Ultra-Processed People - Quick Review
He Read This Book, and His Wife Hated Him!
I gave myself permission to use this somewhat clickbait, humorous title because… who knows, it might really happen. These days, I’m annoyingly picky when I go shopping. A year ago, I read Glucose Revolution by Jessie Inchauspé with great interest. More recently, I picked up Ultra-Processed People: Why Do We All Eat Stuff That Isn’t Food…and Why Can’t We Stop? by Chris van Tulleken, and I can already say I highly recommend it.
The fact that we’re surrounded by a slew of processed products probably isn’t a surprise to most people. We’re aware of it… though we don’t always understand the implications - how it affects not only our health but also the ecosystem and entire societies. The author decided to test on himself what happens when you primarily eat heavily processed foods. The results, to put it mildly, are alarming: worse health, poorer sleep quality, weight gain, and loss of focus. These are just a few observations. Then he takes us by the hand and explains, step by step, how these products ended up dominating store shelves.
I must admit that as I progressed through Ultra-Processed People, I began to better understand the issues raised earlier in Glucose Revolution: it all fits together and makes a lot of sense. While Jessie Inchauspé provides tips from a biologist’s perspective, Chris van Tulleken gives us the underlying foundations: switching to foods with simple ingredients can significantly improve our quality of life. This isn’t a “technically heavy” book - the author explains everything in a very light manner, so you can breeze through it like eating donuts on Fat Thursday. However, be warned: there are some passages that might discourage you from certain food products, and some revelations are downright shocking (for instance, about infant mortality linked to baby formula).
Sometimes I hear people - often those slightly older - saying that things used to taste better. There was less available, sometimes only around the holidays, but it was better. Looking back on my own childhood, I have to agree - I notice it myself. It’s not just “nostalgia for the old days.” No, definitely not. It’s an actual change in what we’re eating. In theory, food additives are made so we buy and consume more, yet you can certainly taste a difference, and not for the better.
Throughout his book, the author casts a harsh light on the practices of many companies and their extremely capitalist approach - relentless pursuit of profit, appeasing shareholders, and ever-higher sales charts. Even though I’m not particularly left-leaning, I have to side with him here. What food manufacturers and processors are doing affects the health of both us and our children. If I have to choose between legal regulations that curb these corporate activities versus a completely free market, I choose the first. I simply don’t want my child to eat absolute junk, which bears no resemblance to what I experienced growing up.
If the above description gives you the impression this book is radically against processed foods, let me correct that: the author doesn’t claim we should entirely give them up. In today’s world, that would be very difficult. It’s just worth knowing what we’re actually choosing - so we might end up cutting down on how much of it we eat. It’s worth knowing the impact on the planet and society. Finally, it’s also worth recognizing that giving up processed foods isn’t a magic bullet for every issue: if you’re a fan of, say, homemade cakes, and you love massive quantities of bread and butter, you probably shouldn’t count on losing weight just because you skip the processed stuff. It’s a complex problem. This book, however, raises our awareness - and for that reason, it’s incredibly valuable.