Ultra-processed foods have become a normal part of everyday life for many people, often without much thought about what they contain or how they affect long-term health.
These foods are made in factories and heavily altered from their original form. They are often packed with added sugars, unhealthy fats, refined starches, salt, and chemical additives designed to improve taste, texture, and shelf life.
Examples include sugary drinks, packaged snacks, instant meals, processed meats, and many ready-to-eat products found in supermarkets. In the United States today, these foods make up close to 60 percent of the average adult’s diet and about 70 percent of what children eat.
Unlike fresh or minimally processed foods, ultra-processed foods contain ingredients that the human body has never encountered during most of its evolutionary history.
Many of the natural nutrients found in whole foods are removed during processing and replaced with artificial flavors, emulsifiers, and preservatives. Over the past decade, researchers have become increasingly concerned that this modern diet may be contributing to rising rates of chronic disease.
Previous studies have already linked high intake of ultra-processed foods to metabolic syndrome, a group of conditions that includes obesity, high blood pressure, unhealthy cholesterol levels, and insulin resistance. People who eat a lot of these foods also tend to have higher levels of inflammation in their bodies.
Inflammation is often measured using a blood marker called high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, which is known to predict future heart attacks and strokes. However, until recently, there was limited direct evidence showing whether eating large amounts of ultra-processed foods actually increases the risk of cardiovascular disease itself.
With heart disease and stroke remaining the leading causes of death in the United States and rising worldwide, understanding this link has become increasingly urgent.
To explore this issue, researchers from Florida Atlantic University’s Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine analyzed data from a large national health survey known as the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. This survey collects detailed information on diet, health, and lifestyle from a representative sample of U.S. adults.
The research team examined data from 4,787 adults aged 18 and older who participated between 2021 and 2023. Each participant provided detailed records of everything they ate over two separate days.
Researchers then calculated how much of each person’s daily calorie intake came from ultra-processed foods, using a well-established system that classifies foods based on how heavily they are processed. Participants were divided into four groups, ranging from those who consumed the least ultra-processed foods to those who consumed the most.
The study focused on cardiovascular disease, defined as having previously experienced a heart attack or stroke.
The researchers carefully adjusted their analysis to account for factors that could influence heart disease risk, including age, sex, race and ethnicity, smoking habits, and income level. The average age of participants was 55, and just over half were women.
The results were striking. After accounting for these other factors, people in the highest group of ultra-processed food intake had a 47 percent higher risk of cardiovascular disease compared with those in the lowest group.
This increase was not only statistically meaningful but also clinically important, suggesting a real and concerning impact on heart health.
The researchers note that growing awareness of ultra-processed foods may eventually follow a path similar to what happened with tobacco. For many years, smoking was widely accepted before its health dangers became undeniable.
Changing eating habits may prove just as challenging, especially since large food companies play a major role in shaping what is affordable, available, and heavily marketed. At the same time, many communities face limited access to fresh, healthy foods, making individual choice only part of the problem.
The study’s authors emphasize that reducing ultra-processed food consumption is not simply about personal willpower.
It requires broader changes in food systems, public health education, and policies that make healthier options easier to access and afford. Doctors also have a role to play by helping patients understand how diet affects heart health and by encouraging gradual, realistic changes.
The researchers also point out that the same dietary patterns linked to cardiovascular disease may help explain rising rates of colorectal cancer, especially among younger adults.
Many of the risk factors overlap, including poor diet, inflammation, and metabolic dysfunction. This suggests that ultra-processed foods may be contributing to a wider range of serious health problems beyond heart disease alone.
In reviewing and analyzing these findings, this study provides some of the strongest evidence to date that ultra-processed foods are not just linked to poor health markers but to actual heart attacks and strokes.
While randomized clinical trials are still needed to confirm cause and effect, the size and quality of this national dataset make the results difficult to ignore. The findings support existing advice that people should limit ultra-processed foods and focus on diets built around whole, minimally processed ingredients.
From a public health perspective, the study strengthens the argument that reducing ultra-processed food consumption could play a meaningful role in preventing cardiovascular disease and improving long-term health across the population.
If you care about heart disease, please read studies that herbal supplements could harm your heart rhythm, and how eating eggs can help reduce heart disease risk.
For more health information, please see recent studies that apple juice could benefit your heart health, and results showing yogurt may help lower the death risks in heart disease.
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