this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2026
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Dana Bash on CNN calling the BS out

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[–] porous_grey_matter@lemmy.ml 12 points 2 days ago (2 children)

When you actually look in to the details of papers on this topic you'll find that it's actually not defined consistently across the literature.

Ultra processed foods are foods made with industrial chemical ingredients either extracted from food or synthesized.

What are industrial chemical ingredients? For example, is sodium hydrogen carbonate one? It's a chemical, produced industrially. Is food made with it in a shop different to food made with baking soda at home? Why?

When you dig into the reason why any specific "ultra processed" food is bad it boils down to:

  • not enough fiber
  • not enough vitamins and minerals
  • too much salt
  • too much sugar
  • too much animal fat

And if you control for those things (which we have known for a long time and are standard nutritional guidelines) then the effects of food processing on health outcomes basically disappear.

[–] RBWells@lemmy.world 0 points 1 day ago

So Diet Coke is the same as water in terms of health? No calories, no fat, no sugar. I still count it as processed crap in my diet and don't drink it instead of water.

[–] davidagain@lemmy.world -2 points 2 days ago (2 children)

When you actually look in to the details of papers on this topic you’ll find that it’s actually not defined consistently across the literature.

This is such anti-science crap, and it's exactly what various industries said all along about climate change and lung cancer studies.

When you dig into the reason why any specific “ultra processed” food is bad it boils down to:

No, no when you dig into the reason why ultra processed food is bad, it boils down to all-cause mortality. As in earlier death and shorter healthy lifespan.

[–] porous_grey_matter@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Here is a good, scientifically informed overview of one popular ultra processed food categorization system and why it excludes good foods and includes poor ones: https://www.eatrightpro.org/news-center/practice-trends/examining-the-nova-food-classification-system-and-healthfulness-of-ultra-processed-foods

The same kind of thing applies to the other popular systems for defining it. It's just not a good scientific category, we already know about all the components it's a mediocre shorthand for.

[–] davidagain@lemmy.world -2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

They concede that the actual scientists found that

ultra-processed foods are associated with increased incidences of chronic diseases such as obesity, heart disease and Type 2 diabetes

And dismissed it all because there's not a randomised controlled trail for ultra processed vs home cooked from ingredients foods, but their counterpoint to that, their main gotcha from that article, is it a randomised controlled trial? Does it measure obesity, heart disease and type 2 diabetes? No! Let's see what it tests:

To answer this question, researchers in an USDA-funded study published in The Journal of Nutrition planned a seven-day, 2,000-calorie daily diet that was based on the recommendations in the Dietary Guidelines but with more than 80% of the foods coming from Nova’s ultra-processed food category. The results showed that this planned diet achieved a Healthy Eating Index (HEI) score of 86 out of 100 points. The HEI measures the diet quality and evaluates to what extent Americans are following the Dietary Guidelines. For reference, the current HEI for Americans is 59 on average, meaning many Americans are consuming a diet below what is considered desirable.

So if you use one set of guidelines to make a diet plan (no one actually eats it) and you deliberately pick foods that are processed but reasonably healthy according to those very same guidelines, you achieve a great score on what basis? Long term health outcomes? No. Short term health outcomes? No. What basis? Oh, the very same guidelines you used to cherry pick the foods? Why isn't it 100%?! What an absurdly vacuous claim.

In their enlightenment and dismissing all the science, they've replaced it by calculating some points of disagreement with some older healthy eating advice? That's IT!?!

You have swallowed a bunch of pseudoscience. You're as bad as RFK.

It's a fucking industry funded pseudoscience pseudoprogessional pseudoeducation body. Did you even think about where they're coming from?

https://www.eatrightpro.org/about-us/who-we-are/advertising-and-sponsorship/meet-our-sponsors

Some highlights for you:

Danone North America
Eli Lilly and Company (weight loss drugs)
Gatorade Sports Science Institute
National Confectioners Association
National Dairy Council
National Honey Board
National Cattlemen's Beef Association
Nestle Health Sciences
Quebec Maple Syrup Producers
Sodexo
Splenda®
Wonderful Pistachios

No wonder they're dismissing all the science associating ultra processed food with all-causes mortality with a single diet plan!

Why on earth do you fall for this crap?

[–] Exatron@lemmy.world -1 points 1 day ago

You have it backwards, sweaty. The garbage you're spewing is anti-science crap.