Research
Energy balance
High consumption of ultra-processed foods increases the risk of incident overweight and obesity (BMI ≥ 25 kg/m²) in individuals who are not overweight at baseline, with a 20% greater risk observed in the highest consumption quartile.
If you are currently normal weight, limiting UPF intake is crucial to prevent future weight gain. High UPF consumption increases your risk of becoming overweight by 20% compared to low consumption.
GoodSupportsHIGH confidence
those in the fourth consumption quartile presented 20 % greater risk (1.20 (1.03, 1.40)) of incident overweight/obesity
Why this rating
Longitudinal cohort design with appropriate exclusions for baseline status.
Source
Ultra-processed foods, incident overweight and obesity, and longitudinal changes in weight and waist circumference: the Brazilian Longitudinal Study of Adult Health (ELSA-Brasil)
Scheine Canhada et al. · Public Health Nutrition · 2019
DOI 10.1017/s1368980019002854
cohort · n=11827Cited 258×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
More from this paper
- High consumption of ultra-processed foods (UPF), defined as >30.8% of total daily energy intake, significantly increases the risk of large weight gain (≥1.68 kg/year) and large waist circumference gain (≥2.42 cm/year) compared to low consumption (<17.8% of energy).Good
- High consumption of ultra-processed foods does NOT significantly increase the risk of incident obesity (BMI ≥ 30 kg/m²) in individuals who are already overweight (BMI 25-30 kg/m²) at baseline.Good
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