To find out, they did a comparative risk assessment, or a simulation of the impact of a risk factor on health, said lead author Eduardo Nilson from the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil.

Based on their model and calculations, ultra-processed foods made up 13 per cent to 21 per cent of the total energy intake of Brazilian adults.

In 2019, more than 500,000 adult Brazilians aged 30 to 69 died. The consumption of ultra-processed foods was responsible for about 57,000 premature deaths among that group, or 10.5 per cent, they calculated.

The team was conservative in its estimations, so the impact could be much higher, Nilson said.

While the team has yet to do a model for the United States, numbers are highly likely to be higher there.

“It is a public health issue,” he says. “What we’re facing in Brazil is a steady, gradual increase in the consumption of ultra-processed foods. In the US, I think it’s actually more stabilised over time, but very high already.”

Her health problems vanished after adopting a whole food plant-based diet

What is ultra-processed food?

Ultra-processed food is industrialised, “ready to eat”, Nilson said. It often has very few fresh ingredients and lots of starches, processed proteins, and food additives.

“(It’s) very different from what we have in our kitchens, when will you mix foods from scratch,” Nilson said. “They’re intended to be over-consumed and have a long shelf life, and normally are cheap to produce.”

These foods are often consumed most by people from low-income communities because they’re worried about how much they can afford.

Processed foods are cheaper than fresh foods and they are more accessible, he says.

Cutting back would make a difference

The researchers used national food consumption data in Brazil from 2017 to 2018, as well as demographic and mortality data from 2019. The team also looked at data and health risks from other studies to estimate how many deaths were attributable to eating ultra-processed foods.

What saves your health, money and the planet? A whole food plant-based diet

The team took things a step further by estimating what would happen to the Brazilian population if people reduce how much ultra-processed food they consume.

Cutting ultra-processed food consumption could prevent anywhere from 5,900 to 29,300 deaths a year.

A 20 per cent reduction would put the country’s consumption of ultra-processed foods back to where it was 10 years ago, Nilson says.

“It’s not far in the past,” he says, “57,000 deaths could be prevented. We need urgency in terms of policies to reduce the consumption of processed foods and to increase healthier foods, which are fresh and minimally processed.”

The many health benefits of a plant-based diet, according to 5 new studies

A right to healthy food

It’s not fair to blame people for their food choices, he said.

“They are inside the food environment that drives many decisions in terms of prices, physical access, and information that comes through labelling, through publicity,” Nilson says.

“There’s a lot of inequity in the populations … the increase in ultra-processed foods in Brazil is mainly (among) the poorest people in the country because they have limited access to healthy foods.”

The same thing is seen in the US and other countries where immigrant populations have less access to healthy foods, he says.

“That should be addressed because people have a right to food,” he said. “They have a right to adequate foods and healthy foods.”

Preventing premature mortality

One limitation of the study is the model didn’t take into account recurring events or the influence of interactions between individuals, populations, or their environments, and their impact on health equality, the team said.

But despite its limitations, the researchers said their model can help policymakers understand how dietary patterns affect mortality. Policymakers can use these findings to come up with ways to combat premature mortality.

Swapping salt for substitute ‘cuts rates of stroke, heart attack, death’

Nilson also said reducing ultra-processed food in diets will come at a price.

Reducing sugars, for example, could lead to more artificial sweeteners. That’s why it’s important for governments to make sure dietary guidelines are based on food and dietary patterns, not just nutrients.

Basing guidelines on nutrients alone “leads to a lot of misunderstanding in terms of the impact of ultra-processed foods”, he said.