Ultraprocessed foods include prepackaged soups, sauces and frozen pizza and pleasure foods like hot dogs, french fries, sodas, store-bought cookies, cakes, candies, doughnuts, ice cream and many more.
Eating a lot of ultraprocessed foods significantly increases men's risk of colorectal cancer and can lead to heart disease and early death in both men and women, according to two new, large-scale studies of people in the United States and Italy published Wednesday in British medical journal The BMJ.
A link to cancerThe U.S.-based study examined the diets of over 200,000 men and women for up to 28 years and found a link between ultraprocessed foods and colorectal cancer — the third most diagnosed cancer in the U.S. — in men, but not women. The study did find that eating a"higher consumption of ultraprocessed dairy foods — such as yogurt — was associated with a lower risk of colorectal cancer in women," Zhang said."Some ultraprocessed foods are healthier, such as whole-grain foods that contain little or no added sugars, and yogurt and dairy foods."
Analysis published in The BMJ compared the role of nutrient-poor foods — such as foods high in sugar and saturated or trans-fats — versus ultraprocessed foods in the development of chronic disease and early death. Researchers found that both types of foods independently increased the risk of an early death, especially from cardiovascular diseases.
Not real foodsWhy are ultraprocessed foods so bad for us? For one, they are"ready-to-eat-or-heat industrial formulations that are made with ingredients extracted from foods or synthesized in laboratories, with little or no whole foods," Zhang told CNN.