UPF included soft drinks, mass-produced industrial-processed breads, sweet or savory packaged snacks, breakfast cereals, and reconstituted meat products. These foods are typically high in calories, low in nutrients and fiber, and often contain artificial colors, flavors, and preservatives. The study found that higher consumption of UPF was associated with a greater risk of developing cancer overall, and specific types of cancer, including ovarian and brain cancers.

Participants who consumed the most UPF compared to those who consumed the least had a higher risk of overall cancer (7%), lung cancer (25%), brain cancer (52%), and a type of lymphoma (63%). Those who consumed the most UPF also had a higher chance of dying from cancer overall, lung cancer, breast cancer, and ovarian cancer. Importantly, these associations remained after adjusting for a range of socio-economic, behavioral, and dietary factors such as smoking status, physical activity levels, and body mass index (BMI).

While this study is observational and does not establish causation, recommendations for cancer prevention should emphasize the importance of nutrient-dense and balanced diets with greater consumption of fruits and vegetables and lower consumption of UPF.

Cranberry Extract Protects Against Persistent Organic Pollutants During Weight Loss

A 2020 mouse study published in Food and Chemical Toxicology¹ found that cranberry extract led to greater fat loss and also impeded the release of persistent organic pollutants upon rapid weight loss.

In general, dropping excess pounds and burning fat is good for health; however, one significant negative to incinerating our fat stores is exposure to pollutants. These pollutants are things we’ve been exposed to through the air, water, or food, and a significant portion of them are locked away in fat cells. During weight loss, these pollutants are liberated from fat cells and can cause damage to the body.

In order to study whether cranberry polyphenols could lower the negative impacts of the exposure to these persistent organic pollutants in the context of weight loss, researchers first put healthy mice on a high-fat diet to cause weight gain. This high fat diet had added corn oil that contained a mixture of persistent organic pollutants. After 12 weeks on a high-fat diet, mice were then switched to a low-fat diet to induce weight loss. During the last six weeks of the study, a portion of the mice received either cranberry extract or water.

While the high-fat diet successfully induced weight gain and the subsequent low-fat diet successfully led to weight loss, the obese mice that were also treated with cranberry extract showed greater weight loss than the group that did not receive cranberry extract. The cranberry group also experienced a greater reduction of adipose tissue mass compared to the water group, in addition to an improvement in blood sugar balance. Even though cranberry led to greater weight loss, researchers also found that the pollutant contaminants were significantly decreased, indicating that the cranberry polyphenols can lower circulating levels of pollutants released from adipose tissue after weight loss.

References

1. Kiara Chang, Marc J. Gunter, Fernanda Rauber, Renata B. Levy, Inge Huybrechts, Nathalie Kliemann, Christopher Millett, Eszter P. Vamos. Ultra-processed food consumption, cancer risk and cancer mortality: a large-scale prospective analysis within the UK Biobank. eClinicalMedicine, 2023 DOI: 10.1016/j.eclinm.2023.101840
2. Choi BS, Varin TV, St-Pierre P, Pilon G, Tremblay A, Marette A. “A polyphenol-rich cranberry extract protects against endogenous exposure to persistent organic pollutants during weight loss in mice.” Food Chem Toxicol. 2020;146:111832. doi:10.1016/j.fct.2020.111832