r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 10d ago

Health Ultra-processed foods harm men’s health. They increase weight, disrupt hormones, decrease testosterone, and introduce harmful substances linked to declining sperm quality. They contain industrial and synthetic ingredients. This may be why over the past 50 years, sperm quality has plummeted.

https://cbmr.ku.dk/news/2025/not-all-calories-are-equal-ultra-processed-foods-harm-mens-health/
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u/rod_dy 9d ago

define ultra processed foods. cuz uh everything at the supermarket seems ultra processed. should i butcher my own meat?

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u/ItsBinissTime 9d ago

Butchering is a process. You have to eat live animals and plants that are still in the ground.

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u/Droidatopia 9d ago

Raw milk can be bad for you because it was milked, a process. To get the most health benefits from raw milk, you really need to drink it straight from the udder.

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u/potatoaster 9d ago

And heaven forbid that you pasteurize the milk. That's an industrial process completely unknown to Mother Nature!

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u/Droidatopia 9d ago

Does it count if we just pasteurize the whole cow? The milk is still raw. What do the NOVA guidelines say about the processing level of consuming raw milk directly from the udder of a cow while it is being heated to a temperature high enough to kill harmful bacteria?

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u/Martijn_MacFly 9d ago

Just cooking your food is making your food 'processed'. We've been doing it for millions of years; cooking; fermenting; smoking; drying; salting; etc.

Not everything 'processed' is bad, in fact, it is part of our digestive needs to get the most out of our foods.

'Ultra processed' foods seem to aim at foods that go beyond just processing it for human consumption by literally starting with a (poor quality) food base and adding chemicals to stabilise it in order to make it palatable and shelf stable. It comes with all the benefits of a long shelf life but with none of the nutritional benefits.

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u/MasterOfBarterTown 9d ago

One long time piece of simplified advice is to only shop the outer rim of the store. So vegetables, meats/dairy, bread (within limits).