Mae Chan, Prevent Disease
Waking Times
It’s not just the high fat, salt or sugar content of processed foods that is driving obesity and diet-related illnesses — the lack of food diversity is killing our gut flora, claims one researcher. If we exclude sugar, approximately 80 percent of all calories in processed foods come from a combination of four ingredients.
Drawing upon evidence from multiple studies, Professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London and author of The Diet Myth, Tim Spector said the restrictive nature of highly processed diets which use just a few ingredients is responsible for reducing our microbe diversity – and is making us ill.
“That junk food is bad for you is not news — the combination of saturated fat, calories, sugar, chemicals and lack of fibre is an obvious signal. The lack of diversity in the diet, though, is an overlooked factor: 80% of processed food is made up of just four ingredients — corn, wheat, soy and meat,” he wrote.
