Ultra-processed Foods Drive Obesity, But a Mediterranean Diet May Help

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5 months ago

December 16, 2024

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Share on Pinterest David Petrus Ibars/Getty ImagesA new study finds that higher intake of ultra-processed foods is associated with greater body mass index (BMI). David Petrus Ibars/Getty ImagesA new study finds that higher ultra-processed food (UPF) intake is associated with an increased body mass index (BMI).The link between UPFs and higher BMI was most pronounced for soda consumption.The findings also demonstrate how adherence to the Mediterranean diet may impact BMI.The study is relatively small but builds on existing evidence showing the health dangers of consuming ultra-processed foods.

Although ultra-processed food (UPF) is a relatively new term, it has already become a household name. Every new study makes it clearer that many of these products are harmful to human health.

The latest in a long line of studies shows that people who consume more UPFs are more likely to have a higher BMI and increased adiposity the amount of excess fat an individual has.

The Italian study, recently published in the journal Nutrients, also shows that people who follow the Mediterranean diet the least closely are more likely to have a higher BMI. Ultra-processed foods linked to higher BMI, obesity

For this study, researchers recruited 175 people with obesity, all of whom completed a food diary, providing information about their UPF intake and how closely they followed the Mediterranean diet. The scientists also measured their body composition and BMI.

According to their analysis: The data showed an increase in UPF consumption as the BMI increased.

In other words, individuals who consumed the highest amounts of UPFs were more likely to have a higher BMI. At the same time, as UPF intake increased, adherence to the Mediterranean diet decreased.

The scientists found that some UPFs were more closely linked to BMI and adiposity than others, notably soda. This is not the first time soda has been singled out.

Although the recent study is relatively small, it is yet more evidence that reducing UPF intake particularly soda is probably a smart move for health.

The study confirmed what we emphasize to our weight loss patients: Focus on adding lean proteins and vegetables to the diet, Mir Ali, MD, a board certified general surgeon, bariatric surgeon, and medical director of MemorialCare Surgical Weight Loss Center at Orange Coast Medical Center in Fountain Valley, CA, told Healthline.

The more processed the food, he continued, the more it stimulates insulin secretion and fat deposition.

Ali noted that processed foods take less energy to break down and make the person feel hungry sooner. He also told us that highly processed foods can trigger addictive eating behaviors. For all these reasons, limiting UPFs can greatly help a person in their weight loss efforts, he said. Ultra-processed foods linked to multiple chronic diseases

In the United States, more than half of calories consumed are in the form of ultra-processed foods (UPFs).

According to NOVA, the most commonly used classification system for food processing, UPFs are:

Industrially manufactured food products made up of several ingredients (formulations) including sugar, oils, fats, and salt (generally in combination and in higher amounts than in processed foods) and food substances of no or rare culinary use (such as high-fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated oils, modified starches, and protein isolates).

This means UPFs tend to contain large quantities of sugar, fat, and a list of ingredients you would not find in a standard home kitchen. UPFs are produced industrially, are relatively low cost, and have a long shelf life, all of which make them convenient for the customer and the manufacturer. Importantly, theyre also highly palatable and easy to overeat.

In recent years, researchers have linked higher intakes of UPFs to a host of chronic health conditions, including diabetes, cancer, and heart disease.

For instance, a recent study found that greater UPF intake was associated with type 2 diabetes. However, when the researchers broke down their analysis by food type, not all UPFs were as tightly linked to the condition. The closest ties were with sodas, savory snacks, animal-based products, and ready-to-eat dishes.

Additionally, there may be a link between highly processed foods and mental health conditions like depression.

Because of the growing evidence that UPFs are closely linked to worse health outcomes, many experts are calling for stricter regulations on these foods, like sugar taxes and warning labels on packages. However, it remains to be seen whether such restrictions in the ultra-processed food industry will take effect. Reducing ultra-processed food intake

The results of the recent study echo other research on the benefits of a Mediterranean diet for overall health and weight management.

Federica Amati, PhD, MPH, a postdoctoral medical scientist and registered public health nutritionist with the Association for Nutrition (AfN), suggested making dietary changes slowly, particularly when it comes to reducing ultra-processed food intake.

Its clear that certain UPFs are worse for our health than others, so if youre looking to cut down, start with the worst offender: soda. The evidence of links between high intakes of soda and poor health outcomes is now overwhelming. So, if you can cut it out of your diet, youll be doing your health a huge favor, Amati told Healthline.

