Ultra-Processed People: Corporate Power and Public Health | Chris van Tulleken, MD, PhD

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Nov 11, 2025

Join Dr. Chris van Tulleken, a physician and BBC broadcaster, as he dives deep into the world of ultra-processed foods. Discover the striking effects of his month-long diet consisting of 80% UPFs, leading to rapid weight gain and hormonal shifts. He discusses how food companies design products for overconsumption and the controversies surrounding UPF definitions. Chris also proposes thoughtful policy changes like nutrient warning labels and taxation, all while striving to balance healthy eating within his family life.

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ANECDOTE

Four-Week Ultra-Processed Self-Experiment

Chris van Tulleken ate an 80% ultra-processed diet for four weeks and gained six kilos without force-feeding.
He measured hormonal changes, inflammation, and brain connectivity that persisted weeks later.

ANECDOTE

From Craving To Aversion

Midway through his UPF month, Chris experienced aversion: favorite KFC wings became hard to finish.
He later found delivery orders unappealing or left them uneaten despite craving them earlier.

INSIGHT

Why The UPF Definition Exists

The UPF definition was created to capture a dietary pattern driving population-level harms rather than to judge single products.
It works well for epidemiology and frames corporate-driven dietary change as a causal factor in obesity.

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What are ultra-processed foods (UPFs), and why is the concept so controversial? How does a diet high in these foods affect our bodies, brains, and hormones? And how can we build effective policies to improve public health without shaming individuals or fueling disordered eating?

In this episode of The Ty Beal Show, Chris van Tulleken, MD, PhD, a professor at University College London, BBC broadcaster, and author of the bestseller Ultra Process People, joins Ty to discuss the science and politics of ultra-processed foods.

Dr. van Tulleken shares the compelling results from his own self-experiment eating a diet comprised of 80% UPFs, detailing the rapid weight gain, hormonal disruption, and surprising changes in brain connectivity it caused. We explore the intense debate around the UPF definition, why industry engineering makes these products distinct from homemade food, and how corporate profit motives are a key driver of the global obesity pandemic. Dr. van Tulleken also offers a nuanced path forward for policy—one that focuses on nutrient-based warning labels, taxation, and marketing restrictions—and shares how he balances this knowledge with real life in his own family.

Highlights from the episode include:

What happened to Dr. van Tulleken’s body, appetite hormones, and brain on a one-month, 80% ultra-processed diet
The scientific and policy debates surrounding the UPF definition
How food companies engineer food for overconsumption and profit
Why a homemade brownie is not the same as a commercially produced one
Practical policy solutions, including warning labels, marketing restrictions, and taxation
The parallels between the food industry and the tobacco industry
The critical problem of industry-funded science and conflicts of interest
Navigating a "disordered food environment" without triggering disordered eating

Dr. van Tulleken brings his rigorous scientific perspective and trademark humor to one of the most polarized issues in modern nutrition, making a powerful case that we must address corporate power and the food environment to solve diet-related disease.

Find Dr. Chris van Tulleken at University College London and get his book, Ultra Process People. Connect with Dr. van Tulleken on X and Instagram.

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