Junk food is addictive in just the same way as cocaine
STEP away from the Coco Pops! Put down that spoon! Put away that bowl! Last week author and associate professor Dr Chris van Tulleken held up a packet of the aforementioned cereal in British parliament and argued that it, and other ‘harmful’ junk food, should be stripped of health claims and banned from advertising.
He was one of a number of experts who spoke about the blight of junk food, particularly when it comes to children. Dr van Tulleken accused the massproduced food industry of acting in a similar way to big tobacco by selling addictive products which could be harmful.
It’s a subject he’s written about in his latest book Ultra-processed People: Why Do We Eat Stuff That Isn’t Food And Why Can’t We Stop, which was serialised by the Daily Mail, and exposes the horrifying health effects — including type 2 diabetes, heart disease and cancer — of junk food and the merciless tactics companies use to peddle their products to an unsuspecting public.
‘Poor diet has overtaken tobacco as the leading cause of death globally — and poor diet means an ultra-processed diet,’ he argues.
It’s hard not to agree. While not addictive in the same way as alcohol or heroin, processed food is often carefully made to light up our reward pathways.
THIS is similar to how cocaine works on the brain and can create a strong desire to seek out the ‘reward’ again and again — a type of psychological addiction. I’ve seen this many times.
Patients simply don’t seem able to stop eating processed food and feel out of control with it in a way they don’t with other types of food. The cravings can be extreme as our brains try to get us into firing up that reward pathway again and again.
This isn’t an accident — these foods are carefully crafted to maximise the effect they have on our reward pathways, making them incredibly alluring.
It’s easy to say people should just learn some self-discipline, but for many these little moments of ‘reward’ are intoxicating and incredibly difficult to resist.
After all, we are hard-wired to seek out reward and it’s a tough instinct to fight, especially if you’re a child.
Manufacturers effectively use our neurology against us to help sell their products.
Now, I should confess that I love Coco Pops. There’s always a box in my cupboard. But they are a rare treat — perhaps once a month, maximum.
Meanwhile, I eat healthily and exercise regularly. I eat plenty of vegetables and fruit, only eat lean meat such as chicken and fish and avoid processed food.
So, once in a while, I think it’s fine to indulge. I’m not a monk, for goodness sake — I need some vices and it could be a lot worse than the occasional bowl of processed, sugary cereal. But for many people, this kind of highly processed food is a mainstay of their diet. For many, processed food is a key source of nutrition, featuring in every meal, often multiple times. It’s particularly worrying for children, whose bodies are still growing and developing. There’s clear evidence of the negative impact ultra-processed food has, not only on physical health, but on mental health, too. A study from Harvard last year found that eating ultraprocessed food (UPF) increased the risk of depression, for example. The study found participants in the top fifth of consumers of UPFs — eating nine or more servings per day — had a 50 per cent higher risk of developing depression than those in the bottom fifth, eating four or fewer servings per day. Other studies have also found links to anxiety and cognitive decline. But why? Scientists have made some headway into answering this tricky question. UPFs are high in carbohydrates, saturated fat and energy, and low in protein and fibre.
This kind of combination is not seen in unprocessed food. This, along with the additives such as stabilisers and emulsifiers that increase shelf life and improve taste and texture, create inflammation in the body, known to increase the risk of mental and physical health problems.
MANY UPFs are low in micronutrients — such as niacin, pyridoxine, copper, selenium, iron, phosphorus, magnesium and zinc — chemicals the body needs in small amounts to function properly, meaning we’re eating food that isn’t really food in the nutritional sense.
I’m a libertarian and think people should be free to make choices about their lives, including what they eat.
But let’s not forget many of these products are aggressively marketed to children and cashstrapped families who don’t know the health implications of the things they put in their shopping trolley each week.
Surely the least firms peddling these kind of products should be made to do is warn those eating them of the health dangers?
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