again: isn’t that unhealthy food we are surrounded by ultra-processed and do you ever see health claims on minimally processed products?
Eva Kestemont, Improved recipe, Ertsberg, 168 pages, 27.50 euros.
It is good and necessary that the debate is being had, but I doubt whether we should do it by continuing to stumble over the definition of ultra-processed food and the study of separate food products. Because maybe that supermarket whole wheat bread is something good to eat, but you rarely eat a dry sandwich. Just think about what you last ate with your bread. There is a good chance that it was either an (ultra-processed) spread or (ultra-processed) topping of animal origin: two things that the study clearly showed increase the risk of multimorbidity. What if you take two slices more of that supermarket bread than of artisanal sourdough bread, because it is ultra-processed and soft and therefore swallows extra easily?
Curiously enough, you can also read this observation between the lines of the study. The researchers concluded that a high consumption of ultra-processed food increases the risk of multimorbidity, but at the same time they only see the same effect in two of the nine food groups into which they split ultra-processed food. Does that mean that the people who ate a lot of ultra-processed foods and were more likely to get multiple illnesses only ate an excessive amount of sauces, spreads and animal products? It seems strong to me. How and what we eat is more than the sum of its individual parts. Viewed in this way, the bundling of the broad group of products under the heading ‘ultra-processed food’ seems to be an added value.
After all, you can continue to split up. It is very interesting that the researchers saw that spreads have a different influence than salty snacks, but that does not necessarily make every spread bad. Not all hummus is the same. Will a next study try to get to the truth by splitting that category into all types of spreads and sauces available and examining all existing brands and production methods? That is an impossible task for nutritional science. You can detect on a personal level whether you are buying healthy products or not by turning them over and analyzing the ingredients list while shopping.
However, we cannot leave this to the consumer alone. If even this study, which is very critical of the concept of ‘ultra-processed food’, shows that higher consumption of ultra-processed food poses a health risk, it is up to the government to intervene. For example, this could restrict advertising for this type of food, or limit the use of concealing colors and flavors, so that producers are forced to work more qualitatively from the start. For all I care, avoid the discussion about ultra-processed foods and promote the consumption of things that everyone agrees are part of a healthy diet such as vegetables, fruits and legumes.
Moreover, let us not forget that it is useful to talk about ultra-processed foods for many more reasons than just their possible impact on our health. All ultra-processed foods are packaged, often in plastic that can only be used once. Ultra-processed food widens the gap between consumer and producer. All these different ultra-processed products often contain ingredients that come from a handful of plants, encouraging industrial monoculture. Do we all still want that in the world of tomorrow?
It’s good that we’re talking about ultra-processed food, but I hope we can soon take the debate a step further. No, not all ultra-processed foods are equally bad. And yet, while reading the above articles, I thought of a comparison that many food scientists often make: that of ultra-processed food with tobacco. This can also be extended here. There are ways of smoking that are more harmful than others. And yet today we agree that smoking is not healthy at all and we have different rules around it. That does not mean that no one still does it today and that manufacturers do not occasionally produce a cigarette that they claim is less unhealthy. This does mean that there are no headlines with titles such as “Not every cigarette is equally unhealthy”. We can certainly let adults make their own choices, but it doesn’t hurt to create a clear framework. If that is possible for tobacco products, why not for our daily bread?
Eva Kestemont is auteur van Improved Recipe – why you’re eating too much ultra-processed food and how to do it differently.
2023-11-19 14:33:50
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