The UK is the “sick man of Europe” because it eats more ultra-processed foods than any of our continental neighbours, the House of Lords has heard.
Professor Tim Spector told Peers that Britons consume poor quality food, causing them to overeat and fueling diabetes, obesity and high blood pressure.
He compared these unhealthy products to passive smoking, and demanded that more be done to protect children from their harm and called for mandatory warning labels on packaging.
Professor Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London and founder of the company Zoe, accused food companies of causing the UK’s obesity crisis by making their products “hyper palatable” to make profits.
Asked how poor diet contributes to poor health, he told the House of Lords Food, Diet and Obesity Committee: “I think there is something in the very essence of the food we eat that is causing us this problem.” and that’s why the UK “is really the sick man of Europe because the highest percentage of our calories consumed comes from these poor quality foods that make us overeat.”
Professor Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London and founder of the company Zoe, accused food companies of causing the UK’s obesity crisis by making their products “hyper palatable” to make profits.
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According to experts, there are some simple tricks to eliminate UPF from your diet, from checking ingredients to making your own takeout meals.
Their warning comes after a study published today in the BMJ found that eating ultra-processed foods can increase the risk of 32 different health problems.
Diets that include large amounts of convenience foods, sugary cereals, and mass-produced bread tend to be high in fat, salt, and sugar, and low in vitamins and fiber.
The UK is the worst country in Europe for ultra-processed food consumption and is estimated to account for 57 per cent of the national diet.
Containing colorants, emulsifiers, flavors and other additives, they typically undergo multiple industrial processes that, according to research, degrade the physical structure of foods, making them easier to digest and faster to absorb.
This, in turn, increases blood sugar and damages the microbiome, the community of “friendly” bacteria that live inside us and that we depend on for good health.
Professor Spector said: “I’m old enough to live through the debates about passive smoking in epidemiology, where the initial studies were not so clear and the tobacco industry balked and said, ‘we don’t really understand the exact dose that’s being used.'” for the children”, and “don’t worry, it’s all very confusing”.
“And I think that’s largely what we’re seeing here.”
Professor Spector said many studies show that people who consume the most UPF have “more diabetes, more obesity, higher blood pressure, altered lipid levels”, adding: “I think it’s pretty clear that you have a problem of health; that is partly due to These foods induce (people) to eat more because they are very tasty.”
He accepted there was still no full picture, but argued it was better to take a precautionary approach, adding: “Given the evidence we have, it’s very similar to where we were with passive smoking at the time.”
Professor Spector claimed that big food companies are “largely responsible” for the UK’s “obesity crisis”, adding: “They have brilliant food chemists, they hire the best people in the business, they recruit them and their work is to make foods as ultra-palatable as possible by adjusting the amount of fat, the amount of sugar and salt in exactly the right proportions, which makes people overeat and their only goal is to make a profit.
‘Their goal is for us to continue eating more of this food because it is much more profitable to produce this type of food than anything else.
The Nova system, developed by scientists in Brazil more than a decade ago, divides foods into four groups based on the amount of processing they have gone through. Unprocessed foods include fruits, vegetables, nuts, eggs, and meat. Processed culinary ingredients, which are not typically eaten alone, include oils, butter, sugar, and salt.
Food experts say some UPF can be “part of a healthy diet.” Baked beans, fish fingers and whole wheat bread are sufficient, according to the British Nutrition Foundation (BNF). Tomato-based pasta sauces, whole grain breakfast cereals and fruit yoghurts are also “healthier processed foods”, the charity claims.
“I think it’s pretty clear, in my opinion, and there is a clear relationship between obesity levels across Europe and the amount of ultra-processed foods that we consume.”
He said the industry was “prepared to follow strict mandates” to prevent bad foods from becoming hyperpalatable.
“At the moment, we have very tasty foods that contain all these chemicals, these emulsifiers and other things that are harmful to gut microbes that have no health warnings and in fact have what we call ‘health halos’ – say ‘low in calories”, “low in fat”, “high in vitamins”.
‘And so parents who buy their children something at the dairy counter are totally fooled into believing they are buying healthy food.
‘People are actually being tricked into buying the wrong foods. And I think it’s something we absolutely should do something about immediately.”