She recommended replacing soda with water with optional added fruit. Or even better, switch to kombucha a type of fermented tea, which contains live microbes. We know that fermented foods are likely to support your gut health and overall health, she suggested.

If youre cutting back on your UPF intake, Amati continued, you dont have to forgo all of your favorite foods you can still enjoy chocolate, for instance. She suggested looking for products that are at least 75% cocoa with as few ingredients on the label as possible.

Dark chocolate, she explained, is rich in antioxidants and other beneficial plant compounds. So, if you choose the right kind, and eat it in moderation, it can actually benefit your health.

Finally, chips are high in salt and fat and contain no useful nutrients. I suggest swapping these for minimally processed popcorn. Because popcorn is made from whole grains, it contains nutrients, including fiber, which most of us dont consume nearly enough of.

Just make sure you select a product that doesnt contain a raft of additives, sugar, and salt, she advised.

If youre interested in learning more about the benefits of the Mediterranean diet or need additional guidance for reducing your intake of UPFs, talk with your doctor for further guidance. Takeaway

A new study shows increased UPF intake is associated with higher BMI and greater overall adiposity.

Although the study is relatively small, it adds to the growing evidence that overall UPF intake particularly soda intake is linked to worse health outcomes.

At the moment, most of us eat around 60% of our calories as UPFs, Amati said. Removing those products entirely would be nearly impossible, especially if we tried to do it all at once. Instead, make small sustainable changes, with the goal of reducing your total energy intake to around 20% from UPFs.

A good place to start is by replacing the UPFs that are highest in energy, like sodas and pastries, Amati concluded.

Sports

Stars’ Hintz remains game-time call for Game 4

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57 mins ago

May 27, 2025

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Stars' Hintz remains game-time call for Game 4

Kristen ShiltonMay 27, 2025, 01:37 PM ET
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EDMONTON, Alberta — Dallas Stars forward Roope Hintz remains a game-time decision ahead of Game 4 of the Western Conference Final on Tuesday.

The club’s top skater has been sidelined since Game 2 in the series when he took a slash to the left leg from Edmonton Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse. Hintz took part in warmups before Game 3 on Sunday but exited early and was ruled out. He was back on the ice for Dallas’ optional practice on Monday and told reporters he was “feeling good” and “trying to do everything I can” to get back in for Game 4.

It was early in the third period of Game 2 when Hintz — parked in front of the Oilers’ net — shoved Nurse from behind, and the Oilers’ blueliner responded by swinging his stick at Hintz’s leg. Hintz was down on the ice for several minutes after that before being helped off by Lian Bichsel and Mikael Granlund.

Nurse received a two-minute penalty for the slash on Hintz but no supplementary discipline from the league. The blueliner addressed the incident for the first time Tuesday, explaining it didn’t come with malicious intent.

“I was backing up to net and I got shot in the back. And I think it was just a natural reaction [to respond],” Nurse said. “It’s probably a play that everyone in this room, whether you’re a net-front guy or D man, probably happens a dozen, two dozen times in a year. It’s unfortunate that I must have got [Hintz] in a bad spot. You don’t want to go out there and hurt anyone. But it was just one of those plays that happens so often.”

Having Hintz unavailable hurt the Stars in Game 3, a 6-1 drubbing by the Oilers that put Dallas in a 2-1 hole in the best-of-7 series. Hintz is the Stars’ second-leading scorer in the postseason, with 11 goals and 15 points through 15 games. He was hopeful when taking warmups Sunday that he’d feel good enough to get back in but a quick discussion with the training staff made it clear he wasn’t ready.

Coach Pete DeBoer has since classified Hintz’s status as day-to-day.

“Of course you want to go every night, but sometimes you just can’t,” said Hintz. “I don’t know how close I [was to playing]. But I have played many years [and I] know when it’s good and when it’s not. I should be good to know that [when] it comes to that decision.”

The Oilers will have some lineup changes of their own to sort through in Game 4. Connor Brown is out after he took a hit from Alexander Petrovic in Game 3; he’ll be replaced by the incoming Viktor Arvidsson. Calvin Pickard — injured in Edmonton’s second-round series against Vegas — will return to back up for Stuart Skinner. And Edmonton continues to wait on defenseman Mattias Ekholm, who is getting closer to coming back from a lower-body injury.

Puck drop for Game 4 is 8 p.m. ET on Tuesday.

Sports

‘That’s wonderful’: Canes finally see ECF skid end

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57 mins ago

May 27, 2025

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'That's wonderful': Canes finally see ECF skid end

Greg WyshynskiMay 26, 2025, 10:52 PM ET
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SUNRISE, Fla. — Carolina Hurricanes defenseman Jaccob Slavin is happy to never get another question about his team’s record-setting NHL playoff losing streak.

