UPFs should also be heavily taxed due to impact on health and mortality, says scientist who coined term
Ultra-processed foods (UPFs) are displacing healthy diets “all over the world” despite growing evidence of the risks they pose and should be sold with tobacco-style warnings, according to the nutritional scientist who first coined the term.
Prof Carlos Monteiro of the University of São Paulo will highlight the increasing danger UPFs present to children and adults at the International Congress on Obesity this week.
“UPFs are increasing their share in and domination of global diets, despite the risk they represent to health in terms of increasing the risk of multiple chronic diseases,” Monteiro told the Guardian ahead of the conference in São Paulo.
Will that achieve anything?
Yes! Various countries implement a “traffic light” style health meter that is legally required to be on the front of packaging that also gives a little subtext to say what causes it to be yellow or red (least healthy). So it will say stuff like “excess sodium” or “too much sugar” which actually does work. People don’t even realize that some staples are considered UPFs because of preservatives (Tortillas), or are otherwise unhealthy (too much sugar and preservatives in ‘health’ cereals and yogurts).
This allows people to find staples that do not contain shocking amounts of sugar, preservatives, or highly processed options within the same category. It’s worked when implemented well :)
In the case of tortillas I imagine the label would do more harm than good. Because what are people going to do, stop buying tortillas? They’d just learn to disregard the label. The only way I could imagine it working is if some tortillas had the label and others were safe, then you could buy the safe ones.
On the other hand, why not just ban the dangerous preservatives and let them all be safe?
Unless we are saying that it’s ok for poor people to eat dangerous food if they can’t afford the good kind
There are usually safe ones as well, just some that might need to be frozen instead of left out.
Fwiw, I always assumed tortillas were just like…flour and water and a bit of fat. Had no idea they had preservatives because I never paid attention to the label until I saw an article on surprising UPF foods in the NYT a few months ago. I’m more careful with my consumption of them now!
