While it’s common knowledge that frozen and packaged foods aren’t the best for our health, many of us continue to consume them due to their convenience.
However, recent research indicates that these foods could not only lead to weight gain and other health problems, but they might also hasten our ageing process.
Scientists have discovered that individuals who consume more ultra-processed foods (UPFs) – such as packaged snacks, fizzy drinks, reconstituted meat products, and instant noodles – exhibit signs of accelerated biological aging compared to those who eat fewer of these heavily manufactured food items.
This finding comes from a team at the IRCCS Neuromed Mediterranean Neurological Institute in Italy, who analysed data from over 2,000 adults.
UPFs are typically high in additives, artificial colours, sweeteners, and preservatives that you wouldn’t normally find in your home kitchen. Shockingly, statistics from 2023 reveal that around 57 percent of the food consumed in the UK is classified as ultra-processed, reports Surrey Live.
The study, published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, revealed that participants whose diets contained the highest proportion of UPFs (more than 14 percent of total food consumed by weight) showed an acceleration in biological ageing of about four months compared to those who ate the least amount of UPFs. While this may not seem significant, it can have a substantial cumulative effect over years or even decades.
Research has found that among participants, processed meat products made up the largest proportion of ultra-processed food (UPF) consumption at 17.6%, closely followed by cakes and pastries at 14.2%, and fruit drinks at 10.9%. According to Study Finds, individuals with a higher intake of UPFs tended to be younger, better educated, and more likely to live in urban areas.
Despite being less active and having fewer chronic diseases, which the researchers attribute to their younger age, there are concerns about the impact of UPFs.
Study co-author Marialaura Bonaccio stated: “The mechanisms through which ultra-processed foods can be harmful to human health are not yet entirely clear. Besides being nutritionally inadequate, being rich in sugars, salt and saturated or trans fats, these foods undergo intense industrial processing that actually alters their food matrix, with the consequent loss of nutrients and fibre.”
She added: “This can have important consequences for a series of physiological functions, including glucose metabolism, and the composition and functionality of the gut microbiota. Also, these products are often wrapped in plastic packaging, thus becoming vehicles of substances toxic to the body.”
According to previous research, consuming ultra-processed foods (UPFs) may be linked to health issues such as heart disease, cancer, and diabetes. However, experts indicate that a total eviction of UPFs from one’s diet isn’t necessary; rather, they suggest reducing intake and choosing less processed options where possible.
“This study prompts us once again to re evaluate the current dietary recommendations that should also include warnings on limiting the intake of ultra-processed food in our daily diet,” commented Licia Iacoviello, director of the Research Unit of Epidemiology and Prevention at the IRCCS Neuromed. She added: “Actually, some nutrient-dense packaged foods can be classified as ultra-processed, and this suggests the need of guiding people towards dietary choices that address also the degree of food processing.”
The research involved enrolling 22,495 adults from the Molise region in Italy, from 2005 and 2010, who completed detailed food frequency questionnaires recounting their eating habits over the past year across 188 food items.
The NOVA classification system was employed by researchers to categorise foods based on processing levels, focusing on UPFs specifically. A cutting-edge artificial intelligence method evaluated 36 different blood biomarkers to calculate what they termed a “biological age” score that was then compared against the actual ages of the participants.