Don't Eat This

By Jerry W. Segers August 6,2022

I have written much on the subject of what to eat and how to eat along with many other writers, but I was encouraged to write one more article when I came across a one-person experiment carried out by BBC television presenter Dr. Chris van Tulleken . Dr. Tullekin ate an 80% ultra-processed food diet and In four weeks, he gained 15.4 pounds, lost sleep, got anxious, had a low libido and felt 10 years older.

While the weight gain and other attributes of the diet were from his observation, he also obtained blood test which showed that his body had changed chemically to take in more calories each day. He postulated that had he continued on his ultra-processed food diet for a year he would have gained 84 pounds.

It seems your intestinal bacterial and metabolic process change when an ultra-processed food diet is consumed. This leads to two important questions;

• 1 – What is an ultra-processed food diet, and
• 2 - Is this relevant to what Americans eat.

To answer the first question, I located “The NOVA Food Classification System” published by EduChange Inc. an educational publishing service. The original data came from the Center for Epidemiological Studies in Health and Nutrition, School of Public Health, University of Sao Paulo, Brazil. There is a link in the side bar if you wish to read their entire list.

This report divides food into 4 groups;

• Group 1 – Unprocessed or minimally processed foods;.

  This group contains foods that are eaten in essentially the same form as they they were produced. This includes things like steaks, frozen vegetables, nuts, fresh squeezed juice, eggs, dried fruit, fresh herbs and spices, coffee, tea, fresh raw milk, and water.

• Group 2 – Condiments - Oils, Fats, Salt, and Sugar

  This group contains foods that have been processed by grinding, pressing, fermenting, stewing, etc. Generally, they are used as condiments or seasonings. Some examples are: olive oil, butter. coconut oil, honey, maple syrup, sea salt, starches from corm or other sources, sugar from sugar cane or combinations of these like salted butter.

• Group 3 – Processed foods.

  This group contains foods that are slightly processed to make them more palatable. Think of this process as cooking and salting beans, or boiling tomatoes to make tomato paste. Some example of this type of food are; Canned vegetables, Tomato extracts, fruits stored in natural juices, beef jerky, salted meat, and fermented drinks like beer or wine.

• Group 4 – Ultra-processed Foods.
  

  This group contains industrial foods with multiple ingredients that when eaten seldom resemble food in any of the above groups. This category encompasses most of the so-called foods you can purchase at a convenience store or fast food restaurant and includes items such as: Prepackaged snacks, Ice cream, frozen desserts, soft drinks( diet or sugar filled),frozen meals, pizza, hot dogs, hamburgers, fish sticks, chicken nuggets, candies, packaged bread, instant anything, sweetened and fruit flavored yogurt, breakfast cereal and bars, margarine, pastries, infant formulas, and distilled spirits. These are the items most often found on the inner aisles of the grocery store and near the check-out stations. They have preservatives to create a long shelf-life and are universally designed to make the customer want to eat thus purchase more of the item.

When choosing what to eat it is better to stay as close to the top of this list as possible. For example, eat eggs instead of Egg Beaters(™), fresh oranges instead of prepared orange juice, coffee or tea instead of a latte or chocolate milk.

One presentation of this style of eating is the program promoted by the Weston A. Price foundation when they suggest eating nutrient-dense traditional foods. The details of the Weston A. Price eating plan with recipes can be found in the book Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook That Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats by Sally Fallon, Mary Enig, Marion Dearth (Illustrator)(1). I highly recommend this book and I personally referred to it frequently as I was relearning how to eat. There is additional information on the Weston A. Price web page.(2)

Now that we know what ultra processed foods are, let us explore the second question posed above, namely the issue of whether this form of eating is relevant to people today. To start this discussion, I refer back to the one person experiment I noted at the start of this article.

When Dr. Tulleken embarked on his one-man experiment, he was already eating fairly well because he was hosting a program that showed children how to eat. Switching to an 80% ultra-processed food diet was a significant change for him, but what about the average eater in the US.

To answer that question, we need look no further than a study in the Journal BMJ Open entitled: “Ultra-processed foods and added sugars in the US diet: evidence from a nationally representative cross-sectional study” published, March, 2016. (3) This study surveyed almost 10,000 people aged 1 year or older. The results state in part: “Ultra-processed foods comprised 57.9% of energy intake, and contributed 89.7% of the energy intake from added sugars.”

Please note the data for this survey was collected in 2010. That means the data is over 10 years old. During the ensuing years many more ultra processed foods have come to market including the Beyond Burger and the Impossible Burger to name but two. It is highly likely this problem has taken a turn for the worse. I will bet that if you look to your own diet, you will find you eat a lot of ultra-processed foods because they are inexpensive, easy to obtain, easy to prepare and addictive.

In short, the Standard American Diet (SAD) is closer to Dr. Tulleken’s experiment than we would like. The article went on to conclude that: “Decreasing the consumption of ultra-processed foods could be an effective way of reducing the excessive intake of added sugars in the USA.”

Clearly the diet we eat each day is contributing to our consumption of excess sugar, but what else does an ultra-processed diet do to our bodies?

I will start with the report by Dr. Tullekin. He noted: Poor Sleep, Anxiety, Low Libido, Hemorrhoids (From Constipation), Heartburn, Sluggishness, unhappy feeling and weight gain.

As a result of one single issue, weight gain , caused by this style of eating the CDC notes the following health issues arise:

Increased all-cause death (mortality), High blood pressure (hypertension), High LDL cholesterol, low HDL cholesterol, or high levels of triglycerides (Dyslipidemia), Type 2 diabetes, Coronary heart disease, Stroke, Gallbladder disease, Osteoarthritis (a breakdown of cartilage and bone within a joint), Sleep apnea and breathing problems, Many types of cancer, Low quality of life, Mental illness such as clinical depression, anxiety, and other mental disorders, Body pain and difficulty with physical functioning

Since this list was created, yet another issue has arisen – Overweight people are more likely to die from the Covid-19 virus. “Novel data report more severe symptoms and even a negative prognosis for the obese patients. A growing body of evidence connects obesity with COVID‑19 and a number of mechanisms from immune system activity attenuation to chronic inflammation are implicated”

Clearly, we are all impacted by ultra-processed foods so I will repeat my admonition - Leave the ultra-processed foods out of your diet. Stay with traditional foods and improve your life.

One final consideration: Take note of the bold entry in the above list. I have known several people who were told that they would be on antidepressants for the rest of their lives. After changing their diet to remove most ultra-processed foods then adding selected supplements, they got off the antidepressants and stayed stable for over 5 years and counting. That is an astounding result backed up by solid science.

I urge you to take the time and effort needed to remove ultra-processed foods from your diet. It will not be easy. Millions of dollars are spent each year on propaganda to make sure you continue to consume an ultra-processed diet because that diet is the most profitable for the food industry, but it is destroying your health.

What can possibly be more important in your life than your health? Without your health you cannot work, play, raise children, help others or even attend religious services. In short, without your health you have nothing; so, get started today by saying NO to at least one ultra-processed food and promise yourself to say NO to one additional ultra-processed food tomorrow. Keep going down that path until you remove ultra-processed foods from your diet. Your life depends on it.