Ultra-processed foods are often cheap, taste great and give us lots of energy. But these foods offer little nutrition, and are made mostly or entirely from things extracted from other foods — like oils, fats and sugars — or from chemicals made in a lab.
Eating ultra-processed foods has been linked to things like obesity, diabetes, heart disease and cancer.
They're not just things like cookies, candy and cola, but also hot dogs, breakfast cereal and frozen pizza.
And they're everywhere, especially in richer countries.
An international team of researchers wanted to find out just how dangerous these foods are for us.
They looked at data from seven past studies, including data from almost 240,000 people from eight countries: Colombia, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Australia, Canada, the UK and the US.
The researchers found that, on average, people in Colombia got 15% of their energy from ultra-processed foods. But the percentage of energy people got from ultra-processed foods was higher in every other country, from 17% in Brazil to 44% in Canada, 53% in the UK and 55% in America.
It was also found that, for every 10% increase in the amount of energy people got from ultra-processed foods, there was a 3% higher chance of death from all causes.
In fact, the researchers estimated that, in America, 124,000 early deaths each year can be linked to eating ultra-processed foods.
The study's lead investigator, Eduardo Augusto Fernandes Nilson, also said that, in richer countries although consumption of ultra-processed foods has been high it hasn't really been increasing. However, it has been increasing in poorer countries. So while these foods are already linked to more deaths in richer countries, their effects on poorer countries will only get worse.
The study authors say their results show that consumption of ultra-processed foods is a global health issue, and that governments should be doing more to encourage people to eat fresh and minimally processed foods.
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