Junk food causing ‘more damage to health now than smoking in 1950s’
THE damage done to the nation’s health by ultra-processed food in our diets will be greater than smoking in the 1950s, an expert has warned.
Cheap processed junk food is now so prevalent that medics fear a health catastrophe which will only be fully understood in the decades to come.
Nutritionists have likened producers of food laden with fat, sugar and salt – and often with high levels of preservatives, stabilisers and colouring – to tobacco firms 70 years ago.
Doctor and academic Chris van Tulleken, who wrote the book Ultra-Processed People, said: “To get effective regulation after the realisation cigarettes cause lung cancer was a journey that started in the late 1950s but took 60 years. We basically have an unregulated environment.
Tragedy
“The food industry has near-total control over messaging, like tobacco.
“There are many similarities in terms of health harms and the companies that make them.
“It’s both a tragedy and a catastrophe and, until we see regulation, these global giants will continue to profit from harm.”
Obesity now costs the NHS £58billion a year. And as many as 10 million Britons are now thought to be hooked on junk food, despite knowing it can cause various killer conditions, making the UK one of the sickest nations on earth.
By 2030, Britain is set to become the fattest country in Europe, with 37% of adults obese, says the World Health Organization. By 2040, estimates suggest more than 21 million UK adults will be obese – almost four in 10 of the population. Health experts including Dr van Tulleken, who has hosted TV shows with twin brother Dr Xand, will tell the first International Food Addiction Consensus Conference on Friday to wake up to the dangers.
They aim to put pressure on the WHO to categorise addiction to ultra processed foods as a substance-use disorder like alcohol, cocaine, opioids and nicotine.
It comes amid mounting evidence that mass-manufactured foods are
driving an explosion in obesity, poor mental health and chronic disease.
The European Society of Cardiology suggests such a poor diet could increase the risk of cardiovascular disease by almost 25%.
The summit, at the Royal College of General Practitioners in London, will see the first global consensus statement on food addiction.
It will be signed by a collaboration of international researchers and clinicians including Dr van Tulleken, 45, a dad of three and an infectious diseases doctor at University College London Hospitals. He said: “We simply cannot afford the cost of dietrelated disease. Addiction is widespread but has nothing to do with willpower. It’s food driving the pandemic of obesity.”
Conference organiser Dr Jen Unwin, a chartered clinical and health psychologist, said: “It’s time for the WHO to recognise foods, such as refined sugars, grains and ultraprocessed foods can be addictive and cause misery for millions.
“The problem isn’t whole foods but highly-processed sugars and flours and the irresistible combination of sugar, starch, fat and salt.
“Just like alcohol, 10% to 20% of adults will develop an addictive relationship with certain foods. That’s between five and 10 million people in the UK. And rates are already higher in younger people.
“It’s a health disaster already happening. Standard advice to eat less and move more has failed.We need a new way of looking at this issue.”
But Dr Vladimir Poznyak, of the WHO’s department of mental health and substance use, said: “There is not sufficient evidence to qualify the over-consumption of ultra-processed foods as a substance use disorder.”