What is more addictive: ultra-processed food or tobacco?

Who has never felt like they swallowed a big bag of chips or ate more donuts than necessary? There is growing evidence that this phenomenon is not due to a lack of willpower, but to a condition called ultra-processed food addiction.

Highly processed foods are addictive in some people because they trigger food cravings, compulsive overeating, and other traits associated with tobacco or alcohol use disorders. In fact, up to 20% of adults and 15% of children and adolescents show signs of addiction to ultra-processed foods.

Ultra-processed foods are made in industrial factories (not grandma’s kitchen) and contain ingredients that have been altered and combined in ways that increase their fat, sugar and/or salt content. They also include a host of other taste and sensory enhancers that make them so appealing that people can’t resist, says Evan Foreman, a professor of psychological and brain sciences at Drexel University in the US who has studied food addiction.

These products include packaged snacks, ready-to-eat breakfast cereals, most fast foods, mass-produced breads and desserts, reconstituted fish and meat products such as sausages, hot dogs and fish fingers, soft drinks, ice cream and candy, and many other products. other packaged foods that can be found in the central aisles of supermarkets. They are estimated to make up about 60% of the calories consumed in the United States.

“I don’t think people realize that they often don’t decide what they eat in the sense that we think of as free will,” says Foreman; “These foods are very powerful in activating our brain’s reward system.”

When three dozen international experts met in mid-May at the International Consensus Conference on Food Addiction in London, UK, they found “ample evidence” that people can become addicted to ultra-processed foods and that this can happen with both other food intake and and without it. disorders such as overeating (although people with these conditions are disproportionately affected).

The idea that certain foods can be addictive has been around for decades, ever since studies on rats in the 1980s showed that the activity of the dopamine reward system in their brains increased significantly when they pressed a lever that required food reward. It was a similar reaction (though not as intense) when they self-administered cocaine.

But over the past decade, as America’s obesity rate has risen to 42% (with the highest rates among people who identify as black or Hispanic), the scientific community has begun to evaluate what changes in the food environment might be causal, and they have found one thing: the impact of an addiction to ultra-processed foods can no longer be ignored. In Spain, according to official data, the obesity rate among the elderly population in 2020 was 18.7%.

For most of human history, survival depended on sufficient motivation to leave the house in search of a variety of fatty and sugary foods, which evolution rewarded with feel-good chemicals such as dopamine.

“In a food environment full of ultra-processed foods, the brain confuses harmful experiences and substances with experiences and substances that promote survival,” says David Wyss, a registered dietitian and food addiction researcher from Los Angeles, US, who participated in the London conference study.

Ultra-processed foods “deliver abnormally high doses abnormally quickly, often in abnormally high combinations of beneficial ingredients,” says Ashley Gearhardt, a psychology professor at the University of Michigan and a leading researcher in the field.

In addition to brain chemicals, recent research is also looking at the gut microbiome. Larger people with an addiction to ultra-processed foods are more likely to have the same microbial composition as people with other addictive tendencies.

According to Gearhardt, cravings are a key symptom of addiction and are easily noticed when consuming ultra-processed foods. “You don’t go out of your way to buy a head of broccoli, but there are people who will say: I really wanted a Krispy Kreme donut, so I drove 40 minutes (even though I didn’t have money for gas) to eat it. a whole box in the parking lot, even though I have type 2 diabetes,” he says.

Withdrawal symptoms are another component of addiction. A study published in May, co-authored by Foreman, found preliminary evidence of withdrawal symptoms when quitting ultra-processed foods.

“I was surprised to see rats’ teeth chattering or people complaining of headaches, fatigue and irritability when they stopped eating this food,” says Forman.

A study published by Gearhardt in 2022 applied the same criteria to these products that were used in the 1988 US Surgeon General’s report to determine whether tobacco products were addictive. He concluded that the food products met all the criteria. Ultra-processed foods can cause compulsive behavior, Gearhardt found, citing studies in which obese rats ignored their standard foods and risked electric shocks to reach for industrially produced cakes and chocolates. These foods are filling enough to be eaten repeatedly. And they have a mood-altering effect, causing a feeling of “euphoria” after consuming certain products, similar to what occurs after a nicotine injection in smokers.

Because ultra-processed foods are produced to produce complex flavors, scientists are unclear whether all of their ingredients are addictive or just some of them.

What they do know is that food companies have learned from cigarettes, especially after tobacco giant Phillip Morris Companies acquired two food companies in the late 1980s to form Kraft General Foods (now called Kraft Heinz). The researchers found that knowledge and resources were transferred to the food company, especially regarding how to market to minority groups.

Eating it usually leads to weight gain, probably because it’s easy to eat more than you intend. When 20 people were randomly assigned to either an ultra-processed or unprocessed food diet for two weeks and told to eat as much as they wanted, the ultra-processed food group ate 500 more calories each day.

But thin people can also become addicted. “There are people at ‘normal weight’ and even underweight who experience these symptoms,” says Wyss, who may be working off extra calories at the gym or not genetically inclined toward a healthy body type.

One of the biggest problems is that people become familiar with intense flavors and mouthfeel and become less satisfied with whole foods.

“The real consequence is that we have teenagers growing up who don’t like lentils and broccoli at all,” says Wyss.

National Geography contacted food majors Kraft Heinz, General Mills and Unilever and received the only response from their trade group, the Consumer Brands Association.

“The demonization of ready-to-eat foods can limit access to nutritious foods and lead to avoidance,” he says. “Providing consumers with clear nutrition information and preserving consumer choice so they can make good decisions to achieve their personal health goals should be a priority in public health recommendations.” The group also notes that the term “ultra-processed” is not clearly defined and “may lead to confusion among consumers.”

Gearhardt wants clear nutrition information to include mandatory warning labels on packaging, similar to those required for cigarettes (which is already happening in countries like Mexico). However, until this happens, consumers are left to their own devices and should try to choose products with the fewest unnatural ingredients. It’s also important to stop selling these products to children, Gearhardt says.

Ultra-processed foods are popular in part because of their convenience. You can buy them in vending machines and gas stations, and buying fast food seems like a smart decision when you don’t have time to cook from scratch. That’s why Gearhardt dreams of the day when local chefs will deliver whole-grain meals to people weekly, subsidized by the insurance companies that currently foot the bill for the resulting illnesses.

How to treat people with serious food addiction is an open question. Some point to the effectiveness of GLP-1 drugs such as Ozempic, which users say reduce cravings for palatable foods (the injections also reduce cravings for alcohol, supporting the idea of ​​a common brain pathway for addiction).

Preliminary evidence of benefit from the study, which Wyss co-authored, points to the success of weekly individual educational and psychological support groups along with a comprehensive nutrition plan.

“This is very different from traditional diet advice, where we tell you what to do… and if you can’t do it, you have to try harder. It’s about offering support based on the assumption that this is a brain disease that requires ongoing modification of behavior, ideas and community – all to support brain rewiring,” says Wyss.

Gerhardt is optimistic that the dangers of ultra-processed foods will become as well known as the dangers of tobacco.

“Smoking used to be so common and part of everyday life for Americans that we didn’t realize people were dying,” says Gearhardt; “I think we also recognize the dangers that ultra-processed foods pose.”