Every bite of ultraprocessed food will increase your chance of an early death, major new study says – CTV

April 28, 2025

As you add more ultraprocessed foods to your diet, your risk of a premature death from any cause rises, according to a new meta-analysis of research involving more than 240,000 people.

“We looked at the risk of a person dying from eating more ultraprocessed foods between the ages of 30 and 69, a time when it would be premature to die,” said study coauthor Carlos Augusto Monteiro, emeritus professor of nutrition and public health in the School of Public Health at Brazil’s University of São Paulo.

“We found that for each 10 per cent increase in total calories from ultraprocessed foods, the risk of dying prematurely rose by nearly 3 per cent,” said Monteiro, who coined the term “ultraprocessed” in 2009 when he developed NOVA, a system of classifying foods into four groups by their level of processing.

Group one of the NOVA system is unprocessed or minimally processed foods in their natural state, such as fruits, vegetables, meat, milk and eggs. Group two includes culinary ingredients such as salt, herbs and oils. Group three consists of processed foods that combine groups one and two — canned goods and frozen vegetables are examples.

Read more: https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/article/every-bite-of-ultraprocessed-food-will-increase-your-chance-of-an-early-death-major-new-study-says/