How food companies ‘sweetened the world’ – and increased the risk of disease

So, the broad recommendation of both books is just to go back to eating real food, that is, home-cooked, minimally-processed, and preferably organic labeled.

I like Ultra Processed People because the author is a medical doctor and a researcher, so he does a good job of getting into some of the research, but the 30 day diet was mostly a publicity stunt, in my view. That said, here are some outcomes:

After the month was over, Chris reported poor sleep, heart burn, unhappy feelings, anxiety, sluggishness, and a low libido. He also had piles from constipation. “I felt ten years older”, he says, but “didn’t realise it was all [because of] the food until I stopped eating the diet”.

Chris gained almost 7kg in the four weeks and moved from a healthy weight to overweight. “If the weight gain continued at that rate for six months, I would have gained six stone”, he says. It didn’t stop there.

Brain activity scans showed the areas of Chris’ brain responsible for reward had linked up with the areas that drive repetitive, automatic behaviour. “Eating ultra-processed food became something my brain simply tells me to do, without me even wanting it”, he says, adding this is a similar brain response to taking substances we consider classically addictive such as cigarettes, alcohol and drugs. The changes in brain activity weren’t permanent, but “if it can do that in four weeks to my 42-year-old brain, what is it doing to the fragile developing brains of our children”.