Ultra-Processed People – Chris van Tulleken (2023)

By philshanklin on July 23, 2024

A title which appeared on my "What I Should Have Read" in 2023 post (and just the second of these I've read since then). I bought a copy of this as soon as it appeared in paperback.

I don't think it is too much of a surprise that eating ultra-processed food is not good for people. I can remember as a child reading the long list of puzzling ingredients on the cereal box on the breakfast table, which seemed to be the one thing I was allowed to read at the table and wondering if one of these alien things that made up my Ricicles would do me harm. Well, it seems a little pre-teen paranoia was not out of place.

Doctor and identical twin Chris van Tulleken is familiar as TV presenter and takes exactly the right stance with this book. He's not going to fuss around us and tell us what we should or should not be eating. In fact, he encourages the consumption of UPF whilst reading. What he does is tell us about these products, why they are in our food, what harm they do (loads) and what should be done to make us aware of this.

The health statistics are, quite frankly, terrifying. The UK eats a lot of ultra-processed food and the toll is huge and with children being the biggest consumers things will get much worse unless there are dramatic changes.

You need to read this book yourself and make your own mind up about what to do about it and how it will affect you and yours. We, the people, need to push for clear food labelling probably in line with some Central and South American countries (needless to say the USA is in an even worse condition than us) who are so far ahead of us in this. An Argentinian can of Coke has two black octagons as warning symbols, here, with our ludicrous traffic light system of labelling it has two green lights. We need to know what we are eating because at the moment without peering at microscopic ingredient lists before purchasing, we don't, even if we know what it is we are looking out for. And it is so confusing- Dr Chris mentions supermarket bought oven-ready lasagne with, at time of writing, some only containing kitchen ingredients and so of no concern, some middling and a couple (Asda and Aldi in this case, but it's not always the cheapest supermarkets) most definitely ultra-processed and thus harmful. I would have said my UPF consumption was below the national average but now I'm not so sure.

The food industry is well aware of the harm it is causing but there's billions to be won and lost and, yes, profit is being placed above your health at every turn. The obvious answer of stop buying these products isn't valid as this food is cheaper, less time-consuming, aggressively marketed and increasingly more available than healthier alternatives.

Chris van Tulleken is the perfect guide for this. It can get technical, there was a lot more serious science than I was expecting but he works hard to make the complex understandable even when he doesn't get it all himself, you feel. It is, at times, quite overwhelming, but stick with it. There's wit, always close at hand, as well as the strong desire not to sugar-coat (see what I did there) anything for us. It is time we know the truth.

If you've watched Dr Chris on TV, especially his ground-breaking documentary "What Are We Feeding Our Kids?" some of this may be familiar but we need it in this form for us really consider the implications and the issues raised within that now seem merely the tip of the iceberg. I think this book might represent a turning point in public health if enough people read it and act upon it. I think it's time to change the world…..