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Children and teens in the United States are now obtaining over two-thirds of their calories from ultraprocessed foods, as unveiled by an analysis of nearly two decades worth of data.
Ultraprocessed foods – think frozen pizza, microwave meals, packaged snacks, and desserts – constituted 67% of calorie intake in 2018, up from 61% in 1999, according to research published in the medical journal JAMA Tuesday. The study scrutinized the diet of 33,795 children and adolescents across the nation.
While industrial processing can extend the shelf life of food and allow for fortification with vitamins, it alters food for taste, consistency, and color to make it more appealing, cost-effective, and convenient – using methods not found in homemade meals. Moreover, these foods are aggressively marketed by the food industry.
Senior author Fang Fang Zhang, a nutrition and cancer epidemiologist at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University in Boston, pointed out, “Some whole grain breads and dairy foods are ultra-processed, and they’re healthier than other ultra-processed foods. But many ultra-processed foods are less healthy, with more sugar and salt, and less fiber, than unprocessed and minimally processed foods, and the rise in their consumption by children and teenagers is alarming.”
The study collected information on children’s diets from trained interviewers annually, as part of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.
Between 1999 and 2018, the consumption of healthier unprocessed or minimally processed foods decreased from 28.8% to 23.5% of total calorie intake, the study revealed.
The remaining calories came from moderately processed foods like cheese and canned fruits and vegetables, as well as flavor enhancers such as sugar, honey, maple syrup, and butter, the study stated.
The study noted a significant increase in calories from ready-to-eat or ready-to-heat meals, such as takeout and frozen pizza and burgers, rising from 2.2% to 11.2% of calorie intake. The second largest increase came from packaged sweet snacks and desserts, increasing from 10.6% to 12.9%.
Furthermore, experts expressed that the implications of the study for future health are substantial, given that childhood is a crucial period for biological development and the formation of dietary habits.
Encouraging Signs
On the bright side, efforts to combat the consumption of sugary drinks, such as soda taxes, appeared to be effective as calories from sugar-sweetened beverages declined from 10.8% to 5.3% of overall calorie intake.
However, challenges lie ahead as the consumption of unhealthy ultra-processed foods, such as cakes, cookies, doughnuts, and brownies, needs the same level of commitment, according to Zhang.
The authors concluded that more refined methods for dietary assessment and classification of foods are necessary to understand trends and mechanisms of ultra-processed food intake.
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