How Ultra-Processed Food Came to Dominate Our Diets

KQED's Forum

KQED

News Commentary, News, Politics

4.2 • 727 Ratings

🗓️ 27 June 2023

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

“If it’s wrapped in plastic and has at least one ingredient that you wouldn’t find in your kitchen,” it’s an ultra-processed food, writes infectious disease doctor Chris Van Tulleken. Your McDonald’s and cardboard freezer meals also fit the bill — and so do your so-called health foods and your splurge on a $20 vegan chicken sandwich. Addictive by design, widely available and relatively cheap, ultra-processed foods, or UPFs, make up to 60 percent of the food Americans eat overall, and Van Tulleken says they’re wreaking havoc on our bodies and the planet. We talk to Van Tulleken about his new book “Ultra-Processed People: The Science Behind Food That Isn’t Food.” Guests: Chris van Tulleken, scientist, doctor, award-winning BBC broadcaster and author, "Ultra-Processed People: The Science Behind the Food That Isn't Food" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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0:00.0	Support for KQIWID podcasts comes from Rancho LaPuerta, a wellness resort 45 minutes from San Diego.
0:07.2	Summer packages of three, four, or seven nights include hiking, mindfulness, and culinary adventures with farm-fresh ingredients.
0:15.0	Rancho LePuerta.com.
0:16.9	Support for Forum comes from Broadway S.F. presenting Parade, the musical revival based on a true story.
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0:30.8	a newlywed Jewish couple struggling to make a life in Georgia.
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0:57.7	From KQ80 in San Francisco, I'm Marisa Lagos and for Mina Kim.
1:18.7	Coming up on forum, did you eat granola this morning or give your kids a prepackaged snack in their lunchbox?
1:24.8	You are not alone.
1:25.8	Up to 60% of the foods U.S. adults eat are ultra-processed,
1:30.3	meaning they likely contain ingredients like synthetic emulsifiers, dyes, stabilizing gums,
1:36.0	and firming and carbonating agents. These additives make our lives easier and make our food
1:40.7	last longer, but they also mean we're eating food that can't really even be
1:45.1	called food in the words of our guest, Chris Van Tulligan. He's a scientist, doctor, and author
1:50.5	of the new book, Ultra Processed People. That's next after this news.
2:00.4	This is Forum. I'm Risa Lagos and for Mina Kim. Pawsing to read the ingredients list on the food we eat is a sure way to encounter words we've never seen before. Mixed in with the multisyllabics or stabilizers, emulsifiers, gums, oils, glucose. Bacterial in our ice cream, is how our guest this hour puts it.
2:20.5	Seeing all these ingredients is a telltale sign that what we're about to eat is an ultra-processed food, or UPF, which make up on average 60% of our diets here in the U.S.
2:31.5	And they have some devastating health effects on our bodies,
	...

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