“Wonderful. That’s wonderful,” he said after Carolina’s 3-0 win over the Florida Panthers in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference finals on Monday night. “The guys in here worked hard tonight and that’s all you can ask for.”

The Hurricanes avoided a sweep by the Panthers, sending the series back to Raleigh, North Carolina, for Game 5 on Wednesday night. In the process, Carolina snapped a 15-game losing streak in the conference finals — the longest losing streak by a team in a playoff round other than the Stanley Cup Final in NHL history.

The Hurricanes’ last win in the Eastern Conference finals was in Game 7 against the Buffalo Sabres in 2006, a game that saw current Carolina coach Rod Brind’Amour score the winning goal.

“It’s been a story. So, yeah, it’s nice to not have to talk about that [anymore],” Brind’Amour said.

When the streak began in 2009, Carolina captain Jordan Staal was helping the Pittsburgh Penguins to a conference finals sweep of the Hurricanes. He said the win over Florida in Game 4 showed how much pride was in the Canes’ locker room, as they refused to allow the Panthers to end their season.

“There’s a lot of guys that didn’t want to go home,” Staal said. “We know we have a huge hill to climb here. We’ve got a great team on the other side that is going to come back with a better effort. It’s a great challenge.”

Florida coach Paul Maurice, whose team had a chance to advance to a third straight Stanley Cup Final with a victory, gave credit to the Hurricanes for a solid and disruptive game while acknowledging that his team could have gotten to its own game better.

“I haven’t been nearly as down on that hockey team as you fine people have been over the last three games, and I won’t be as down on my team tonight,” he said. “[The Hurricanes] were good. They had good sticks. They had good quickness. You see that happen more often when the possessor of the puck’s feet are not moving.”

Three factors changed the vibe for Carolina in Game 4.

Goalie Frederik Andersen had his second shutout of the postseason after being pulled in Game 2 and benched for Game 3. Andersen was 7-2 with a .937 save percentage and a 1.36 goals-against average in nine playoff games before facing Florida. In two games against the Panthers, he gave up nine goals on 36 shots (.750, 5.54). Andersen had given up just 12 goals in his previous nine postseason games.

In Game 4, he was a great last line of defense, stopping all 20 shots.

After the game, Andersen declined to discuss being benched.

“I don’t really want to talk about my feelings. It’s not about that. It’s about the team and trying to put the best lineup on the ice that they feel like gets the job done. So I’m ready for when I’m called upon and glad to be able to play,” he said.

Andersen played a key role in another factor: the Carolina penalty kill. The Panthers were 4-for-5 on the power play in the first two games of the conference finals. The Hurricanes killed off four power plays in each of the past two games.

“Our goalie was great when he needed to be. The penalty kill was phenomenal,” Brind’Amour said. “We gave ourselves a chance, and that’s all we can ask.”

Perhaps most crucially, the Hurricanes scored the first goal. Carolina is now 6-0 when scoring first and 3-5 when it trails first in these playoffs. In the regular season, the Hurricanes were 30-7-2 when scoring first and 17-23-3 when trailing first.

They scored first and then played the type of close, low-scoring game they excel at. As winger Taylor Hall said before Game 4: “We’re thinking about winning the game 1-0. If it’s close, then we’re in a good spot.”

“It’s been a story. So, yeah, it’s nice to not have to talk about that [anymore].”

Rod Brind’Amour on Carolina snapping 15-game losing streak in conference finals

Forward Logan Stankoven opened the scoring at 10:45 of the second period, giving Carolina its first lead of the series. Rookie defenseman Alexander Nikishin made a terrific backhand pass across the neutral zone to spring Stankoven ahead of the Panthers’ defense, and he beat goalie Sergei Bobrovsky for his fifth goal of the playoffs.

Stankoven said he called for the pass from Nikishin, who was playing in his third postseason game.

“The play happened so fast and it was a great feed by him to make that play off the turnover. It all starts with him,” said Stankoven, who was acquired from the Dallas Stars in the Mikko Rantanen deadline trade.

It remained 1-0 until Sebastian Aho and Staal added empty-net goals in the last 2:11 for the 3-0 win.

Slavin said Game 4 was in the Carolina’s comfort zone.

“A thousand percent. It was 1-0 up until the end there. You can’t get any tighter than that,” he said.

