In 1982, after working a stint in the food industry, Paul Stitt wrote the book Beating the Food Giants. The term ultra-processed foods was not invented yet, but he was warning people back then, and for many years after that, to abandon the offerings of the food industry and turn to organic, whole foods that are nutritious and built health. Paul Stitt could see what the foods were doing to people’s health, but he didn’t have all the data we have now about the dangers of ultra-processed foods.
I’ve written about ultra-processed foods before, warning people that eliminating animal products was not enough for good health. In the Adventist Health Study 2 cohort, ultra-processed foods were more dangerous than animal products. In this cohort, the people who ate the most ultra-processed foods had a 14% increased risk of dying of any cause.
In another article, I pointed out that not all ultra-processed foods were equally dangerous. Organic whole-grain bread and refined white bread are both classified as ultra-processed foods, but only one of them builds health. Sugar-sweetened and artificially sweetened beverages were clearly dangerous, as were ultra-processed foods containing animal products and ready-to-eat mixed dishes/meals.
Ultra-processed foods are dangerous, and you probably have enough reasons not to eat them, but I’m going to give you one more: Cancer. Several large-scale prospective cohorts have shown us the connection between consuming lots of ultra-processed foods and the risk of getting cancer and dying of cancer.
Ultra-Processed Foods and Cancer in France
One of the first studies of ultra-processed foods was produced in France in the NutriNet Santé study. The cohort was launched in 2009 with a web-based questionnaire. They followed almost 105,000 adults for about 7.5 years. Researchers used the NOVA system to identify ultra-processed foods, which include products with five or more ingredients.
Here’s what the researchers found: a 10% increase in the dietary proportion of UPFs correlated with a 12% overall increased cancer risk and 11% elevated breast cancer risk. Among people with cancer, UPFs accounted for 18% of their calories, which is relatively low compared to some other populations we’ll discuss. But even in France, UPFs were definitely linked to cancer.
Ultra-Processed Foods and Cancer in the UK
In 2023, a research article was published on the UK Biobank cohort’s experience with UPFs. This cohort had 197,000 people in it who were followed for about 10 years. There are almost 16,000 cases of cancer and over 4,000 cancer-related deaths in this group.
Ultra-processed foods made up 23% of the total diet by weight, but 49% by calories. A 10 percentage point increase in UPFs increased the overall risk of cancer by a couple of percent, but the risk of ovarian cancer was raised by 19%.
Cancer mortality was also increased by UPF consumption. Every 10 percentage points higher UPF consumption was associated with a 6% increase in overall cancer death, a 30% increase in ovarian cancer death, and a 16% increase in breast cancer death. So, ovarian and breast health were particularly compromised by higher intakes of ultra-processed foods. Perhaps this is due to endocrine-disrupting additives in these food products.
Dr. Kiara Chang stated, “The average person in the UK consumes more than half of their daily energy intake from ultra-processed foods. This is exceptionally high and concerning as ultra-processed foods are produced with industrially derived ingredients and often use food additives to adjust color, flavor, consistency, texture, or extended shelf life.”
She added, “Ultra-processed foods are everywhere and highly marketed with cheap price and attractive packaging to promote consumption.. This shows our food environment needs urgent reform to protect the population from ultra-processed foods.”
Ultra-Processed Foods and Cancer Across Europe
The EPIC Cohort is an extensive prospective study across 10 European countries at 23 sites, including 520,000 individuals. Intake of ultra-processed food, as a percentage of calories, ranged from a low of about 15% in Italy and Spain to about 20% in France, 33% in the Netherlands and Germany, and a high of 45% in the UK, as noted above. When the EPIC cohort was analyzed for the effect of food processing on cancer rates, researchers found that replacing 10% of their ultra-processed food, by weight, in their models with minimally processed food would result in:
- 20% reduced risk of head and neck cancer
- 27% decrease in risk of hepatocellular carcinoma
- 27% decrease in risk of colon cancer
Ultra-Processed Foods and Cancer in the USA
In November 2025, an analysis of the Nurses’ Health Study II looked at intake of ultra-processed foods and the risk of early-onset colorectal cancer precursors, and had at least two endoscopically confirmed outcomes, with screenings before the age of 50. The nurses were followed for over 24 years, and they found 1,189 cases of early-onset conventional adenomas.
In this group, the women consumed about 5.7 servings of ultra-processed foods a day, which was about 35% of their total daily calories. They say this was slightly lower than the U.S. national average, which is a bit scary.
But the women who consumed the highest amounts of ultra-processed foods, or about 10 servings a day, had a 45% higher risk of developing conventional adenomas, which are a precursor most associated with early-onset colorectal cancer.
In the Harvard Gazette, senior author Dr. Andrew Chan called this a “linear” risk. The more UPFs a person ate, the more polyps they found, with no plateau effect. The risk continued to increase with higher intakes.
Plan a Whole Foods Diet, or They Will Choose UPFs For You
These extensive studies across Europe and the US paint a consistent picture that aligns with what Paul Stitt said 40 years ago. Food products made with industrial ingredients by food industry giants are harmful to your health. Here we find that they cause cancer. The more you eat, the worse it gets.
Even without the exact mechanism, it’s clear how to fix this problem: Eat less ultra-processed foods. A whole foods plant-based diet, like the Hallelujah diet, is going to reduce your ultra-processed food intake to basically zero.
There may be a place to have public policy ban additives that are known to cause cancer. This would be a good thing. But you should not wait for the government or public policy to fix your diet. You’re responsible for your own health, so take care of your body. After all, it’s the only one you get to live in while here on Earth.
Switch to Convenient Natural Foods Instead of UPFs
We have discussed what to do and which switches make sense in our previous article on ultra-processed foods. There are convenient, healthy foods. You just need to get used to choosing those and making sure they’re in your house ready to grab, instead of ending up choosing whatever is in a vending machine or a convenience store.
- Apples instead of apple pie.
- Oranges instead of orange juice.
- Nuts and seeds or trail mix instead of candy bars or meat snacks.
- Pure water or even flavored unsweetened water instead of soda pop.
- Whole-grain breads instead of refined white bread. (Clean-label national brands like Dave’s Killer Bread are now widely available.)
- Raisins, prunes, and dried apricots instead of candy.
“If you don’t carefully choose what to eat, someone else will make that choice for you, and they will select your diet for you based on their best interests and bottom line, not your health.”
It takes a little bit of planning initially, but once you get used to it, it becomes routine, like everything else in your daily routine. So take this step: Get away from ultra-processed foods to lower your risk of cancer and get back to nature.