Highly processed foods: What frozen foods, snacks and ready meals have to do with diabetes

“The results of this study add to the growing body of research linking UPF consumption to a higher risk of certain chronic diseases such as obesity, cardiometabolic disease and some cancers,” said Marc Gunter, an author of the study and professor of cancer epidemiology and prevention at Imperial College London. However, the study, as the authors also make clear, has one major weakness: it is an observational study. The researchers cannot establish a causal link.

That’s not the only problem with the new study. “Most long-term cohort studies of associations between UPF and chronic diseases, such as this one, are based on dietary intake measurements that use data collected before the concept of UPF was developed and published,” said Prof. Kevin McConway, Emeritus Professor of Applied Statistics at the Open University, who reviewed the study for the British Science Media Center.

Although it is a good study in many ways, says McConway, and it sheds a little more light on the possible reasons behind the link between UPF consumption and poor health, “the new study leaves a large number of questions completely unanswered.”

The research situation on highly processed foods is difficult. There are many limitations or distortions, says the German Nutrition Society. There is evidence of risks for overweight, obesity, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease everywhere, but there is still a lack of research into the causes: Why do highly processed foods have side effects, and when exactly which ones? Time is of the essence. Because although there are many calls to limit the consumption of highly processed foods, such as from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), they are our main source of energy. In Germany, according to calculations from the National Consumption Study II (NVS II) in the early 2000s, around 50 percent of the total energy intake of adults comes from highly processed foods.

And what are you cooking tonight? Perhaps you’ll come back to the slogan that is now over 50 years old: Fresh from Germany to your table – allotments and balconies included, of course.