Ultra-Processed People

Chris van Tulleken, a British infectious disease doctor and television presenter, investigates ultra-processed food: factory-made products packed with ingredients that never appear in a home kitchen. Such foods now make up most of what many people eat, and they are designed and marketed to be eaten in large quantities.

He traces the subject through its science, its history and its economics, from the way these products are manufactured to the way their makers earn money from them. The book is non-fiction reporting with a personal experiment at its centre.

To test the claims himself, van Tulleken spends a month eating a diet that is mostly ultra-processed food. His body is measured before the month begins and again after it ends.

He also talks with nutrition scientists and with people from the food industry. He weighs the evidence on weight gain, appetite and health, and looks at how research funding and conflicts of interest shape what the public hears.

His argument is that the food is the problem, not a shortage of willpower in the person eating it. He also holds that people have a right to know what is in their food and to be able to afford good food. The book won the Fortnum and Mason Debut Food Book Award in 2024.