Consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados: uma revisão de literatura

Abstract

Healthy eating is of paramount importance because it has a great influence on the growth, mental and physical development of the human being and the maintenance of health, requiring care at all ages. With the strong growth of the food industry, people have acquired inadequate food habits, substituting healthy foods such as fruits and vegetables for industrialized products that are rich in salt, sugar, oils, fats and other additives, compromising health, in the short and long term, in the emergence of Chronic Non-communicable Diseases, problems that were common only in the third age. Thus, in 2010, created a classification that makes it possible to group foods according to the extent and purpose of food processing, dividing them into three groups: unprocessed or minimally processed foods; ingredients processed for cooking or the food industry; and ultraprocessed products. Given the importance of this classification, the Ministry of Health decided to publish it in the second version of the Food Guide for the Brazilian Population. During the development of the second edition, Monteiro's classification was improved and consumer items were divided into four groups: in natura or minimally processed foods; processed culinary ingredients; processed foods; and ultraprocessed foods. In 2016, this group of researchers published the latest version, naming it NOVA. This exploratory literature research aims to explain the consumption and eating habits of childhood to adulthood; to evaluate the consumption of ultraprocessed foods and their relationship with chronic non-communicable diseases and to verify the prevalence of this consumption in Brazil and in other countries. Brazilian food is generally inadequate, due to the high rate of ingestion of ultraprocessed foods and the reduction of consumption of fresh or minimally processed foods. As a consequence, there is an increase in the number of people with CNCD. Studies analyzed here, reinforce that this event is not unique to Brazil, as it affects several other countries.