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Latest study: Ultra-processed foods should be treated more like cigarettes than food

2026-02-03 14:04:29Lifestyle SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX

Latest study: Ultra-processed foods should be treated more like cigarettes than

Ultra-processed foods (UPFs) have more in common with cigarettes than with fruits or vegetables, and require much stricter regulation, according to a new report.

E-cigarettes and cigarettes are designed to encourage addiction and consumption, researchers from three US universities said, pointing to the parallels in the widespread health harms that link the two.

UPFs, which are widely available worldwide, are food products that have been industrially produced, often using emulsifiers or artificial colors and flavors.

The category includes beverages and packaged foods such as chips and cookies.

There are similarities in the manufacturing processes of E-cigarettes and cigarettes and in manufacturers' efforts to optimize the "doses" of the products and how quickly they act on the body's reward pathways, according to the study by professors at Harvard, the University of Michigan and Duke University.

They rely on data from the fields of addiction science, nutrition and public health history to make their comparisons, published February 3 in the healthcare journal Milbank Quarterly.

The authors suggest that marketing claims on products, such as “low fat” or “sugar-free,” are problematic as they can hinder regulation, similar to the advertising of cigarette filters in the 1950s as protective innovations that “in practice offered few meaningful benefits.”

"Many UPFs share more characteristics with cigarettes than with minimally processed fruits or vegetables and therefore require regulation consistent with the significant public health risks they pose," they concluded.

One of the authors, Ashley Gearhard of the University of Michigan, a clinical psychologist, said her patients made the same connections.

They said, "I feel addicted to this product, I used to smoke cigarettes and now I have the same habit, but it's with soda and ready-made pancakes. I know they're killing me, I want to quit but I can't."

The debate over UPFs fits a well-used model in the addiction field, according to Gearhardt.

"We just blame the individual for a while and say 'smoke in moderation' and eventually we get to a point where we understand the levers that the industry can use to create products that can really appeal to people," she says.

While food, unlike tobacco, is essential for survival, the authors argue that this distinction makes the action doubly necessary because it is difficult to exclude oneself from the modern food environment.

Gearhardt said it should be possible to distinguish between harmful UPFs and other foods in the same way that alcoholic beverages are distinguished from other beverages.

UPFs meet “established standards” for whether a substance should be considered addictive, the document argues, with design features that “may promote compulsive use” – although “the harms of UPFs are clear, regardless of their addictive nature”.

The authors suggested that lessons from tobacco regulation, “including marketing restrictions and structural interventions,” could provide a guide to reducing the harm associated with UPFs, calling for public health efforts to “shift from individual responsibility to food industry accountability.”

Prof. Martin Warren, chief scientific officer at the Quadram Institute, a specialist centre for food research, said that while there were parallels between UPFs and tobacco, the authors risked "overreaching" in their comparisons.

He said there were questions about whether UPFs, like nicotine, were "intrinsically addictive in a pharmacological sense, or whether they primarily exploit learned preferences, reward conditioning and comfort."

He said it was also important to consider whether the negative health effects attributed to UPFs came from their content, or because they replaced "whole foods rich in fiber, micronutrients and protective phytochemicals."

“This distinction matters because it affects whether regulatory responses should reflect tobacco control or instead prioritize dietary quality, reformulation standards, and food system diversification.”


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