Ultra-processed foods (UPFs) have more in common with cigarettes than with fruit or vegetables, and require far tighter regulation, according to a new report.
UPFs and cigarettes are engineered to encourage addiction and consumption, researchers from three US universities said, pointing to the parallels in widespread health harms that link both.
UPFs, which are widely available worldwide, are food products that have been industrially manufactured, often using emulsifiers or artificial colouring and flavours. The category includes soft drinks and packaged snacks such as crisps and biscuits.
There are similarities in the production processes of UPFs and cigarettes, and in manufacturers’ efforts to optimise the “doses” of products and how quickly they act on reward pathways in the body, according to the paper from researchers at Harvard, the University of Michigan and Duke University.
One of the authors, Prof Ashley Gearhardt of the University of Michigan, a clinical psychologist specialising in addiction, said her patients made the same links: “They would say, ‘I feel addicted to this stuff, I crave it – I used to smoke cigarettes [and] now I have the same habit but it’s with soda and doughnuts. I know it’s killing me; I want to quit, but I can’t.’”
No, because that was entirely different. You might as well say beer and everclear are the same thing. Or tea and coffee.
It’s not. That’s why the knock offs and alternatives tend to taste off as well - that’s what they make. Because jellied mince is easier to make.
I didn’t say all candies. Obviously a honey ball isn’t the same as bubblegum.
Modern sodas are certainly ultra processed.
Pine soda is, however, definitely soda. There might be a difference in the source of carbonation (fermentation vs artifical carbonation) and the amount of sugar (fuckin berries n’ roots compared to the eldritch god that is High Fructose Corn Syrup).