Source: Healthline
Security & Justice
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Lebanon’s army chief, General Joseph Aoun, detailed to Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati how Israeli forces likely exploited gaps in the country's coastal radar system during the recent raid carried out in Batroun. The briefing comes as Lebanese officials seek answers on how Israel’s elite Shayetet 13 unit carried out the landing undetected.
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Opinion
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“Large numbers of people continue to flee their homes every day, as Israel’s military operations in Lebanon have been going on unabated.” These disturbing words could be from almost any news report about Israel’s invasion of its northern neighbour over the past month. However, they can be found in a report by the Norwegian Refugee Council’s Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre issued on July 27, 2006.
Saturday, November 2, 2024
A Future Without Hezbollah
At the end of September, when Israel’s campaign to destroy Hezbollah was reaching its height, I met one of the group’s supporters in a seaside café in western Beirut. He was a middle-aged man with a thin white beard and the spent look of someone who had not slept for days. He was an academic of sorts, not a fighter, but his ties to Hezbollah were deep and long-standing.
Thursday, October 31, 2024
Sports
Tottenham Forward Son Heung-min Crowned Asia’s International Player of the Year
Tottenham forward Son Heung-min was crowned as Asia’s International Player of the Year for the fourth time by the Asian Football Confederation at its annual awards ceremony Tuesday.
Wednesday, October 30, 2024
Real Madrid Launch Investigation into Racist Insults After El Clasico Defeat
Real Madrid has launched an investigation into racist insults directed at players during Saturday’s 4-0 home loss to Barcelona in LaLiga, it said on Sunday.
Monday, October 28, 2024
Thursday 10 November 2022 19:26:51
More Evidence Links Ultra-Processed Foods to Premature, Preventable Death
It’s no secret that ultra-processed foods can be detrimental to health and contribute to chronic conditions like obesity, diabetes, and hypertension.
Now, a new study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that increased consumption of ultra-processed foods (UPF) was associated with a significant increase in all-cause premature, preventable deaths in Brazil in 2019.
What’s more, the researchers note that Brazilians consume far fewer ultra-processed food products than other countries with high incomes, such as the United States.
“Ultra-processed food consumption, which corresponds to 23.7% of the total energy of the diet, is associated with over 10% of all-cause premature, preventable deaths in Brazil,” study author Eduardo A.F. Nilson, ScD, a researcher at the Center for Epidemiological Research in Nutrition and Health, University of São Paulo, and Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, Brazil, told Healthline.
“This means that about 57,000 deaths per year among adults are attributable to the consumption of ultra-processed foods in Brazil.”
Ultra-processed foods and all-cause mortality
Nilson said the study modeled data from nationally representative dietary surveys and mortality data from Brazil to link dietary patterns, considering the extent and purpose of industrial food processing, to deaths from all causes.
He explained the researchers used statistical analysis to estimate the proportion of total deaths that could be attributed to eating UPFs, and what impact reducing intake of these products by 10, 20, and 50% within those age groups had on mortality using data from 2019.
According to the study findings, over a half-million adults, ages 30 to 69, died prematurely in 2019, and nearly 300,000 of those deaths were due to preventable, non-communicable diseases.
A growing need to reduce ultra-processed food consumption
Nilson noted that his study adds to a growing body of literature pointing to the importance of reducing the consumption of ultra-processed foods.
He said it’s important to consider their imbalanced nutritional composition, their “altered food matrix,” and their ingredients (i.e., food additives) and “neo-contaminants.”
“High consumption of ultra-processed foods has been associated with cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes, some types of cancer, depression, and other diseases,” he said.
In addition, Nilson cautioned that the adverse health effects of ultra-processed foods could be worse in wealthier countries where they’re even more common in standard diets.
“In high-income countries, such as the United States, ultra-processed foods represent up to 57% of the total energy of the diet, so the estimated impact of these foods will be even higher,” Nilson said.
Be that as it may, Nilson said that by reducing ultra-processed food consumption by 20% to levels of consumption observed a decade ago, around 11,000 deaths per year could be prevented.
Are all processed foods unhealthy?
Emily Feivor, a registered dietitian at Long Island Jewish Forest Hills, part of Northwell Health in New York, explained that ultra-processed foods consist almost entirely of additives and substances derived from foods that have undergone several steps of processing.
She emphasized these products usually lack protein, fiber, and many common micronutrients and typically contain a large number of calories, sugar, total fat, and saturated fat.
But Feivor clarified that some processed foods, such as oils, pasta, flour, sugar, and salt, canned fruits and vegetables, seasoned nuts, cured or smoked meats, cheese, and bread are not necessarily detrimental to health.
“These can all be part of a balanced diet and are, at times, inevitable to consume,” she told Healthline.
“Foods that have been formulated to be more nutrient dense and include fewer ingredients may be an alternative to conventional ultra-processed foods. These can include grains, pulses, fruits, vegetables, and fresh meat and milk.”
The link between diet and health
Dr. Theodore Strange, chair of medicine at Staten Island University Hospital in New York, told Healthline that people who eat fewer processed foods experience less incidence and prevalence of some or all of the possible health ailments.
“Diets that are more natural, [and] less processed have been attributed to better overall health and have been shown to have decreased incidences of diseases like diabetes, hypertension, atherosclerosis, diverticulosis, migraine, and some cancers, just to name of few,” he said.
Dr. Strange further noted there’s a “direct correlation” between salt and hypertension, trans fats with atherosclerosis and colon cancer, and processed sugars with diabetes.
“Trans fat diets, high sugar diets, high salt diets are unhealthy, and over time, can be unsafe, leading to higher chances of health impacts,” he said.
“The more color on the plate, the more likely that these are healthier food choices and better for you.”
The bottom line
A new study builds on existing evidence linking ultra-processed food consumption to chronic disease and premature death.
Like other nutrition experts, study author Nilson agreed that a healthy, balanced diet should be based on fresh and minimally processed foods, when possible, in addition to avoiding ultra-processed foods.
“The continuity of the current trends with gradual increases in ultra-processed food consumption will increase premature deaths,” Nilson said, adding that his research highlights a need for a shift in policy around ultra-processed foods.
Policies that disincentivize ultra-processed food consumption may include expanding nutrition education and improving accessibility in food deserts, which could help make healthy food choices more available and affordable.