With that, the Hurricanes ended their historic losing streak and turned their attention to making more NHL history. Only four teams in the history of the Stanley Cup playoffs have rallied to win a best-of-seven series after trailing 3-0, although two have done it in the past 15 years (Philadelphia Flyers in 2010 and Los Angeles Kings in 2014).

“You watched the way we played tonight. Everyone put their heart on the line,” Slavin said. “We know we’ve got a good group in here. We know we’ve got all the pieces. We just have to bring it every night.”

Politics

ZKPs can prove I’m old enough without telling you my age

Published

57 mins ago

May 27, 2025

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<div>ZKPs can prove I'm old enough without telling you my age</div>

Opinion by: Andre Omietanski, General Counsel, and Amal Ibraymi, Legal Counsel at Aztec Labs

What if you could prove you’re over 18, without revealing your birthday, name, or anything else at all? Zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) make this hypothetical a reality and solve one of the key challenges online: verifying age without sacrificing privacy.

The need for better age verification today

We’re witnessing an uptick in laws being proposed restricting minors’ access to social media and the internet, including in Australia, Florida, and China. To protect minors from inappropriate adult content, platform owners and governments often walk a tightrope between inaction and overreach.

For example, the state of Louisiana in the US recently enacted a law meant to block minors from viewing porn. Sites required users to upload an ID before viewing content. The Free Speech Coalition challenged the law as unconstitutional, making the case that it infringed on First Amendment rights.

The lawsuit was eventually dismissed on procedural grounds. The reaction, however, highlights the dilemma facing policymakers and platforms: how to block minors without violating adults’ rights or creating new privacy risks.

Traditional age verification fails

Current age verification tools are either ineffective or invasive. Self-declaration is meaningless, since users can simply lie about their age. ID-based verification is overly invasive. No one should be required to upload their most sensitive documents, putting themselves at risk of data breaches and identity theft.

Biometric solutions like fingerprints and face scans are convenient for users but raise important ethical, privacy, and security concerns. Biometric systems are not always accurate and may generate false positives and negatives. The irreversible nature of the data, which can’t be changed like a regular password can, is also less than ideal.

Other methods, like behavioral tracking and AI-driven verification of browser patterns, are also problematic, using machine learning to analyze user interactions and identify patterns and anomalies, raising concerns of a surveillance culture.

ZKPs as the privacy-preserving solution

Zero-knowledge proofs present a compelling solution. Like a government ID provider, a trusted entity verifies the user’s age and generates a cryptographic proof confirming they are over the required age.

Websites only need to check the proof, not the excess personal data, ensuring privacy while keeping minors at the gates. No centralized data storage is required, alleviating the burden on platforms such as Google, Meta, and WhatsApp and eliminating the risk of data breaches.

Recent: How zero-knowledge proofs can make AI fairer

Adopting and enforcing ZKPs at scale

ZKPs aren’t a silver bullet. They can be complex to implement. The notion of “don’t trust, verify,” proven by indisputable mathematics, may cause some regulatory skepticism. Policymakers may hesitate to trust cryptographic proofs over visible ID verification.

There are occasions when companies may need to disclose personal information to authorities, such as during an investigation into financial crimes or government inquiries. This would challenge ZKPs, whose very intention is for platforms not to hold this data in the first place.

ZKPs also struggle with scalability and performance, being somewhat computationally intensive and tricky to program. Efficient implementation techniques are being explored, and breakthroughs, such as the Noir programming language, are making ZKPs more accessible to developers, driving the adoption of secure, privacy-first solutions.

A safer, smarter future for age verification

Google’s move to adopt ZKPs for age verification is a promising signal that mainstream platforms are beginning to embrace privacy-preserving technologies. But to fully realize the potential of ZKPs, we need more than isolated solutions locked into proprietary ecosystems.

Crypto-native wallets can go further. Open-source and permissionless blockchain-based systems offer interoperability, composability, and programmable identity. With a single proof, users can access a range of services across the open web — no need to start from scratch every time, or trust a single provider (Google) with their credentials.

ZKPs flip the script on online identity — proving what matters, without exposing anything else. They protect user privacy, help platforms stay compliant, and block minors from restricted content, all without creating new honeypots of sensitive data.

Google’s adoption of ZKPs shows mainstream momentum is building. But to truly transform digital identity, we must embrace crypto-native, decentralized systems that give users control over what they share and who they are online.

In an era defined by surveillance, ZKPs offer a better path forward — one that’s secure, private, and built for the future.

Opinion by: Andre Omietanski, General Counsel, and Amal Ibraymi, Legal Counsel at Aztec Labs.

This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.